winter

Already busy planning out next year's garden and looking through the new seed catalogs! And it was only last week that I finally pulled the last of the carrots and leeks out... Sadly I did not have much time to put the garden to bed in November because I was too busy with other things. Some beds still need to be mulched, and I have yet to finish putting together the compost pile. Fun stuff to do when it's 25 degrees out.

Season's end

I don't feel like writing much, so here's a bunch of pictures! (they say a picture is worth 1000 words, after all)

Fall already?

Temperatures have gotten cooler, it might be almost time to cut down all the basil and harvest the rest of those tomatoes! It's too bad, the garden is looking its best right as it's nearly over.

Looking much better since I tidied up! I've planted peas around those big teepee things. They have not sprouted yet. I also planted some lettuce, kale, and brussel sprouts in that bed, but I'm not expecting too much from them at this point.

Everything's all filled out and looking beautiful!

This bed is doing great, since I've been sprinkling it with deer repellent regularly.

And speaking of carrots... I pulled these up to use in a roast recently. Unfortunately you don't get a good size reference, but the middle carrot was huge! They were all very tasty too. :)

All cleaned up and ready to be baked.

First new bed finished since what, June? It was just too hot all summer to do much digging. I've added compost and lime to this bed, and will soon be planting it with a cover crop.

Two compost piles. The right one is finished, and the left one is being added to slowly. When the leaves start to drop, I'll add plenty of chopped leaves (since I only have a rake and a tiny mower, that's going to be a lot of work). At that time I'll also make a trip to the stable to get horse manure, a trip to the beach to get seaweed, and a trip to Starbucks for used coffee grounds. I'm going to need a lot of compost next summer.

Harvesting

I haven't updated in a month, mostly because I spent almost half of August in Los Angeles, visiting my good friend Al! I had a good vacation there, going to the beach, riding roller coasters, and climbing some serious mountains. Meanwhile, I left the garden in the hands of my Mom, with a to-do list for her to do every day (she was thrilled). So the garden survived my absence, but it's amazing how much things can grow and change in two weeks. I have a lot of work to do out there!

















Here is my dog, Max, posing with all the pumpkins I harvested today. All of these are from a single volunteer plant that got attacked by everything: powdery mildew, squash bugs, and squash vine borers. Despite all that, it still grew five beautiful, big, heavy pumpkins! I credit that to several things: an early start (it sprouted in early May or late April), healthy, deeply dug, compost rich soil, and the fact that no squash has ever grown in that spot before. I hope these pumpkins last for a long time.

Sunflower heads. Drying and removing the seeds from these was a pain in the neck! Not too sure it was worth the trouble. Next year I will probably not grow an entire bed of these again, but instead just a couple in a flower bed for ornaments. It was fun to watch goldfinches eat the seeds, though.

Here's how the garden looked at the end of August. That is a lot of corn! You can't even see the tomato jungle from this angle. Since taking this I have removed and composted the sunflower stalks, pulled up the pumpkin vines, and mowed the lawn.

So much corn!

Here is the difference between un-pollinated and pollinated corn. Unfortunately, every single ear has been attacked by corn borers. That's usually not a big deal, because you can just cut off the topmost section of the ear and eat the rest. But sometimes they slice through the silks before the ear gets pollinated, resulting in this.

Nasturtiums, basil, sweet potatoes, marigolds, lima beans, carrots, chard, and beets, with pumpkin vines in the background. I think marigolds are the most successful thing I've grown this year! The sweet potatoes have lots of beautiful flowers that are only open for a few hours a day.

My strawberry patch is STILL sending out runners! I have to cut them out of the path every week. I'm thinking of devoting a second bed to them, because they're already so crowded in this one.

The tomato jungle! Clearly, pvc pipes are a horrible support, lol! I will have to devise something more intelligent next year (I'm thinking stakes).

I thought this was beautiful.

Everything here is from the garden except for the apple, which I put in the bowl to help those tomatoes ripen.

Siamese twin!

My fall seedlings, which have largely been a disappointment so far. Critters have been chewing on them almost as soon as they sprouted. =(  I've already had to pinch off multitudes of caterpillars and spray with Bacillus Thuricide. Then, something ate the lettuce seedlings right down to the soil. So I put them in this cage, thinking it was probably a squirrel, but today something ate even more of them! So whatever it is, it's small enough to fit through the bars. I've wrapped the whole cage in small deer netting, hopefully that'll keep things out. I really wish I could start these indoors, but I need a couple big florescent shop lights to do that. I'll have to start some new seedlings, but I'm afraid it might be too late for that already.

All but one of the butternut squash, and all of the acorn squash I've harvested this summer. Not tons, but it's something. :)

Pumpkins in July

Ok so it's August now........ but my biggest pumpkin began ripening in July! Isn't that a little early? I dunno, but I hope it lasts until October. Here it is!

This is from my volunteer pumpkin that's taking up half the yard. Right now it's slowly being killed off by powdery mildew, and it has two smaller green pumpkins on another vine.

The squash in the old garden is almost completely killed off by powdery mildew. :( Since I'm committed to avoid dousing everything in chemicals, there's not really anything I can do about it. At least there's some small ripening squashes, and we got plenty of zucchini before it died.

Here is the squash section of the new garden. Still looking ok... but it's also being slowly attacked by powdery mildew. The pumpkins and cantaloupe are being hit the hardest. I've tried spraying it with neem oil and milk. So far neither has completely solved the problem, though perhaps they've slowed the spread. If I grow squash again, I'll be sure to buy varieties that are specifically labeled as disease resistant.

Corn is looking great! No problems with it so far, except for a big ugly worm that I killed while it was trying to get into one of the stalks. Most of the plants have two to three ears on them, despite being crowded so close together. Several ears are producing silk, but nothing's ready to eat yet.

The sunflower's bright, happy faces are turning into sad, droopy faces. :( But that's just because they're growing lots of great big seeds! I am going to cover most of the heads with cloth, which will hopefully keep critters from devouring them...

The remains of carrots, beets, and chard, after the deer snacked on them. I pulled up all the onions that were growing in this bed, and I'm drying them out now. Soon they will become onion braids!

Sweet potatoes, marigolds, lima beans, and nasturtiums. I have had very little success with the limas. They were attacked by everything from snails, deer, and bugs ever since they were seeds. Most of the seeds I planted didn't even sprout. I'll probably only get a handful of beans from them, if anything. I don't think this is a great climate for them. The sweet potatoes are looking healthy, except recently some of the leaves have developed rusty brown splotches... not sure what's up with that. At least the marigolds are doing well. Next year remind me not to plant any southern climate crops!

The first ripe tomato. I ate it. It was delicious. Unfortunately, it was just one little cherry tomato. I think my tomato patch got started too late and needs to be in a sunnier spot.

Weevils?

So I think I've figured out what's chewing on my sunflowers and tearing their leaves to shreds. I believe I've got a weevil infestation. I noticed some damage to a ripening flowerhead, so I poked around in it a little, and a tiny little beetle-ish thing crawled out. Ugh. Now to figure out how to get rid of them before they ruin all the seeds...

STILL no ripe tomatoes! But at least there aren't any more hornworms, yet. Deer ate all the swiss chard over the weekend while I was gone camping. Oh well, I don't like swiss chard anyway! Onions might be ready to harvest soon.

Next on the agenda: finish double digging the last two beds, and get my fall crop seeds started. I also need to order some cover crop seeds.

Sunflowers

Sunflowers have appeared! And they are gorgeous! I feel like I'm living in Provence. Maybe next year I'll grow poppies and lavender too, just to complete the picture.

Me and my flowers. I had to stand on a stool to take this pic, as they are easily 6+ feet tall.

That huge plant taking up half the lawn is just one pumpkin plant!

Tomatoes and corn. That's a pumpkin vine trailing down the path, I cut it out today though.

Beautiful green tomatoes.

Velvet Red cherry tomatoes.

From left to right: Kentucky Wonder, Hidatsa Shield, and a mystery Chinese bean we got from a friend. Japanese beetles have attacked the Kentucky Wonder, but they'll probably be alright. Hidatsa Shield is the short one in the middle, it started producing beans first. The Chinese bean is outgrowing the pole, but has not even started flowering yet.

Lettuce Leaf  basil loves being on the deck. It's delicious, with a slight licorice flavor.

I got lazy and forgot to harvest chamomile for about two weeks, and most of the flowers went past their prime. Also, some driving rain knocked the long plants down. So today I harvested what I could and then cut them back to about 6 inches. Hopefully this will re-invigorate growth, if it doesn't kill them.