The number of spirals of florets in the center of the sunflower always follow the Fibonacci series. This is apparently the result of the angle between adjacent florets, which is about 137 degrees, or the "golden angle", giving the most efficient packing of florets into the head. Bees like golden, especially in the form of pollen.
Plenty of material to study.
One hundred pounds of potatoes are out of the ground. A few more to go.
The first garden tomato of the year:
Yes!
I harvest when the leaves are just starting to turn yellow, a week or two before the books tell me to. In our hot humid weather, late-pulled garlic tends to acquire patches of rot. These are a hardneck variety of garlic that I'll set out to dry for a few weeks.
Buttonbush (Cephalanthus occidentalis) is a wetland species of shrub. We have several in the soil around the overflow area of our duck pond. The shrubs grow to head-height and produce globular flowers in the summer. The flowers are rich nectar sources, so they attract a number of insects.
Buttonbush being visited by a fly. Note the long styles projecting from each flower in the globe. Unlike the flowers of most other plant species, the area at the top of these styles (the stigma) serves both to release pollen and to gather incoming pollen. To prevent self-fertilization, the buttonbush first releases its own pollen, then when this is complete the plant switches to receiving pollen from other plants.
This fruit is not much grown in North America, which is a pity. The fruit is tart and flavorful, like a cross between an apple and a blackberry. Gooseberry shrubs struggle in the heat and dry soil here, so ours grow in a partly shaded area near a large apple tree. Their lack of popularity may be due to the fact that federal and state governments banned them for many years, fearing that they would spread a blister fungus to white pine. This fungus uses gooseberries and its relatives as an alternate host. The bans have now been lifted and many varieties are now available to American gardeners.
Gooseberries fresh from the garden.
I sowed the last of the summer corn this morning. This is the American crop, domesticated in the New World, then spread across the world. Holding a dried corn seed, I’m connected to thousands of years of history.
Our inheritance from agrarian ancestors. This is the "Tuxedo" variety of sweet corn -- it has nice tight husks to keep the earworms out.
Happy Solanum tuberosum
So far, this has been the best potato year ever. The relatively cool and wet weather has let them grow into gloriously lush plants. In most years, potatoes struggle a bit in the heat — Tennessee’s summer is not well-matched to plants’ genes which yearn for the cooler Andes (or perhaps for Ireland).
David George Haskell 