I put the flannel sheets on a week ago. :0) It's been getting down to 42F.....Friday 30F & rain, but in town....still above freezing. (Colorado)

Frost coming here soon, too. I have two houseplants outside. I better go grab them.

I feel the same as you, schoolhouse, about the annuals. Time to say goodbye! Actually, my geraniums are blooming well. We also are getting warmer temps this weekend and next week, so i may have geraniums into November.

Im just northwest of Philadelphia.

Here in NE Illinois we had some pretty cold weather. Cool enough that DH turned heat on! path by the lakeshore was icy in patches this morning, and we did bring in the plants. I’ll be stopping over in Cleveland in a couple of days, so I guess I’ll keep my fleecy jacket close.

Yesterday was chilly, but I sure was surprised at the down coats I saw! I mean, it was maybe a high of 50°, is that down coat weather?

I'm in NE Ohio, WFMJ says 38 for a low. I had to go check because I didn't know it was supposed to freeze because I'd want to disconnect the water hoses if it was. I think we are good where I am, for tonight that is.

We have a freeze advisory here too, in Central Kentucky. I picked most of my cherry tomatoes and okra. My poor, huge, beautiful eggplants are loaded with blooms. I brought one that was in a pot inside this evening, along with a potted bell pepper, cilantro, begonia and a Japanese green whose name I can't remember at the moment.

The good thing about the cooler temps is that my persimmons are really starting to turn orange finally. They're getting heavier too, the limbs are drooping. There were 33 fruit on my one little tree.

I'll miss my flowers, though. My blue morning glories only recently started to bloom. Temps are supposed to go up over the next few days so I'm hoping they don't freeze tonight.

Cold here but no frost yet (low 40's) and the long range predicts warmer than normal temps for the rest of Oct, plus no rain in sight, not a drop. Our flowers should be ok until Nov as long as I keep up with the watering. The fall crops of broccoli, cabbages, turnips, collards, and carrots are doing well, still picking a few tomatoes, I need to dig up the sweet potatoes but won't wait for that first frost.

Oh, we got a hard frost overnight thru this morning alright. The grass is white and crunchy out there. I just now took the covers off the mailbox and the dahlias. The fabric was semi-frozen with ice crystals! I have them drying out in the garage.

The petunias look ok, but of course not as vibrant being mid-October and there are new blooms wanting to come on, don't notice any damage. However, the soil is dry so I watered them. I'm all out of Miracle Gro that I normally add to the water, debating whether or not to go buy a small box, that is do I want the plants to keep putting out this late? I like to put the mailbox cover away by Nov. 1st. Didn't water the dahlias tho. Maybe tomorrow if the ground under them looks on the dry side.

Weather forecast calls for 33 degrees tonight, so far no frost warning.

No frost here! I may get another eggplant or two!

We have had frost warning for the last two nights and tonight too. I threw a sheet over my most gorgeous fern last night but apparently everything is okay. I have four huge ferns and a gaziilion impatiens and begonias and coleus , all in pots. I also have six lantanas in pots. Since the temps next week will be in the 70s, I'm guessing I'll have flowers till the end of october. I only brought in one begonia and one geranium in but all the others will die in their pots and urns. My son carries the palm tree and all the lantanas and ferns to my green house basement room.

Darn Iris, I would liked to have seen the toad but don't find a photo. Nothing that interesting has turned up in my bathroom. I did find a little newt marching from my kitchen towards me in my laundry room one morning a few years ago, with dust bunnies on it. Suspect it had been under my refrigerator. No houseplants that summer outside here. I did have thresholds and storm doors replaced at each end of a hallway after that - bug and critter proof now.

No frost forecast here but we've fallen into the mid 40's a couple of times. My big geranium planters are on wheeled bases to roll into my garage (DH) if necessary but they are good down to about 28-29 overnight, maybe a degree or two more if pushed right up against the house with our very deep overhang. I will usually get 5 or so years from the plants if cut back hard in earliest Spring.

I have a cover on my tomato planter and am hoping for a few more for a fresh frozen tomato sauce. Some very young late lettuce I am trying that may not get large enough for a harvest.

All the kale I was growing is gone, I pulled the last plant. DH had gotten so he'd been enjoying it (his father never failed to grow it) and the only place I can find it locally is the organic section of the grocery store. Price makes our vegetable dish cost as much as our main dish to put on the table!

We already had frost last week. Much as I love spring and summer, I'm glad -- the frost knocks everything down so my environmental allergies almost entirely disappear until spring. It's a relief. I'm not exhausted to the point of needing a nap 2 hours after waking up :0/

We haven't had frost in the past five years that I've been here, but we're now having weather that is cooler than average, with highs in the 80s and lows in the low 60s. Soon I can start planting herbs in the patio area, but I have to move pots and a planter from the other house, which we are still living in part time.

The cooler weather is nice, and it also facilitates getting work done on the house and in the patio, but it also means that tourist season is approaching, which brings a bit more traffic to this area.

We had freeze warnings overnight Tues & Weds, but only a frost warning for last night - so although I covered my peppers, citrus and figs T & W, I didn't last night. I was surprised that this morning my car's windshield had a thin layer of soft ice (when I went out around 9am), the figs also had frost on the leaves, but the citrus on the back patio had none (whew! the figs can take it; not so sure about the citrus although I have had them out, covered, in the high 20s without issue).

We had frost warning this morning so I moved kaffir lime tree and a bunch of tender plants indoors yesterday. I also dug up purple sweet potatoes from the 2’x5’ portion of the raised bed. I was surprised to get nearly 10 lbs sweet potatoes since I mainly grew the vines to pick tender shoots throughout the growing season.

Palisades, you pick the sweet potato shoots to eat? in salads or cooked? I've not heard of doing so!

Raee, there are many ways to eat them but I mainly steam or stir fry them. They are quite nutritious and popular in East Asia dishes.

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8038024/

https://www.scitechnol.com/proceedings/the-benefits-of-consuming-sweet-potato-leaves-helps-reduce-risk-of-chronic-diseases-and-promotes-health-6867.html#:~:text=Sweet%20potato%20leaves%20contained%20in,and%20suppressing%20cancer%20cell%20growth.

https://ourpermaculturelife.com/sweet-potato-greens-more-nutritious-than-the-tuber-do-you-eat-them/

Edit to add a short Western fact sheet about sweet potato leaves, as some people may feel uncomfortable to see all those researchers with Asian names in the pubmed, and Chinese traditional medicine articles. This green vegetable has been long consumed in Asia before scientists in the West became aware of its benefits.

https://www.udc.edu/causes/wp-content/uploads/sites/11/2016/09/Sweet-Potato-Greens-Fact-Sheet-010.pdf

palisades - regarding your links:

#1 - first name (pole position for the work done) is a person from Vietnam. No credentials or CV stated. Lots of citations to work from relatively unknown organizations.

#2 - a Chinese naturopath. Naturopathy is not viewed as a legitimate or proven professional or scientific discipline.

#3 - written by a person (apparently lacking any credentials) self-described as a devotee of "permaculture". This is a gardening/farming approach without an accepted scientific basis.

Do you think someone like that would advocate a practice they don't personally follow? What otherwise is the basis of the advice?

Do as you wish of course and eat what you like but these are hardly authoritative sources.

these are hardly authoritative sources.

Obviously someone who thinks they know it all is not able to offer better “authoritative” sources.

One doesn't need any expertise in a given area tobe able to spot pseudo "information" of questionable origin.

One doesn't need any expertise in a given area tobe able to spot pseudo "information" of questionable origin.

Lol. Not you because is no pseudo "information" of questionable origin. But you can choose to remain in your own sphere…

Center for East-West Medicine, Santa Monica | UCLA Health

After avoiding a freeze but only frost warnings, every one of my many many flowers of all kinds in pots and urns look as well as they did mid-summer. Since it will be 80 all next week , maybe with climate change they will live on all winter.

palisades, the relevance of your link to an acupuncture clinic to what we were discussing is not immediately obvious. LOL.

Of course it’s on point because they’re not an acupuncture clinic. Acupuncture is only a part of their practice.

From their description: blending the best of modern Western and traditional Chinese medicine, including acupuncture and integrative medicine

Out of 17 MDs listed on that page, 7 of them offer acupuncture as a part of Chinese traditional medicine integration, part of which you call pseudo "information" of questionable origin.

Have trouble reading today? Lol. Carry on…

" pseudo "information" of questionable origin "

Sorry, no. I used this term to describe the links you posted to random, not credible "information sources" you suggested justified your eating sweet potato foliage. You proved what many do here often, thinking that any information found from an internet search is credible without doing even 30 seconds of further reading to see that source information, when disclosed, discredits or leads to serious doubt of the validity or bona fides of authors.

If another "permaculture" expert lacking any credential like the one you cited posted an article boasting the health benefits of eating of potting soil, would you follow it? PS, I hear it enrichens your compost pile if you add your own outflow the next day or two after you eat it.

Oh don’t get stuck on “permaculture “, that article was just to show Raee many different ways the veggie can be eaten. I observed that you are just myopic and on the edge of subtle racism to not see the substance of the sources, credentials, and citations, and kept bringing up the nonsenses.

Well, I've eaten sweet potato leaves in salads and stir fries.

We've warmed back up here today, so watered my garden. Not all of it, just some flowers, trees and plants that are still producing. I also picked a few strawberries, more out there growing. So odd in October.

Don't resort to insults, which are completely off the mark by the way, simply because I pointed out that your "facts" were other than that.

If you feel Vietnam has a history of important scientific research, explain why and give examples. If you think Naturopathy is other than quackery (which is what it is), explain why. If you feel that someone with no credentials of any kind can simply make something up and others should accept it as factual, explain why.

I don't know why but in my lifetime, and especially in the last decade, people have become either less able to identify truth from non-truth or perhaps have decided to not be bothered with considering the differences. I hope for your own benefit that that's not true for you on a broader scale.

Is there ANYTHING you won't argue about? No one owes you any kind of explanation of her preferences. If you don't want to eat them, just scroll on by and stop being a thorn in everyone's sides.

Sure, lots and lots of things. Try me.

If someone shares information that seems misleading or that seems it might have been better thought through or considered before doing so, I say so. You do the same and I hope everyone else does too.

If you feel Vietnam has a history of important scientific research, explain why and give examples. If you think Naturopathy is other than quackery (which is what it is), explain why. If you feel that someone with no credentials of any kind can simply make something up and others should accept it as factual, explain why.

Strange and incorrect assumptions.

The pubmed article is a collaboration of many Chinese researchers, and one researcher from Vietnam. And Chinese traditional medicine has been my interest in providing the sources to Raee.

And to quote: “Milagrosa Chiu Shieh Liu has completed her Doctor degree in Naturopathy in 2000 from Trinity College of Natural Health, Indiana, USA.”

Quackery? I think you’re out of your mind. Lol.

I think you don't understand what Naturopathy is. And isn't. LOL

I also think you don't understand what PubMed is. And isn't. LOL