freeze warning tonight!

 
 
I worked this afternoon to get my tender greens covered and the last of my frost-sensitive vegetables harvested. A frost, or even a freeze, is predicted in my area tonight. I have to admit I’m not ready for the end of the season. I was hoping it would go on for quite a while yet. It’s seven days later than our average frost date so it has been a nice long growing season.
 
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today’s garden work

 
 
With a frost coming tonight, I did a lot of clean up at my home garden: – Pick the last of the green tomatoes, eggplants, peppers and watermelons – Remove tomato tepees (10-ft wood stakes) – Pull tomato plants and compost (nice with no late blight – right into compost bin) – Pull and compost all frost sensitive plants: pepper, eggplant, basil, cilantro, beans – Cut off sweet potato vines and compost (bins nice and full by now!) – Find my heavy row cover in shed, lay it out on…
 
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garlic sources for planting

 
 
Here’s the list of garlic seed sources that people have recommended so far from my post a few days ago. They look awesome! I can’t wait to try out some new sources. If you have one to add, let me know and I’ll include it here. Pacific Northwest: Filaree Garlic Farm – So many! This source was seconded and thirded! Washington State Adaptive Seeds: Good selection, also grey shallots, free shipping over $50. Oregon Territorial Seeds: Oregon Colorado:  The Garlic Store Potato Garden New England: Fedco bulbs division: Maine. Ordering…
 
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green tomatoes

 
 
Seems we might get a freeze or frost Sunday night. I picked 32 lbs of green tomatoes today! This caps off a pretty good harvest. I didn’t weigh everything, but I bet I harvested 100-150 lbs of tomatoes.
 
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today’s garden work

 
 
At my community plot: – Clean up and compost the last of the squash vines. – Rack beds all smooth (except one with beans, fennel and tomatillos still growing) – Spread and rack in cover crop seeds (I used Johnny’s green manure mix: rye, clover, vetch and field pea)
 
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ordering garlic – where do you buy garlic?

 
 
I FINALLY remembered to order my garlic. I hope it gets here soon. I’d like to plant it at the end of this month – in 2 or 3 weeks. My garlic crop had problems this year. More than half of it rotted in the ground. I only harvested 40 heads so I decided to eat them all and buy new (clean) stock. I usually like to save 75-100 cloves (about 15-20 of the biggest heads) for planting. I checked a couple local sources first (Johnny’s and Fedco) but seems…
 
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chickens are molting

 
 
My chickens have started molting. The coop is covered with feathers. I guess they are shedding their dirty summer feather and will grow in fluffy new down coats for winter. I’m told it takes a lot of protein to molt and they don’t lay eggs during this time. I’m down to one egg a day. Only because the youngest (Roxy: my barred Rock) hasn’t started her molt yet. Today, I’ll try to remember to get their winter light set up. I put a standard 40 watt bulb in the coop…
 
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what caused my garlic to rot? rotation, rotation, rotation

 
 
I’ve been thinking about why half of my garlic crop rotted this year. In early spring, my garlic plants yellowed and curled and then died. This started mostly in one area of the bed and then gradually other plants curled and died more slowly. Some just stopped growing looking like a small plant, but when pulled, the bulb was rotten. Once I saw the plants rotting, I worried that I planted where onions had been last year and maybe garlic the prior. This is my list for crops the bed…
 
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frost?

 
 
We’re creeping toward our average first frost date… It would normally be October 10 and was right on schedule last year. This year, it looks like we have at least a week to go. That’s good. I want to get my winter bed covers in place before we get too cold. I’m planning to dig out around the bed and run hardware cloth 6 inches down to keep the voles out. Also planning to order a bottle of castor oil to soak the soil at the edges of the bed.…
 
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today’s garden work

 
 
I was at my community garden plot. Today’s work: – Pick the last of the winter squashes and one last summer squash: a nice Costata Romanescu zucchini. – Harvest the green tomatoes. Take down and compost the dry tomato vines. (I didn’t have time to water these for the past, very dry, two month.) – Harvest green beans. I got a nice late crop of Jumbo, a wide Italian bean. – Cut back dry perennial flowers, like tansy, and the tall dried up sunflowers. – Weed the beds so they…
 
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Kathy Martin
This is a journal of my vegetable gardens. Skippy thinks the garden is his, even though I do all the work. We're located near Boston, in USDA zone 6. I have bees, chickens, fruit trees and berry bushes, too. I use all sustainable organic methods and strive to grow all of my family's vegetables myself. -Kathy


weeks and counting until my last spring frost

What I planted recently

Jan 21
thyme, lettuce, escarole

Feb 21
celery, celeriac, parsley, leeks

March 11
cabbage, kale, arugula



What I'm planting soon

April 1
peppers, eggplants, marigolds, beets

April 12
tomatoes, basil, sunflowers

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My garden this week

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17 years of archives!

Check out the food pantry farm I helped to start up:

Aurelia's Garden

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Skippy’s vegetable of the month – Egyptian walking onions!

“I envision a day when every city and town has front and back yards, community gardens and growing spaces, nurtured into life by neighbors who are no longer strangers, but friends who delight in the edible rewards offered from a garden they discovered together.” – Greg Peterson

"What can happen to a seed is a miracle."

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