I have about 10 hummingbirds here again today. They likely moved in with this little storm we are having-been raining for about 8 hours now

Richard - I'm glad your hummingbirds came back for a little visit! It appears you'll be eating plenty of eggplant soon. I hope your broccoli heads for you. I didn't manage to get a fall crop going this year.

I need to get on the job of getting some peppers frozen and/or dehydrated. The average first frost date is approaching so I know they could be zapped about any time now, although the lowest temp forecast over the next couple weeks is 38 tomorrow night.

We have received 2.75" of rain in the last 5 days which came in 2 different storms, the last of which included some winds. I had to upright a couple pepper cages and a tomato cage that had leaned over a bit in the storm. The biggest pepper plant I have is approaching 5' tall!

That's great, Len!

I'm scared....tonight's low is supposed to be 38*. Brrr...

Love it Len

Burpee’s has all their seeds on sale for half price right now (SeedSale1021) which is the only time I buy them. The delivery price is $2.99 no matter how many packets you get. The have some seeds that a lot of places don’t have and they are usually high quality, just normally charge double what they are worth. One can get about 5 packets of their most expensive seeds now for $20 or less including delivery.

Here's our mid Oct garden round-up...

A row of carrots planted in-between the late sweet potatoes. These carrots replaced the original row of SPs which were dug up in late August

Here is a row of collards, again planted between 2 rows of late Sweet Potatoes...

The autumn green and purple cabbages shaping up...

Broccoli plants next to a compost pile, no sign of heads yet which should result in Big heads later...

Some late tomato plants trying to ripen up before the blight takes over...

A row of Snowball turnips, we find them milder than the purple top variety...

Some fruits are up next....

A couple of Pomegranates are hanging on....

and lastly the Persimmons are starting to turn orange...

A closer look...

Thanks Richard...I checked them out but I'm only in the market for a couple of things they don't have in stock. I'm looking at buying Sungold tomato and Tonopah tomato from Seeds n such but their bulk order is too many for me. Anyone want to share a purchase?

Len - I have Tonopah tomato seeds that I can send you. I didn't care for the tomato much.

Thanks Cindy I'll take that one off my shopping list ὤ2

Ah, I’m too late. I would have split a tonopah order with you Len.

A neighbor has been having some work done on the house and the construction guys have a big dumpster thing parked across the street from

me. The work’s about done. I happened to catch them at the end of the day yesterday and asked if I could add some tomato plants. So…Today I made that my focus. Four big tomato plants found their way into the container as well as a pepper plant and some pepper branches. This time of the garden season is always such hard work. Tomorrow I will have another go at the ”what can I add to the dumpster” game.

Margi you can have some of whatever Tonopah seeds Cindy has....I only need a few seeds. Are you looking for Sungold cherrry tomato seeds?

I also pulled down several trellis' of tomato vines today. We have yard waste service and they had enough black on them I did not put in compost, but I did compost the cucumber, squash and bean plants I pulled up. It was a perfect gardening day, cool and sunny!

I'm working on a video of this year's dahlias as sort of a catalog for friends wanting tubers, along with one with pictures of some I'm looking for (some of which I might have given away in years past) I hope to have a really diverse dahlia bed next year!

Fall has been warmer than normal and we have not had a frost yet. It is hard to believe that I need to get the veggies harvested and stored when the weather is still so mild. But that is bound to change and I do not want to have tons to finsh when the weather is bad. Most all of the potatoes are dug. That is not fun to do in the cold, just guess how I know that! The warmth is giving some late tomatoes a chance to size up and ripen....much appreciated. A few spring planted snow peas dropped seeds I did not know about. I noticed young pea plants in my late radish planting...Fun! There are only a few but they dress up a stir fry nicely.

Len, the dahlias look great. I have less dramatic, but colorful, zinnias and sunflowers still blooming and feeding the bees. No hummingbirds have been around for the last few weeks. I do not expect to see them anymore this year.

Naturegirl, my last hummingbird left yesterday. All the ones in the front left the day after the rain (and I just filled the feeders)—about 3 days ago. The last one was in the backyard and I didn’t see him today.

Couple days of cleaning out and planting in a bed. Yesterday was picking all the tomatoes from green to last of reds. 4 towers along the fence side. It's time. Plants cleared and towers taken down. Light fork over of the whole garlic leg of the bed. And somehow struck a rather large chunk of slab concrete way out in the corner. Not sure how that got missed before this, lol.

Today I planted in garlic cloves. Got some softneck and hardneck home stock, but not much. Bought a bunch of kinds from Keene out of Wisconsin this year. Overall, 16 kinds of garlic, 365 cloves planted. Most of it hardneck. 4 barrows of pine straw scattered all over the whole area. 8x20 food bed :) And still got a bit of space for some spring onion and beet planting and the fenceline to plan for next year.

And getting some new furnace action coming up... so time to move all the containers and bins from the kitchen garden and cleanup in the herb beds to prep for workers to come in with new gas line digging and such. We run on LP tanks out here. I've kept this area under containers for a couple years to save up and plan for this. But it's still going to need a good week or so of work between the rains predicted.

Nice is in some of my bins. Lots of yellow and orange mums, happy herbs and final round of some things to be brought inside.

The garden looks pretty bare but tidy which is a good thing because we are getting our first real rain of the season (Daughter said it rained while we were in Tennessee but that does not count) So I will be inside with hatches battened down except when there is a break between showers and I can get out with the doggies. Looks like 10 days or so of rain if the guessers are right.

Wow, Len, 10 days of rain seems like a lot. We received .75 inches recently spread over a few. It has been a fall with even rainfall and warmer than normal weather. We have some cooler nights ahead, but still not freeze.

Beesneeds, what a nice assortment of garlic to have in the ground. It is fun to feel like one has a start on next year's garden already. I like your idea of using pine straw on it. I found a bag of pine straw in my garage. We are cleaning a lot since we are having our first visit from relatives in 18 months. We sure let things go around the house, but it is almost clean enough now to not raise too much concern with the visiting kids :) I'm not sure why I have the pine straw. I think it came along with some leaves in bags from neighbors last fall. Hope all goes well with your furnace work.

RD, I hear you on the feeders. It seems like they always leave right after the feeders are cleaned and filled. We expected "ours" to leave while we were gone for a week. We returned to dirty feeders with hummers still visiting. We have two feeders so it is not a big waste if they leave and don't finish "their" food.

I still have a few cherry tomatoes and small zuchini. Also a few late potatoes to dig and a few very late potatoes I will leave as long as possible.

Our neighborhood nursery has an end of season sale on garden seed packs - 75% off. They are all mixed together in a big tub that one needs to sort through to see if there is a variety that you want. I restrained myself. I do not need more seeds.

Naturegirl we have whole months of rain sometimes here:)

Slipped out into the garden for half an hour between showers to pull up and transplant some of the mache that volunteers for me every fall. I just let one plant go to seed in the same place and i have plenty. I did buy some "Piedmont" corn salad to try...supposed to be a good one grown in NW. Birds tore up most of the seedlings so probably should start some again.

Yes, we get rain for extended periods of time out here! That's why it was so weird when our spring was exceptionally dry, my area was in severe drought, other parts of OR were in extreme drought. But now "Portland Has Nearly Made Up Its Rain Deficit for the Year------The weather systems in the Pacific Ocean over the past week-called 'bomb cyclones' because the atmospheric pressure drops so steeply-have soaked Oregon since Tuesday evening."

I am admitting that my garden is done (sad face), except for lettuce and carrots, some aspabroc starts plus some of the original plants which are still producing.

Time to put out the hummingbird feeders, the Anna's stay here all winter.

I too got my garlic planted this morning. I decided to just plant German White this year since I had enough large cloves after I busted up my best heads. It does better than Spanish Roja and Chesnok Red in my garden and I like the fat cloves better for eating because I don't have to peel as much. A couple co-workers from India want to try growing garlic so I will give the other 2 types to them.

I also cleaned out 3 more beds. Still have 5 left to clean and then I'm going to take the frames off my 3 newest beds and use the frames to replace the ones on 3 of my oldest beds. So I will be downsizing by 120 sq/ft next year. I didn't even plant anything in 2 of the newest beds this year so the space won't be missed and I'm sure I will be happy to have less to tend next summer.

Picked the first turnips today. The fall crops are doing well and growing good. We could use a good soaking rain and that may arrive next week. In the meantime these cooler daytime low 70's are keeping the evaporation rate down and the cole crops happy. The broccoli plants have tiny heads peeking out now so those should be ready to pick, blanch, and freeze in about 2 weeks or so. Eating the first persimmon with dinner tonite.

Got a lot of the kitchen garden cleaned up today. I think just another hour or two of work and I will be set for when the gas guys come out. I had gotten a couple of little greenhouse tops at Aldi a month or two ago and set them up over my herb bins- 2 bins fit perfect into one top. Had to transplant some little parsley and cilantro, but now they are tucked in for several more weeks of season. The rain held off and weather was fine, so I got it done. Also set up the couple of compost cage beds with their next wall layer for filling up.

And pulled up most of my matured bushy pelargonium, 8-10 plants- I grow out cuttings each year for the gardens. So into a large plastic cauldron with some compost tea in the bottom for them to sit for a few in the porch till I can get around to trimming the best out. A goodly three foot mass of the stuff, stinking my porch up something wonderful. They die with the cold anyway outside, and can survive being pulled really well, so I like to pull them and use them through the winter :)

We are predicted to have our first below 40 dip tonight. though frosts aren't predicted for a week or two yet.

Had a lot of green tomatoes so I made a batch of slow cooker green sauce for the freezer, and a batch of sliced on the dehydrator.

Is Jack this is the time of year when I plan to downsize . Of course what really happens is I start too many seeds in the Spring and have to find some place to put everything . I'm pretty sure this is incurable incurable but I make the same promise every year.

i picked a 5" Straight Eight cuke yesterday off a plant that I direct seeded on July 2. Also a ripe smallish Dester tomato..There's one more 4" cuke and a few small ones that I'm thinking of putting whole in a salad.

That fence that I installed 3 years ago is coming down. You may remember the 7 or 8 inch oak post that I cut down in the woods and spent days hauling out of there. I used it as a corner post. It must be full of bugs and something is scattering chips off the post. It and another oak post have apparently broken. The big one is threatening to take out my Lima bean tripod which I'm still hoping to at least get some seed out of. None of the pods have begun to brown up and I don't know if seed will be viable after they freeze.

Richard - You sent me some pepper seeds last spring. I want to thank you. The Albino Bull successfully seeded and It was the only pepper that we used this year. There are still lots of peppers on the two plants. This is a yellow sweet bell pepper that turns to oranges and reds when fully ripe. We also bought a few seedlings of a sweet pepper that I thought was a renamed Hungarian Wax that was named as a different, but similar, country than Hungary. It turned out to be mildly hot. It grows long thin peppers that grow as large as 8 inches long. Turns a bright red.

Major storm front went thru here last night and dumped about 1.5" of rain, that should keep the fall crops happy. No damage done but one Giant Thunderbolt sounded like a bomb went off nearby. A lot of leaves are on the ground this morning just as they were starting to look pretty. Upper 60's for the rest of the week with another storm predicted for Thursday nite, no 30's in sight yet.

Same here, vgkg. But it really poured here. Lots of thunder an lightening, too. 3.1" of rain in my gauge. There was a little flooding of our basement and that hasn't happened in a long time.

We did need the rain so we are good for a while. Rainfall was down over two inches.

We are in midst of flowing storm with lots of wind...no power over night because there are lots of trees hovering over wires that bring electricity to our corner of the county. Fortunately it is back on now and generator warmed us up this morning:) There will not be any gardening today. I'm reading "Discovering Dahlias" which I recommend to anyone who thinks about growing them...great of dahliaholics like me!

Nearly 4 inches of rain over 2 days...not really wanted here. Predicted first frost in patches tonight.

Will start picking the first batch of persimmons today, it looks like the tree has twice as many fruits as last year so there will be plenty to share with the neighbors. Still hanging onto the daytime upper 60's and nighttime lower 50's here with another inch of rain predicted for Friday. The broccoli, cabbages, and late sweet potatoes should fatten up before the first frost which is still nowhere in sight.

Carrots looking good too and should be ready by the time the first cabbage is picked (in about 10 days) for some fall slaw. The beets are sparse, not enough to pickle but a few for fresh cooking. A few late tomatoes are slow to ripen but they're still trickling in. Otherwise it's garden clean-up time as the old dead summer plants get pulled and composted.

We got another inch of rain here overnite with another possible inch on the way. A good day to chill indoors, esp since we got our covid booster shots yesterday. Picked more turnips yesterday and a few dozen persimmons which were hanging too low to the ground. Still picking a few tomatoes too but most of them are similar to persimmons in size. It looks like our days in the 70's are behind us according to the long term forecast, but at least there is still no sign of a first frost yet..

It looks like we will get a nice break in the rain this weekend. Time to mow down the asparagus ferns and maybe think about planting garlic. Dahlias still standing and may go ahead and take them down too because it does not look like frost in forecast for a while yet.

You are most welcome, John. Glad they grew well for you.

Richard - I picked some yesterday for the stuffed peppers we had for dinner. Thanks again!

It poured here all day and there was a areal flood warning all day. It was still raining at seven this evening. Too dark to check my rain gauge but I will tomorrow.

Hold on to your hat, Cindy…I saw on the national weather that the system that was here yesterday (61 mph winds at the airport just south of me) is knocking on your back door. we got about 2.25” of rain over a couple days earlier this week. So needed!

Probably the last fresh pico of the season.

All toll we topped off at 1.75" here, glad it wasn't more as the carrots do tend to split with too much rain. By next weekend the nighttime temps may dip into the 30's so those late sweet potatoes will be dug up soon with spinach seed planted in their place for an early Spring harvest. The cabbages and broccoli heads are getting larger by the day. Collards and turnips are doing well too. Will be giving out bags of persimmons to the neighbors over the coming days, a major bumper crop this year.

Nice looking pico, Margi!

Margei and vgkg - We ended up getting 1.8" of rain. And it really feels like fall out there now. Looks like we will have low temps in the 30 beginning this Tuesday with the low on Friday predicted to be 31. I still have quite a few peppers to pick but everything else should be ok.

Happy Halloween!

BOO!

Boo, back Len!

It’s going to likely freeze here this week, so I picked a bunch of peppers today and got a couple more soaker hoses couled up and put away.

Boo hoo here, I have had to admit that the tomatoes are done. I got all of the plants out and into the yard debris bin, I never compost them due to late blight. A few things left, carrots and lettuce and a second planting of zucchini paid off, but it's the end of those too.

My last two

It was a very busy day here today and I have yet to go trick or treating with Madison. Maybe she will forget? Planted about 200 cloves of garlic after prep the beds, cut down the asparagus ferns, mowed the leaves and needles up from the lawn, and harvested tatsoi and chard. Whew, too much work for an old guy.

Our jack o lanterns are really scary now after a couple of weeks in the rain...will need rubber gloves when I carry them out to compost tomorrow!

Len, the pumpkins remind me of a precious old children''s book called Mousekin's Golden House, but our pumpkins tend to mold instead of gently closing.

Rabbit, rabbit.

It's boo-hoo here, too Lea. Tomorrow night they are calling for a low of 32 and it's supposed to rain tomorrow, too. It's wool sock weather.

So, after lunch I'll head outside to pick the last of my peppers and squash.

Mother Nature is just kissing us here with mid/upper 30's for this weeks nightly lows, no killing frost yet so the sweet potatoes are having a short reprieve. I'm stocking up on ice to blanch a load of these babies by the weekend...

WHO is going to start November? I know that most of us aren't as busy in the garden, but I'd like to keep up with any news.

Here you go, Lea.

https://www.houzz.com/discussions/6195000/november-veggie-tales#n=0