Fall Planting

I'm not really into planting bulbs.  I have enough lilies about to keep me in bulbs for the year.  I never got into tulips and the like.  I guess they are just too ephemeral - a quick splash of color in the late spring, followed by months of withered leaves.  I think I prefer plants that take their time and stay around a while (I still have stella d'oro lilies flowering!).

The only bulbs I plant are garlic bulbs.  Today was the day.  We filled one of the deep beds in the raised bed garden.  I covered it with a bunch of mulched leaves.  It will be about 9 months before we get garlic - but what a great scent once we pick it (assuming you like garlic).

I have turned over most the empty beds and hit them with a dose of calcium / calcium sulfate pellets.  I swear by the stuff.  We had a lot of fruit on our plants this year, and no blossom rot in our tomatoes!

As always, we have one tree that hasn't dropped it's leaves.  It is the same every year.  Luckily, there is still a little room in the compost bins for it's leaves.

I have to cut back the peonies and four o'clocks.  I also need to rake out the shade garden and hosta beds once they are thoroughly withered.  Not much yard work left.  We are moving into the quiet time around here...

Changes

I have been traveling a lot lately, and need to catch up on yard work.  Our autumn is nearly over, the majority of the leaves are off the trees and in the compost bins.  Morning frosts have shut down almost all the garden plants (except for the spinach, collards and arugula).

We have had cold and windy days with scattered rain.  I cleaned out the gutters, collected seeds pods from the green bean plants for next year, pulled the bean, zucchini, and peppers plants (into the compost bins they went), trimmed some bushes, put away lawn furniture, did a mowing (the final one for the year I think), trimmed the grass, ran the string trimmer dry, cleaned up the porch, brought the potted herbs inside.  Just getting ready for the coming winter.

We have been running the pellet stove almost continuously.  It is getting colder, and the days are getting shorter.

I really sense the change this year as I recently came back from New Zealand and Australia.  It is spring in those southern parts of the world.  Time to enjoy the warmth there...

Auckland Harbor and the Botanical Gardens!  Cherry blossoms, quiet paths, spring flowers...

 

Sydney, Australia!  Opera House, Botanical Gardens, colorful flowers, tropical birds... 

Autumn Barns and Bridges

We took a little vacation last weekend down to Gettysburg.  We took the long way down, backroads, rolling hills, the changing seasons.

The leaves were really starting to change...

We came across a farm with a whimsically painted silo!

There were a wide variety of well-cared barns about the Gettysburg battlefields . . .

One of the most stately is the Maclean Barn.

I really like the way the doors are painted.  I also have seen this in Ohio.

 The Trostle Barn is very unique - it is built of brick (note the cannon ball hole in the gable end...).

We read about the Sachs Bridge.  With the assistance of a GPS, we were able to find it.  It is the most famous covered bridge in Pennsylvania.  It is quite picturesque.

And yet another stately barn.

The weather was perfect, as was the scenery.  It is good to just travel about and enjoy the simple views of countryside.

Trying to Change

It's amazing what a little change in temperature and daylight does.  Autumn has started, and the cooler winter and ever-delayed sunrises have really slowed me down.  I don't have many chores to get ready for the winter.  I'll have to clean out the gardens, fill my compost bins with leaves, plant our garlic, and clean out the the flower beds.

I worked out over the weekend, but just didn't seem real motivated to work all day in the yard.  I gues my body is telling me to slow down and get ready for the quite times.

The big maples are starting to change . . . 

The leaves are really starting to accumulate . . .

The roads nearby are starting to be framed in color.

I'll need to start raking soon!

The sumac are really changing now.  It is definitely autumn.

The Black-Eyed Susans are looking spent . . .

. . . the hydrangeas are at peak . . .

. . . as are the fields of goldenrod . . .

. . . and the sedum.

I was surprised to see the columbines have bloomed again . . .

 

. . . as were some of the stella d'oro lillies!

Well, if some of the plants think it is still summer, I guess I can play along and mow the grass!

Plaid Days

I took the red-eye back from Los Angeles.  It was nearly 90 degF and sunny every day I was there.  When I got off the plane back home, I was greeted with cool weather.  The toll keeper at the airport parking lot told me that there were flurries early that morning.

We started the pellet stove this morning to take the chill out of the house. I brewed a pot of coffee and enjoyed it with some pumpkin and spice creamer.

It is time to break out the plaid shirts.  I can feel the summer heat flowing away. I started to pull out the spent plants from the garden.  The tomato vines are withered.  I pulled out gallons of drops - most were starting to rot.  It was a bumper crop this year.  A few drops are not a concern.  We are still getting zucchini, peppers, and green beans.  The cool weather plants are coming strong - the spinach, collards and arugula.  The bees are furiously buzzing around the basil plants.  The shortening days mean they have to work even harder to get ready for winter.

I used four pallets to make a bin for the garden waste.  I don't like to put anything with seeds and heavy roots into the compost bins as the seeds seem to return the next year.  With the larger garden we started this year, the new bin will get full very quickly.

The leaves are starting to fall from the trees. The trees are starting to look tired - the vibrant green of summer is getting ready to change.  It won't be long before autumn starts - next week as the calendar predicts.

The Coming Fall

The goldenrod is in full bloom now.  Fall will be here soon.  We have been busy with end of season activities and keeping up with the garden.  We have had a bumper crop this year.  Our freezers are near bursting.  We have carrots, peppers, green beans, snow peas, corn and tomatoes in the freezer.  Now we are in the last throws of canning.  Lots of jars of pickles, hot sauce, cherry peppers, and tomato sauce.

We have had to resort to using buckets to collect the tomatoes.  We had a frost advisory late in the week and are scrambling to keep up with the harvest.

Our counters are full of tomatoes.  Today we made a gallon of marinara.

I also put up a a few pints of basil pesto.  I'll do a few more pints next weekend and we'll make more sauce,

The zucchini are slowing down, and we are near the end of the tomato picking.  I still have to put up a few more jars of cherry peppers, and make some dilly beans.

We have some fall spinach, arugula and collards waiting for us.  I'll start to turn the beds over for next year.  The quiet times will be coming soon.

You Say Potato, I Say Tomato

Thursday night brought a lot of rain.  Localized flooding ensued.  The East Branch of the Owego is just 1/4 of a mile from our place.  The low-lying fields by the river were flooded . . .

Our creek was running high, but we had no flooding at our place.

The heavy rain knocked the plants in the garden around.  I had to re-stake the tomatoes, but we had no drops.  I finally got to pick a few . . .

Our plants are so laden with tomatoes that they a drooping right to the ground!  This is a calm before the tomato picking really gets going!

I decided to harvest the potatoes.  We had 16 plants (the results of 4 individual potatoes).  I figure we got about 50 pounds of potatoes.  Wow!

We have to let the potatoes dry out a bit, then we will pack the dusty potatoes away in bins and keep them in a cool, dark place.

We need to figure what we'll put in the potato beds for some fall crops.  Any suggestions?

Dewy Morning

The heat of the last few weeks has left, and we have had perfect days and cool nights.  We have had nice mornings here in the valley, full of fog and dewy lawns.

I watered the vegetable garden, and then looked around the other gardens.  The Painted Garden was most interesting.

I came across this oddly shaped leaf of Sweet Sorrel . . .

How did it get this way?  I don't think it was a snail, though they are in the Painted Garden . . .

I walked around to see what was around.  The Jewel Weed is about.  They are abundant (almost invasive), but I really like them.

We had quite a bit of rain this week.  The creek was very low during the recent heat wave, but it has recovered.

We haven't seen a lot of rabbits earlier in the summer, but we seem to have one hanging around the barn.  We see it every morning and in the evening.  We have seen him/her in the vegetable garden, but it hasn't found it's way into the raised beds.

I have consolidated the compost bins down to a single bin.  The bins were nice and damp, and full of worms.  It is doing well.

We are only halfway though Summer, but I feel Autumn is not far way!