Today (Aug. 17) we harvested our first few stalks of rice and hung them up on a laundry drying rack in the dining room. Our cat Sabrina was very very curious about it. I wish I had had my camera when she was standing on top of the scratching post by the rack and leaning in carefully to sniff the end of the rice stalk. I think she was not sure what to make of it.

Here is Katsuya coming back with the harvested stalks.

Here is a close-up of the harvest. If we’re really lucky, we might have a handful of grain from our rice plants. Aren’t they a beautiful golden color?

We took these photos on Aug. 1 and Aug. 2. Several of the rice stalks have started to bend over, which his a good sign. It means that the seeds might actually contain rice!

Here’s a close-up that really shows the grains. They started out all green, and then the “flowers” came out (they look like little yellowish bits hanging off the grains, kind of like corn has.) Then the grains start to turn golden and get heavy, causing the stalks to bend over.

We’ve had many thunderstorms this summer and a lot of rain (I think that for at least the last month or more, we have had 2-3 thunderstorms a week or more. Katsuya was afraid it might damage the important pollenation of the grains, but it seems so far not to have affected the rice very much.

Here’s a close-up of one of the rice buds. The second rice seedling also has the start of some rice grains. Now we just hope that they will be full of rice and not empty hulls.

The below shows another view of two of the buds.

The heavy rain we’ve had this summer — in the form of thunderstorms — has been really good to all the plants in our garden. The ornamental grapes look terrific, but they are still very hard. Maybe we’ll try to eat them if they get bigger and softer. Last year was really dry so they didn’t ripen before they shriveled up.

I was going to go swimming at a pool near my office, but they have no lockers! I think I will have to join the local YMCA after all. It’s a very reasonable monthly fee and it includes swimming and yoga classes.

Our rice plants (in the white bucket) seem to be doing ok. Still just 5 stems, but now the biggest one is 5″ tall. Katsuya is taking a look.

In the back brown pot are string beans I planted from seeds I saved last year! It’s exciting that they’ve sprouted. The front pot is supposed to have Japanese cucumbers. I’m not sure if they’ll come out, but I’m hoping as the rain has been good this spring.

Here’s a closeup of the rice plant:

Last weekend, we attended a rice workshop in Vermont where a farmer is trying to grow rice in the Northeast. The purpose of the workshop was to get more people involved to collect data to see what works and doesn’t work for growing rice in this region.

Katsuya transplanted our seedlings to a 5 gallon bucket per instructions which we’ve put in a spot that hopefully gets maximum sun for the longest possible time each day. Right now the water is filled to half way up the stem of the plant. We have 5 stems right now and the plants are about 3 inches tall. Here’s a picture of them.