Colors in the Garden This Time of Year

August has proven to be a very dry month.  We haven't had more than sprinkles in a month.  The parched land cries out for some refreshing.  Hopefully we'll get some soon as I'd like to get the Fall Garden planted.  I'm still real sore and have limited mobility since my surgery, so perhaps this is God's method of teaching me patience.

Therefore there's not a whole lot going on in the garden right now aside from sweet potatoes that we'll be harvesting toward the end of next month.  The eggplant are full of blooms and small fruit.  The peppers are producing and will continue to do so.  From this point through the fall is where we really make some peppers.  Here is a basket of Anaheims, Banana, and Shishito peppers:

At the tail end of the garden, the Heirloom Louisiana sugar cane is very healthy.  I'm considering making some homemade cane syrup again this year.  We haven't done that in a while.  Back by the sugarcane, we have vines galore.  Louffa gourds sprouted up volunteer and their bright yellow flowers dot the landscape.  Honey bees and bumble bees are attracted to those flowers.  It looks like we'll once again make more louffa sponges than we could ever use!

The fuchsia-colored blooms of the Hyacinth bean brighten up the rear gate to the garden that leads to the barn.  Hyacinth beans are strictly for beauty.  I think they are actually toxic, so I won't be eating them.  They sure are pretty, though.

I have a section of reinforcement wire bent over for the hyacinth beans and louffa gourds to climb on.  It would make a really nice trellis or arbor to walk under, but the doggone goats climb up on the garden fence and eat any of the vines that get too close to the outside fence.

I enjoy color in the garden, but I'm more a fan of eating delicious vegetables from the garden.  If the Good Lord's willing, we'll get some much needed rain soon and my post-op soreness will subside so that we can get some seeds in the ground.

The Perfect Scrub for the Tub

Every couple of years, I'll plant three luffa gourd seeds in a hill and let them trellis on some cattle panels I have stacked one on top of the other.  They vine like crazy, with big leaves, big beautiful yellow blooms and before long dozens of gourds hang from the trellis.  The yellow flowers attract honey bees.  We welcome them to the garden.

The gourds mature and dry on the vine and I usually pick them off when they are at this point:

This is how they look when they are almost fully developed.  Once they reach this point, they'll begin to turn yellow and then brown and will dry up.

The brown, outer-skin will need to bee peeled off.  This exposes the inner fibrous sponge.  The first time you see it, you wonder how this was grown and not manufactured.  

When you turn it to the bottom, you see NUMEROUS black seeds.  I begin gently batting the luffa gourd and all the seeds begin to fall out.

The seeds you see below are just from one of the gourds.  It is amazing how many seeds they produce.  I have a big container full of them.  If anyone is interested in seeds, just let me know.  You can have all you want.

Once I have all the luffa skins removed, I mix a bleach/water solution in a 5 gallon bucket and soak the luffa gourds for 10 minutes and then flip them over.  This cleans them up.

At this point your luffas are ready to use.  We use them as a wash rag in the tub or shower.  The luffa is a little too big, so we cut them in half.  Pour some shower gel on the luffa or rub some soap on it and scrub.  It exfoliates your skin and cleans you up nicely.

Or you can give them away as gifts.  They make a nice present.

Believe it or not, they last for a long time.  Freshen them up from time to time by soaking them in bleach.  Rub a Dub Dub.

Growing, Harvesting, and Processing Luffa Gourds

We tried growing something this year that we've never grown before on Our Maker's Acres Family Farm: We grew Luffa Gourds!  Granted, I like growing things you can eat.  But believe it or not, I learned that you can eat luffa gourds when they are very small.  They say that they are like cucumbers.  I haven't eaten any yet, so I can't recommend them to you.  But what I can tell you is this: They are so easy to grow. They require no special care.  Well, except...

They grow very quickly and vine all over the place and each afternoon, I have to go pull their vines off of the okra plants or they would completely take them over.  But that's the only downside I can think of.  In the early mornings the yellow blooms of their flowers are beautiful and make a garden that is largely dry and dormant (other than peppers, okra, basil, peanuts, and sweet potatoes) look somewhat presentable during the last days of summer.  Luffa are prolific producers.  I have luffa gourds growing all over the place.  Here are three nice sized ones that have grown from vines that took over a stack of tomato cages.

Luffa Gourds

Since it was my first time growing them, I had to do a little research in order to figure out what to do with them.  I learned that you should wait until the outside of the gourd feels like the texture of a football before harvesting it.  I actually harvested one a little early due to my impatience and learned that it is okay, you just need to let it dry a little longer, so there's room for error without ruining the luffa.  I like that.  It is forgiving!  I brought the ripened luffa inside.  It felt light and if you shake it you could hear seeds jiggling around inside.

A luffa gourd that feels like a football

Benjamin took over at this point and he used his fingernail to puncture the outer skin of the gourd. Then he simply started tearing it away.  It came off easily, exposing the actual sponge.  It is still amazing to me that you can grow something in your garden that looks like it came from the ocean.

Peeling off the outer skin

Now once you peel the skin off a dry one, you can cut it in half and pour out the seeds.  This one required a little drying so I set it outside in the sun on top of the air conditioner to allow it to dry.  The next day I flipped it over to allow both sides to dry equally.

Drying the luffa

Then it was completely dry and we brought it inside and Benjamin cut it in half with a steak knife.

Cutting the luffa in half

Genesis 1:1 says, "Then God said, "Let the earth sprout vegetation: plants yielding seed, and fruit trees on the earth bearing fruit after their kind with seed in them"; and it was so."

The luffa gourd growing in the garden was listening very closely to this command, because I've never seen a plant that grew more seeds!  We kept shaking and shaking and shaking and the seeds just kept on falling out.  It was really incredible, I tell you.

Shaking the seeds out

I'll save these seeds, but I think it may be overkill.  If anyone needs any, I'd be glad to share!

An abundance of luffa seeds

Once all the seeds were removed, I poured a little water in a bucket and added a capful of bleach.  I just wanted to clean up the luffa of any seed particles like you see in the photo above.

Soaking the luffa sponges in a mild water/bleach solution

Then I removed them from the bucket after a few hours and allowed them to dry.

Ready to go take a bath!

And that is it!  I've given these to our kids in college and once ours are dry we'll put them in the shower.  These can be used in place of a washrag to scrub or exfoliate your skin.  Simply wet it, apply soap and scrub.  You can use the luffa on the heels and soles of your feet, too.  You should rinse the soap out of them when you are finished and allow them to dry.  It is probably not a good idea to use a luffa every day since your skin needs a certain amount of oils, but once in a while removes dead skin and scrubs the grime off of you that you get sometimes when working in the garden or with the animals.  When Saturday night rolls around and it is time for my weekly bath, I'm ready for a good scrubbing with a luffa.  Just joking, of course.