back to garden time

It's been about a lifetime since I was in the garden. I think the last meaningful time was when I was prepping for the "hurricane" that never was. The worst part of that was I picked all of this fruit that largely ended up spoiling because I couldn't eat it, sauce it, or give it away fast enough. Quite the bummer.

But this was the first Fall weekend when there wasn't a football game, bad weather, or a birthday party - so I got the chance to climb back in there and see what was left. The weather has been so warm for the last week or so that it almost felt like summer.

After just over an hour, things began to feel under control again. The main goal was to remove dead or unproductive branches. The secondary goal was to trim back the plants a bit heavily so as to concentrate all the growing energy on ripening the remaining fruit. An unexpected result? I ripped out a couple of plants completely.

I do wish I had a couple more hours to get things back to normal for the last week or so of growing - but the super short days there just isn't much time for gardening before or after work. Really took for granted that I could go to work, come home, take a long walk, and spend some time in the garden before it got dark. Now? It's dark before I even get home.

TOMATOES

  • ripped out both the Razzle Dazzle 
  • ripped out one of the Red Lightening
  • trimmed back the Orange juice rather heavily
  • could have done more on the black cherry, mystery tomato, black truffle

End result, this cleaning provided a good retrospective of what I really liked about this growing season. Every year I want to plant the black truffle, I always care about checking on its progress. I also really love the cherries but can barely eat all of them (never mind the rest of the produce).

CUCUMBERS
This plant got a lot stronger with the dip September dip in temperature. It really cements the logic that cucumber plants need to go in on the early side to develop better roots. Everything about this babe is heartier. There were a few itty bitty Mexican gherkins hanging around when I peeked under the leaves.

OTHERS

  • PEPPERS // Beyond disappointing. Quite literally 3 peppers all season off of 5 plants? Yes, we had some super windy weather but still. I'm not exactly sure what I would plant instead but these were super dumb.
  • CARROTS // So many. Like, so many carrots. Need to look into how I preserve them for the winter. Something about putting them in a box with sand and straw? 
  • BEANS // I tried to plant a second batch of beans. Didn't take off. They looked good at the start but never took over... even a little. They were so skinny and thin when I pulled them all out this weekend. No sign of beans.
  • KALE // So much kale. One of the great things about kale is how you don't really need to babysit it. It just grows and you pick it. But, right now I could go for some arugula and this weekend I had to buy spinach. I'd like to try and be a little more diverse about this next year. In a fantasy land, I have a tiny cold frame that I keep in the garden to keep greens growing a little longer.
  • HERBS // I have never seen parsley so large in my life. It's like it's on growth hormones but I haven't fertilized (organic) in probably 2 months... The basil is gone and the parsley swallowed the mint whole. I didn't even think anything could kill mint but apparently this parsley has super powers. 

Veggie 2017: hurricane prep [9/17], garden update [9/9], green tomato party [7/27] garden update [7/10], garden decisions [5/27], what I planted [6/16]

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