Helen Chesnut
Large insects rarely numerous enough to do much root-feeding damage
It came out of the ground squeaking and hissing, like a miniature bellows on wiggly legs. They’ve been more numerous than usual this year, these ten-lined June beetles. I’m accustomed to finding their dark and light striped casings in the garden, and to digging up the large, C-shaped white grubs with dark heads, but they are rarely numerous enough to do much root-feeding damage.
They’ve been a peripheral nuisance to my friend Daphne, though. Raccoons invaded and damaged her new greenhouse to feast on a tasty grouping of the big white grubs making a home in one of the beds.
I was digging over the bed emptied of a pea planting when I unearthed the protesting, about-to-emerge adult beetle. June beetles take three or more years in the ground as grubs before reaching that adult stage. The grubs can attain a length of five cm.
That’s much larger than the similarly shaped chafer beetle larvae, which complete a generation in just one year. Adult chafer beetles, also smaller than June beetles, are light mahogany brown.
The ten-lined June beetle is just one of many fascinating creatures to observe in the garden. I wasn’t so thrilled, though, when I found one clinging to the side of my trousers one day. It was a struggle to brush the big bug off. Its sticky little feet clung like glue.
Pretty garden food. So many vegetables are as attractive as they are flavourful and nourishing. At this most bountiful time of year I relish colourful vegetable medleys steamed crunchy-tender into an easy side dish for supper.
I almost always cook more than I need at one meal, so that I can transform the extras into a tasty salad for future meals and snacks.
The most recent combination I used in this way included carrots, Romanesco (ridged Italian) zucchini, and Tanya’s Pink Pod bush beans — a variety new to my garden this year, from Salt Spring Seeds (SSS).
The variety originated from a mutation. A garden apprentice named Tanya at the SSS farm spotted two bushes of beans bearing pink pods in a row of green-podded beans. Seeds saved from those pods produced the same pink-podded beans and eventually Tanya’s discovery came to be a listing in the SSS catalogue. This source grows all its own seeds.
My Tanya’s Pink Pod bean planting is unbelievably prolific. Dan Jason, the company owner, recommends the pink, meaty pods for fresh eating, right in the garden, and for steaming, as well as for use as a creamy-textured, nutty-flavoured dry bean.
For my meal I cut up the bean pods, carrots and zucchini, steamed them, and had several large spoonfuls with butter and salt with my meal of lamb curry. Meanwhile, I had ready a big bowl with a blend of fresh lemon juice, olive oil, mashed garlic, salt, Dijon mustard and chopped sweet red pepper. Into the bowl went the rest of the freshly steamed vegetables to be mixed with the dressing. After the meal, I also added toppings prepared for the curry — toasted cashews, and minced onion and tomato.
The salad makes a nice lunch, and is easily varied with other additions such as olives and chunks of feta, or artichoke heart. I find this a super-easy way to help ensure an optimum intake of nutritious vegetables.
More coloured beans. This year, I tried two new (to me) broad bean varieties, and was particularly impressed with Karmazyn, described in the catalogue from Chiltern Seeds as "highly unusual." The pods are traditional green, but the beans inside are pink. I found the taste and texture of the pink beans pleasantly buttery, not at all starchy. Chiltern recommends trying the beans at a very young stage, raw, in salads. Karmazyn is certainly an attractive broad bean variety for gardeners seeking something different.