N&C Midwest—October 2020

Can you believe it is October already?  Where did summer go?  We had a predicted heavy frost warning for Friday night/Saturday morning, but they has since cancelled that warning. I still have a lot of peppers and tomatoes to pick before frost gets them.  Yesterday I picked up some bales of straw so that I can heavily mulch the beds after I remove the last plants from the beds, then we'll be ready for the long winter months.

Cleaned up the bed with the peppers, and one tomato plant, and readied it for winter. The pepper plants were so productive this year that we could not keep up with all of them. There were 6 each bell pepper, banana pepper, and Jalapeno pepper in the bed, and they were all over 3' tall. After cutting off all of the plants at the soil level, I applied rock phosphate, Azomite, coffee grounds, and compost to the bed. Then I mulched it with straw to bed it down for the winter. I soaked the straw with water so that it won't blow around before it gets packed down a little.


This is a "before" picture of the bed with peppers and a tomato. Picked all of the peppers and green tomatoes before removing the plants.



This is an "after" picture of the bed after all of the plants were removed, the bed was topped off, and then it was heavily mulched.

Yes, SR, I picked all of the green tomatoes and they are wrapped in newspaper so they can slowly ripen into the winter months.  In addition to the peppers and tomatoes, I picked all of the summer squash and cucumbers in case we did get frost. We didn't get any frost, though.  The only things we have left in the garden for harvest are the kale, swiss chard, and spinach. This week I hope to get the rest of the beds ready for winter. I currently have two beds planted in the winter cover crop of Daikon radish, and the one bed I did yesterday that is mulched with straw. Three more beds to finish....

It was time to clean up the tomato plants and get the bed ready for winter. All of the green tomatoes were picked and stored for winter ripening, so there is no reason to leave the plants there. Took the plants out and chopped them up, and removed to the tomato cages and hung them back up in the garage. Then refreshed the bed with rock dust and rock phosphate, and then topped off with about 2" of compost before heavily mulching with straw. The one cage left on the end is for the cucumbers to finish maturing. After the cucumbers are either picked or frost killed, that cage will be removed and store, then straw will be applied to that corner of the bed.


The tomatoes and tomato cages are ready to be removed to clean up the bed.



The tomato plants and cages have been removed, the bed refreshed for winter, and is heavily mulched with straw.  I left the Sweet Alyssum on the bed until frost kills it, then I will remove them.

Yes, SR, I have grown Music Garlic. It is one of my favorites, especially for cooking. Raw it is a little spicy hot, but for cooking it has great flavor. It only has about 4 to 6 cloves per bulb for most of them, although a few bulbs had as many as 8 cloves. The cloves are very large, and have a pinkish color to them.  The plants get very tall, and the scapes are very long as well - most of the plants were over 3' tall. After the bulbs are harvested and dried, they seem to store very well until the following spring, if we don't eat them all. 

nrstooge wrote:That is the garlic I got this year.. Music.. we will see how it does in a container

It will be interesting to see how they do in a container. I've never grown in containers, so don't have any experience with that.  The only concern I've ever had with growing garlic in the raised beds is that it ties up that bed until July when I can harvest the garlic. But, of late I have found that isn't a much of a problem since I can plant squash in that bed after the garlic is harvested.

Here is an interesting article on growing garlic in containers, and the first two paragraphs sums up the issues with it: https://www.thespruce.com/growing-garlic-in-containers-848231

I haven't ever trimmed the leaves of the garlic either, SR, the plants need them for photosynthesis.  I occasionally pinch off yellow ends of the leaves, but that is about it. BTW, you'll love the almost 3' long scapes from the Music garlic! 

Took advantage yesterday of a beautiful fall day to take a break from gardening to enjoy a Fall Color Tour Road Trip, which included a stop at Urban Farmer to stock up on all of the garden seeds for next year.  Today I'm going to clean the pole beans off of the arbor, and then all of the beds will be ready for winter.

SR, the rain started here about 1:30 this afternoon, and was constant until 8:00 this evening. The rain brought in a cold front. It is supposed to get down to 39ºF tonight, and tomorrow night is is supposed to get down to 30ºF. The last thing I have to pick tomorrow are the cucumbers before the frost/freeze kills them.  I'm going to throw a frost cover over the bed with the lettuce, kale, chard, and spinach tomorrow evening to see if that can be kept for a few more weeks before the real cold weather starts. Other than that, the gardens are done except for the cold frame which has lettuce, spinach, and radishes growing in it.

Picked the last of the cucumbers this morning. Going to miss the fresh vegetables over the long winter months.  Had a light frost last night, the first this fall, and we have a freeze warning for tonight. So, the gardens are done for the year, except for the cold frame which will produce lettuce and spinach all winter long.