Nov1 and the lettuce is still growing!!!

Having spent our anniversary in NC with friends and family I have been gone for almost a week.  We had a great time in Asheville, NC see how life happens in Western NC.  I find it hard to believe that GB can not even support a whole food / organic market.  Asheville is 80,000 people and they have 4 markets doing a booming business as well as 2 food co-ops.  FRUSTRATION....

We got home this past Thursday.  The rain was just starting on the drive home from the airport.  It continued to rain all day Friday and at least until mid Saturday morning.  Spent Saturday cleaning out the garage and made great headway to get both vehicles back inside.  Let the winter start.

Sunday was spent in the garden.  Lots was accomplished.
1. Picking of vegetables
Picked about a point of broccoli side shoots.  They are nearly done and will most likely get pulled and sent to the leaf bin next weekend.  Great results for late season.  Will definitely do this again next year.

Cut swiss chard (bright lights), beet greens, and a big dish of lettuce.  Yes,  I know it is hard to believe but the greens are still growing.  I am making every effort to not cover them but still feel that the fact that we even have greens is a win.  A really big win.  I will cover as long as we continue to stay above 25.  We will get a good killing frost soon, but probably not this week.

Cut a big bowl of collard greens to make dehydrated veggie chips with them.  Still have two plans left to trim.  The collards were mixed with swiss chard, olive oils, Braggs Amino, and nutritional yeast .  12 hours in the dehydrator and yummy, yummy, yummy.

I still have about 9 brussel sprout plants that are still holding onto their prizes for me.  Great place to store these little gems.  It will be  at least another week until we have to start thinking about what we are going to do with them, other than Thanksgiving.

2.  Asparagus cleanup.
Cut the fronds down for all 4 beds.  Also took the opportunity to weed and clean up the beds.  Actually in pretty good shape.  Spread 13 oz of GreenSand and 12 oz of Rock Phosphate in each bed.  Had a garbage can of potting soil that I needed to find a home for.  Fit nicely as a top dressing for the beds.  Will spread some leaf mold after the ground freezes.

3.  Storing of the leaves
Mike, my great neighbor is really enjoying that fact that he has a place to empty leaves without making his front yard a mess.  He collects the leaves with his JD riding lawn mower and dumps them out of the 3 pt carrying bin right next to my leaf bins. While we were away last week he brought over 3 dumps worth.  They had some rain and actually stating fermenting. I cleaned them up and finished filling leaf bin #1.

By the time I had everything cleaned up,  he had already dumped another load of fresh leaves.  Time from bin #2.  This bin is 4w x 6d x 4 h.  #1 is 4w x 4d x 5h.  Between cutting grass/catching leaves from my lawn and what Mike brought over, #2 is now full.  It will settle and will take at least another 2 good fills.  Who knows, we might even need to put up #3.

All in all, a really good weekend.  Seems that winter is getting closer.

Have a great week
Bill

It may be October but we are still gardening

First off, I need to apologize.  It has been toooooooo long since I have sat down and took the time to let people know what was going on in the garden.  No explanation, just I'm sorry.

The growing season was less than stellar.  Cold early, dry in the middle, and then we got rain and warmth.  Alas, it was basically too late to salvage a great year.  However, the fall broccoli, brussel sprouts, and all the greens did good.  The beans were good enough to freeze some.

Today, I planted 70 white garlic, and 35 purple stripe in bed #5.  It was double dug, tilled with the mantis, fertilized with rock phosphate and green sand, and then planted.  Note:  the garlic follows the tomato/pepper beds.

I also double dug bed #12 to get it ready for winter.  We had peas in it as a green manure crop.  It didn't start out that way but it certainly turned out that way.

We're getting ready to head to North Carolina next week for our anniversary.  Will try and see some organic farms / gardens while we are in the Asheville area.

Until later..
Bill