Late season thoughts

The days are getting noticeably shorter, and cooler weather will be with us soon. For the past week we have been enjoying endlessly sunny warm weather thanks to Danielle and Earl. This will come to a close on Saturday when we experience a cloudy, rainy high of 63 as Earl blows by to the East.

We are still enjoying cabbage, onions, potatoes, chard, kale, carrots, beets and parsley from the garden though we haven't done much except water and weed since mid-July. Because we got such a slow start with tomatoes and peppers, the large varieties are just beginning to ripen now. We have been enjoying cherry tomatoes for a couple of weeks.

At the end of this season, I am planning to move several of the garden frames. Currently they are separated by four feet on each side. I am planning to reduce this to three feet on the sides and two feet front to back. This will allow me to make more efficient use of space and adjust to get the most sunlight possible from our backyard location. At the same time, I will put down pea gravel to keep the weeds down and discourage insects from migrating to the frames.

I have been using frames fully enclosed with chicken-wire for two years and have not had a single incident with the resident woodchuck. I know other gardeners who have tried to keep out woodchucks by putting up fences and burying them deep enough to prevent burrowing, but the critters still manage to get through. My theory is that the chicken wire enclosures are small and complete enough that the woodchuck doesn't think to try to get inside, maybe it looks too much like a woodchuck-trap.

I have read a lot about composting over the years and it has always seemed like too much of a project to gather the right materials in sufficient quantity to make a real working pile. While recently reviewing "Gardening When It Counts" by Steve Solomon, I noted that he recommends making one big pile at the end of each gardening season. This way, one can be gathering the necessary materials throughout the year and make use of the slow time at the end of the season to build the pile. I planted some comfrey earlier this year with making compost in mind. Hopefully the stars will align and I will find a day this fall to do it right.

Bloom report:
Black-eyed susan, pink phlox, mint, butter and eggs (yellow toadflax), white snakeroot, morning glories and gladiolus are flowering in the yard. Virgin's bower (a native form of clematis) is fading.

Mid-August Report

I was making mental notes for several weeks, then went away on vacation. I came back to find our vining tomatoes reaching the top of the 7' high protective enclosures and full of green fruit. I have some work to do this weekend to harvest chard, beets, onions, and carrots, and to prune back the tomato and potato plants that are beginning to overshadow everything else. The fall crop of lettuce, beets and chard which were planted in July are doing well. I will try planting more lettuce once I have applied some discipline to the garden.

There is at least one gladiolus at the front of the house that found its way to the sunshine this season. Something ate all of my lightly protected sunflowers. Could it be Woody the woodchuck? I wouldn't be surprised. Not much else is blooming right now except for morning glories. Check the previous back-dated post for the bloom and activity report for the rest of July.

Best regards,
ST Gardener

July Wrap-Up

Beginning in the second week of July we saw the following plants blooming: chickory, queen anne's lace, echinacea, bee balm, sweet william, and sunflowers. Lilies are in full bloom; pink spirea began fading. Tomatoes, potatoes, and onion are still blooming; We harvested large amounts of lettuce along with chard, kale, beets and carrot. In the third week of July, we planted lettuce, beets, and chard for a fall crop; The first self-seeded morning glories appeared the morning of July 20. Our next endeavor on this blog will be to post more pictures. They tell the story better than anything that we can say.

Some like it hot

In anticipation of the heat wave, I picked as much lettuce as possible on Monday morning and gave it to family members and neighbors. We still have quite a bit of lettuce left if it doesn't bolt in the heat. I fertilized the tomatoes, peppers and brassicas with COF a couple evenings ago. This weekend, I will replant available squares with lettuce, carrots, and beets for the fall.

We heard the first cicada on the morning of July 5;