For people who want to grow more food with less work. 🌱 This is my weekly newsletter loved by 38,000+ subscribers—here's what one of them had to say: "These are not the regular run-of-the-mill garden-based emails. You actually touch on more unusual tidbits that encourage me to keep growing and learning."
the best time to pick tomatoes is NOT what you think
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If you were asked when the best time to pick a tomato is, you'd probably say: when it's ripe. And you wouldn't be wrong. After all, the idea of a warm, sun-ripened fruit on the vine is what all our tomato dreams are made of. But even though the ultimate goal is ripe tomatoes, picking them when they're fully ripe isn't always the best call if you also want high-quality fruit before they fall on the ground, before the squirrels and birds get to them, or before the skin splits and cracks. Also: It's not the sun that ripens them, it's the heat. (I know, same difference, but an important difference for what I'll tell you next.) 👉 It's okay (preferable, even) to pick tomatoes before they're ripe, and finish ripening them indoors.That's because there is no discernible (or scientific) difference in flavor, texture, or quality between vine-ripened and indoor-ripened tomatoes, no matter what you've heard. Indoor-ripened tomatoes tend to get a bad rap because of supermarket tomatoes, but they're bland and boring because of the commercial varieties typically grown—not because they were ripened in warehouses. But that certainly doesn't help our biases! So, when's the best time to harvest a tomato if you want to make sure it ripens properly? ​Find out right here in my guide to picking tomatoes for peak quality.​ Seasonal tipsUnexpected nature lessonOnce in a while, we find chrysalises in our yard while clearing brush or removing old plants. It turns into a little science lesson for our kids, who carefully collect the stem and chrysalis and relocate them to a jar inside the house so they can watch the emergence. We've "hatched" several butterflies this way, so when my husband found a chrysalis on the ground a couple weeks ago, we propped it up in an empty jar and waited... ... Only this time, we didn't get a beautiful butterfly. We got this: 😲 We were confused. My kids were confused. Where did this bug come from? Where was the butterfly? What was that thing anyway?! I eventually figured out that the chrysalis we found had been parasitized by an ichneumon wasp, which is harmless to humans (and actually considered a beneficial insect) but, obviously, deadly to caterpillars. An ichneumon wasp attacks her host by injecting an egg into the caterpillar's body before it pupates. When the egg hatches, the wasp larva eats its way out and emerges from the chrysalis as an adult wasp. It sounds gruesome, but this was absolutely fascinating to experience and explain to my kids (who, understandably, were sad over the loss of a butterfly). Despite the way they come to life, you DO want parasitoid wasps in your garden. They're a very effective form of biological pest control, with different species of parasitoid wasps laying eggs inside hosts that we typically consider pests: caterpillars of all kinds, aphids, scales, flies, cockroaches, and more. Braconid wasps are another parasitoid species to know about. I wrote a post here on all the aphid mummies I found in my garden that were the work of braconid wasps! Have you seen any aphid mummies in your garden? (I bet you'll start noticing them more once you know what they look like!) P.S. Find out the best time to harvest tomatoes for peak flavor and quality. P.P.S. Learn how to store all the vegetables you grow (or buy) with my Fruit & Vegetable Storage Guide. Download the PDF, print out the charts, and save money in wasted food! |
Garden Betty
For people who want to grow more food with less work. 🌱 This is my weekly newsletter loved by 38,000+ subscribers—here's what one of them had to say: "These are not the regular run-of-the-mill garden-based emails. You actually touch on more unusual tidbits that encourage me to keep growing and learning."