Finally cleared out the tomato beds. Such a chore. Getting the posts from the tomato fencing down was tough, my partner must have used a sledge hammer to pound them in the ground.
But it had to be done if there was any hope to get the lettuce, more spinach, carrots, turnips, and beets planted. I've been watering everyday by hand with the watering can while the newly emerging infant plants get established. It's been so dry this fall, we might have had one rain storm in September and a couple light rains in early October. The ground was so dry to begin with, the rain actually made the soil the perfect texture to dig. I'd been digging each bed as I got them cleared out and then planting them up one by one.
All the old seeds has been getting used up this fall which is so satisfying. If they don't come up I just seed something else in its place. A surprise was the ancient kohlrabi seeds from 2009 and 2011. All of them must have come up and now there's a 25 foot row of them. Hilarious. Especially since we've never eaten kohlrabi.
Carrots and radishes were planted together in a couple of beds. Never again. What a horrible mistake. When you pull radishes the carrot seedlings come up right along with them. It is so much trouble. But come to find out it's better to thin a bed when the soil is dry, I was able to carefully pull radishes without bringing up too many carrots along with them.
Did I ever mention they had a pitcher's mound in the middle of where the garden is now? A gigantic pile of sand. Huge. It's made the clay soil really friable in places, hopefully it'll make for long delicious carrots this winter.
They were predicting our first frost to be November 18th. We shall see. The weather had been in the 80's (26 degrees Celsius) the last couple of weeks, but has cooled down this week in the 60's and 70's.
These carrots were planted August 27th, so they are definitely growing slowly, very slowly.
Shogoin turnips planted at the same time as the carrots, this variety takes longer to mature in general and they are just starting to head up.
4 comments:
Yum...that fried egg dish looks delicious. I'm beginning to realize that a fried egg goes with almost anything.
I have a few last tomatoes that have ripened on the counter as well...once they are done it will be a long wait until next July. And you think your carrots are slow - mine look about the same stage as yours and they were planted at the end of June...ugh!
Your egg dish looks very tasty!
I worry I have started all my fall seeds for winter to late. But we kept staying in the high 90s pushing 100 forever it seemed. I didn't think I could get them up and keep them from cooking alive literally in that kind of heat.I am hopeful that it will get enough size on it before our first freeze to. That wont be for a while yet or shouldnt be. Several weeks for everything to grow.
I too found kholrabi seeds to hold their germination ability for a very long time. I have only eaten it once myself. It was good.
Hi Margaret,
Carrots seem slow to grow in general, maybe even slower than beets which is shockingly slow. :) I wonder if it's the cool weather that's slowing their growth, the turnips and radishes seem to be growing faster now that it's cooled down.
Your onions, garlic, and shallots look amazing. And that is definitely a monster tatsoi you had growing in your garden.
Hi Texan,
Most winter/fall crops do fine with light frost, I imagine it'll probably be awhile before you have a hard freeze. Your fall planting looks great! Don't you love it when things just start to come up? Keeper looks like such a happy mellow fellow, he's so big!
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