empty garden

- mostly. It's cleaned out and blanketed with dry leaves. I have a few plants still hanging on- some swiss chard and beets- I've pulled a few and they are rather small-

Self-seeded borage that came up end of summer:

Sage needs a trim-

Parsley and thyme got trimmed back and mulched; oregano doesn't seem to suffer as much from the cold.

I still have green onions, and in spite of how it got ignored, my leeks actually did okay. They aren't very robust, but the foliage grew quite long and I pulled some to use in place of onions in a dish (my kids prefer the slight sweetness of leeks). They were good!

Tomatoes are all done for, the vines cut down and cages stacked away. I dumped the end of the green bean pots and pulled the withered marigolds. We got a few small broccoli heads and the rest froze. And next year there will be another garden.

creeping over the wall

My least favorite herb, oregano, is of course the most lush in the garden patch right now.

It has grown over the edge of the garden and where it hangs down there is a clump of clover and mock strawberry

so if you don't look it seems as if the oregano continues, morphing its leaf form...

kind of how I merge the look of hygro compacta with rotala indica in my aquarium....

herb harvest

I got ahead of the bugs by harvesting my herbs to dry early this year. The herb spot in the garden bed was so full-

and starting to get insect damage- especially the oregano looks bitten and scarred. I don't disturb tons of whitefly out of the plant, so I suspect it's mostly aphids?

So I figured since it has grown so much already, why not cut what I want to dry for winter now? I did this several weeks ago (behind in updating the blog)- and already most of the herbs have grown back enough to use fresh again- dill in particular.

Here's parsley, oregano and thyme cut and stacked in a box. The thyme and parsley were mostly undamaged.

It's oregano that was riddled with bug scars. I stripped all these leaves-

Keeping just the best to dry. It's still plenty. I don't use oregano much- in fact, I think I want to get a different oregano plant. I used to have one with smaller, round leaves I preferred its flavor but not sure the variety name...

The pretty, ferny dill- so hard to get a photo of- see two attempts in different lighting above-

Was so prolific this year I got two big bunches this size. It doesn't have any pests aside from one or two caterpillars since removed- my daughter kept them for a "pet".

Thyme bundle.

Second-year parsley setting seed head- but this is one plant I have plenty of seed, so I didn't let it finish. Cut it down to the ground for drying, and already it has sprouted new leaves. I have two new young parsley plants still in the coldhouse to replace them with...

Here's before picture of the herb spot- left to right; borage, oregano, thyme, sage, parsley in front.

And after.

a few herbs

I planted out into my deck railing boxes some of the herbs that like cooler weather- dill, cilantro. I really like dill and I don't even grow cukes for pickles- love the flavor in certain kinds of fish and eggs. That and summer savory.

I have one deck planter filled with cilantro

two more with dill, and the fourth reserved for summer savory (which is still in the coldframe). This year I'm going to try and establish a nasturtium patch in the yard, plant sweet potato vine in pots, and keep basil in the garden beds (all plants that were in these boxes last year).

Not sure why some of my dill has dried, brown edges. Perhaps it got too hot last week, or not enough water? Plants aren't that big yet because already twice I have cut and eaten it- even before they were out of the communal tray!

I want to get two more planter boxes for the railings, but have to find the right ones- not this which bows out in the center it doesn't have stiff enough walls. In fact if I can find the other kind which has thicker walls and straighter corners, I'll probably get three and replace this one.

Since I'm mentioning herbs, here's a pic of my herb corner in the garden beds, seen from above. There's sage, parsley, thyme and oregano. Barely can see the green onion.

Sage in pots is growing back but doesn't look nearly as nice as the ones I have in the ground. I think it has more setback from the cold.

in the garden

Things that survived the winter.

Broccoli!

I've even taken a second cutting of small heads.

Swiss chard is ready to eat again.

One green onion. Planning for more.

Five sage plants- three are in the garden and two in pots. While the potted ones are larger, those in the ground are in much better condition.

Several bunches of parsley, going into their second year. I'll probably start more.

Deep in the heart of dry stems, Oregano is resprouting.

Thyme looks great! I wish I could maintain it this way, keep the bugs off... Maybe I will start washing dishes by hand all summer, just to have soapy water to regularly throw on the plants, haha.

One borage plant. Got more coming from seed. I am planning to have this all over the garden this year, and see if my hunch is right that it deters the squirrels.

And what makes me happiest: rosemary! Thrilled this one made it. The little plant I grew from cuttings.

winter chard

First really hard freeze last night- glad that just the day before I cut all my swiss chard. It was just enough to make a quiche. Broccoli is killed by the cold now. Up until yesterday I was still occasionally cutting fresh thyme and oregano from the garden, too, but I think that will all go dormant now.

spice rack

Husband finally hung up my old yardsale-find spice rack. What has always sat at the back of counterspace, never properly mounted on a wall. Until now.

I really like seeing it properly placed. Herbs on the top shelf: chocolate mint, spearmint and thai (purple) basil.

and bottom: stevia, sweet basil, oregano, thyme, sage, parsley. All from the garden!

riches of dead leaves

I have finished processing all the dead leaves in the yard (well, eighty to ninety percent- our maple tree is still holding onto some that might come down later, and the neighbors' sycamore tree keeps dropping leaves into our yard too) for mulch and composting.

It is quite a task, but a very satisfying way to wrap up the gardening season. I have a leaf-eating machine; my husband bought it several years ago and this is the third season I have used it. I've gotten more efficient at shredding the leaves up. This is a chore with very particular timing- it doesn't work well if the leaves are wet, it's annoying to do if windy (leaf dust blown in my face) and I don't like to do it when the children are around- very loud, kicks random bits of bark or twig out that I miss when sifting the leaves- I wear protective goggles but have gotten my cheek nicked a few times- plus I'm afraid a curious child might throw something in there to see what the machine will eat, and really it can only handle leaves- I have to sift each handful to pull out small twigs, even the heavier petioles of sycamore leaves will snarl it up.

So sometimes it's hard to find the time to grind the leaves. This year I made the effort to gather them as often as I could, into huge piles the kids like jumping in, and also into my wheelbarrow and plastic bins, which I stored under the deck and some old carpeting to stay relatively dry until it was time to shred them. Unfortunately I think I burned out the motor of the shredder. I was just finishing up the last leaf pile and it started to make a high pitched whine and a terrible smell. I shut it down and just bagged the remainder of the leaves, let the motor rest for the day but I'm not sure if it will work again. It's possible there was too much dirt and thatch in the last lot of leaves I raked off the lawn, which has been too dry this year...

Have a good dozen bags of leaf mulch saved under the deck now, for composting throughout the coming year. I applied a lot more to the yard immediately- around all the trees, all plants in the beds, mailbox spot, new shrubs- rhodies, summersweet and hydrangeas got an extra thick layer. Two or three inches thick across all the veggie beds. You can see there is still some green life- broccoli on the left, a few herbs (parsley, thyme, oregano, sage) on the right and some swiss chard. In the upper picture, borage is still making a statement, and my tiny rosemary is still alive. Speaking of what's still green, there is argyranthemum making green lacy shapes, hellebores nice dark green, and sage pretty blue-green in their various spots and containers. I am seriously considering planting a lot of sage next year, just to have more greenery in the yard when it gets cold, and spreading the argyranthemum if I can. Hellebores grow slowly, it will be longer before I have more of them.

end of season

Here's what was still growing end of last month, in my garden.

Peppers. I had already potted up a second bell pepper to bring into the house for winter, simply because it was growing straighter than the other one I kept in a pot on the deck all summer. That one was leaning crooked, looked funny.

Then I saw this plant making narrow, long peppers- which must be jalapeños or serranos, either one of which I'd love for cooking beans and lentils. So I potted up one of that, too. Now I have four peppers overwintering in the house, and that's the limit.

Some herbs came back with a flush of new green after the heat waned: thyme

oregano

here a sage plant next to a young pepper- which is now dead, but the sage still thrives.

In fact sage stays green and nice-looking so long into the coolness of fall, I'm starting to think I should use it in the landscape- I've got so much seed. And I love the blue hues in its foliage.

Parsley looks like nothing- because we have been eating it!

Now that many bugs have died from cold- no more attacks of whitefly, and the caterpillars that plagued my broccoli are all gone- the plants are growing new leaves

and some are even forming tiny heads.

And now that I don't really need its services anymore- driving away problematic bugs- the marigolds have taken off and produced tons of blooms.

Especially the red one, which is my least-favorite. Of course.

Without much care is the swiss chard. Soon I will eat it again.

I planted more chard from seed, they are just coming up. But the soil around them keeps getting loosened by digging rodents (grrrr) so I don't know if they will grow well.

And here's a tiny thing I'm happy to see is still green- the rosemary I started from a cutting. Go, rosemary! you can make it through the coming winter I will bury you in leaf mulch above your head.