Summer and fall meet in the harvest: sweet peppers, eggplant, kale and pac choi.

Rain, lots of rain, fell on the garden last week - the first real rain we’ve had in five weeks or more! If I had to list the one thing that consumed our fall it would be watering! The container garden and big raised bed garden both have drip irrigation (which still has to be turned on and off, hoses moved, broken pieces fixed), but we spent at least two hours a day watering the different sections of the garden by hand.

Even with the fall drought, we’ve still managed to convince a few things to grow. This month, we’re harvesting kale, collards, tatsoi and pac choi, all planted in August and September. The peppers rebounded in the slightly cooler temperatures, and we still have a few eggplant, too.

Fall is the season of leaves and roots. Beets, spring onions, and lettuce are on their way, and a few turnips have sprouted, too. We planted carrot seeds last week and hope this rain will help them sprout. Carrot seeds need lots of water, constant soil moisture, which is a tall order when it’s been so dry! Cross your fingers for carrots later in the winter.

Volunteers bring in the sweet potato harvest!

This month students from the Therapeutic Recreation Center, after school program, and field trips began harvesting sweet potatoes. Volunteers and students planted five beds of sweet potatoes from rooted stem cuttings last April and May. They’ve been growing all summer, and between now and the end of the month, we’ll harvest orange, purple and white sweet potatoes. You can help us finish the sweet potato harvest on October 29 from 9 to 11 am.

Not everything goes as planned (often lots of things don’t go as planned) in the garden. Cutworms took out most of a bed of kale. If it looks like your seedling has been sucked down into the soil, is missing its stem, or if the poor little leaves are just lying there on the surface, it’s likely cutworms. We still need to replant and will try surrounding the stems with cardboard collars sunk into the soil around the plant.

The groundhog (aka the hill hippo) is also causing us grief. We could try to trap it, but we need a bigger trap. It’s grazed collards and a bed of lettuce. Yesterday, we were eating lunch under the oaks only to look up and see the hill hippo making a lunch of our kale. It doesn’t seem to like the spring onions, so that’s something to file away for later - if you have groundhogs grow garlic and onions!

A little blurry, but the monarchs don’t like to stand still for the camera! (Image: blurry green grass with an orange and black butterfly in the middle of the grass)

Lately, we’ve seen a few monarch butterflies traveling through on their way to Mexico. If you want to see a miracle, look no further than than a fragile butterfly traveling across an ocean and back. Our marigolds and zinnias are still blooming giving them a place to rest on their journey.

You’re welcome to stop by the garden for a break like the monarchs do, to rest or just to see what’s growing. We’re open Tuesday-Saturday from about 7:15 until dark.

Fall in the Garden