Grape Harvest -- sort of

Unlike Carmen's splendid harvest, my grape gleanings are far too pitiful to post photos.

I've got Concord grapes growing, but this east coast of mine is too hot and humid for them to do much more than suffer. Every spring, beautiful green globe-lettes burst forth but by July, some fungus has turned half of them into hard little inedible lumps. Not raisins, more like driveway gravel.

And the ones that survive don't ripen together in one big lovely purple bunch, but here and there amongst stubbornly green siblings. It's a guessing game as to which one is just sweet enough and which still has the flavor of a little purple lemon.

The first year that the vines were mature, I had to battle a million hornets for them. I finally grabbed a hose and blasted away angry clouds of the bugs. That hasn't happened again. Who can figure?

But this year, as I plucked my hopeful harvest, I noticed something special: an empty bird nest near the top of the arbor. I hope its former occupants fledged safely and are off preparing nests of their own now.