Fall Color

The best fall color in our yard is the blueberry bushes.

By the time we return in three weeks this will all be gone.

Fall Cleanup Part II

Since we're leaving on our cruise in two days, I decided it's time to do some more cleanup.  I removed all the plants from my nice glazed pots.  Some went in the ground, some into plastic pots for now until I decide what to do with them.

It's also time for the tomatoes to go.  I pulled the last ones and added two big bags of leaves to the bed.  (I've collected eight bags in the neighborhood, so I still have plenty.)

I had planned on pulling out the squash plants, too, but they are still looking good and there are lots of squash coming.  So I left them for now.

The weather continues to be beautiful, except for fog on some mornings.  The cosmos that reseeded have started to form flower buds.  I decided not to tell them that winter is coming.  I'll let them enjoy life a little longer.

I found two more nice heads of cauliflower, so I picked them and will freeze them.  There are still several very small heads, which I'll leave and hope they'll be okay when we return.   We're about to O.D. on squash.  Waste not, want not.

Pizza Night

Today I picked my first cauliflower, which was just under a pound.

So tonight's pizza was roasted cauliflower and kalamata olives.

Borscht

This morning I decided to make borscht.  I pulled three beets from the winter planting.  The leaf miners have slowed down, so the leaves looked pretty good.

No I didn't grow the cabbage.  But everything else.

Sweet Potato Harvest

Today I dug up the sweet potatoes.  I had no idea what to expect.  The plants had not bloomed, so my fear was that there wouldn't be any sweet potatoes.  There weren't a lot, but I did find some

The big lunker weighed two pounds eleven ounces.

Fall Cleanup

Today was nice but cool (55) so I decided it was time to start cleaning up the garden.  It's my second favorite thing to do in the garden, after planting.  I love getting everything out and the beds neat and tidy.

I took out all the pepper plants, harvesting the remaining fruit.

I picked a few squash while I was at it.  They're still producing, so they get to stay a little longer.

Next to go was the basil.  It has started dropping leaves, so it's pretty much done.

Then I tackled the tomatoes.  I left the cherry tomato, even though they're pretty tasteless and are cracking with all the rain.  Maybe they'll get better if it dries out.  I also left the Debarao paste tomato.  It still has quite a few green tomatoes and some that are close to ripening.  I really like this tomato.

The winter stuff is really looking good.

Stinkbug Invasion

Yesterday was sunny and 72 degrees.  Perfect conditions for all the stink bugs to come out.  We had hundreds of them on the house and sidewalk.  Everywhere we looked they were flying around, I guess looking for the perfect spot to hide over the winter.

This one is particularly nasty.  It's the brown marmorated stinkbug and has become a major agricultural pest. We did our best to squish as many as we could.  Very satisfying.

Garlic

We've had several nice sunny days, so I was able to plant the garlic.  I put in two rows, each about six feet long.  This really is the last thing to get planted (I think).

The asparagus has gotten really tall, so I've put up some stakes and string to contain it all.

I bought an Owari Satsuma mandarin tree from One Green World.  I've put it in a 7-gallon pot and set it along the south wall of the house, next to the lemon.

The Eureka lemon was about this size last spring.  It has more than doubled in size.

Frost on the Roof

Our low last night was 38.  This morning there is frost on the roof.

David picked a nice handful of raspberries this morning, but the strawberries are a grey, fuzzy mess.  I think once dry weather returns they'll be good again.  We've had an awful lot of rain in the last couple of weeks.