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Brian Lehrer: We're going to wrap up the show in our last 10 or 12 minutes by opening up the phones for a very different kind of local news. It's the news from your garden report. Yes, we want to hear how your crops are doing. By crops, I mean whatever you're growing to eat on no matter how small a scale, so whether you have acres to tend, and yes, any farmers listening, we're inviting you right now, or if you just have a tomato plant on the terrace, tell us about this summer's produce.

How did the food items in your garden do this year, and have you been seeing longer-term changes in the last decade or more, perhaps due to climate change? 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692. We heard earlier in the show about how hot this summer was, and we're getting a little bit of that today, but climate change isn't only about heat, it's also about changing patterns that could affect when things ripen or whether they do at all.

What did you see where you are? Is the corn as high as an elephant's eye, as the song goes? Did the lettuce melt in the field from dampness, as one farmer put it in his report to CSA customers recently? Did anyone get really good strawberries this summer? Let's hear from you in New York City, the suburbs, and the farms, East End of Long Island, South Jersey, Hudson Valley, [unintelligible 00:01:39] North. What's your hyper-local farm report? 212-433-WNYC. That's 212-433-9692.

How did the food items in your garden do this year, and have you been seeing longer-term changes over the years? 212-433-WNYC. We've done call-ins before, as you know, on this show, many of you to hear the news from your block or the news from your home country if you're an immigrant. Today, it's the news from your vegetable garden. 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692. Or maybe some of you even do grow fruit. I mentioned the strawberries.

Also, I was down in the Lambertville, Frenchtown, Stockton area of Jersey a couple of weeks ago and bought local peaches at a farmers market there, so yes, your vegetables, and yes, your fruits. Was this growing season better or worse than other years? It's the news from your garden 2023. We'll take your calls after this.

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Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. Now, the headlines from your garden in 2023, especially if you're growing things that are edible. Faisal in Queens, you're on WNYC. Hi, Faisal.

Faisal: Hi, Brian. Thank you for taking my call. Every year, I grow beans from Bangladesh, and I usually get at least 200-300 pounds in my backyard. This year, I even don't have flowers coming up, very late. I collected maybe half a pound so far. Very difficult.

Brian Lehrer: Do you have a theory why?

Faisal: I don't understand. I have peppers also not doing well. I also put flowers in flower pots, they're also not doing well. I'm not sure if it is the soil that I bought or the climate change [inaudible 00:03:45] hundreds of pounds.

Brian Lehrer: Faisal, thank you very much. Better luck next year. I think I'm going to get a very different story from Joe in Atlantic Highlands. Hi, Joe. You're on WNYC.

Joe: Hi, Brian. How are you today?

Brian Lehrer: Good. What's up?

Joe: I just wanted to say I had a bumper crop of almost everything I grew this year. I started all my tomatoes and squash plants and other things from seed, and I had a really, really great season. I think it may have to do with the rain we had in June, I'm not sure, but I've not had to water a whole lot this summer. I was just giving it away to the neighbors and whoever else, people at work, whoever else wanted my string beans, and I've packed about 25 jars of tomatoes from my tomato plants.

Brian Lehrer: Awesome. Joe in Atlantic Highlands, swimming in tomatoes and string beans. Oh, Mary in the Hudson Valley also had a good season, I think. Mary, you're on WNYC. Hi.

Mary: Hi, Brian. Yes, it was terrific. Of course, everybody's talking about the rain. I think that had a lot to do with it, certainly the squashes, the greens. I just planted to get my garlic and put in quite a bit of lettuces and chard, of course. I love chard, and it grows until October, November, December. It has been a good year. Yes, we didn't have to water as much as we thought. I'm in a community garden, I also have a garden at home, and another one on our roof where we have buckets. Watering was minimal this year.

Brian Lehrer: Mary, thank you very much. A whole different story here from Wesley in Manhattan. You're on WNYC. Hi, Wesley.

Wesley: Hi, Brian. Thanks for taking my call. We've heard a lot about the spotted lanternfly. This is the reality, I'm a terrace gardener, I'm on the 25th floor, and every morning I kill spotted lanternfly, those that can't get away [unintelligible 00:05:50] attack the tomatoes.

Brian Lehrer: All the way up there?

Wesley: Yes, sir. It's attacked the tomatoes. It's attacked the beans. This thing is kind of a new plague.

Brian Lehrer: It affected the plants that you had?

Wesley: Yes, yes. Tomatoes, beans.

Brian Lehrer: Wesley, thank you very much. Yes, well, that's news, because mostly, we heard about the spotted lanternflies affecting certain kinds of trees. Wesley's report from his terrace garden, it's affecting the food that he's growing there too. We had an interesting text from a listener after our spotted lanternfly segment last week. The listener said he's in a moral dilemma with his kids.

He knows he's supposed to teach them to stomp on the spotted lanternflies when they see them on the sidewalk, but he feels bad about training his kids to squash any kind of living thing. Does anybody else have that-- We're not doing a call-in on that now, I'm just planting that thought bubble. Does anybody else have that as a moral dilemma? Margaret in Laurel Hollow, you're on WNYC. Hi, Margaret.

Margaret: Hi, Brian. We have two peach trees and we had so many peaches this year that I finally picked my last two today. We are having work done at our house, and everybody who comes in and goes leaves with at least a dozen peaches, and I still have like hundreds. I've made two big jars of brandy with them, and salads, and salsa. It's crazy. Great summer.

Brian Lehrer: Margaret, thank you very much. Christine in Greenwich, you're on WNYC with the news from your garden. Hi, Christine.

Christine: Oh, hi. First-time caller, been listening for a long, long time. Nice to talk to you.

Brian Lehrer: Hi.

Christine: I wanted to let you know I've been growing tomatoes for 20 years. Last year was probably the worst year ever because I think it was a pretty cold summer, and I got very few. This year, it's been a very hot summer here, 90 degrees plus on many days, and I have plenty of tomatoes as of mid-July, early August. It's been a very good year.

Brian Lehrer: Christine, thank you very much. All right, I think the headline from this call-in so far about the news from your garden in 2023, for the most part, it's been a very good year, from a lot of rain early on, and things like that. Leslie in Lincroft is going to get our last word. Hi, Leslie, we got about 30 seconds. Hey there.

Leslie: Oh, hi, Brian. I'm so glad to be here. My big takeaway this year is that my spinach that I grew last fall wintered over. The same spinach grew back in the spring, never happened before. First winter I didn't see one snow flurry as well, so that was a big deal that my spinach actually came back and I didn't have to plant new spinach. It stayed for the whole winter.

Brian Lehrer: Yes. Leslie, thank you very much. Popeye will be happy about that, among others. I happen to love spinach. It's my favorite vegetable. Leslie, thank you for calling in. Thanks to everybody who called in with the news headlines from your garden in 2023. That's The Brian Lehrer Show for today, produced by Mary Croke, Lisa Alisson, Amina Srna, Carl Boisrond, and Esperanza Rosenbaum. Zach Gottehrer-Cohen produces our daily politics podcast and made that great audio piece about climate change set to music. Megan Ryan is the head of live radio, and we had Milton Ruiz at the audio control. Stay tuned for All Of It.

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