Blah, Blah, Garden Update, Blah, Blah

It seems like all we have to talk about these days is the garden. I am sure some of you may be bored with garden updates but that is all I have to talk about, so too bad. This is actually going to be a pretty interesting update I think. First of all the boring update, we did 30 more ears of corn tonight and that is almost all of it thank goodness.
I am not sure if I have mentioned this before but something I planted this year just for fun was luffa gourds. This is where luffa sponges come from. We thought we would try to grow them and if it worked out give them out as presents to people (I know you are all excited about getting one). They grow as a vine so I made a hoop out of a cattle panel and put one end on one bed and the other end on another bed so it hooped over the isle between the two beds. Just let me tell you that the vines grow really fast and get really long. They are doing really well and so far we have at least 30 gourds. It's crazy. Here are some pics.

Here is the side view


Here is the view looking through the hoop, they are basically taking over


Here is a view of the inside and some of the gourds


Here is Margo holding one of the gourds so you can see how big it is (insert joke here)


We also did something really exciting today. I have been looking into ways to water the garden when it gets hot and dry like it is right now. Fayetteville got rain yesterday but we did not get a drop. Some of our plants like the cucumbers and tomatoes are starting to wilt a little with no water and 90 degrees everyday. I don't want to use water that I have to pay for because that could get expensive. Since the garden is next to the pond I thought that I might be able to pump water out of it to water the garden. I looked into buying a water pump but they are kind of expensive and require electricity or gas to run them. Well I found an article on siphoning out of a pond with a water hose so I thought I would try it out. I know what you are all thinking, how are you able to get it started siphoning, it would be impossible to suck the water all the way through the garden hose. What you do is put all the hose down under the water and get all the air out. Then cap off the end that is going to be out of the water, then take it out of the water and to the lower area where you want the water to go. Then uncap it and let the water flow. I was a little worried that it would be tough to get it going but it wasn't. I am now able to water the garden out of the pond. When I get done watering I just cap off the end until I am ready to water again. I can garden like crazy now. It is really exciting.