Mystery of the missing Mockingbirds

I've written many posts since we started growing blueberries four years ago complaining about Mockingbirds that view our bushes as as nothing more than giant feeders. But this year, despite a bumper crop of blueray berries, the birds are strangely uninterested. We have seen them on nearby buildings and regularly hear them singing. We even sighted one on our terrace recently. But they have not been feeding on our juicy fruit. Sure, the berries are a little tart, but could that be it. The berries just aren't to their liking this season? Are these birds such connoisseurs that they are rejecting our fruit? Our neighbors Michele and Charles across the street grow blueberries as well. Are the birds stocking up there? I should be overjoyed. After all, when they come, they babble, chirping with verve outside our bedroom window at 5:30 a.m. And when they nosh, they take the berries just before they're perfectly ripe, which leaves us with little worth eating for ourselves. So, I'm thrilled that the birds have found blue-r pastures. I'm just trying to make sense of it all.

A bumper blueberry crop has not attracted Mockingbirds this year

Ants and aphids make for a gruesome garden

Sometimes, rather than bucolic idylls, gardens can be horror shows. Like when you discover squishy white aphids all over your beautiful Japanese eggplant, just as the flowers are beginning to bloom. Couple them with ants crawling all over the plant, not to eat the aphids, but to protect them, and its enough to turn a sunny day black indeed. Turns out that ants are sort of aphid farmers that sup on the tiny bugs' "honeydew"--a sweet secretion they produce. As soon as I discovered this unappetizing scene I went to work to salvage the plant. I pulled out my spray bottle of soapy water and washed away as many of the small bugs as I could (and there were hundreds, maybe even thousands!) Then I sprayed the Ichiban eggplant with Safer Insect Killer (I hate to use it but aphids are tenacious and will kill your plant.) Finally, I squirted tiny blobs of Combat ant killer (it comes in a syringe-like tube) on the pot rim where ants were swarming. Just minutes later, I witnessed a gruesome sight: ants feasting on the poison which is engineered to attract them. An orgy of delight for such a fortuitous meal ensued. The ants were of course unaware of the consequences: certain death. After two treatments, I am happy to report that the aphids and the ants were seriously depleted! But vigilance is a must. Aphids are hard to eradicate entirely. They often return on the young leaves. Still, the plant is back to healthy and plenty of eggplants are growing. What a relief!

This gorgeous eggplant was growing beautifully

But then I noticed aphids.  They are the tiny white dots

Combat attracts ants who eat it and then bring the poison into the nest

This feast will end badly

Healthy again. The lovely purple flower could become a Japanese eggplant in a few weeks

Recipes starring Serrano chilies

Sure I'd like to be cooking with tomatoes about now, but since our tomato harvest was a bust  (I'm still holding out hope for the green fruit that has finally sprouted on our vines) I've started preparing some fun dishes with our Serrano peppers. We have one very productive plant, and faced with an abundance of hot chilies, I began seeking out recipes calling for them. I found one for Chicken Enchiladas Verdes at Simply Recipes through Tastebook (my favorite food app). I'm new to cooking Mexican food (though not eating it) so it was a fun experience and it turned out to be a tasty--and spicy--meal.  Fresh corn salad with cucumber, cherry tomato (from a farm stand), red onion, cilantro and a mustard vinaigrette  made the perfect side dish.  Next, I will try my own hot sauce with a recipe from my friend Kim in Tejas. I can already feel the burn!

Oh, p.s., if you are cooking with hot peppers be sure to wear gloves! I got a case of hot hands last week that kept me up half the night. After trying soap and water, aloe, olive oil, and a few other Web remedies, I rubbed ripe banana all over my hands and the burning finally subsided. Maybe the enzymes in the fruit neutralized the capsaicin. I'm just glad it worked.

Yummy chicken enchiladas made with my Serrano chilies

Green tomatoes

Finally, we have tomatoes. Tiny green ones, that is. This will go down as the worst summer on record for our garden. Our tomato plants just never took off. We were a little late getting them in their pots this season, planting them all by mid-June. But I thought they'd catch up. They should be tall and full by now. Instead, the poor things are thin and spindly and they haven't produced at all.The rainy June didn't help.Nor did the steamy July. Our harvest should be rolling at this point, but instead our plants have just begun to fruit. If we're lucky, if we don't get blossom rot, a hurricane or some other mishap, we might have tomatoes by late Sept. Wow, what a disappointment!
Fortunately, the lettuce, eggplants, peppers and herbs are doing well. I got a few cukes too, though not the harvest I'd hoped for, and the heatwave knocked off the vines. I was able to save our blueberries from the mockingbirds by netting them.
Still, without tomatoes, I'd have to call the season a bust.

These plants are way behind schedule.

The eggplants are tasty, stir-fried with some green market onions.

The lettuce has been loving it this summer. I have had salad all season long.