Tomato plants, being genetically a perennial, do not have a sensor for seasons. I started pinching all buds/flowers starting lat August on my plants. Because I new that those buds are not going to make it. I was right. My plants are loaded with fruits initiated before end of august but are not ripening, EXCEPT a handful of Sun Golds. . I picked some as big as 10 to 18 oz (Ananas Noir, Cherokee purple) and smaller varieties with slight hint of color, just yesterday , Hoping that they might ripen inside . I have hundreds more that are green, no chance to ripen. Incidentally we have had a goo fall weather. Our lows now going down to about 45F and highs around 57F. I gave up on pinching by the end of September. Even now some of them are flowering, while almost half dead. They just don't get it. Dets seem to be a bit cold sensitive.

I'm west of you in Martinsville, VA and also had awesome results from overseeding last fall, but made 2 mistakes which I will remedy this year: 1. No pre-M in fall, which resulted in massive Chickweed bloom that I had to battle into late spring. I'm adding Tenacity at overseeding and a pre-M 6-8 weeks later as well. 2. No fungicide in spring, which resulted in large Brown Spot outbreak in May and killed a lot of my new grass in the back yard. So, next April-May (when nightly temps hit 70F), I'll be putting down a fungicide. I like your plan and agree with the above posts. Good luck and pray for rain soon!!

I've hesitated to reply because I don't know! only want to sympathize with your dilemma. At our old house growing young roses up a bit in pots was basically a failure,because of lack of light, but here at the new house I can see that it's very different: plenty of morning sun and afternoon shade. So this fall I'm thinking to pot up all new roses,but just for one season. I, too, find growing roses in pots too much work and just can't keep up. Like Kes Z, I am much more concerned about losing roses to heat and drought (I'm in Italy, about a zone 8,but my garden has a south-western exposure, so it's protected from North winter winds, but subjected to terribly brutal summer sun). Still, I've always mounded/protected baby bare-root roses planted out in fall/winter, just in case. I guess in general I'd vote to plant them out in the ground,especially the larger ones,but I think I might protect them. One way that I've done this successfully is by using pieces of styrofoam-you know, those odd-shaped pieces that are used in packaging so many things? I break these up to smaller sizes, if necessary, andmake a sort of little corral around the canes of the rose,holding the pieces in place with stones,earth,whatever. Then I fill in the top a bit with other pieces,holding these in place with sticks,teepee-style,or use wine corks. I like this way of protecting because the materials are efficient insulators, but also sterile so bacteria and fungus aren't encouraged.You'd only mount these potective teepees once the temperature really drop.If some are still very, very tiny, you could keep those few in their pots.

No "great" updates, honestly. I did trim it down a lot earlier this year, and it definitely looks better for it! Now that I know it's OK with it, I'll do a better job of trimming this winter. Since posting this, my mom passed, my dad got COVID which led to end stage pulmonary fibrosis, and one of my dogs passed... so it's been a rough year :-( Obviously I haven't had the time, energy, or money to focus on the gardens like I wanted. I have 2 sunshine ligustrum in another section of the landscape, though, and I'm kinda thinking about pruning them and then planting the cuttings all around the front of the butterfly bush (leaving the back open so that I can get in and prune the butterfly bush easily). That wouldn't cost anything, they're drought-tolerant so I wouldn't have to worry about watering them after the first year, and the evergreen yellow would offset the purple colors well. I had to Google the vitex... wow, that's going to be gorgeous! I'm going to have to look in to that, I'd never heard of it :-O