Lughnasa Lughnasa Moon
There’s a Goldilocks’ quality to gardening. Not too much, not too little, but just right. The Goldilocks’ formula applies to water, soil additions, number of plants and temperature. The gardener can control soil additions and the number of plants with relative ease, confident in her adviser’s soil tests and their recommendations for additives. Likewise, though the temptation may be too either over plant or under plant, get more vegetables per square foot or give the plants room to grow, a wise gardener develops a feel for how the beets perform in her garden, carrots, tomatoes and spaces accordingly.
The temperature, especially in northern or high altitude climes, might need some control though here at Artemis Hives and Gardens we’ve not added hooped plastic over our beds to extend the growing season, either early or late. Plants can be started inside to counter the prevailing outside temperatures of late winter and early spring. But, for the most part, we’ve accepted the temperature that the sun and the clouds and the zigzagging jet stream have given us.
We can, and do, add water during periods lacking rain, but we cannot adjust the water that comes from rain. This year we’ve had too much. A sticky fungus has attacked the peppers and the raspberries, a not uncommon result of too much water. Each year brings some challenge, this year it’s too much rain and that’s the one element we can do little about. We need not too much water, not too little water, but just the right amount.
