Terry Walton deals with marrows and sweetcorn
September heralds cooler days but there’s still so much to savour
September is breezing in and autumn’s nearly with us. But early September is still warm by day, and there’s plenty of colour around to keep us cheerful. But look carefully and those gentle autumnal traces appear everywhere. Yes, the colours are a-changin’! And the gentle breezes have that nip in them that tells us the season is on the turn. The early morning coolness brings wisps of mistiness to my breath as I turn over the emptying ground. It’s a month to celebrate harvests that have been safely gathered and admire the ‘shed load’ of crops that are growing daily in the store.
Oh, I do love September, a time to look back and give thanks for a bountiful summer.
Despite the shortening days the plot is far from finished. Marrows and squashes are swelling and firming their skins, ready to be harvested and stored in a cool, dry place for early autumn meals. The winter crops are enjoying the coolness of the nights and making good growth in readiness for their long winter harvests when all those ’soft’ vegetables of the summer are but mere memories.
It seems an age ago that I was gifted two marrow plants of unknown parentage. They’ve thrived in the hot summer and grew an enormous amount of foliage. This was helped by copious watering and regular feeds of SeaFeed Xtra. Now it’s payback time as I rustle among the foliage to find a huge harvest of marrows of all sizes. These are cut off and put in plastic crates at the top of the plot for their skins to ripen. This will help them store well into late autumn and even mid winter. They’ll make great stuffed marrow dishes.
Talking about these rampant marrows, they’ve not done my asparagus and scorzonera crops any favours as I planted them too close and they’ve been overwhelmed by masses of foliage. Despite constant trimming these two crops have suffered from overcrowding! When will I learn to give crops space? The asparagus was supposed to give some August spears but has not. Also the progress of the scorzonera has been checked by this shading foliage.
Florence fennel, on the other hand, has grown well just outside the scope of the marrow foliage. The roots are starting to swell nicely and as they’re close together I might harvest a few to add that aniseed flavour to some of my wife’s dishes.
For both of these unusual crops there’s still time to put on some weight, as long as September is kind to me. This magnificent heat of the summer has allowed the sweetcorn to grow very tall and I do believe there may be some now ready to savour. I gently peel back some of the green leaves covering the cobs and check how yellow the kernels are beneath. Also using my thumbnail I pierce a yellow kernel and if it oozes a white sap then they’re ready for the pot.