As you are reading this, it should be mid-August and the summer will be winding down. Here in the North Country we are still waiting for summer, which is scheduled to arrive tomorrow, a mere four days after the summer solstice. Benefit of the lasting “spring” was a near absence of black flies, although that may be failure to encounter them due to the general unpleasantness of being outdoors in 50-degree wet weather. My plants, far from being in place, thought they were commuters (from the deck to inside and back) through late May. With the wet weather we are expecting a bumper crop of mosquitoes. Hope we get corn!


Obviously, I have not been overwhelmed with news from you all; please take a moment to bring me (and your classmates) up to date on your doings this summer or in general. Otherwise you will be reading another delayed weather report in two months!


—Scott Holland, P.O. Box 607, Grantham, NH 03753; hollansx@hotmail.com; Jon Oplinger, 6 Pump House, Springhouse, PA 19477; jonoplinger@yahoo.com