October 2011 New England

October 1, 2011
It's raining again

We've had rain since yesterday and a couple days before that. I think I've harvested all there is to take.



I also got one pickling cuke you can barely notice behind the cabbage. I still have two red cabbages and some sweet peppers in my garden, but I think the rest are done. A few tomatoes might make it. Our close-to-freeze day (34F* expected Wed nite) coming soon so there's still time for more to ripen.

I was able to roast 2 more quarts of tomatoes and have some fresh roasted as a side-dish for supper on Friday nite.

I finally cleaned off and bagged the garlic I got this year from last Oct 12th's planting.



The ones in the left bag I'll use to replant this fall for next year. I want to put in more this fall.

I think my garden is about done. I wasn't well enough to plant my fall coldframe seeds this year as planned, darn it. At least I'm fine now so I'll be able to put my garden to bed after cleaning out the debris to add to my compost pile and adding completed compost to my beds to overwinter.

I wish you all a fine fall and some good fall crops if you're further south than Maine.

Gorgeous!

How do you clean off the garlic and where did you get those bags? I have my garlic I harvested a few months ago and it is dirty and I cannot figure out how to clean it. I thought I was not supposed to get it wet. What do you do?

I cleaned mine the day pulled it up. I peeled the outer most dirty paper layer off and hung them to dry a few days then braided the wilted greens to make a nice garlic braid. I don't know if other folks do it that way, but it worked for me.

Chopper,

I left mine to dry in the garage for several weeks, then took a paper towel and rubbed across the bulbs. It easily took the outer layer of dirty skin right off.

The bags are onion bags saved from when I buy my onions at the grocery store. I save them for a few things; hanging deodorant soap beside my fruit trees and here and there in my veggie garden to discourage deer (it works), and to store garlic.

quiltbea wrote:Chopper,

I left mine to dry in the garage for several weeks, then took a paper towel and rubbed across the bulbs. It easily took the outer layer of dirty skin right off.

OK. I will try again. I tried to get them nice and clean after I picked them, but was not successful. Maybe with a little drying time under their belts it will be easier.

Freeze Warning
Statement as of 3:55 PM EDT on October 05, 2011

... Freeze warning remains in effect from 2 am to 8 am EDT
Thursday...

* locations... Cheshire NH... Franklin and Hampshire MA.

* Temperatures... in the lower 30s.

* Timing... temperatures will fall below freezing after midnight.

* Impacts... freezing temperatures will kill exposed vegetation
and bring an end to the growing season.

Precautionary/preparedness actions...

A freeze warning is issued when freezing temperatures are
forecast to threaten outdoor plants. Those with agricultural
interests in the warning area are advised to harvest or protect
tender vegetation. Also... potted plants normally left outdoors
should be covered or brought inside away from the cold.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
It's coming to a close. I put the mouse guard on the bee hive this afternoon. Tonight I will cover what tender veggies I have left, a few eggplants and the poblano peppers, cross my fingers and hope for the best. Time to haul wood, bags of pellets, clean the chimney, rake leaves, clear beds, transfer compost, put in the last of the lilies and bulbs, plant garlic, build the winter compost pile, wave to the geese as the fly by, tune up the snow thrower, roof the house...

yeah, I aint nearly done.

I picked a dozen more tomatoes and 4 cukes after the rain finally stopped and checked things in the garden today. There's 4 green Gourmet sweet peppers still very small which I'm trying to grow a bit larger before harvesting. I've got 2 red cabbages ready to harvest but my family aren't ready for them yet. I need to divide my chives and plant them in a pot to take indoors in the next few days. I actually found 5 white eggplants in different sizes that I harvested tonite because I think that's it for eggplant.....too many cold nites coming. They hate it below 60*. Tonite I've got the thick gardening towels covering those plants susceptible to the drop in temp. and that I'm hoping to save. The tomatoes and cukes are about finished for sure this time.

I defrosted the first of my frozen pickles and they are good, but a little too vinegary. I made a mistake in that when I found I was short of brine, instead of making up another batch to cover the cuke slices, I just added more cider vinegar to the freezer bags. Wrong move. They aren't too bad, but next year I'll just make larger batches of brine for them and they're sure to taste better. In the meantime, they won't go to waste.

The next thing will be to plant garlic cloves for next summer. I was pleased with mine this year.

Things are winding down a lot now. There's the strawberry bed to thin out of the older plants and to mulch with straw for the winter. General cleaning out of all the depleted plants. Sifting and adding compost to the beds. Bringing my potted herbs in for the winter and hoping to get more fresh herbs for meals up to early winter. Very soon now I'll be back to making quilts and quilting projects for the cold season.

quiltbea wrote: Very soon now I'll be back to making quilts and quilting projects for the cold season.

Yeah, I'm looking forward to getting back to my stained glass and sewing!
Sorry about your pickles.

I think the temperature last week reached 32.5 degrees. My basil got lots of brown spots, but didn't wilt, and is growing some new happy leaves. I still have cosmos growing like wild, which I pick for little vases on the tables of our restaurant.

And the crazy thing is that I have the world's tiniest crop of raspberries from out of the blue! I have probably harvested 8 in the last week, with another 5 that are imminent.

Crazy!

I have a single rosebud on my rose bush!

It's been so beautiful and warm lately, my tomatoes look like mid-summer (the green anyway - not ripening very quickly).

But that will soon be coming to an end.

I hope we discuss how to put the beds to sleep for the winter. I'm thinking of mulching up the fallen leaves in the lawnmower bag and putting them on top of the beds. This is my first winter with the garden, and I'm hoping to really feed it this fall so that by spring it will be stronger. If I can wrestle my compost pile back from the tree roots that have taken it over, I'll put whatever I can from my compost pile on top of the beds too.

We got an inch of snow last night and a Winter Storm Warning has been issued for our area, estimated snowfall...4-8 inches of the cold heavy wet stuff. Meh
It's friggin' cold out! I was not paying attention and didn't dig and pot up my cilantro...

camprn....We're going to get the same Nor-easter this weekend. Dropping down in the 20s every nite as well. Brrrrr, winter is around the corner.

NHGardener.....When you rake up those dry leaves, you can take handsful and bury some deep into each square in your raised beds. The worms will love you for it by feeding on the dry leaves and leaving rich compost behind. Its a good time to also add up to 3" of compost over your beds for the winter. Mulch any strawberries, garlic or overwintering onions, carrots, and parsnips with straw or deep leaves as well.

If you can mow your leaves into smaller pieces, you can put them right on your beds. Some folks put their leaves in a trash barrel and use the weed eater right inside the barrel to break them up. I just rake mine up into leaf bags, as is, and leave them piled behind the compost barrel thru the winter. In the spring they are starting to break down on their own and I add them to my compost piles as my browns. I like the ratio of 1 part green and 1 part brown for my compost. I need lots of decomposing leaves for that.

Happy Gardening!

Thanks for the heads up on that, quiltbea. I have a pile of chopped up leaves ready to go. I don't know that I have enough compost for 3" for each box, but maybe if I count all the chicken manure pile I'll make it.

I think it's time to take down the trellises and store them for the winter.

It's sad because the grape tomatoes were really doing well just until our coating last night. There were still blossoms on pretty much everything that's still alive. Boo hoo, so sad to see it go.

What do I do with the cornstalks and other plant remains? Can I bury those as is, or do I need to throw them into the compost pile? I'm mad at my compost pile because it's turned into tree root. I still put stuff on it, but I've almost given up on getting much out of it. I need to make some boxes and maybe put hardware cloth (wire) on the bottom, so the worms can get thru but maybe the roots will have a hard time.

camprn, how did your bees do? I have 2 more classes and then they're going to push me out on my own - yikes. (With a bee buddy, I think.) A little intimidating. There's a man in the group here who had 1000 hives, now that he's older he's cut back to 500. HAHA.

All my big stuff, like stalks and vines, I chop up on a large old wooden cutting board and toss them into the outside compost pile. I have 3. One is the outside pile where I just chop up and add everything, including my kitchen wastes that don't go to the worms and the leaves from the bags of last fall. The 2nd one is my black barrel where I add a few bags of fresh brown leaves to decompose. The 3rd is my green monster barrel that turns with a handle. This is where I make my finished compost. I add my ratio of 1 green (kitchen wastes) to 20 brown (old leaves) and turn that thing during the spring, summer and fall months as needed. I get my finished compost from this.



Above is my compost corner. The green plastic fencing you can see behind my green monster encircles my #1 pile where everything is tossed. The black barrel turns with lots of effort so I fill that with brown leaves and only turn it occasionally. The bags of last fall's leaves are behind it. You can see sections of the black leaf bags. The green monster gives me my finished compost. When I've filled the green monster with waste from the compost pile and the leaf supply, I then give it a turn every few days and add some water now and then.



Above: I sift my compost thru an old kitchen bin bought for storing onions or potatoes in my pantry, directly into my wheelbarrow. It sifts just great. Any large bits get tossed back into the green monster for more finishing with a new supply of compostables. The odd bits have the bacteria needed to work on the next batch.



Above: I'm adding a new supply of compostables to the green monster including fresh grasses and lots of brown leaves. I just keep adding day by day until its filled and then I just turn it til its finished. All new kitchen scraps, leaves, etc go into compost pile #1. They start their decomposition in that pile.

I saw one beautiful tumbler like your green monster, only it was shiny and new and I think they paid around $260 for it, they're not cheap. And he said it gave them, hmmm, a wheelbarrow a week of compost? What he did was throw in a handful of alfalfa pellets (rabbit food) everytime he added his greens. Turned easily, had 2 compartments, I think one was for finished and the other was for stuff working, I forget. The only thing I keep stuck on with a ground-based compost tho is that earthworms can't get to the tumbler. Of course, if the tree roots are going to take over, it doesn't matter anyway, there are plenty of earthworms there but it isn't doing me any good.

I believe he said their regular ground compost pile, which they also had, produced maybe a couple wheelbarrows of compost the entire summer. So that's quite a comparison. I guess the best of both worlds is having 2 different compost methods.

It's gonna whollop us tomorrow, now they are calling for 8-12 inches of snow. I am so glad I planted my garlic last week.

Well, well, well... I just went out and measured our snowfall here at home, 11.5". But SURPRISE! there is 25" of fresh snow in the mountain town where I work.

camprn wrote:Well, well, well... I just went out and measured our snowfall here at home, 11.5". But SURPRISE! there is 25" of fresh snow in the mountain town where I work.

That first snow is so beautiful. But by snow number 25 it gets old. LOL. What a surprise! Too early!