Box full going home with my daughter

Hey, Faye, I see you are gainfully occupied. I can smell those apples from south Alabama, honey.

And I bet those donkeys are a happy bunch, probably hee-hawing like crazy, staggering around with a bit of fermented apple in the gut. Great image. And wow to think about those BEARS coming out to get their share. Are your bears the big ones? Not grizzleys I should hope.

My figs are coming in nicely, the second crop. It was delayed by all the rain, which with wind caused the tree to topple over. That delayed the little figs from developing. Then my cumquats are weighing down the limbs of the bushes which are about 9 feet tall now. The thumb-size fruits are getting some golden glow to them, but it will be around mid to late November before they are ripe enough to pick. There are also some clementines and tangerines (mandarin oranges) about to begin turning colors, which is the pride of my DH. I see no passion vine fruits at all this year. But, I plan to get the ladder out tomorrow and lop off the bunches of bananas our trees produced this year. If the winter doesn't kill the stalks, they will produce even more next year. Bananas produce on 2nd year stalks, not first year. We missed our crop of blueberries this year, because I had to trim the bushes back severely. But the new growth points to a good year in 2014.

As for my hosta, I have 12" x 12' x 2" treated lumber standing by to upgrade to stadium seating for the winter sanctuary. Plus I'm getting the 1/2" hardware cloth ready to protect them from squirrel predation. And, I am also beginning to harvest the dried seedpods on the good producers. That includes a lot of fragrant hosta, open pollinated of course. I hold my breath that they will sprout.

We are not affected by the Tropical Storm Karen which is mucking about offshore Louisiana presently. Maybe the descending cold front will shoot it toward us tomorrow, but nothing we haven't seen many times before. No sweat. Can you imagine hiding 400+ pots from high winds? Sheesh. So glad it is not a monster storm. But, we are ready.

Once my storm is done with, I can focus on the upcoming house remodel, after which I will again have access to my gardening books, as well as finally have a REAL STOVE IN THE HOUSE. Cooking on a 2 burner WaringPro caterer's hotplate for 4 years is a bit much. So it will be a big winter for us.

Hi Faye. I'm going to drink goodly amounts, eat a lot, gain some weight and then work it off in the spring/summer. Rinse, repeat. : )

Don B.

For me, the daily routine in Autumn is dominated by my little ones' soccer games, dance classes, piano practice, school happenings, etc. We are also busy with plans for fall festivals, Halloween costumes, weekend hiking and biking trips, etc. I have put up several jars of salsa and plenty of tomato sauce, but how I would LOVE to take care of the rest of that apple tree for you! Going to an orchard to pick apples is a longstanding family tradition for us.

As the cool weather sets in, I am spending a little more time than usual lingering by my kitchen window to enjoy the view of the hosta beds, for every thing there is a season, and I am very grateful that in my dear little home every season is full of something to look forward to!

I will continue to move my plants about. I have been in a house remodel. So far the foundation repair people have done their job, and a job on the back yard. ugh. The tree man is next so everything on the south side needs to move up against the house which was cleared for the foundation work. Once the tree man is done comes the roofers, air people etc. So I move them back off the house again. Then I paint. I have had some plants go dormant already but I am still in full swing. Seeds are coming to full term and so much garden work to do. I need a bad habit.

Mocc glad to see Karen will not bother either of us. I have had enough rain for a few weeks.

Faye The apples look great. Drunk bears!

Tee tee on the drunken bears but the mash is still sweet so is like the apple juice and not hard cider. The only one we saw was a small black bear as his droppings were small but they seem to usuall stay more up towards Myrle's higher on the hill where we live.
I would love to share the apples with any one of you but so many people around seem to never process or can and would sooner just go buy from the store( or us do it for them ) Not happening except for my neighbors that are really senior and my waterfall friends who we wil make a 5 gallon pail full and she can either freeze it or can it herself.

Jadie your kids would have a blast picking here because the branches were so heavy they hung right to the ground. My husband hasn't pruned it for three years so is time to get rid of some of the branches

Moc I envy all the different fruits you have in the south but we do take what we can here. I bought 80 lbs of pears to can but they are too green yet and I am not sad over that yet. My daughter bought 200 lbs and makes dried pears for her kids and family. I take it she will be very busy when she goes home Monday too

Don were you refering to drinking beer or apple juice for over the winter weight gain lol? Hard to work it off in the spring and get down to the hosta weeding so try not to gain too much and leave the beer drinking to my husband when we go south and get cheaper US beer and warmer weather

I put 60 ft length of a 8 inch deep barrier of sharp rocks under the back chain link fence to keep voles out. I will add to that.
In the next 1 to 2 weeks I will get a group of very good arborists to cut down 3 trees and limb up two large pines. One of the 2 is a larger maple which sheds too many leaves and has too many roots, the other is a type of tall wild cherry tree which dropped a mass of seeds some spring with a lot of seedlings popping up everywhere. I had enough of both and will get the stumps ground down. So that will give better hosta land. Right now a lot of my hostas still look good, though some of them will be squashed by the tree guys, but frost will it do a week later probably anyway. Bernd

Built two new beds today and got three new hostas in the ground. Orange Marmalade, Praying Hands and Kiwi Full Monty.

Bowling,and watching football on TV. I don't even like to look at the garden this time of year! Phil

Big football fans over here too, Phil!

College games after little league is a Saturday afternoon staple. We don't follow NFL games much, but since moving to Baltimore catch a bit of the Ravens games when we can.

Catch up on Dexter series!
Finish organizing pics into hosta albums on my iPad in prep. for winter Alphabet rally!
While enjoying downtime, at the back of my mind I will be counting the days to Spring....sick, huh?

BUT, tomorrow promises 15 Celsius and sunshine, so I will be checking for nematodes and finish potting up more hosta...put patio furniture away...clean up more garden cuttings, blah blah blah..basically.just havin' fun in the sun!

This post was edited by josephines67 on Tue, Oct 8, 13 at 0:17