October Garden Ramblings.
Veggies took a lot longer to ripen this year but luckily for us, harvest has been prolonged with the lovely sunny weather, giving the stragglers time to finish off.
In The Hoop House
The luffa gourds are in the hoop house, the unheated greenhouse, still growing and ripening off. As with all gourds, ripening on the vine is always best for good curing so will leave them in there as long as sunshine is in the forecast. Will pull them in to finish off when the weather changes as they will quickly rot in cool, damp weather, even in the hoophouse.
We have emptied the hoop house bed of everything besides these gourds and one tomato plant, the Mystery Keeper, that is still going strong. The tomato post will be coming along this week for us tomato nutters ; )
In The Potager (Spring and Summer sown crops)
What is left to do in the potager? We still have tons of basil yet to harvest, a few pumpkins that I am still waiting on, and a few heads of summer cabbage left to deal with.
After that, is time to clean up and put away the weeping hoses, trellises, tomato cages…
The rest of the veggies will stay in the potager to be harvested in fall and winter.
Beets - pickled half of them, leaving the others in the garden for fresh eating.
Brussels Sprouts - not yet as big for Thanksgiving as I would like so leaving them for Christmas dinner instead. They get sweeter and better tasting after they have been frosted. Take off any yellowing leaves and twist off the cabbage like top to help the sprouts size up.
Cabbage - You can leave your cabbage in the beds if you are not ready to deal with them. Give the heads a quarter turn to loosen some of the roots, this will keep them from splitting in the fall rains.
Carrots - Leave them in the garden till you need them. The frost will eventually do in the greens but the roots will be just fine till you need them. try to use them all up by March or they will become woody and soon start to go to seed.
Celery - Harvest stalks as you need them. They will be fantastic until we start to get lots of rain and cold, then they turn to mush for a bit, leave them in and they will start to put out new growth from the middle. Nothing better than homegrown celery!
Kale - hardy as all get out. Harvest as needed through rain and snow.
Leeks - leave in till needed.
Parsnips - In the pic above. They are amazing this year. I will be leaving them for a while as they get sweeter once we get some frost, so will pull a few for Thanksgiving but leaving the rest till winter.
Do a thorough clean up in the beds now to prevent bugs and weeds next year. Run your hoe through the garden to upend any weeds that may have blown in. Make sure to run the hoe along the sides of the beds to dislodge any bug eggs, too. Remove any plant debris as they may be harbouring pests or eggs.
Top dress the beds with 1/2 inch to 3 inches of manure or compost in the fall, after clean up is done. Do not dig it in or you will be breaking up all your lovely fungi threads and natural soil organisms that give you better crops next year. Add shredded leaves to your manure, if you have, to feed the soil life.
Here is a post about how to put your garden to bed in the fall, the no dig way : )
The Winter Veggie Garden (late summer planted and sown)
All is well in the fall and winter patch. Fall and winter gardens are super easy to care for, not much attention required. I watered in late August and early September to make sure the seeds and transplants got off to a good start but nothing since. Just harvesting and enjoying.
The lettuces and beets will be harvested this fall, while the rest will come along in the new year. In this uncovered bed, we have mostly fall veggies but also the purple sprouting broccoli which will be ready in February or March.
The mesh covered bed houses cauliflower, broccoli, onions, cabbage, anything that is prone to bugs.
We top dressed this bed (was the potato bed this summer) with a couple of inches of chicken manure in preparation for garlic planting later on this month. Have covered it with chicken wire and goat wire to keep out Little Lulu, our feisty little mouse and rat hunter.
Fruit Trees and Shrubs (and ornamental ones, as well) - I have had several of you ask how to winterize fruiting shrubs and trees. Other than a good clean up around the trees and shrubs by raking up the leaves and fallen fruits, very little needs to be done at this time of year. A good clean up now will help cut down on bugs next year. To feed them, you add manure around the drip line in March or April.
If you are off island, water all of your trees in well before the snow flies.
Pruning - Remove dead, diseased, or damaged branches now but leave the real pruning till spring.
Pick up a Dormant Spray Kit (horticultural oil and lime sulphur) now so that you can spray your roses and fruit trees for bugs and fungal issues next month.
Over-Wintering Bulbs, Corms, Tubers - In our mild climate, it can be very tempting to leave dahlias in the ground. I used to leave mine but over the years have lost every single one, little by little. While I was not particularly attached to the specific varieties that I had, it sure does add up to replace them year after year. If you decide to leave yours, mulch heavily with leaves, bark mulch, compost, or straw… and cross your fingers for a mild winter.
If you are going to lift them, dig up the tubers and cut off the top foliage, leaving just about 2" of stem. Hose them down to clean off the soil, place to cure in a warm, airy spot for a week or two, or even longer. I use the greenhouse tables to dry mine but you can place them on newsprint in the furnace room or laundry room, too. Do not place directly on concrete or you may get rot. Wooden surface, cardboard or newsprint is best.
After curing, you can either store them till spring or prune them after curing this fall. I like spring pruning as the eyes are easier to spot, but generally it just depends on how much time I have in fall. If you want to wait till spring, store as mentioned below., or if you want to divide them now..
Start by removing any bits that are bruised or damaged, maybe by the shovel as you dug them up, or by bugs, etc.. these bits will just rot in storage.
You then want to remove any tubers that are growing off of another tuber. They will not ever make eyes or grow any leaves or stems, so toss them away.
Generally, you would also throw away the mother tuber, the one that grew this year’s flower, as that will rarely do much the following year.
Then have a look at what you have left and start dividing. Make sure that you have an eye on each piece that you keep. The eyes are wee bumps around the top of each tuber, up by the old stem, not all over the tuber like they are on a potato. They just look like little dots. This is where the new stems will come from.
To store, place the good tubers in a box or bin with vermiculite, peat moss, or potting soil, label, store in a cool-ish (+5°C), dark spot till spring. Make sure that they are not touching each other. I toss mine into a cardboard box with some potting soil and stick it under one of the greenhouse tables for the winter. A temp of +5 to 10°C is the ideal storage temp.
Most all other tubers, corms, and bulbs can be treated the same way, they should all be cut back and cured for several weeks before storage.
Canna lilies in pots can be left in their pots, if you like. Bring into a garage, greenhouse or shed, keep cool but not cold, cut back, and leave till spring. Pull them out into the greenhouse or into the warm sun in spring and they will soon start to send up new leaves. I leave mine for two or three years, then I lift and separate them so that they do not outgrow the pot.
Garden Clean Up - While I do a super duper thorough clean up in the food garden to thwart pests from over wintering, I leave most of the flowers in the front garden standing till spring. Yes, they kind of get bedraggled in the winter rains, but they also offer a bounty of food for both the native bee population (active till November), birds of all kinds, and other wee critters, too.
Many of the native solitary bees will overwinter in the hollow stems/canes of plants like raspberries and lilies. It is vital that we do what we can to save our native bees. While they do not give you honey, they pollinate more of our trees, flowers, and veggies than the honeybees do and are a vital part of our eco-system. So, leave those asters, black-eyed susans, coneflowers, sedums, and such, for now, they are super easy to rake up in spring.
Leaf raking and blowing… obviously, you cannot leave tons of leaves on your lawn or it will suffer over winter, but leave them standing wherever you can (in the side yard, the flower beds), to provide shelter for the wee little critters like frogs, snakes, ladybugs, salamanders, native bees … over the winter months. We leave ours everywhere except the potager beds and the walkway and driveway. In the rest of the areas, we just consider it garden gold : )
Planting bulbs now for flowers in spring - Pick up loads of tulip, daffodil, crocus, grape hyacinth bulbs to pot up and plant in your garden beds. Plant in clumps of 3 or 5 or 7 or in wide blocks for an eye-catching border planting.
Clean up your greenhouse in preparation for fall and winter. Get rid of lingering pests and dirt and algae before you bring your tender plants back in to over-winter.
HERE is how we do the clean up...
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| Tibetan Garlic |
What to sow and grow now? Garlic.
Here is the how to for growing really great garlic.
You can try sowing or planting some hardy greens, leeks, shallots, and onions in a covered bed but out in the garden, is too late to plant your fall, winter, and spring crops.
Next month, you can sow your broadbeans, order them now so you are ready to go.
Transplant/move/plant - This is a great time to transplant or plant new trees and shrubs, too. Anything from the shops or currently growing in pots, will need no additional pruning or care, just amend the planting hole, rough up the roots a bit, and pop in the hole. Water once. Likely you will not need to do much more to it this season, unless we have many weeks of dry weather, so that it needs another shot of water.
Anything you are transplanting will need to be cut back so that they put all their energy into getting a strong root system rather than fruiting or maintaining top growth..
Strawberries - Your strawberries should be renewed and rejuvenated every third or fourth year. After that time, the berries begin to get smaller, misshapen, dry, and less tasty. Lift and compost the 'mother' plant, clip off the runners, and plant these 'daughter' plants into new rows that have been well amended with manure or compost.
The potager... slightly bedraggled looking but lovely in it’s own way…
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