It's Fall, Y'all

We've had a few faintly frosty nights lately.  Yesterday, I went down to the garden to see what havoc they caused. 

The purple hull peas are goners.  It's a shame that I did not get the seeds in the ground a couple of weeks earlier; most of the pods did not have time to fully fill out. 

The pepper plants are wilty, but the peppers still hanging on them are fine, since we haven't had freezing temperatures yet.  Ditto for the tomatoes. 

Everything else - greens, radishes, broccoli, and brussels sprouts - stood up well to the frost.  The greens are pickin' size, finally.  Radishes are ready to eat.  The beets are still small, but doing well.  The broccoli and brussels sprouts look as though they're considering doing some work.  The sugar snap peas have bloomed, but I'm not finding any pods yet.  I wonder if the bees have been too cold and sluggish to do any pollenating.

I have decided that I like fall gardening better than summer gardening.

Fall Garden Check-Up

Yesterday afternoon, as soon as we returned from a camping trip (which you can read about at www.susanshappytrails.blogspot.com as soon as I get around to posting), I went to the garden to see how things were growing.

The broccoli and brussels sprouts are looking great!  The radishes have marble-sized roots.  Greens are coming along nicely. 

We have three volunteer plants that I thought were squash.  Never mind that I did not plant any squash where these things sprouted; they had the look of squash plants, and when they bloomed, they looked like squash blooms.  They are starting to fruit now, and I have no idea what they are.  They are shaped like yellow squash, but they are mint green. 

Last Monday, I planted more seeds - bok choy, cabbage, rainbow chard, and lettuce.  It may have been pure insanity to plant these things this late.  I've never even seen rainbow chard, but it looked pretty on the package, so I thought, "Why not?"  It has rained here since I planted this last batch of seeds, and I could not walk between the rows without sinking in the mud.  The whole garden has tiny little green things coming up everywhere, most of which are weeds, and from a distance I could not tell if the new seeds have sprouted.  But I put some of the lettuce seeds in a planter box on the patio, and they have sprouted, so hopefully there's lettuce in the garden, too.

The purple hull peas I planted several weeks ago are starting to mature.  Nanny said that she picked and shelled "a cup full" of peas, and that they may not be purple hull peas because their "eyes" are pink.  Pink eyes or not, we are hoping that the first frost holds off long enough to allow the rest of the crop to mature.

Cool-Weather Plants

Saturday I planted the broccoli and brussels sprouts that I started indoors a while  back.  They've been living on my front porch for a few weeks, where they've been getting serious afternoon sun.  I hope they like their new digs.

Today I planted turnips, mustard greens, kale, spinach, and collards.  The spinach seeds were left-overs from some previous year; time will tell if they're still viable.  I also planted radishes and beets.

It may be too late in the year for everything but the greens, but there's no harm in trying, right? 

Oh, and NEWSFLASH!  We have carrots!  Not just little matchstick-sized things, either, but full-fledged carrots.  It's a gardening first for me.

Blue Moons

The mailman left fall garden seeds in my mailbox this week - sugar snap peas, cabbage, beets, radishes, and carrots.  I decided this afternoon that I'd better get busy preparing the soil for planting. 

Right now, my garden is about halfway toward being a mess (or, for the glass-half-full folks, it's 1/2 clean).  The front 1/4 was recently plowed and disked and is ready for tilling.  At the far edge of this strip stands a double row of the scrawniest rattlesnake bean plants you ever saw, plants that have only made one pickin' of beans all summer.  I decided to let them stand, having had, in past years, sickly plants suddenly spring to life with the September rains and bear until frost.  My intention is to plant the sugar snap peas right beside them, so that the peas can use the existing string supports.  On the other side of the bean trellis are several rows of beans, peppers, and tomatoes.  It is all over-grown; the tomatoes have fallen over, cages and all.  Beyond these rows are three immaculately clean rows of purple hull peas that are just starting to grow, a grassy row of scraggly tomatoes, and three more clean rows of purple hull peas. 

The task I set for myself this afternoon was to (1) apply lime and fertilizer to the front 1/4 of the garden and till it into the soil, and (2) plant the sugar snap peas.  All I actually accomplished was applying the lime and fertilizer, and tilling the soil one row wide on either side of the bean trellis where the snap peas will go.  As I was tilling, it occurred to me that we're about to have a blue moon.  I think I shall wait until Friday to plant the blue-green, moon-shaped seeds.  ;)

The broccoli and brussels sprouts that I started from seeds a couple of weeks ago are ready to go in the garden.  They're going in the front 1/4, once I prepare the soil.  I planted the cabbage seeds indoors yesterday.  I don't know whether they'll grow in time to make heads before winter. 

I still haven't decided what to do about the carrots and beets.  I've not had much luck with root vegetables.  This clay soil is just too hard.  Fellow gardeners have suggested that I mix some sand into the soil, but online sources say that it takes a lot of sand - a truck load for a big garden - to help clay soil.  But I've had another idea.  I saw a 10-ft.-long livestrock feeding trough in a farm supply ad.  I could fill it with half soil and half sand and plant the seeds there, and it could happen in my very own yard (instead of across the road in Nanny's yard), where I can keep a watch on the plants.  I'll let you know if it works!

Fall Gardening

The summer garden is getting tired, and I am tired of fooling with it.  Yesterday, I decided that it was time to get rid of some of the most troublesome and least-producing areas.  I pulled up some tomatoes that weren't earning their keep.  The Husband cranked up the tractor and plowed and disked the front third of the garden, which was mostly sunflowers, scraggly tomatoes, and weeds.  So far, I've managed not to kill the broccoli and brussels sprouts that I started 3 weeks ago.  They have been transplanted into plastic drinking cups (just try and find peat pots or pellets around here this time of year) and are now living on my front porch.  In a couple of weeks, when this heat lets up, I'll move them to the garden.

Today, I made two more batches of pepper jelly.  I gave away at least half of the first batch.  It's kind of fun to make new pepper jelly converts.  Those who have never had it will crinkle up their noses and say, "Pepper jelly?"  But once I give them a jar and they try it, they're hooked.  Today's second batch also has onions in it (I was a tad short on peppers).  I haven't tasted it yet, but it smelled delicious while it was cooking.

Purple Hull Peas

This evening, The Husband and I planted six rows of purple hull peas.  We missed the almanac's planting window by a day, but maybe they'll make.

The broccoli and brussels sprouts that I planted last week have come up.  I could not believe how quickly they sprouted.  I planted them Friday afternoon.  By Saturday night, there was a white dot in one of the tray compartments on the broccoli side.  By Sunday morning, ALL of the broccoli side had sprouted.  By Monday afternoon, the brussels sprouts were up, too.

They're leggy, though.  They're in a south window, with a flourescent light shining on them, but they seem to need more light than they're getting.  I'm scared to put them outside - even in the shade - in this heat.  Cross your fingers that I can keep them alive until they can go outside.

Canning Frenzy

As soon as I can work up the energy to get up, I'm going to bed.

It was a long day in the kitchen. 

When I went to bed last night, my plan was to get up early this morning and go to the garden before it got so hot.  I didn't factor in that big old margarita I had with dinner last night.  It was almost 9 before my feet hit the floor.  I was slightly headache-y, slow and mean.  Before I'd even finished my first cup of coffee, Nanny called, wondering if I was planning on working in the garden.  I said I was, and that I'd be down there as soon as we finished breakfast. 

It was hot as blazes.  Nanny was already out there, and had picked the squash and eggplants and was working on the tomatoes.  All I really wanted was a few hot peppers and a few squash.  But the butterbeans needed picking - some of them had already dried up - and I knew that if I pick get them Nanny would, and she was already hot enough. 

I came home with a two buckets of tomatoes, a sack of squash, and a sack of hot peppers.  In addition, there were two grocery bags full of pears on my kitchen table.  I set to work peeling and chopping.  By 4 p.m., I'd canned four pints of pear butter, 5 pints of squash pickle, and 6 pints of pepper jelly. 

I made the pear butter a little differently this year.  These little pears were slightly under-ripe and hard as rockes.  Instead of peeling them then cooking them, I just washed them, put them in a roasting pan, and baked them in the oven at 350 for an hour.  They came out brown and wrinkly.  When they cooled, I quartered them and stuffed them through my Sauce Master, peelings, cores, and all, using the juice screen.  The ground pulp felt a little gritty, so I ran them through the squeezer again, using the berry screen (it has a finer mesh).  The second squeezing took out a lot of the "grit."  I put sugar, lemon juice, honey, cinnamon, and cloves in them and cooked them until they were hot and bubbly, then put them in the jars and water bathed them.  In retrospect, I wonder if I should have pressure canned them.  Maybe I'll research that tomorrow.

After the canning was done (which, as you will know if you've ever done any canning, involves washing a mountain of pots, pans, bowls, measuring cups, spoons....) I had to go to the grocery store, as we'd invited the kids over for dinner.  When I got home, the men-folk were doing stuff on the tractor.  It was 9 p.m. by the time we ate.

I'm going to bed.