September Gardens

[CathyA]

I was going to post on August gardens, but realized it was September 1st! Seems like it came much too fast this year.

In the big garden I'm getting some pole beans, cherry tomatoes and this has been my best year ever for peppers. We had an orange one at dinner last night and it was the sweetest pepper I'd ever eaten! This was their first year planted in a stock tank.
No red tomatoes......what there were of them have been picked. There are a number of green ones, so I'll either have to be patient, or make a green tomato casserole.....which is yummy too.
The cucumbers have definitely rallied and we're getting plenty of them

I'd love to start weeding and preparing some of the areas in the garden for winter, but we have a number of milkweed plants among the weeds and they have caterpillars on them. I'm sure they'll make some chrysalises in the garden among the weeds......so we'll wait until later October to deal with all the weeds. I did pull all the seed heads off the foxtail in the garden, so we can use the bottoms for the compost.

The back yard stock tank gardens are still making pole beans, swiss chard and couple cherry tomatoes here and there. I planted Fall spinach about 10 days ago and it's sprouted. We eat tons of spinach.
Gosh I love eating our own stuff!

I've ordered a couple more stock tanks, since I'm changing most of the big garden over to raised stock tanks next spring. We're making a concerted effort to put stuff on our compost pile and keep turning it, so we'll have plenty to fill the new stocktanks. I really love having things waist level, since the ground gets further away every year. haha

How's your garden doing?

[iris lilies]

The next couple of weeks are about planting iris and peonies and tagging lilies.

DH is tilling up more land for me, yay! I've got to get some of these lilies in full sun so that they will be super-large.

He keeps taunting me with the prospect of cutting down 2 or 3 trees at home (old and diseased, but just barely--they've started the march toward obscurity) and if we do that, it will open up a whole world of sunshine. Then I can move plants around.

[KayLR]

I had a very nice stand of 8-ft. tall corn until Saturday. A freak windstorm flattened all of it. Oh well, it's not like we were counting on it for survival or anything. In fact, I know it's a space-hog. But we have the space, and we just like fresh corn to have for a few weeks and give away to friends and family.

Beans are slowly coming on. Seems the past two years they've been so late. Tomatoes and peppers are doing well, after I doctored some of them for BER. I have 3 spaghetti squash and 4 acorn squash on 2 plants.

I've begun a fall crop of lettuces, kohlrabi, more chard and beets. Spinach and another succession of lettuce will be next.

[CathyA]

Kay......that corn should still be okay. You might help it be a little more upright with some rope across the rows attached to metal stakes at each end of the row.
The corn, even if it's sort of flat, should still make good ears.

I hear ya.......it IS comforting to know we won't starve to death when our "crops" fail in the garden. :)

[lessisbest]

Picked our first cantaloupe, which was a volunteer plant that grew in a planter where we grew leaf lettuce this spring. We topped the planter off with compost that must have had some cantaloupe seeds that didn't break down completely.

Still supplying the people where hubby works with the extra cucumbers and kale, and peppers will soon be more than what we can use, freeze, or dehydrate. Pole beans are just now getting started - surprised the heat didn't kill them. It's the first time I've grown them.

Decided against attempting fall crops because we now have grasshoppers invading everything. They will clear off a row of fresh greens overnight, so I won't waste the seeds. Lots of fall jobs to do in the garden beds, so the sooner we get everything cleared out, the sooner we can put a wrap on this season and start planning for next year.

It's also time to start thinking about my indoor gardening - a WindowFarm (http://www.windowfarms.com/) and AeroGarden (http://www.aerogarden.com/home-roll/?cid=ppc_m). I'll start growing wheatgrass as soon as it gets cool enough. I need indoor temperatures under 70°F. or it gets moldy. And before the first frost I'll pot herbs to grow indoors. These are our winter staples for fresh food, along with growing sprouts and micro-greens.

[Tussiemussies]

Sounds great everyone...had heard that peppers do better when the nights are not hot. Our nights in NW NJ have been very cool this whole summer mainly down into the sixties, I forgot the temps they gave but sounds nice Cathy to have such a great sweet pepper...

I traditionally don't garden in the spring or fall, having one in the summer is enough for me!!

Lessisbest, I would love someday to learn how to grow sprouts...

[SteveinMN]

Status quo here. Two Hubbard squash which I'm thinking should look less like acorn squash, but there's still growing time left. As the squash leaves have died off, another collard plant has taken off, so now we'll have three usable plants. Our volunteer tomato has three more tomatoes (total of six now). And our neighbor's spaghetti squash is doing quite well on our side of the fence, with probably ten squashes come harvest time. For a first real foray into gardening, I'm pretty happy.

[KayLR]

Kay......that corn should still be okay. You might help it be a little more upright with some rope across the rows attached to metal stakes at each end of the row.
The corn, even if it's sort of flat, should still make good ears.

I hear ya.......it IS comforting to know we won't starve to death when our "crops" fail in the garden. :)
Yeah, I'm going to assess the situation a bit more this weekend when I have more time. The ironic thing is, it was already roped around as it had been leaning in one area. It doesn't appear to be uprooted; I'll have to see if I can re-rope it up.

[CathyA]

I gave up on growing corn a number of years ago. Just too much work. I learned to make a deep furrow and plant the seed, then add soil around it as it grew. I would even "hill" it up, after it grew to ground level. The weeds in it were always awful. And it still always fell over in a wind. And then.....when the ears were just about ripe, the coons would get them. So now I just buy it at the store. I LOVED home-grown corn, but it was just too much work. Let me know how yours does.

[KayLR]

DH implored that I leave it alone. I don't think it's going to do much.
On another note, all my lovely greens and beets I've been growing in my elevated grow box have become a smorgasbord for finches. they just about nibbled them all away!

Spent last night stapling a closed chicken wire tunnel over the box. I've never had that happen before in all my gardens.

[CathyA]

That's a bummer, Kay. Have you grown those exact things before, and they were never bothered? Are they maybe eating bugs that are on the greens?

[KayLR]

Oh, yes, I've always grown chard and beets. And no, they're eating the entire leaf! They are sweet. They are not touching the kohlrabi which is planted between the chard and beets, so they must not like it.

[CathyA]

That's really curious. I wonder if anyone else here has had that problem?
What kind of finches are they? I wonder if it reflects something going on in their habitat that isn't obvious to humans?.......like some sort of deficiency.??

[CathyA]

Over the 33 years we've lived here, I've planted hundreds of different flowers...........many of which died off. In fact, I'll bet if I hadn't spent money on them, we could have a garage by now!
The flowers that made it are now surrounded every summer by tons of weeds. It's all just too much work any more. So now I'm getting rid of some of them, moving some of them, etc.
I'm really into hostas. They behave themselves, weeds don't grow well through them, they tolerate shade, and their flowers really attract hummingbirds and hummingbird moths.......plus their blossoms are beautiful.....purple or white.
So........I'm transplanting a lot of the hostas to fill up previous spaces that had struggling other flowers. I had several "islands" of flowers in the yard and they always ended up being islands of weeds. So I'm getting rid of the islands.

I'm trying to simplify the areas around my in-ground stocktank watergardens, instead of putting tons of different plants/flowers around them. I'm finally at the point of crying "Uncle!" It will still have lots of flowers/plants.....but in a much orderly fashion. I just can't believe how overwhelming weeds can be. Both DH and I are having wrist problems. DH never wants to give up anything, so I'm having to be the voice of reason.

Hostas are great. I know they probably aren't native......but they are wonderful plants. I used to have northern oats around my ponds, but they are pretty invasive. They were really neat to look at, but pop up everywhere.

The big garden is slowly coming to a close. I'm glad it's finishing up early this year, since I have to figure out all the spacing for all the stock tanks for next year's garden. DH is weeding it nicely, but has to avoid one area because there are monarch caterpillars and a baby treefrog on the milkweed. :)

[Gardenarian]

The deer have entirely destroyed our "deer-proof" fencing, so until we get our new fence up - no gardening to speak of.
I am laying paths and creating beds in the front yard by using a layer of cardboard covered with chips and shredded bark. For the beds, I'll be planting pollinators, natives, and those few edibles that the deer don't devour (mostly herbs.) The plants won't go in for another month or so, when we can be sure of some rain.

[CathyA]

Gardenarian........the deer don't bother our garden anymore. Our fence is only 4' high, but I have mostly metal trellises in it and I think the deer don't want to jump into that.
I've heard that instead of a solid fence, you can use about 4-6 strands of wire from about 2' down up to 9'. Maybe that would work for you?
What kind of fencing did you have?

[KayLR]

That's really curious. I wonder if anyone else here has had that problem?
What kind of finches are they? I wonder if it reflects something going on in their habitat that isn't obvious to humans?.......like some sort of deficiency.??

They're American Goldfinches.