Late summer report

The nights have turned decidedly cooler, some trees have begun to shed leaves (maple), and the sunlight has become more muted early and late in the day; another season is winding down...

We completed planting frame two with new seedlings last week. Frame five, which was planted late June is finished with lettuce production.

Lately, the woodchuck has been spotted sitting on top of frame three chewing the volunteer tomato plants that are growing out of the frame. I hope that he doesn't try to get inside once the outer delicacies are gone. In the next frame over, where I attached a trellis frame, the yellow pear tomatoes planted _?_ are just beginning to ripen. They are reaching over eight feet in height.

Up front, the container tomato plants are looking sad. The leaves are losing color and developing purple veins. Based on research, this may be due to insufficient feeding. We will try adding some liquid fertilizer to see if that brings their color back.

The basil which was planted with the container tomatoes did fairly well, however it was a bit crowded. Next year I may try planting an entire frame of basil with cherry tomatoes in the back row.

We harvested the three buttercup squash since the plants are mostly dried up. Next year, I will not make "hills", but rather "bowls" that will retain moisture and I will keep the area deeply mulched.

The pepper plants that seemed like they would never fruit are finally flowering and fruiting like mad. I hope the weather will be warm enough to allow them to mature.

The cucumber plants have about given up the ghost after experiencing a difficult season with inadequate drainage in the grow box. We harvested about a dozen nice cucumbers. I think we can do much better next year.

The one surviving Heavenly Blue morning glory plant began blooming this past weekend. The gladiolus bulbs that were planted in early June are also blooming.

One last planting

We cleared garden two of all except one cabbage plant and made a new planting of lettuce, spinach and chard. With luck, this will provide us with fresh greens up to and beyond the Winter Holidays. We had such an overabundance of greens this year, I would like to space the plantings out better next year. Perhaps start one frame in early April, one in early May, then one every three weeks through mid August. I commented in year one at Winter Holiday time how there were only 8 weeks left until it would be time to start plants again for Spring. Vegetable gardening can help make the Winter seem not so long. I believe that we are only a year to two away from being able to provide fresh greens year around from our garden. See the work of Eliot Coleman for how this will be accomplished.

Tomato report

There are many tomatoes ripening now. Since the last post we have harvested four and there are seven more that are ready to be harvested. The cherry tomato production has increased to more than four per day. Some of the tomatoes are showing signs of blossom end rot. According to my research this could be due to insufficient calcium in the soil or erratic watering. I will try adding calcium to the soil next year and perhaps modify the grow boxes for better drainage.