Dawn, I just got worn out reading you list. I dont see how you do so much.

The grasshoppers the three kinds of broccoli I had planted. The Roma green beans are a little weak. The first 5 rows of Pinkeye purple hulls are starting to bloom, the second 4 rows of pinkeye purple hulls got trimmed down about 30% by the deer. I planted some Evergreen onion plants, mainly because I could not find someone to give them to. I have some Egyptian walking onions I got from George that I want to make a special bed for when the weather gets better. My okra, peppers and sweet potatoes still look pretty well, it is raining now so I expect they will be looking even better.

I still have a lot of seed of different kinds of Cole crop seeds to plant, but not sure how many things I will plant because it is so late for starting seeds in the ground where I have no protection.

Larry

Dawn That is similar to what I have except purslane, salsify and rutabaga. I wasnt sure about salsify and I couldnt find seed for rutebaga.
Of course I dont have as many varieties as Dawn. I have 1 of each kind except carrots, greens and peas. "somehow" I ended up with lots of packages of those.
The peas we are just going to sow over whatever space is left in the garden. I also have my garden at home which still has peppers [jalapeno, banana and bell] 5 tomato plants, several melons, beans and pumpkins.
Then I need to check into the rest of what we can plant this fall.

My list was similar, the heat knocked some of it out. I got early purple broccoli too, growing that for the first time. I got some peas and cabbage started. Some Kholarabi, and mache. I tried to pick cold hardy stuff considering I will have to start late due to the heat.

I hate that heat...

I have started lettuce, spinach, French Breakfast radishes, baby pak choy, and a mesclun mix in the screened frames to keep the grasshoppers out. One found its way in somehow and ate all the lettuce and spinach seedlings but left the others alone. So will replant them. But unless it rains, we're not planting anything else outside. Still too hot, too dry, and too many hoppers. We also have way too many perrenials that we are still watering. Maybe next year.

Dwan,
Thanks for the listing. I have only few of them are in ground and rest are in seeds rack and waiting for the "wet rain" and cool weather.

Y'all, I hate the heat and it has slowed down the fall garden a lot for sure. I am just so ready to be able to go outside in cooler weather and spend the whole day out there if I want to. The stuff I still have in seed packets in the house isn't going to grow until it is planted, is it? It isn't going to get planted until the soil cools. Our high temps this week have ranged from 101 to 106 and our heat index has been even worse, so the soil sure hasn't cooled down a lot yet and I have only gone outside for very limited times in early morning and in the evening. Hopefully the cold front that should make it this far south late this evening or early tomorrow will give us enough of a cool-down that the soil temps will drop some more and quickly at that.

Larry, I have big plans for the fall garden, and even to me, my own list seems too ambitious if I look at it all at once. Luckily, it doesn't all go into the ground all at once or I'd never manage to get it done on time. Due to the nature of the plants, some were planted many weeks ago and some aren't planted yet. I can manage a big garden in lots of small spurts of activity, squeezed into whatever cool hours we have. Lately I just wave at my plants as I walk down to the mail box and back, and I promise I'll stop in and see them when it cools down.

All along I intended to keep whatever summer plants were still producing (except for most of the tomato plants since I had so many) and whatever had survived the grasshoppers and blister beetles and I intended for sure to plant October beans, southern peas, summer squash and broccoli. Everything else was "iffy" depending on if it ever rained again. I ordered the seeds, though, so certainly hoped I could use them this fall instead of next spring.

Being this far south and often having high temps in the 100s occasionally through the end of September, I never get to put greens in the ground very early so normally the fall garden gets planted in July/August for the warm season stuff and then late August/early September for the cool-season stuff, and often I don't get the fall greens into the ground until early October. So far, that's about the same planting track I am on right now, except I'd hoped all summer for an early cool-down so I could be ahead of my own planting schedule for once. That didn't happen.

For whatever reason, the grasshoppers are still munching away on the plants that remain from spring and summer, and especially on the tomato plants (the blister beetles are helping them eat tomato plants) but haven't touched the fall plantings of southern peas and green beans. That sort of adds to my feeling that insects are more prone to attack stressed plants and leave healthier plants alone. It isn't that the heat isn't stressing the beans and southern peas, but just that they are younger, healthier and better able to handle the stress. I did keep row covers on them for a while, but the row covers have been off the southern peas for a couple of weeks now and off the green beans beginning about 3 or 4 days ago. So far, nothing has nibbled on them.

The 3+" of rain that fell a couple of weeks ago saved my fall garden plans. For a while there, after I planted the southern peas and green beans, I thought that might be all I'd do for fall. Then the rain came along and perked up both the garden and the gardener, and I added fall cukes and squash, and started seeds in cups of a lot of the cool season stuff that can be grown from transplants, like the kale and lettuce.

Now I'm just waiting for the weather to become more cooperative.

With cooler temps, I hope to get the root crops seedied into the beds in the next few days, and I do mean "few" because our VFD's annual fundraiser is next week so I'll be spending some time on that as well. I have to wait until the soil temps drop low enough for good germination though, so you can bet I'll be out with the thermometer checking the soil temps daily.

Carol, After that 3" of rain fell, our heat index just soared. I would use our own readings from our thermometers and barometer and plug them into the HPC's online Heat Index Calculator. For a few days we had a heat index between 112-116 but it has been lower the last couple of days as the insane heat has sucked up some of that moisture from the ground.

I hope you get more rain and if it will cooperate and fall in lower temps then maybe your heat index won't get so high.

Kim, I haven't planted salsify this late in years, but since our overall weather pattern is hotter than it used to be, I think it has a good chance. Last winter was so hot that the only really cold spell I remember was the first week in December when it was very cold for the downtown Marietta Christmas parade. We thought that was the beginning of winter, but looking back, that was just about the beginning and the end of winter weather all in the same week.

Of course, since I am planting salsify and counting on fairly warm ground through at least the end of December, we'll probably have an early winter and a long, cold one just to make me crazy. That's okay. If fall salsify doesn't work, I'll plant it again in spring.

Most of the more ususual seeds I get, I cannot find locally and I order them so I can have the specific varieties I want to grow. All you really can find in the stores here is the same-old-same-old hybrids with a few heirlooms and open-pollinated varieties, and I don't necessarily want to grow the standard varieties. I like a lot of the open-pollinated and heirloom varieties bred with flavor in mind rather than earliness or uniformity or shelf life. With a lot of my fall plantings, I had seeds left from summer, but for the Wild Garden seed mixes and some of the kale and root crops, I ordered from Southern Exposure Seed Exchange and Bountiful Gardens. The "Wild Garden" mixes are not actually wild plants, they are just mixes of anything/everything from the breeding program at Wild Garden Farms.

A few things I choose are season-specific. For example, for Spinach I choose some varieties that do better in fall and winter than in spring. In spring, we often go from 'too cold' to 'too hot' in about two days and sometimes spinach doesn't get to gtow for very long before the heat sets in, so I choose varieties that make smaller plants that mature faster. With a long, mild autumn I can grow some varieties of spinach that get larger, but which also have later DTMS and would likely be hit too hard by the spring heat. Sometimes it is a very subtle difference but it does matter. Winter Bloomsdale Spinach withstands cold and winter moisture a little differently than Bloomsdale Longstanding, which is why I choose it for fall, for example.

Last year I planted a forage mixture for the deer and rabbits since there were so few native plants alive after the long hot summer and the wildlife was so starved, and it included turnips and collards that never froze all winter long, so this year I thought I'd plant more of them for us.

It is not a bad wildfire year at my end of the state, and that is what determines how much of a fall garden I have most years. If the fires are bad in late summer and fall, I am too busy to plant a fall garden. Since the fires here haven't been too bad since late July, I have time for a fall garden. I just try to work with whatever the weather and real life allow me to do. Our "normal" wildfire season actually is in the winter months, but not much has been normal the last couple of yeas. Back in June and July when I was canning like a maniac, every day I hoped I could have just "one more day" without fires so I could get a bit more canning done. It used to be the fires only interfered with spring planting time, but lately they are a problem at different points year-round. Last summer, between the drought and the almost-daily wildfires I didn't can anything all summer long. This year, I canned day after day after day. I'm hoping for a quiet autumn, fire-wise, so I can work in the fall garden day after day in the same way.

Ezzirah, I think it was wise to choose cool-season stuff. Now, if only the cool weather will arrive and cooperate with us.

After suffering through these last two hot summers, I am determined to have a good fall garden. Having to hang out so much inside to avoid the heat all summer long for two summers has driven me crazy, because I'd much rather be in the garden. I've mostly dabbled in fall gardening in the past without getting overly serious about it, and a lot of that has been because of us being busy with fire department stuff in the fall, but there's been some major schedule changes to routine fall VFD fundraisers and community activities, so I ought to have more time free for the fall garden. Yay!

I'd be remiss if I didn't add this last part for anyone considering a fall garden. Without a way to protect your plantings from wildlife, you have to share the plantings with them. Because I am surrounded by plentiful wildlife, my big garden has an 8' tall garden fence around it. Without that fence, I wouldn't even attempt a fall and winter garden because the wild animals would get it all. Even now, I have deer that come and nibble anything that I grow on the fence, but I don't mild sharing that little bit with them since they can't reach anything else, and they are hungry too.

Dawn

I planted snap peas, beets, carrots and lettuce several weeks ago. However, between my puppy getting through the fence and digging everything up, and the hot, dry weather we've had since, not much came up. I have maybe 5 or 6 pea shoots that are a couple of inches tall, that's about it. Some of the beets sprouted but then died. Of course the melons and sweet potatoes, basil and one okra plant are still growing. I planted a new Champion tomato in a pot by the front door around the same time, and it has really taken off. It was just a little plant when I got it at TLC a few weeks ago, and now it is close to 2 feet tall and has a couple of blossoms. I wish I had picked up more tomatoes. I suppose it is too late now...

I really hope this is it for the heat this year. Maybe we will get a nice, long fall so all of our fall stuff has time to produce. This summer wasn't very productive for me.

I will try to plant a few things tomorrow if we dont get more rain tonight. We got .5" Thur evening and .4" this evening. Sat. and Sun. may be the only time I have to plant for about a week.

Larry.

Dawn;
I was just wondering what you use your Salisfy for? Salsa? I have some seeds and no clue what it's about. lol

bon

I went up to the home depot in Edmond and they had all kinds of transplants. So I bought a bunch and they were pretty good size, so I think just keeping them alive will be the issue. I am hoping mulch will be my friend in this case...

I bought 9 napa chinese cabbage yesterday at the Mena, Ar. Farmers Co-op. They had better looking plants than I have seen in other locations, but they had a small supply. I think I will be able to plant them today even though we have had 1.1" of rain in the past twp days.

I also bought two more packs of onion seed that I know nothing about, Red Creole and Crystal White Wax. With the addition of these last two packs that brings me up to 5 or 6 types bulding onions to play with. All these seed cost me less than 2 bundles of onion plants.

Larry

Larry, I hope you get to work in the garden today. At least the violent weather that will plague much of the eastern half of the country is already east of all of us so we don't have to worry about that today.

We only had about 1/3rd inch of rain overnight, which was just perfect. The ground is just soft enough that I've been doing some weeding today.

Ezzirah, I hope your plants do well. Even with temperatures forecast to return to the 90s in the next day or so, I think they'll be a lot more pleasant. Also, daylength is shortening, so that even on a hot day, it isn't as hot for as many hours as it was a year ago. This week at our house, we weren't hitting 100 until 1 or 2 p.m. and then might stay in the 100s until only 5 or 6p.m. whereas in August we were hitting it before noon on many days and then staying at 100 or higher until 8 or 9 p.m. Since there will be less intense heat and fewer hours of the highest temperatures, most plants are deliriously happy in September and even in October. I think yours will be fine.

The biggest challenge for some of us for several more weeks will be the grasshoppers. The nights have to get pretty cool before the grasshopper activity drops significantly.

Also we have to watch for the cole family pests like imported cabbage worms and cabbage loopers. Most years they are not too much of a problem in fall, but that doesn't mean they aren't around. We still have to watch for them and act quickly if they appear.

Bon, Salsify is a root crop. If it was a salsa plant, I wouldn't have planted it. We have dozens and dozens of jars of Annie's Salsa in the pantry and the last thing I want to even think about is making more salsa. I'm all salsa'd out for this year.

Salsa is long like a carrot, and most varieties get about 12-14" long. It is very slow growing and more commonly is planted in spring for a fall harvest, but I didn't have room for it in the spring and I have room for it now, so thought I'd give it a shot. I really should have planted it in July, but it was too hot and too dry as you well know.

Salsify has a really unique flavor that reminds some people of oysters, hence its nickname "Oyster Plant". Your grow it the same way you grow carrots, but it takes it months to mature. Because it is incredibly cold-hardy, you can leave it in the ground (as long as the soil drains well) over the winter and harvest whenever you want to use it.

It is a biennial so will go to seed following the winter, and often very early in the season.

It does not care for drought at all, so if you let it get extremely dry during the summer, it will bolt. That makes it a challenge to grow in Oklahoma some years.

You can prepare it in the same ways you cook other root crops. If you get to the point that you're harvesting some, I can post some salsify recipes. You pretty much can cook it the way you cook carrots or potatoes, serve it sliced or mashed, etc. It also is often added to stews and soups or roasted with other cool-season veggies.

Some people like to cut off the leafy tops right after harvest, leaving an inch or so of the tuber, and replant them. Then you cut off the leaves about an inch above the ground. New leafy growth, which is edible, will sprout. Once those leaves are 4 or 5" tall, you can cut them off, cook them and eat them like you'd eat other greens. Many people say those leaves taste like asparagus, though my taste buds didn't seem to think that when I tried it.

Dawn

Thanks Dawn;

I didn't have much problem getting one started before. I ended up neglecting because I couldn't figure out what it was. LOL I have some more seeds, so I'll give it another whirl and do as you suggest.

bon