Yesterday I'm out there thinning collard seedlings* that are growing where I should be picking tomatoes, and bringing in handfuls of yellow squash, zucchini, green beans, carrots, radishes and whatnot, thinking, no tomatoes, but not so bad. And then, as if to remind me that the cold is on the way, I get this picture in my email from my Innkeeper friend Cherie, who runs the Hale Hookipa Maui bed and breakfast.
That's quite a haul, all from one day she tells me... Well, put my little pile of squash in perspective, will you! Cherie also runs this volunteer on vacation in Hawaii site, and a great Maui blog. If you like tropical gardening (she also has great flowers), check it out. Or better yet, check in for a week. Maui is a gardener's paradise. But beware, in the depths of winter in upcountry, you might wake up to a cool 55 degree morning!
* Planted from the seeds from the greens I let overwinter last year, in an attempt to make them even more cold hardy. I will let some of these go over winter again, to seed in the spring, for seeds for next fall's crop. I never really learned this technique, it just seems to work well, and my theory is that anything that can stay alive over winter here deserves to be propagated. At least that way, if we keep having summers that weren't, I'll have some cold hardy greens to grow any time of year!
