Our weather is beautiful right now! It’s Indian Summer all right, and it’s perfectly timed to get us out in the yard doing some leaf-raking and other yard work.

A week ago we had our first frost warnings of the season.  I went back and forth several times on whether or not to cover… and in the end I decided to cover just the basil and the tomatillo.  In anticipation of the frost, I went out and picked all the green tomatoes.

And then it didn’t frost here. :p

Apparently it stays a touch warmer here in the city, and there was frost on the roofs, but not on the ground.  With Indian Summer in full swing, there is a piece of me rolling my eyes at myself, wishing I wouldn’t have picked the green tomatoes.

Then again, had I left them, I could have gotten a few more ripe tomatoes, but not many.  So instead, I was able to take full advantage of the beautiful weather and rip all the plants out.  The sweet peppers I left- I’m really hoping the Red Marconis will turn red- but other than that, the tomato and pepper patch is gone.

The kids gardens are gone.

And Andy finally removed the large privet bush and grapevine- and look what we found! More sunshine. (And a seriously leaning fence…hope we can talk the neighbor into removing the tree that is pulling the fence over.)

My herbs are still chugging along in their strip of yard, and I actually have one butternut squash still defying the odds and managing to avoid being eaten by a bunny.

But I’m really excited about next year.  With my garden gone, I sat down in the yard last Friday and just relished my space.  While I had a terrible gardening year- it was not all for naught.  I learned quite  a bit about where we live.  Number one: there are no feral cats in our corner of the city.  Because of that, the critters and rodents are abundant.  Nothing I did this year kept the rabbits away, so we’re going to do the one thing I know to do to beat them.  And that is go up.

Andy is going to build me raised beds that are two feet tall- plenty of height to keep the rabbits out.   The raised beds will also be adaptable, so that we can make one or two a hoophouse and maybe get a jump start on growing season.  Fencing will be our friend, and I’m going to have to invest in floating row cover as well to keep the squirrels out when the seeds are first in the ground.

I’ve learned that next year I want to cut back on tomatoes.  Oh, I love them dearly, but I’d like to focus on the ones that I know taste delicious, as well as the more abundant ones.  I plan to trial one or two new varieties, but 20 new-to-me plants at once are a little silly.   Next year I will have an abundance of tomatoes.

Is it spring yet?

It could just be that I’ve read a little too much Little House On The Prairie, or Sign Of The Beaver, but I’m noticing things in my yard, and the city surrounding me that give me concern.

Namely, the critters.

Now, they are pests in the first place, I’ll give them that, but it seems to me that the squirrels are especially squirrely.   They started early harvesting nuts from the trees, burying them, literally everywhere.  I’ve found half-eaten apples buried in the dirt as well.  I realize that maybe a squirrel has nothing better to do than to scavenge and hide it’s food, but it seems more frantic to me.

And there’s the rabbits.  They’ve been content with munching a little here, munching a little there, but in the last week, it seems they’ve become frantic.  The carrot tops?  Sheared completely.  The Swiss Chard patch, and the one Kale plant that I was excited about have been sheared off as well.  As in gone.  As in, maybe they know something we don’t know and are stuffing their bellies before a long, hard winter sets in.

Is it possible?  Of course it is.  If I was living in the early 1800’s I’d be out in the woods, looking for a muskrat lodge or a beaver dam, to see how thick the mud is.

I hope I’m wrong.

It’s been a trying year for the garden, to say the least.  The best thing about gardening is that there is always a next year.  There will always be another year to try new things and be successful in growing vegetables.

My garden though, is not ready to give up.

My surviving pole bean plants were putting out a few beans here and there- enough for the kids to get a snack, but then something began eating the actual beans- six feet in the air. I now suspect it was voles, as we have ’em.  But as a result, I stopped checking the bean plants.  Well, as it turned out, a handful of beans did grow- and they are huge!  Too huge for eating, but today I harvested and I will let them dry a bit and then have seed for next year.  The beans themselves are delicious and worth growing.  The real reason I harvested though is because some of my other bean plants have put out another round of blossoms.  Since the hot sticky weather passed, they want to grow again, so I wanted to encourage my plants to put out more beans.

By butternut squash is finally producing squash as well.  Crazy, but I have about six or seven baby squash out there.  I saw today that one has been nibbled on, and I really am doubtful as to whether there is enough growing time for them.  But I can dream, and I can spray the plants with soap spray to keep the bugs off.

My tomatillo actually has three lanterns on it.  After waiting all this time, it’s amusing to see it doing something.

I seem to have a serious shortage of bees in our yard.  Something I am going to have to remedy next spring by making sure I have some good attractors for them growing.   I suspect that many of our issues are from the lack of bees.

We also found a miracle in Zander’s garden patch.  A tiny, three-inch cucumber.  A small Poona Kheera managed to survive the baby bunnies.  It was deeply russeted, and ready for harvest, despite its diminutive size.  Everyone waited eagerly for me to wash off the prickles and carefully slice that tiny cucumber so everyone could get a taste.  Oh my, as delicious and crispy as we remembered.  Next year, we will grow more and they will be successful.

The tomato patch looks better and better everyday- provided you can ignore the damage from whiteflies.  I suspect this will be a good week for them, as it’s going to be toasty again.  The other day I picked a Black From Tula to let it sit on my counter- we haven’t tasted it yet.  Today I picked a Valiant, and decided to let the Brave General ripen on the vine for just a few more days- as seen in the picture above.  Dangling just above the general in a lovely cluster is my Gypsy tomato plant.

Earlier this week a neighbor shared some ripe tomatoes, so I went out to my garden and harvested some chard for a simple salad.  Tossed with some black olives and almond slices, it was wonderful to be eating something grown in the backyard.

I’ll leave this post with a picture of my tiny harvest today.  My pole beans that will be saved for seed.  My Black From Tula, my Valiant, and Zander’s teeny tiny Poona Kheera.  This is why we garden- the rewards are always unexpected.

A week in the woods was the death stroke to much of the garden.  Without me here everyday to spray liquid fence or cayenne pepper or soap spray, a good deal of the garden was descimated by critters.  And I mean descimated.  My new green bean patch- gone.  40-some little sticks are poking out to the sky with nary a leaf in sight.  My lettuce was completely shorn off, and most of the beet greens are gone too.  I may get a beet or two yet though.  The newly planted kale was digested by something from the insect world- and that is not a cabbage looper- I know what those are.  The scarlet runner beans had their stems snapped by rough winds, and the pole beans had their stems eaten through about 8 inches up.  I have about 4 pole bean plants still chugging along.

The butternut squash is looking okay, as is the delicata, but there are no fruit yet- as there are no fruit on the pumpkin.  The melons are all growing very slowly, and I don’t expect they will bear fruit, really.  The tomatillos are growing and pushing blossoms, but they’re not getting pollinated and are not setting fruit at all.  The peppers are mostly intact yet, although the fruit they bear is small.

The pots that I recently planted with chard, kale, lettuces and cucumbers have been obliterated by squirrels.  I put fresh dirt in the pots, and the squirrels proceeded to dig, dig, dig.  With a nut tree in the yard, they are constantly looking for places to bury their plunder.  I wish we could get rid of that nut tree.

But then there are these.

Those are on one of my Black From Tula plants.

And these are on one of my Woodle Orange plants.

And this is my Brave General.

Then, as I was tying up a few more branches on one of my plants, I spied this little fella below.

My trusty Sungold that I took from a sucker from those plants in my house.  My Sungold plant gave me my very first ripe tomato.  As I popped this gem into my mouth and savored the delicious pop of the skin and the sweetness of the juice, I experienced promise.  This one little tomato speaks of promises to come.  The rest of my garden may have succumbed to the never-ending parade of squirrels and rabbits, but I will have a tomato harvest.  It may be modest, at best, but I will enjoy tomatoes of all shapes, sizes and colors, and I will enjoy every single one.

In the meantime, plans are being made.  Next years garden will have to have fencing.  In multiple places.  The beds are going up.  We need to get away from tree roots galore, so we’re going up a good foot or so.  Where the existing bed heights are, we will attach fencing in-ground to prevent burrowing critters from digging up.  And then every garden bed will have a fence- and depending on the bed, a system in place for floating row cover as well.  We are trying to decide the best lay-out, but I have to confess, other than the tomatoes, I’m looking forward to starting over.  It’s rather saddening to walk out to the garden and take a peek.  Even my sage plant has met an untimely demise.  How did that happen?  I have no idea, but just like that, the plant is void of life.

Next year, the garden will be wonderful, but for the remainder of this year, I will be concentrating my efforts completely on tending and enjoying the tomato patch.

All the pictures I am going to share with you today are actually from Tuesday and Wednesday of this week.  I spent a bit of time in the yard these days. Andy had sprayed for mosquitoes over the weekend, so I was able to enjoy the yard without being under attack.   I had read a really lame gardening book Monday night while I sat at dance class, and while I found the entire book condescending and totally not for this area, I did take one thing away from it.  When you’re trying to make the most of your space, first, you should see what you can do with things you have on hand.  Gardening- especially vegetable gardening- should not be an expensive hobby.  By gum, he was right, so Tuesday morning I eyed up my yard, eyed up the various things I had around the yard, and I went to work- taking pictures along the way.

First up, I have a picture of my pea tower.

Using two tomato cages, zip-tied together worked beautifully.  My lesson learned this year is that I need to add some tendrils to the cages- using string or fishing line to give more options for the vines to climb up.  The other lesson learned is that if we want enough peas to enjoy, I probably need to have four of these towers going.   Since tomato cages and zip ties are incredibly inexpensive, this is how I will grow peas from now on.  Not only is it effective, but visually, it’s very pleasing to look at.

Next I have a photo of my small greens patch- these are from my very first plantings in the yard.

They’ve taken forever to do anything, but they finally perked up.  There are two heads of romaine, a dozen beets, some bright lights chard and then some scallions.   They’re all chewed on, but looking perky these days.   I’m thinking the scallions are simply going to remain unpicked.  I will let them winter over, and then next spring I will have some great spring onions to enjoy.

Here are the pole beans and the butternut squash.  They’re growing well, and I added a second level of taller bamboo poles for the beans to grow up, and the squash to grow down.

And what’s this?

Ah, this is a butternut squash blossom.  Anyone who’s followed my blog for a while knows that I plant butternut squash pretty much every year, and I have yet to be rewarded with a squash.  This year, I bought established plants, and they’re doing great so far.  The one problem so far?  This blossom is a male blossom- and none of the females are open for business yet.  I am planning to self pollinate, but first I need both genders of blossom to do so.

Next there’s my second sowing of chard, with a line of kale behind it.

Again, these are getting chewed up, so I don’t know what results I’ll have.  I would really like to get some greens to grow so I can freeze some.  I really like what they add to soups and stews in the winter.

Next I have my strawberry plants.

They’re growing like gangbusters, but I’m not getting any berries- they are being eaten before I can get to them.  But for this year, I’m okay with that.  I’m really just trying to establish the plants this year, so if we only get a berry or two, that’s fine by me as long as the plants keep growing so well.

My tomato plants seem very grateful for the additional sunshine Andy has given them.  In the last week they’ve really shot up and put out more blossoms.

Today when I went out I found that my Sungold and my Brave General have the first tomatoes on them.  YAY!  In the next week I expect to have to move a little faster in getting the plants trellised and tied up. I’ll definitely take pictures of how I do that.

My pepper plants are full of blossoms too- and some are beginning to push peppers as well.

I lost a sweet pepper in our mid-week storm this week, but the hot ones are all still doing well.  They seem to like the additional sun as well.

Here’s a picture of a geranium a friend gave me.  They really add a nice punch of pretty to an ugly part of the yard.

I have interesting fungus in the yard too.  I realize they may be indicative of not so good things, but it’s been kind of fun seeing all the different kinds grow.  Since my children hate mushrooms, I don’t have to worry in the least about one of them thinking a mushroom in the yard could be edible.

By the way, if anyone is thinking ahead for Christmas gifts, I would love one of those at-home mushroom farms.  It would be really fun to grow my own shiitakes or creminis.

And finally, I have a picture of one of the things that lame book inspired me to do.  I realized that I had plenty of containers yet, a very large bag of potting mix, and an endless supply of seeds.  So I went to work.  In one pot,  I put some lettuce seeds- I think I put them in so that they will grow to be attractive- artfully displayed as they grow.  In the second pot, I decided to put some cucumber seeds, surrounded by some chard seeds.  Again, thinking that this will be visually appealing, whether or not I get any produce out of it. (But I am hopeful for some late cukes here.)  This is what I ended up with:

To the right of this, I also took an unopened package of Earliserve green beans and planted the entire thing right in the ground- using square foot spacing.  Once they start to sprout I will have to determine how best to repel critters, but it just came to me that I still have plenty of dirt to work in, I might as well try planting stuff in it.

I also took three more pots just sitting around and planted a medley of kale and chard in them.  I used up the last of my potting mix in those, or I would have just kept going, filling pots and planting something in them.  What I’m really thinking is that if I do things correctly- especially with things like kale, chard and lettuce- that once the cold weather strikes, I can move these pots into our screen porch and try and extend their season by quite a bit.  I’m hopeful anyway.

Of course, all these pictures were taken before our big storm Wednesday night.  Thursday I had to spend time in my tomato patch, misting the plants and washing all the mud and dirt off them- as well as standing up quite a few that blew over.  I lost my black cherry tomato, which I’m bummed about, but I’m glad the other 33 plants are still intact and thriving.  The kids gardens aren’t looking so hot- they are just incredibly wind-blown, but I’m hoping for their sake, they’ll bounce back.  Slowly, everything else seems to be bouncing back from the stormy weather.  Although here it is three days later, and the ground is still soggy from the storm.  It can not rain for a while.

There will be more pictures to come.  Every day I find something new, and even though this will not be my most prolific year of produce, I’m still enjoying the process.  We’re learning what we need to do to maximize the space in our yard, and I’m really enjoying trying to garden potager style- and making it visually appealing as well as productive.

After going away for the weekend, I was totally delighted to come home and find some great changes to the gardens.  Namely, I actually find some marked growth on much of my plants.

The pea plant has quite a few peas- unfortunately, it’s also gotten hot and muggy which is the kiss of death for peas.  We’ll enjoy what we can get, I guess.

My butternut squash seems to have exploded!

And right below that, the pole beans are taking off.  Sprinkling them with a soap spray and then cayenne pepper did the trick.  Now I have to figure out what to do with them- they’ve reached the top of the 3-foot canes, where the pot is, and now I’m unsure what to do with them.

I was especially excited to find a blossom on my Scarlet Runner Beans.  I don’t expect much from these this year because the critters have had a field day.  But in the last few weeks, they’ve started to take off- and boy, if they would do what I want to do, we’d have beautiful blossoms followed by delicious beans

The tomatillo that I bought from the garden center has several blossoms.  This concerns me, because the one I started does not have blossoms yet- and I think they both need to be blossoming in order to achieve pollination.  But I can hope.  Next year I already know to start these plants much earlier than I did.

The strawberries are doing fantastic! I have several runners already as well as blossoms and baby fruit.

Abigail’s pie pumpkins are thriving!  We’re going to need to figure out where to send the vines in the next little while here.  All the melons the kids planted are doing well too.

Here’s Zander’s bean patch- four varieties of beans, and they are all doing really well.  Again, that soap spray and cayenne pepper has really made a difference in keeping the plants whole.

I found two of my sweet pepper plants look like they had been sat on or something while we were gone.  A little strange- but I propped them back up and we’ll see how they do.  Most of the sweet and hot pepper plants have the beginning of blossoms on them.  The one hot pepper I bought at the garden center is fruiting already.

And then there’s the tomatoes.  Before we left for the weekend, one tomato plant had generous blossoms- I was very excited about this because I have one variety of tomato I wish to save seed from- my German Red Strawberry, and that was the first to push out blossoms.  With no other blossoms nearby, if they can set fruit shortly, I won’t have to bag any blossoms or worry about cross-pollination.  Make saving the seed very easy if I just remember to save one of the very first tomatoes.

Two other tomatoes are showing blossoms now too.  The Cosmonaut Volkov and Brave General are bearing open blossoms- and it looks like more plants are on the way.  I was a little disappointed that my tomato harvest may be late this year, but I’ve decided it’s actually a great thing, because I won’t have to worry about everything ripening while we’re on our annual camping vacation.

I went out this afternoon and sprinkled the tomato and pepper patch with a general 30-30-30 granular fertilizer.  I just sprinkled it around the plants, and later when it rains the rain will carry the fertilizer to the roots.

I will say that I am impressed with the tomato plants themselves.  They were so scrawny and spindly when I planted them, but now they all have nice and sturdy strong stems.  The winds and breezes we’ve had have really toughened up the plants.  I’m grateful for this- it gives me time to think on my plan for trellising the plants.

I tried being nice.

I tried being patient, thinking that I would lose a few beans here and there ,but that would be okay.  I even put out a little dish with some lettuce and veggie scraps in it.   But the bunnies and I have not seen eye-to eye.

A week or so ago, we finally did some serious planting on top of my tomatoes and peppers.  I gave the kids each their own space and they chose what they wanted to plant.  In addition to the seeds, Abigail added a tomato plant to her patch, and Zander added a peanut plant.   He was really excited about the peanut plant.

I worried about that plant, so the next day I went out and bought a product called “Repels-All”.  It stinks like you wouldn’t believe, but you spray it around the perimeter of your yard, and it should act like a barrier for the bunnies.  It worked for two days, so I was hopeful, but then I woke to discover the peanut plant missing.  A closer look confirmed that the bunnies had eaten all but a little nub of the plant.  War was declared.

Using items I had on hand, I fashioned a fence around the kids gardens.  I used iron fence posts, the green plastic fencing we used last year, staples, electrical tape and zip ties to construct a fence that I hoped would protect my kids gardens.  The fence went up just in time- their gardens started sprouting, but I swear, it looked like something was nibbling those new bean leaves!  So I used another Repels-All product, this time a granular form and sprinkled it thickly around the perimeter of their gardens.  I sure hope it works.

I also had to spray my plants today with a soap solution.  Bugs! Some kind of bugs- white flies maybe?  They look kind of like mosquitoes- but they have been going to town on my plants, and I’m not letting them have anymore.  When I sprayed the soap on the plants today there were a lot of refugees.  I ordered them to stay away.

The tomato plants are looking good.  After lots of rain, we finally got some sun, and the plants seem a lot happier- all 34 of them.

This is something new I added a few weeks ago.  I really didn’t want the bunnies to get my butternut squash, so I decided to put them in a pot.  Then I got the idea to use a bar stool that Andy had made for our last house, but we don’t need at this house- to place the pot on.  At the base of the stool I’ve planted pole beans, and my goal is to have a really cool looking pole bean and squash display.  I really like the pop of color the red stool adds.

On the far left there you can see my baby rhubarb plant, and behind that is the trellis where my runner beans are planted.  I don’t know if I’m going to get runner beans this year.  I keep planting, and they keep being eaten.  I thought I got rid of the bunnies with the spray and granules, but now it looks like something else is eating them.  Maybe the soap spray will take care of them.

There are plenty of sprouts in the kids gardens.  We have broccoli:

Pumpkin and melons:

And lots of beans and peas, as well as a few sprouts of corn and cucumbers.

I also have a new patch of kale and chard going, so I’m hopeful those will do well too.

Up next, I’ve been thinking about all the space I have but am not using yet.  My current plan is to continue amending the soil with compost, tilling it up a few more times, and then I want to try my hand at a fall garden.  Andy’s been just itching to design and build me some cold frames, so I’m going to choose a few spaces, and let him have at them. It would be so awesome to be picking lettuce, broccoli and beets into November this year.

Slow and steady.  I just keep telling myself that- because this yard is a lot of work!   I finally had to cave and beg my husband to give me a hand- because it was just wearing me out.  Every day I would go out and pull some weeds out and it just didn’t seem like I was getting very far.  When you have 486 square feet of garden space filled with weeds- that’s a lot of weed pulling.  And speaking of weeds…

Bishop’s Weed is the enemy.  Also called Goutweed in it’s green form, but in it’s more familiar variegated form, it’s called Snow On The Mountain.  This stuff is a noxious weed that will literally take over your entire yard.  It spreads in two ways- one via the seeds that the flower heads put out mid-summer.  The second way it spreads is via rhizomes in the roots- meaning that unless you pull the entire root out, any small pieces of root left in the soil will re-create another plant.  It’s a horrible, vicious plant.  Just ask my neighbors- they all have it, thanks to the yard that we’ve moved into- and they hate it too.   So if you have it, get rid of it.  If you don’t have it, don’t let the garden center talk you into it because it grows nicely in the shade.  That’s a big load of hooey- buy some hostas, which stay contained and don’t grow to take over the entire yard- including the lawn.

Anyway, the weeds are slowly going away.  And with Andy’s help, I was able to get a huge portion of the garden cleaned out, and then we tilled in some compost- which we got free from our city- isn’t that cool!  On the day we tilled, I took the time to plant two strawberry plants that we’d bought, as well as my two tomatillo plants.  (Remember those?  I’m very excited to see how they do in the ground.)   After a few days wait, I finally got the tomatoes and peppers in, and while I haven’t snagged pictures of that yet, I do have pictures of the garden in general- would you like a tour?

Here is where the garden starts.   Up by the shed there, there is a garden patch that is about 6 x 8.  In that small patch the only plan I have so far is to try some sweet corn to go in next week- what else, I dunno.  My garden is going to be a bit spontaneous this year, I think. That patch runs the length of that piece of drain pipe, and then you see the beginning of the tomato and pepper patch.

Here is a better picture of what I’m doing here.

This patch is 17 x 12 feet, so what I’ve done here is laid out where the tomatoes are going to go, using some empty pots I had laying around.  Then I cut cardboard and laid that down to mark the rows in-between where I can safely walk.   I have space for as many tomatoes as I could possibly want.

Here’s another view of it backed up a little bit.  Off to the very right you see the beginning of the next section of garden.

The whole garden space is lined with old railroad ties, but many of them are old and crumbling, so Andy will slowly be replacing that with lumber that has not been treated with that yucky tarry creosote found in railroad ties.

Here’s a better view of the next section.  This is actually at the back of the yard.  Climbing on our fence there is a whole mess of grapes- wild grapes I think- I’m looking forward to seeing how that does, so I can try my hand at wild grape jam.

This section of garden isn’t really planned yet.  Abigail and Zander will each get a portion of it to plant something in.  The whole space is 25 feet long by 6 feet deep at the back, and then the front section is also 25 feet long, but only about 18 inches wide.   The smaller front section we decided would be a great place to try our hand at some strawberry plants.  Here’s a better of those.

Those two white pots right in front of the birch tree are marking the spot where I have the two tomatillo’s planted.  To the left of those are the big bushy strawberry plants.  They’ve been in for a few days and are looking really happy.  They are an everbearing variety, so we’re hopeful that we may at least get a couple of berries off of them this year.  Next to the birch tree above I also planted some yellow zucchini seeds, just because I could.  They were kind of old seed, so I’m not sure how they’ll do.

Of to the right of the above birch tree is a huge honeysuckle bush which is being smothered by the wild grape vine.  I also have a compost bin (Yay!) next to that, but those sections are still plagued with bishops weed.  And then I have the whole other side of the garden yet!!  I have all kinds of dirt available now, and I just need to come up with some kind of planting plan, and I’ll be good to go.

We also recently added a raspberry patch that we hope will like it here.  We have a nice spot next to the house that gets great morning sun, and it seemed like the perfect place to start a patch.  When we were visiting Tomatobug a few weekends ago, we dug up some volunteer plants they had in their yard, and so far they seem to be liking it here.

The lettuce patch has sprouted, but I’m not convinced that it’s going to get enough sun for those sprouts to do much.  We’ll see- it’s in such a place that it doesn’t get much rainwater either, so I need to be diligent in watering them.  Right now I have a ton of sprouts- I’m looking forward to seeing them do something.