2009 season

We finally had our first frost, which, to me, signals the end of the growing season. It came a month late, so I had plenty of time to prepare for it.

Only hardy crops left now. With a proper greenhouse or cold frame, I could protect more tender vegetables through winter. I have some lettuce, spinach, and arugula still going, so I hope to finish up a few cold frames to keep them alive.

Purple sprouting broccoli leaf showing off some frost (and some slug damage).

We had an amazing spring and summer this year. By far the hottest and driest since I've lived in Whatcom county. Up here, rain can be just as much an enemy as an ally. In a wet year, we fight mildews, molds, and early blights, and plant twice as many tomatoes and peppers as we think we need to make up for pitiful harvests. In a dry year, we don't complain - just water a bit more and enjoy the sun!

Frost free from March 10 - November 14; that's 249 days, or 8 months and 4 days, an extra long season for us. You can see that we have a pretty reliable wind, primarily a breeze from the SW in the summer. Note the change in wind direction from late summer into fall. We get our fall and winter "Nor'easters" (cold and powerful NE windstorms from the Fraser Valley in Canada) pretty regularly that time of year. In October and November, it's pretty clear that the spikes in average wind speed fall on the days of NE winds. Also of note is the rarity of rainfall this year - only 3 or 4 days of measurable (and it was barely that) precipitation from mid-May through mid-September.

For me, keeping track of the weather each year is crucial. I plan when to start my seeds in late-winter based on when our last spring frost will occur. I calculate at what date in summer I must plant fall crops in order to mature them before cold weather sets in based on our first frost date. The length of the growing season helps me determine which varieties of certain crops to grow, based on whether or not our season is long and hot enough. For a real farmer (one who depends on farming for their livelihood) favorable weather can mean keeping the farm and poor weather can mean bankruptcy. Yikes!

Squeakers.

Two weeks ago we had some friends over. We were showing them around the house and property and they wanted to see the pigeons. I opened up the door so they could look in the coop and out of NOWHERE, Buk (our dog) darted his head in and grabbed a pigeon! I grabbed Buk and he dropped it right away, and it flew up on the house. I caught it a day later. The strange part was that it was sitting in the front corner of the coop, where there is no perch, so I couldn't even see it there when I opened the door. Fast forward to a few days ago, when I was feeding them in the morning, I stuck my head inside and was surprised to see two yellow fluff-balls in a feather-nest in the corner! The bird was in the corner sitting on eggs!

These are about 4 or 5 days old, with eyes still shut. I thought the back one was not alive, but I watched and it rolled over. Unfortunately, it didn't make it for too long, and was still the next day. It was probably the second egg to hatch, and I read that the second, weaker pigeon of the two will sometimes not make it. So we will have one baby pigeon this winter.

The doting parent. I have nest boxes, but I didn't want to put any in until the spring, when warmer weather would make it easier on the chicks, but the birds were resourceful and made their own. I also read that I shouldn't put in a nest now, or move the baby into a nest, or the parents may reject it. So I'll just let them be. Exciting though!

Cover crops

The cover crops/green manures are up in both the main garden and the field plot. They need to get established before it gets too cold, but they won't do a lot of growing through winter.

Crimson clover is in all the beds in the main garden. It's mainly a nitrogen fixer, but will make tons of growth in early spring and add plenty of organic matter when it's turned under before planting. You can see the winter crops that are left (not as much as I'd hoped with no cold frames).

The field plot cover crop mix is slower to establish, and won't put on much growth at all over winter. In spring it will start early, and grow into a thick, waist-high stand before being cut and turned under in late spring before planting summer crops. This mix contains Austrian field peas (nitrogen-fixer, organic matter), hairy vetch (nitrogen-fixer), cereal rye (deep, penetrating root system and tall stalks for legumes to climb), and canola/rape seed (organic matter). All four will decompose quickly (~2 weeks) after turning under in spring. During the winter, they'll help control erosion and runoff, and keep nutrients from leaching out.

Fall weather finally arrives

It's not cold yet, but the rain is here. Tonight it is pouring, we are supposed to get half an inch. It's also very windy, with sustained 10 mph winds and gusts of 35 that are expected to reach 50 or 60 mph later tonight. This is normal fall weather for up here.

This picture was taken at about 5 pm a few days ago...

and this was the same time the next day. You could say the weather fluctuates.

Final fall work

Finally was able to finish winterizing the garden this weekend. Our first frost hasn't come yet, and it looks like it won't for a few weeks, so I still had time to get the cover crop planted in the last few beds. I cleared out the beds of beans, tomatoes, and peppers, the last remaining hot weather veggies.

This year my tomato seedlings got a little lanky. When I transplanted them I plucked off all the lower leaves and planted them deep and at an angle, with all of the stem buried to the uppermost leaves. I had read that they would sprout roots all along the stem, and they did! On the far right is the original root ball, with roots that grew all along the stem. I really had to fight these stems out of the ground, so the depth and spread of the roots for each plant had to be many feet.

This is from a few weeks ago, but I picked about this many green tomatoes off the vines as I pulled them.

The eggplant did awesome this year - we had way more than we knew what to do with. I picked the last of them and we'll just slice and freeze it all and try to use it this winter.

This is Hansel hybrid eggplant. Very sweet when picked small. I probably got about 20 this size and 20 half this size, from 4 crowded plants.

The remaining peppers. I will probably not do this well again with peppers unless I grow them under plastic - this summer was just too abnormally good. I picked a grocery bag FULL when I pulled these (I got 3 more bags full over the summer). I also hung two entire chile plants in the garage to dry the peppers - we'll see how that goes.

It's said that almost any veggie that follows a bean crop will do well, and I have to believe it. The beans left the bed in amazing shape - I can only hope the beds will be this nice again in the spring. I sowed crimson clover in these two beds, and filled in all the remaining bare spots in the other beds. Ideally, I would've had compost ready to spread and mix in the top few inches, but I'll just have to do that next spring instead. In the emptied pepper bed, I got my garlic in.

I put in about 125 cloves of Chet's Italian Red garlic. We eat about a head a week (we use a lot of garlic!) and I like to plant twice as much as I think I'll need, to cover losses, to make up for the smaller bulbs, and to have plenty to give away. I bought 2 lbs of organic seed garlic cloves from a local Deming, WA farmer. This variety is a mild softneck with good keeping qualities. Planting in fall after colder weather sets in will prevent the tops from growing, but will allow roots to establish over winter. They'll start growing earlier than if planted in the spring, will grow larger heads, and should finish bulbing by July.

So that will pretty much take care of the garden for this year. I didn't get my cold frames built in time for fall, so I don't have many semi-hardy crops to carry through the winter. I do have purple sprouting broccoli, cabbage, carrots, leeks, and Brussels sprouts, none of which need protection over our mild winters. I will build the cold frames this winter and use them next year in the early spring. I have some other projects for the winter as well, including repairing and restoring a few implements for the Gibson, getting to work on a chicken coop for next year, and getting some work done on my old truck I have stored in the shop...It will be a nice change of pace from all the hard work in the vegetable garden this year.