a snow bouquet

we are bundled up here and ready for the snow.
yes you read right, SNOW!
i know for some of you this is no big deal.
but where we are snow in october is rare.
and possibly 10 inches, well that now is unheard of.
to say the little people around here are excited would be an understatement.
and the big people, well they are excited too.
we have brought in the potted plants,
harvested what was left,
stuffed the chicken coop with straw,
and put the walls on the rabbit hutch
to give the bunnies a bit more insulation.
but a little gnomey in our garden thought it most important to pick "a vase" as she calls it or a bouquet before the snow comes.
she chose a nasturtium (hard to believe nasturtiums are still growing when snow is on it's way),
a small chard leaf,
a sedum,
an anise hyssop flower
and a begonia.
so sweet, and quite beautiful
as it sits there on our windowsill
waiting for the first flake to fall.

late october in the garden

snow is in the forecast for tomorrow. we keep having false alarms in the frost department, but we felt it was time to harvest our tomatillos. did you know that we didn't think we planted tomatillos this year? we were sent tomatillo seeds instead of the husk cherry seeds that we ordered. i'm not complaining. more salsa verde in our very near future. we also pulled out our matt's wild cherry tomato plants (finally!) and have an entire colander full of various shades of cherry tomatoes sitting by the sink.



it's time to plant garlic. many of you wrote to tell me that you are a bit intimidated by garlic. don't be! it's super easy to grow and doesn't have many pests. just simply break the bulb into cloves. don't peel them.



and plant them with the tip pointing up. i've read different opinions about spacing. 4-6 inches sounds good to me. at the farm, we plant them 8 inches apart because we have the room to do so. push the entire clove into the soil and cover. pat the soil down when you finish planting.

if you have a chance, enhance your soil with some aged manure or compost. at the farm, we add cheep cheep, which is supposed to be good for any plants in the allium family.



our hives are wrapped and ready for winter weather should it truly arrive tomorrow. mouse guards are in place, too. we're all set whether it snows or not.

quiet in the garden

a quiet evening in the garden.

an accidental abundance of gourds

 

 

 

so here i am, with a pile of gourds.  i didn't intend to plant these, you see. this plant was supposed to be a crazy productive zucchini grown from seeds that my coworker saved from his crazy productive zucchini last year.  but, apparently it was some sort of hybrid and got cross-pollinated because this is what we both ended up with this year, instead of a boatload of zucchini. 

so i ask you, gardening friends, what in the world am i supposed to do with all of these gourds?  just put them in a bowl and let them look pretty? i'm gathering that's pretty much all gourds are good for, but i'm open to any and all suggestions.

(alternatively, i could feed them to my dog, because apparently he thinks they look mighty tasty!)

backyard chicken workshop

chris and i have taught several different kinds of workshops, all related to our backyard.
but one of our favorites is backyard chickens.
we taught one on tuesday night at a local high school through a community class program.
we give a really fun slide presentation with all of our own photos.
we talk about coop designs, breed selection, chicken care basics and the wonderful benefits of keeping a small-scale backyard chicken coop.
this time we thought it would be fun to give a two part workshop,the second part being in our backyard.
we wanted people to see how small our space really is and what you can do in such a tiny space.
today participants came for the second part.
some brought their kids (who got the biggest kick out of petting the girls and feeding them sunflower seeds) as well as partners and spouses.
two women even went home to get their husbands and bring them back to talk to chris more about how to build themselves a coop like ours:)
it was such fun showing every one around
and sending them all off to come up with their own little backyard operation.

Pepper harvest

Last night in anticipation of autumn's first frost, we covered tomato plants, brought in the potted plants, and harvested all the peppers. There are five bags of sweet and hot peppers! So now I am on the hunt for pepper recipes. Do you know of any to add to the list?

Roasted Tomato Soup
Cream of Red Pepper Soup
Sweet Pepper and Lentil Soup and Romesco Sauce (also on that page)
Roasted Sweet Potato Salad with Red Pepper Vinaigrette
Fusilli with Sweet and Hot Peppers, Fava Beans, Lemon, and Olives
Bell Pepper Egg-in-a-Hole

autumn garden notes

I took a walk down to our field garden today. It's the garden that's so far away that we often go a full week without checking in. We have some gilfeather turnips that are ready whenever we are, but i'm waiting for Thanksgiving. I love looking around our gardens and seeing things that will end up on our thanksgiving table: tiny brussels sprouts, leeks, sage, and kale.

The winter rye cover crop we planted is doing well. You can see it in this photo growing all around the turnips. I have to say that the morton oats we broadcast on the left side of the garden did not germinate as well.

Next week, we'll plant our garlic. We've been holding out because it's been warmer than usual and we don't want the cloves to germinate and grow too much before the winter snow cover. I recently came across this article on garlic and really enjoyed it. Everything you need to know right in one place. Our seed garlic from Fedco arrived recently too. We're planting five different varieties as we want to do a taste test and find our favorites. And we really would love to be garlic farmers one day. Here's what we're planting:

Georgian Fire
German Extra-Hardy
Music
Phillips
Russian Red

How about you? Are you planting garlic this year?



I couldn't leave the garden without taking back a snack. three pretty little cherry belle radishes. a nice treat.