Dawn
I was still working up some garden things like green tomatos and peppers, over the weekend. I had a mountain of them. Made some Red and Green Tomato Salsa for something different. Looked and tasted nice.

Before the cold snap, I gathered all the things I couldn't or wasn't able to save.

But, I'm still growing!

Here's what we did...you have to sort of mentally envision this. I had 2 rows 50ft long, made of connected trellised fencing supported by posts about 5 ft high, and 9ft across, with lasagna gardening material on the floor topped with good soil and some hay in places for mulch.
Along the trellis I have my still vigorously bearing young tomato plants, assorted peppers, pole beans, and other beneficial flowers, culinary herbs, etc, that I wanted to keep growing.

So, DS took a 100ft length of 4mil Visquane, measured it, cut it, and taped it together twice with heavy duty outdoor duck tape.

Then he created a pup tent like affair out of 1 1/2" PVC for the top and end support with elbows and T's, and guy wires for extra support from the top ridge to the fence posts. The fence posts are securely wrapped so they won't tear the Visquane.

The Visquane he draped over the sides are weighed down to hold in place. He placed support poles every 10ft, but may go back in and add some more later for good measure.

He left enough Visquane on each end so that the front and end can be closed or opened at will. The end result was that now I can actually stand up and work inside, and things are still growing and producing like crazy.

Since we have drip irrigation we can irrigate the soil underneath the plants without adding additional unwanted moisture. I noticed that even after the torrential rains we had, the soil inside the greenhouse was almost dry. Perfect for the ripening tomatos.

Also, I noticed that as I had worried the humidity would be too great for the tomatos, no, it hasn't affected them at all so far.

There have been very gusty winds but the greenhouse is withstanding both that, and the rains. I noticed that when it had been cold on the outside, the moment I stepped in, it seemed very warm. I need to get a thermometer to place inside.

I figure that eventually the warm weather plants will either give out and quit producing due to age or cold, so, in their place I am potting up some more cold weather plants to go inside for the winter.

I now envision an early spring planting whereas before the soil and weather prohibited it. Maybe, just maybe I now have a 4 season garden. Large enough for me to grow lots of fresh food throughout the cold winter months.

DS says we can put some safe heat in there if we need to.

The total cost of this so far, for the 50 ft of greenhouse, 9 ft wide, for the 100 ft of 4 mil Visquane, $10 for the heavy all weather duck tape, and the PVC, (don't remember how much he had to use) was right at $100.

And it also looks pretty darn good.

So, that's not bad, do y'all think?

Barbara

Barbara,

It sounds terrific. Not bad, not bad at all! LOL Aren't you thrilled with how well it is working?

We errected 4 similar crude hoophouses in the spring of 2007 when I had dozens and dozens of tomato plants in the ground, and a late cold spell brought 3 weeks of freezing and near-freezing weather. I didn't heat mine, although I had kitty litter buckets full of water and 5-gallon buckets full of water (one bucket between every two plants)to use as solar collectors,so I guess that was a form of passive heat. The hoophouses protected all the plants...I don't think a single one died, and some of them bloomed inside their plastic houses. Those plants withstood a lot of cold rain, sleet and one snow storm inside their plastic 'tents'. The humidity didn't harm them, and that had been my biggest concern...other than being concerned they'd freeze on a cold night.

I hope your set-up works as well for you this year as ours did for us that year, and I bet it will too.

I'd love to build a permanent hoophouse, and do have it on our long "to do" list....maybe by next spring. Maybe for Christmas, I'll give Tim the "How To Build A Hoophouse" book I have my eye on. Do you think he'd then suspect that I want him to help me build a hoophouse? LOL

For safe heat in the past, I used strings of the larger Christmas lights (not the really small twinkling ones)--I don't remember if they were C-7s or C-9s, but they kept fruit from freezing under plastic thrown over the tops of my then-small fruit trees. Even with fairly regular pruning, those trees are too large for that now, but I'd do it again with smaller trees.

Since the tornado shelter (which doubles as a root cellar) and freezers are so full, I won't bother covering anything this fall to keep it going, but I am happy the garden continues to produce despite the clouds and cold and 'autumn gloom'. I think I've forgotten what sunlight looks like, and am sure the plants feel the same way. If we can go another 3 or 4 weeks here without the garden freezing out, then the fall garden will have produced better and deeper into the fall than I had expected it to.

I have got about half of the weekend harvest of tomatoes and peppers (way too many peppers even now....) processed and have a lot left to do tomorrow. We could just about live for the next year on all the stored peppers, although it would get pretty monotonous.

Tim has been digging into the apple pie jam (yum! yum!) and now I think I need to make more ASAP. I do love it in the center of Apple Muffins, and think the next time I make apple muffins or apple cake, I'll dot some of the jam right in the middle of the batter in the pan.. you know, half the batter, then jam, then the other half of the batter on top of it. He hasn't 'discovered' the apple cider jelly I made last week, so it may survive a while longer. I hide the jams and jellies in the darker corners of the cellar, whereas the tomatoes and peppers are more front and center......if "they" find the jams and jellies too soon, we won't have enough to last a year...or at least until fresh fruits are abundant again next spring.

My project for next week or the week after is to make some flavored syrups.

I'm also working on canning lots of half-pints of goodies for all the police officers and security personnel who work for Tim and also for all our local VFD's firefighters, so that's a whole lot of jelly jars. So, I guess I am spending more time in the kitchen than in the garden lately, but the kitchen is warm and dry and the garden is not, so I'm happy about that.

The Little Red Hen frenzy is in full force. I wonder if I am instinctively preparing for a hard winter (like the local squirrels seems to be doing) or if I'm just having too much fun to stop putting food by????

Dawn

I picked what I think was the last of the okra yesterday and only had enough for a mess becausse I added a young loofa to it. Found a black brandywine hiding under the foliage of a plant and still have a few Husky Cherries, but the tomatoes look as bad as the okra, not from a freeze just from bugs, disease and cold. Pulled the bush beans as I picked them last week and put several gallons in the freezer. Also threw some into the refrigerator pickle jar as the okra and cucs were almost gone out of it.

But the broccoli, cabbage, chinese cabbage is still growing and I am hoping the freeze holds off so I can harvest something. Oh and daikon radish too. But have French Breakfast radish and lettuce, turnips and mustard ready to eat.

We still have "tons" of stuff to harvest, green beans, okra, tomatoes, many many seeds, squash. But for weeks I haven't had time to do more than run out and rescue a few things at a time. Jerreth and I are in Midlothian, TX until Wednesday. Thursday I have to catch up from being away. Hopefully frost will hold off until Saturday night.

Some bean seeds may be lost due to all the dampness. But I can't do anything about it now.

Old Timey Cornfield Pumpkin has nearly 100 lb more, of squash which may yet be good. It all depends on how "colored up" it has to be before it is picked. Some are now buff colored, they just don't have that burnished look of a really mature squash.

We harvested about 42 lb more of honey recently. This is the first fall honey crop we've seen since moving to Oklahoma in 2005.

I need to plant garlic, potato onions and lettuce. Also need to clear the place where we're planning to plant some more asparagus.

George

I am only harvesting green beans because everything else that was in danger has already been picked except for the spaghetti squash. I am still growing though since I have cabbage, brussel sprouts, broccoli, and salad greens. It looks like we will be back to the same game this weekend so I think it's about over for me.

George, It's hard to catch up once you get behind, isn't it?

I hope the frost holds up until y'all make it back home and can harvest whatever is ready. The honey harvest sounds wonderful.

It is a hard year for bean seed to mature. I was hoping to harvest a lot of purple hyacinth bean seed, but they've been wet almost every day for the last six weeks, so I am not sure how that will work out. (I have lots of seed stored, but hoped to harvest more to share.)

Our garden is bearing pretty well despite the rain. I harvest in spurts though since there isn't anything growing that needs daily harvesting. I'll harvest a lot, and then spend a couple of days blanching, freezing, canning, jellying or dehydrating. Then, a couple of days later I harvest a lot of stuff again, and repeat the cycle again.

We are not "supposed" to be cold down here this weekend....we are supposed to be warm and sunny. However, they've been so wrong on so many forecasts that I'm not sure I'm buying into their forecast. I'll keep watching the NWS and Mesonet too, so I can make good decisions about what to harvest or cover if it seems the cold from northern OK is creeping down into southern OK this weekend.

Dorothy, My okra has gotten really slow too. I pick, blanch, put the small amount in a bag and put it in the freezer. A few days later, I pick again and add that to the original bag. It is taking me 2 or 3 pickings to fill up a bag. I used to do a couple of bags, or more, every day that I picked okra. It is blooming really well, but in the cool temps and absence of sunlight, the pods are growing painfully slow.

Carol, Isn't it crazy? I was hoping when we got through last weekend unscathed that we'd be good for another few weeks. Maybe you'll luck out and the freezing temps will miss y'all again.

Green beans are doing well here now, but I still think they'd produce better if they'd get some sunshine.

Dawn

I haven't had any frost here, so everything is going as it was going, except much slower. I've picked and brought in all my watermelons. About half went straight to the compost, but of the rest I've been coring them out and eating or dehydrating the hearts.

We haven't had frost either, had a couple REALLY COLD days tho. And TOOOOO much rain. We're sloggy. But I'm still getting little bits of okra and jalapenos here and there. Glad it's not going like gangbusters, we had a fire in the kitchen last week and have been wrapped up in the clean up. Hubby trying to make fried egg sandwiches for him and our oldest one morning, FORGOT WHAT HE WAS DOING. He burned himself rather badly on his hand, and we had to get a new stove and paint... not the end of the world, thank the Lord! :)

Beth

Beth,

Thank goodness it wasn't worse! I hope his hand heals well and burns can be so painful, so I hope you've been babying him.

Tell me you have a fire entinguisher in the kitchen too! You wouldn't believe how many kitchen fires our VFD gets paged to respond to....nor would you believe how many people save their own kitchen (and, generally, their whole house as well) just because they have a fire extinguisher handy. Often, all the fire entinguisher does is knock down the initial flames and buy time for the firefighters to arrive on-scene, but it does give the fire dept./homeowners a chance to save the house by keeping it from getting out of hand too quickly.

I am sure the first frost is coming sooner rather than later, but I wish it wouldn't. I want another year like....I think it was 2003 or 2004---when our first hard freeze here didn't arrive until about Dec. 17th or so. It was a gloriously long fall gardening season that year.

Dawn

In 2004 we got our first freeze here on Thanksgiving day. We had gone to Florida the early part of Nov, expecting to find that it had frozen during the two weeks we were gone and came home to find that it didn't. And wasn't Jan of 2005 the warmest Jan on record in Ok or was that 2006. One of those years spinach produced well in Jan.

OK, Dorothy, that's the year I remember. We had Thanksgiving here for my side of the family, and our flower border around the veggie garden froze that night right before they came up...or at least the zinnias and hummingbird salvias did although I think some other flowers survived. My gardening aunt was very disappointed to hear the flowers had JUST frozen. She kept going on and on about how she'd just missed seeing them. I hated that they froze right before they drove up here. Her flowers were still going strong in Fort Worth then, but mine was mostly done.

Some of the veggies lost the top portion of the plant and survived, and they lasted until December 14th or 15th when we had a pretty decent freeze. THEN, on December 23rd, we had one of the coldest nights we'd had since moving here and that was the end of everything.

If Jan. 2005 was the hot January, and I think it was, then that was the beginning of the 2005-2006 drought for us, but we didn't know that at the time, of course. We had less than an inch of rain that whole month, and several days in the 80s. It was pretty brutally hot for January--I think we were in the 80s here a lot that first week or two. It was just bizarre. Here we had the occasional cold night once or twice a week, but it was a warm month overall.

And then there was January 2006...it was warm too, but not as warm for us as 2005. Don't you remember the weather forecasters going on and on about us having 2 or 3 of the hottest winters ever in a row during that time? What I loved about 2005 and 2006 was that the soil temps in Jan. and Feb. were really high so I planted tomatoes in early March, and then all I had to do was cover them up on an occasional night and they produced early, early, early.

I remember our VFD went to a very bad fatality accident on I-35 down near the Winstar Casino in latest February or earliest March and were there for several hours. (It was a horrible accident.) Usually in the winter I take water, Gatorade and hot coffee. This time, I took water, Gatorade and 5 gallons of sweet tea. All the firefighters wanted was the sweet tea! I am almost positive that someone stuck in traffic behind the wreck on the freeway told us their car's thermometer was showing 92 degrees that February or early March day. The firefighters couldn't drink the water, Gatorade and sweet tea fast enough. It seems like the casino's own security people kept bringing me more ice and water to supplement what I'd brought, so we could keep all the law enforcement officers, firefighters and emergency medical people hydrated as they performed their tasks. It was brutally, brutally hot for winter.

We haven't had that kind of warm winter weather here since then, or at least we've had really cold March and April weather that more-or-less cancelled it out, and I have planted tomatoes later and later every single spring. I don't think I'll ever forget those two winters in 2005-2006 and wonder if we'll see that kind of hot winter weather again in our lifetimes?

Dawn

I'm really hoping for some Thanksgiving brussels sprouts, green peas, and lettuce. The Brun d'Hiver lettuce is a really pretty butterhead type with red freckles. It will be okay I bet. Is anyone else growing fall sweet peas? How are they doing?
Carol, you mentioned you had a lot of cole crops, what brussels sprouts are you growing? You mentioned before, but it escapes me now of course. Do you ever have cabbage moths bother them?
Has everyone planted garlic? Do any of you plant garlic later than this? Lots of questions and I haven't visited the forum in a few days. We're busy opening a new BBQ restaurant in OKC and I'm way too busy. ( Am I allowed to self-promote on GW?)
I also want to be the first to sign up for George's first trapping seminar. :)

Hope everyone is warm, fed, and doing well,
Dale, OKC

I don't think it is too late to plant garlic. I think as long as you get it into the ground before Thanksgiving it will be OK. A lot of people have planted already, but I haven't yet. I grow my garlic in a fairly wet spot in my garden (well, it is only wet about 2 years out of 5, but this is one of those years), so I haven't put it in the wet ground, and may plant it in the raised bed currently occupied by bush Roma beans.

I hope the rest of your cool-season crops do well. This is the coolest and wettest autumn weather we've had here in quite a few years.

You are not allowed to self-promote on GW and can be banned for doing so. However, if one of us asked you the name of the place you're working, I think you could answer that question as long as you don't go into detail beyond answering the question. So, Dale, where do you work? (Got a restaurant garden just outside the door? (Wouldn't that be heavenly?)

If you are going to take George's trapping seminar, and then trap your own meat for the BBQ place, that could be a plus, i.e., "locally raised meat". LOL Sorry. Couldn't resist.

I found a new recipe to try soon. It is for bacon jam. Imagine putting that on a biscuit! You can only preserve it as a freezer jam, or keep it in the fridge. As soon as I mentioned that I am going to make it "soon" the entire family started saying "you can make it now....we have bacon". LOL

I hope you'll keep us posted on how things are going with the new place. Even if you can't mention your location or hours, you won't have to tell us the name but once because we'll remember it after that. One of the GW members who posts a lot on the tomato forum and other veggie forums raises and sells tomato plants online. He has to be very careful and must refrain from mentioning his own business, but that doesn't stop other people from mentioning it for him as a 'recommendation' in those 'where can I find heirloom tomato plants?' threads.

Hope all is well with y'all and that everything goes smoothly.

Dawn

Do not worry about us, Miss Dawn! I'm a big believer in many smoke alarms and fire extinquishers. We live in a old house and use space heaters, enough said. And, YES, I'm babying him big time. Aloe vera on the burn, constantly redressing it since he drained the blister, light gauze dressing so it can get air. I know burns. When I was little I burned both my hands on a floor furnance.
Oh, and I got my garlic planted! I've got one head planted in the ground, and a few cloves in a container, just to see which does better. :)

Beth

My garlic is not in the ground yet and I am glad because it is very wet here. Maybe next week.

Dale, I planted De Cicco Broccoli which was just a Ferry Morse rack pack. I think every seed germinated, but I had some damage after it was planted. Part of it was from heavy rain and part was from the cats that decided it was great fun to tear up the floating row cover. Those that didn't get damaged are looking OK, but I am not sure how much cold they can take. I planted a lot of cole crops and it is growing well, but probably should have been planted much earlier. I expected the cooler weather to get here about Halloween, but it came much earlier. We have had cool temps and lots of dampness. Since I don't normally plant a fall garden, this whole thing has been an experiment. I bought Packman for next year.

My DH will be in OKC next Friday for a doctors appointment and loves Bar-B-Q. Can you recommend a place? Will he be able to eat there in the evening? He is going to the VA hospital for his once a year (if that often) visit. There is something else he wants to go to the next day so I am trying to get him to stay overnight. He always wants me to go with him, but I told him I would stay home and feed his quail and he could stay overnight. I guess he's afraid I will let a few out while feeding. LOL Actually, we both have done that before and have to have a little quail rodeo to catch them. We have lost a couple, but we usually can net them and get them back in. The quail are his project and I don't normally get very involved, but I do stick greens in their cages from the garden. They expect it now, so they are always glad to see me. They may miss the garden this winter as much as I do.

I don't know that I am a great broccoli grower, but I think the secret is in the timing. I have had some years that the spring broccoli is great and others when it flowered almost as soon as it formed a small head. I thought fall would be better, but I picked the wrong fall to try it. It's OK though, I will enjoy what I get and not worry about the rest. I take the Thomas Edison attitude and just considered it another thing that didn't work. Carol

Summer squash and peppers are the stars of the moment. Yay! There are several tomatoes still going but they're ripening oh so slowly. Radishes, turnips, lettuces, cukes, English peas, and walking onions are still going. Herbs are looking happy now that I've removed the skyscraper-high weeds from around and in them. Oops. LOL I do need to get the garlic shoved in the ground before I forget about it in the upcoming holiday craziness. I have planted them as late as January, maybe even February, here and they've done just fine. It's me who doesn't do well in the cold. *shiver*

Diane

I went out today and picked the second row of bush beans, only got 1&1/2 gallons this time which is fine because they aren't as tasty as they would have been had they had sun, and I am tired of putting up beans. Also stripped the tomato and pepper vines. Got several green tomatoes several with dings from the second spurt of hail we got a few weeks ago. The cucs didn't make anything although they would have had time if it had been a normal fall. Also pulled some more radishes and picked some lettuce and some other oriental greens for salad.

I think we must have had a very light frost, because some of the okra leaves looked limp. Anyway, pulled all the okra stalks because there were only a half dozen that had any leaves at all left. Still have warty looking knots on our okra roots but not as bad as former years. We tried to solarize the area where it will go next year but I don't think it was very successful as it was mid Aug and already too cool. The grass never did die under the clear plastic just flourished. I'm wishing I'd bought black plastic.

Left the broccoli, cabbage and chinese cabbage in the garden and hope they can take a light frost. I want to make kimchee.

We're still harvesting lots of hot peppers and sweet peppers, quite a few bite-sized tomatoes, a few slowly-ripening regular tomatoes (I may pick 'em green this afternoon because we're expecting about 36-38 degrees here at our house tonight), a decent amount of green beans---would have had more if the sun would shine, a few okra pods her and there, and still have winter squash and cukes growing.

Dorothy, I ended up getting enough fall cukes for about 18 to 20 or maybe 22 jars of pickles....mostly bread and butter slices, bread and butter stackers, dill stackers, but also some dill chips and some sweet relish. I think it we could have a couple more weeks of sunshine without a freezing night, I'd get enough cukes to make at least one good batch of dill spears, but think tonight's cold may thwart those plans.

My entire fall garden has produced less than expected (back when I planted in sunny weather!) and more slowly than expected due to all the clouds and rain. However, the cool season crops look good and I have high hopes for them. The fall potatoes look good above ground, and I'm hoping that when I dig them, I'll find lots of taters underground too.

I hope your broccoli, cabbage and chinese cabbage can take the light frost tonight so you get a chance to make kimchee.

I may or may not go out this afternoon and cover up what I can to get it through tonight's cold. The forecast for Marietta doesn't sound so bad, but our well-experienced local forecaster took great pains to explain on the weather forecast Thursday night and yesterday as well that those of us in "rural outlying areas" were likely to go into the 30s and likely would have patchy frost in some areas. So, if I don't cover up and everything is damaged or killed, I can't blame him for the weather because he warned us.

I'm not really ready for the warm-season gardening season to end, but it is inevitable at some point, and the cool-season crops ought to hang on a bit longer.

I have several volunteer tomato plants sprouting in the pathways, undoubtedly from one of the cherry or currant types, because the birds get some of those maters....especially the currant ones. I'm tempted to dig up a couple of those 6" tall tomato plants and try to grow them on the patio in tubs, but I know from trying it before that tomatoes that ripen in cold weather just don't have the flavor I expect.

They always say it isn't over until the fat lady sings....well, for the warm-season crops, the fat lady may sing tonight.

Our temps here are running 10-14 degrees colder than average for this time of year, so I don't think we'll make it to our usual average first frost date in November. I think we'll freeze here, if not tonight, then soon.

Dawn

I thought about a "bbq themed " garden outside, like with maybe okra and chile peppers and such. It's a little late for stuff late that, of course isn't? There;s a considerable amount of space to work with for spring and that will be fun. (expect lots of recommendations from everyone.) Right now we've inherited some ugly ugly fake plastic flowers stuck in the ground overrun with weeds.
Carol, sorry I didn't get the forum earlier to recommend a good place. I don't want to break any rules or overstep my bounds but for my money the best barbeque in OKC is at smokey's bbq. I think it's on 23rd(?)

mmmm....bacon jam....

I think smokey's bbq custom smokes bacon too, but I'm not sure:) It is sad to see the warm season crops go, but I do like the stay-inside-and-go-crazy-in-the-kitchen-and-makes-lots-of-dirty-dishes-weather too of course. ( I see the other threads too of course, and so wish I had time to comment!) I just haven't had time for sitting at the computer till now. Whew!
Dale

Dale,

Sooner or later, Tim and I will drive to OKC to spend the day and I'll come back to this forum well in advance and ask your advice about what to order at the BBQ restaurant you recommended. I'm sure it all will be good, but you must have your personal favorite dish or two (or six or eight).

After I make the bacon jam, I'll post a message and tell y'all how it went and what I think. I also have a recipe for tomato/bacon jam I've been meaning to try---clearly also a freezer jam type recipe.

The recipe for bacon jam can be found at homesicktexan.blogspot.com, a website that features a lot of recipes I like, including one for hatch chile pepper/potato casserole. (I've never met a potato casserole I didn't like.)

I'm glad you have time to read if not time to post....at least we know you are still "there", or actually, still "here" with us.

Oooooh.....what a fun challenge for us to discuss all winter....helping you design a Bar-B-Q themed garden. That could be such fun!

Dawn

We got a good frost over the weekend but seem to have only lost a few leaves on the summer squash. Everything is still doing as well as it was.

I'm working on dehydrating a couple more gallons of summer squash today and I just finished canning up five quarts of pickled peppers.

Stay away, winter! At least for a little while longer...

Diane

Diane, How do you use dehydrated summer squash? I dehydrate okra to use in stew; it seems to lose a bit of its slime when dried. And green beans and then just rehydrate and cook. But have never tried squash. Don't like it frozen except shredded to make into bread later.

We still have tomatoes, some beans, and some squash to harvest. The frost which hit us Sunday did minimal damage.

George

We continue to harvest okra, tomatoes, green beans, pickling cucumbers, and (unfortunately) peppers.

At this point, I think I have at least a two-year supply of peppers preserved in every possible way, and I silently chant "Die, Pepper, die!" every time I walk past the two short rows of pepper plants.

Winter squashes continue to mature, albeit slowly, and the cool season crops, including the fall potatoes, continue to grow well.

I don't know what tomorrow's predicted heavy rains will do to the garden.....and no frost is in sight here, so I am afraid there will be more peppers to pick this weekend or next week.

I dehydrate the summer squash in slices, then just toss into soups, stews, and stir fries all winter long. I don't do anything special other than making sure to add some liquid to the stir fries and letting them go until rehydrated.