N&C Midwest October 2023

I can’t believe it is October!  Doesn’t feel like it, feels like summer around here!  80s, sunny, but very dry out here.  

I suppose I should water today but not sure I will have time.  Will need to figure out what to do with my beds, I think I am going to start over on the strawberry bed, it hasn’t been very productive.  

What is everyone else doing?  Winding down or getting ready for Fall harvests?

I can't believe it is October already! Where has summer gone?  I've been busy getting the beds prepped for winter with new compost and wheat straw mulching. One bed is still in use for the winter beets and carrots, and the pole beans on the arbor are still heavily producing. Have one tomato plant and 3 Eggplants still producing. The greenhouse is coming to life with greens started in the raised bed, and 5 gallon buckets growing some peppers.

The To-Do list for winter activities is growing, though. Two of the original Rhubarb plants in fire rings have to be dug up and divided as they have grown to fill the entire rings. Another project for the Rhubarb is to add a drip irrigation system for them so I don't have to continually water then through the prolonged summer dry periods. That will require adding a new line with its own timer since they will be on a different schedule than the raised beds, needing much less water than vegetables do.

Harvested the Red Kuri Squash this evening. Had a good crop of them on the one vine this year.

If you are not familiar with how the harvest winter squash, check out the post I did last fall on the best way to cut the squash off of the vines:
https://squarefoot.forumotion.com/t23735-how-to-harvest-winter-squash?highlight=Winter+Squash

This year's harvest of the Red Kuri Winter Squash

Yum!  Red Kuri is a wonderful cultivar.   I liked this post for our growing year as it comes to a close:

From Square Foot Gardening Foundation:

A moment for reflection One of the most important steps to Square Foot Gardening is assessing the past season. While our Method has been carefully designed to succeed in any garden, there are some things that will always be unique only to you.

How did your harvest of each plant look this season?
What did you feel was most challenging?
Did you encounter pests? What kind was it?
What were your biggest surprises? Biggest let downs?
What did you enjoy the most? (This is the most important question to ask yourself!)

You’re the only one that fully knows all the joys and challenges you encountered. Use that knowledge to strengthen your Square Foot Garden yields in each season to come!

If you feel like you want to go back to the basics, check out our 2-hour self-paced online course. It’s a great way to refresh on the fundamentals of Square Foot Gardening: https://squarefootgardening.org/square-foot-gardening-online-course/  

Photos from Square Foot Gardeners posting to our Official Square Foot Gardening Facebook Group 

#SquareFootGardeningFoundation #GrowYourOwnFood #SquareFootGardening #GardeningCourse #GardeningBasics #FirstGarden #NewGardener #GardeningTips #Gardening #GardeningMethods #NutritiousFoods #Reflection #ReflectionPost #Learning

Garden Abundance...

I picked (and watered) my peppers.  Got a bunch of jalapeños, a few sweet peppers and 2 poblanos.  4 yellow Brandywine, and a Cherokee purple….nice.

Harvested the Butternut Squash today. Sixteen of them, with the largest one weighing 5 pound 9 ounces, and the smallest one weighing 4 pound 1 ounce. There are four squash still on the vines since they are still green, but it is unlikely they will ripen before we get our first frost in a week or two.

Also picked the rest of the bell, banana, and jalapeno peppers, cut the plants off at the soil level, and shredded them into the compost bin.

Scorpio Rising wrote:From Square Foot Gardening Foundation:

A moment for reflection One of the most important steps to Square Foot Gardening is assessing the past season. While our Method has been carefully designed to succeed in any garden, there are some things that will always be unique only to you.
You’re the only one that fully knows all the joys and challenges you encountered. Use that knowledge to strengthen your Square Foot Garden yields in each season to come!"

Keeping a journal is a great way to help reflect back on the year's gardening.

It is crazy….I have harvested big yellow Brandywine tomatoes.

 I am needing to figure out which angle to take but I will break the big chunks apart and plant them!  Love garlic!

Tomorrow I am planning to can (candy) my jalapeños.  Delicious—everyone loved them for Christmas!

We are under a frost warning tonight, so I am going to pick the rest of the tomatoes, eggplants, and green beans. Then I'll clean off those two beds, apply some more compost, and mulch with wheat straw for the winter. The summer garden has ended for us.  

Fortunately, the plants in the greenhouse are thriving. 

OhioGardener wrote:We are under a frost warning tonight, so I am going to pick the rest of the tomatoes, eggplants, and green beans. Then I'll clean off those two beds, apply some more compost, and mulch with wheat straw for the winter. The summer garden has ended for us.  

Fortunately, the plants in the greenhouse are thriving. 

My messenging situation isn’t working, OG.  We too are under a frost warning.  Honestly I am done.  I need to re-evaluate my goals with the garden over the winter.  With my job, I cannot get things done that I want to do….sad really.  I have thrown way a lot of food this and last year.

I do have rhubarb, it’s Stark Crimson.  Love it.  I can’t reply to you!

they just updated us to frost warning.. so herbs/ginger/tumeric in containers are coming inside.. picking tomatoes... the brassicas, etc will be fine

Woke up to 30ºF this morning. Glad I picked all of the tomatoes, eggplants, and beans yesterday before they would have frozen. After removing the plants, I applied fresh compost on the beds, but didn't have time to get them with straw before darkness started setting in on me.

Yeah, my summer garden is over with the exception of the peppers! Frost here for the 2nd night in a row.  I am trying to figure out the timing of my garlic planting….usually lore says Halloween….but we have a warm-ish fall on hand….

Got a small load of aged calf manure today from a friend that has an organic beef farm. The manure is from the calves that are raised in separate pens with wood chip bedding, so it is a mixture of manure and wood chips which are partially composted. By next summer this pile should be well composted and ready to use on the raised beds.  

My friend the tree trimmer dropped a good sized load of wood chips early this morning. This afternoon I was able to spread all of the new chips on the raised bed pathways. Ready for winter.... 

A new load of wood chips were dropped off this morning....

The load of wood chips were spread out on the raised bed pathways...

Scorpio Rising wrote:

OhioGardener wrote:We are under a frost warning tonight, so I am going to pick the rest of the tomatoes, eggplants, and green beans. Then I'll clean off those two beds, apply some more compost, and mulch with wheat straw for the winter. The summer garden has ended for us.  

Fortunately, the plants in the greenhouse are thriving. 

My messenging situation isn’t working, OG.  We too are under a frost warning.  Honestly I am done.  I need to re-evaluate my goals with the garden over the winter.  With my job, I cannot get things done that I want to do….sad really.  I have thrown way a lot of food this and last year.

Scorpio Rising,

I completely understand how the work situation is getting in the way of gardening goals. I haven't had a lot of time to even ben on the forum lately because of work. I have really come to love gardening, but there are only so many hours in a day and when work takes up a lot of them, the garden gets less and less. I also need to find a balance so that I can feel fulfilled with gardening and not stressed by it. Good luck!

Down-sizing or taking a break is sometimes just what is needed. If I was still working, I would not be able to maintain the number of beds I have, plus harvest, can, dehydrate and freeze. I have really down-sized this winter's garden.

If nothing else, it pays off in the long run to pull the spent plants and cover the beds with straw. In the spring, one can evaluate how many beds one wants to deal with for the summer. The straw will protect the empty beds until one can come up with a plan.

sanderson wrote:Down-sizing or taking a break is sometimes just what is needed.  If I was still working, I would not be able to maintain the number of beds I have, plus harvest, can, dehydrate and freeze.  I have really down-sized this winter's garden.

If nothing else, it pays off in the long run to pull the spent plants and cover the beds with straw.  In the spring, one can evaluate how many beds one wants to deal with for the summer.  The straw will protect the empty beds until one can come up with a plan.

Thanks for the advice sanderson. I think for me it might be best to skip a fall garden. When I step back and think about where things get hard, I would have to say it is trying to continue with a fall garden because with my current work situation this is when I have the least amount of time to garden. Or maybe just reduce the number of things I grow in my fall garden. Either way, I am going to focus on putting all the beds to rest and reevaluate the situation moving forward

Finished the last of my To-Do list for preparing the beds for winter today. Cleaned off all of the Rhubarb plants, dug and divided the two plants that had become too crowded in their fire rings,  topped off all of the fire rings with a fresh mixture of MM, and applied the winter mulch of aged cow manure to feed the plants for next year. Shared nine Rhubarb crowns with three neighbors that had asked for starts, after keeping two crowns to re-plant the beds that had been dug up. While digging out the Rhubarb to divide them I found several grubs in each bed, so after everything was replanted and topped off I applied some GrubGone to the soil and watered it in.

The only raised bed still active is the one with winter carrots and beets in it. Those won't be harvested until December.

JAM23 wrote:Scorpio Rising,

I completely understand how the work situation is getting in the way of gardening goals. I haven't had a lot of time to even ben on the forum lately because of work. I have really come to love gardening, but there are only so many hours in a day and when work takes up a lot of them, the garden gets less and less. I also need to find a balance so that I can feel fulfilled with gardening and not stressed by it. Good luck!

The only thing I have committed to for Fall (and it really is zero work) is garlic!  I love it for cooking, roasting, etc. it can’t be beat.  I haven’t really done a Fall garden for several years for this reason—days are just too short for me to do anything after I get off work.  Dark.  I have tried different things in my cold frame.  Spring is easier than fall…

Scorpio Rising wrote:

JAM23 wrote:Scorpio Rising,

I completely understand how the work situation is getting in the way of gardening goals. I haven't had a lot of time to even ben on the forum lately because of work. I have really come to love gardening, but there are only so many hours in a day and when work takes up a lot of them, the garden gets less and less. I also need to find a balance so that I can feel fulfilled with gardening and not stressed by it. Good luck!

The only thing I have committed to for Fall (and it really is zero work) is garlic!  I love it for cooking, roasting, etc. it can’t be beat.  I haven’t really done a Fall garden for several years for this reason—days are just too short for me to do anything after I get off work.  Dark.  I have tried different things in my cold frame.  Spring is easier than fall…

Thanks Scorpio Rising,
Yes, garlic is a definite plan for the fall garden and I did get my 2 small cold frames finished and planted (beets, carrots, spinach, thyme and parsley). Fall gardening can be something I look forward to in retirement? LOL

OhioGardener wrote:Finished the last of my To-Do list for preparing the beds for winter today. Cleaned off all of the Rhubarb plants, dug and divided the two plants that had become too crowded in their fire rings,  topped off all of the fire rings with a fresh mixture of MM, and applied the winter mulch of aged cow manure to feed the plants for next year. Shared nine Rhubarb crowns with three neighbors that had asked for starts, after keeping two crowns to re-plant the beds that had been dug up. While digging out the Rhubarb to divide them I found several grubs in each bed, so after everything was replanted and topped off I applied some GrubGone to the soil and watered it in.

The only raised bed still active is the one with winter carrots and beets in it. Those won't be harvested until December.

Nice OhioGardener! You are one nice neighbor! I have closed one of my beds for the season. Still have a few more to get too! Want to be finished my mid-November. I use mulched leaves to cover my soil since they are free but I have run out of them (because I am trying to make lots of compost)! Waiting for the leaves to start falling in my area so I can get them mulched to cover the beds and stock pile them for another year of composting.