Rusty Mint

Rusty Mint

Posted by Heather Harris

This has been one wacky season for vegetable gardening. First, we had  an April and May with high temperatures ranging from 57 to 88 degrees, a June that started off at around 99 degrees and then plunged into the 60's for most of the rest of the month, and a July that had more days under 80 degrees than over. This has led to a very strange climate that I like to blame for all bad things going on in my garden, whether it has anything to with it or not. I have impeached it for no zucchini, disappearing cucumbers,  thousands of hard, green tomatoes, rotten potatoes, rust on my bumper mint crop, and slug infested collard greens. Naturally my gardening prowess is responsible for the mammoth pumpkin, indefatigable kale plants, and masses of peas and beans.

        

Sadly, like a day of parenting, the entire garden can never be totally successful all at once.  That's why the word is gardener, not planter. Birds, squirrels, and preschoolers can plant. Gardeners have to figure out how to grow, despite the less than ideal circumstances that come every summer for one plant or another. I am admittedly closer to a planter than a gardener.That's why I throw a little of everything out there because something, much like someone, is bound to like the weather. For example, I prefer to lay out in the blazing sun like a lizard. My dad likes to creep out with the vampires when the sky is overcast. Same for plants. The tomatoes want a party in Cancun, the lettuce would prefer a  foggy afternoon in San Francisco. Every now and then though, I attempt to coax something along that should be hating life. Is this cruel or helpful? Again, like parenting, hard to say. I have decided to tackle sassy eye-rolling, I mean, mint rust.

Here is the abridged cure I just read for mint rust (Well, the second cure I read. The first one was about 20 steps long and involved digging up plants, boiling roots at 111 degrees, transplanting blah, blah, blah)

Here's the plan I like and am likely to execute:




1. Cut everything down to the ground.

2. Set a straw fire on top of the roots and burn the fungus up!

Doesn't that sound fun?! Wonder if it works for sass too?