Frost

We finally had a bit of cold weather and you can clearly see some of the frost damage on the plants. I believe the temperature at the Epworth Veggie Garden drop to around 30 or 31 degrees overnight. Above, you can see damage to the red salvia. Below you'll see some damage to the Lima beans. We'll probably pull out many of the damaged plants this weekend. The tomatoes have really slowed down with the cooler weather. Not may of the nice "vine ripe" tomatoes we had a wee or so ago. Soon we will switch from "harvest" mode to "clean up" mode.

More Veggies

The harvest is winding down for the year. The weather is turning cooler and veggies like the tomatoes and yellow squash has slowed down production. We decided this evening to harvest the last batch of carrots and another solid batch of lettuce. Looking back on this year, well....its been a great year. Check out the harvest numbers. Best year yet!

What's Left in the Garden?

I thought I'd like the veggies that are still growing in the garden and include some pictures. You never know what the weather will be like and I'm sure as soon as we have our first good frost we'll be out of the regular gardening business. We could bring in some techniques to extend the gardening season, but some of the gardeners and the soil need a little time to recover for next year. Typically our gardening season has been from about April until late October.

Here is what's left in the garden: lettuce, beans, yellow squash (this is our second planting this year), tomtoes, peppers, okra, collard green, cabbage, carrots and some herbs.

Epworth Havesting

We've had lots of rain in the past week and unfortunately we haven't been able to harvest in the gardens like we normally would. This evening, I went out determined to harvest tomatoes and a few other items. I knew that since we hadn't picked tomatoes in about a week that there would be lots! This time of the year darkness comes earlier and earlier so it becomes a race against time to get over to the garden after work and harvest everything before night comes. First on the list to harvest are the purple beans. Purple is a bit hard to see in the dark. Last on the list is typically tomatoes. At a certain point it becomes just too dark to see the tomatoes and you'll start stepping on more than you harvest. I got as much as I could before it was just too dark. I'll try to get up early in the morning and go back to the garden and harvest more tomatoes. I bet this week will be a record harvest for tomatoes for Epworth.

Buckeye Lake

The harvest at Buckeye Lake is winding down for the season. We're getting a few tomatoes, but many aren't being picked regularly. It appears that perhaps some birds are snacking on the tomatoes? We've seen slugs on the tomatoes and many of the tomatoes are laying directly on the ground. Next year, we'll need to do a better job of staking the tomatoes, watering and harvesting.


One of the coolest things is the seed pods that have formed on the broccoli. We've let the broccoli continue to grow and even flower. Sorry the picture didn't turn out, but perhaps next week we'll have a picture. Many of the kids are mentioning how good the "green beans" are, but they seem to take a little like broccoli. This is the first time I've seen broccoli seeds.

Northwold

Its been tough to keep up the watering over at the Northwold property. The one thing about growing veggies in the wading pools is that you need to make sure the moisture level in the soil is consistent. We've been through several extremes with the pools this year. We've had plants stressed from lack of water and then bottom rot on the tomatoes. Things are a little easier now that we have the 55 gallon rain barrel to fill up and take over to the garden. Perhaps next year we can figure out a way to have water available at the garden.

Potatoes

The past few weeks I've been very curious about the potatoes. At times I would stop at the "potato box" and dig around a little with my hand. I guess you are suppose to wait to harvest until the plants have died back. Well - the garden season is winding down and I just could not wait any longer! Towards the end of the night, I decided to take a look and see if I could find any potatoes. After I dug up the first potato I was ready for a second potato, then a third and so on.


By the end of the night we had dug the potatoes up in about 1/2 of the bed. The potatoes were nice. I asked several others in the garden if they'd like to dig some potatoes and that it was like a treasure hunt. Finally a couple of the youth tried their hand at potato digging and actually said how much fun it was to search for the potatoes.