Fall Gardening Round-Up

 As I write, we have windows up around the house. It's November 10 and it was 80 degrees today.  When I'm not playing a podcast or audio book, I can still hear harvesting equipment in the distance and smell the crops being taken off the fields or moved from truck to silo. I'm still harvesting Calendula, and the chickens old and new are still laying eggs. I worked on designing our holiday card this year, Andrew and I are discussing what we are doing for Thanksgiving. On a day like this though, everything and nothing, the past and plans for the future seem to intersect at once. 

I think blog posts are definitely going to go monthly for a while. I'm following some other creative threads that will eventually make their way to this blog, and another blog project I'm working on. All in good time. I see myself writing more this winter but for now I continue to straddle the demands of a transitioning season. 

I'll try to put these pictures in some semblance of order. These span late August/Early September to the first week of November. 

I did a lot of gardening some Friday afternoon that seems so far away now, more harvesting Calendula and adding thyme. 

Andrew wanted some additional thyme in a pot so I replanted it in the garden. It had become so root bound, that roots had went beyond the drainage hole and about 5 inches through a gap in the paver stones. 

Other goings on in the herb garden include an impressive bed of sage. 

 I have so much sage I will try to do a creative project this winter, we'll see how it goes. 

I also dried chives. 

We had just run out of chives in this bottle, and putting my own chives in it gave me a particular satisfaction. 

Also, the beautiful Malabar spinach that my green thumb friend gives me every year. 

I planted it the same time I did the tomatoes, the lavender, the marigolds and calendula, Memorial Day weekend. And the Malabar spinach hangs out at around 6 inches in length for three full months. Then around Labor Day, it grows like Henry David Thoreau would say, "like corn in the night."

Here is a nice shot of Tutu guarding the carrots and watermelons. The watermelons will appear later in the blog. Also, take note of all those carrot tops.

I also harvested the Rosemary for the year once the nightly freeze watches started stacking up.

Let's go to the back porch now and check on the Dahlias.

This is the second variety I bought (in July for 50 cents) Andrew likes this variety better, but I like the solid pink.

So pretty after a light warm rain.

That also carries a rainbow with it. 

The same night I replanted the potted thyme and cut the sage, I also made a cut flower bouquet for my Mom's birthday.

Clearly, flower arranging is not "just putting flowers together."  However, since I focus on herbs so much, it was fun to have enough flowers to gather. 

Here is a shot of the back trellis. The moonflowers have been frost nipped, the morning glories are on there way out, but the Dahlias are going strong and inspiring me for next year. 

This Friday I will dig up the Dahlias that have browned and died back. My green thumb friend has offered to overwinter them for me which is lucky for me, since being back in the library full time has definitely made me prioritize the work outside. 

The most recent gardening project was planting the little tree that first appeared on the blog here.

This little hemlock started to brown as time passed. As the baby lavenders died, I paid less attention to this little guy. I planted the tree on Halloween and the dirt was still very moist from the rain. Sadly, even though I pass this tree twice a day, it's always with Tutu on a leash, and not with a watering can. I hope it takes root, and that rain helps him out. I just cannot get to him now. Good luck little tree!

And look how many roots it grew in 6 months!

And once the tree was planted, I looked up to see the neighbor bull had been supervising my work. 

And speaking of the bull, here he is growing his winter coat. They start at the head and it goes from there. They say that the thicker the coat, the colder the winter. But since I don't get close enough to the cows to collect samples of winter coat, and compare them from year to year while cross referencing average temperatures...(shrugs.)

Hey look! It's my favorite cow in the background. What? You don't have a favorite cow?

Let's check on the lavender on the way to the chicken pen.

The baby dilly dilly plants planted Memorial Day weekend are mostly volley-ball sized, a good size headed into winter. 

And the established plants pruned in August are greening up nicely. 

So, let's take the chickens a treat shall we?

Look at all these watermelons. The biggest three are heavy, and they thump when I smartly tap them. Most have a yellow spot. It's mid-October, surely these Black Diamond/Cannonball watermelons are ripe and sweet with their signature deep red color and black seeds.

Well, the seeds are right, but the melon is about 4 shades of red too light.

A taste test confirms my sadness, the watermelons are not ripe...for me to eat. So, to the chickens! I mean they will eat anything right?

The chickens have gotten watermelon rinds all summer, and by morning all that's left is a creamy white shell. The green vegetation in the background is what is left of a wheelbarrow worth of carrot tops. 

And after the first couple bites, the hens demure. They ate them anyway but I'm glad I got this picture of their displeasure!

I say hens...but maybe I should say chickens...

There is something a little bit different about this lady in the middle.

Peeking at me coquettishly from beneath a much larger comb.

Often, showing me the "better side" but I know I'm only getting three new white eggs a day, not four. 

Could we have a rooster in our mix? If so, Elvis as I've named it, is so far the lowest chicken in the pecking order. Seriously skittish, and always chased away from treats and other actions by everyone else in the pen...is this a mild mannered Clark Kent rooster just waiting for sexual maturity to show his Superman side...or is it just a mild mannered rooster hoping to fit in? These are the questions of my time on the farm. A friend of mine responded to this picture "I'm no bird expert, but it sure looks like a dude to me." They are probably right. 

But this is not the only mystery. The same day I took these pictures, I noticed something strange on on the side of the coop...look closely.

Yeah, I know. I've asked you to look at a picture of chicken poop. But look at where the chicken poop is! I mean the stain on the ladder runway and the one right above it, I get it, a chicken perched on there and poopped. But look at the one in the upper left hand corner. It's twelve inches away from the splat closest to the wooden board...and even farther from the board itself that the chicken was perched on. Also, I'm no animal dung splat expert but come on, it looks like a paint ball delivered perpendicular to the ground. How did this happen? Call Mulder and Scully! 

Anyway, maybe it's just best that I keep them in food, water, clean grass hay and semi-ripe watermelons and not ask too many questions.

Let's wrap up with a nice sky shot.

The trees we planted 14 years ago have grown so tall. I actually blogged about them when I first started this blog. One of the pine trees is easily over 15 feet. And beautiful blue skies remind me of another book I finished reading from the personal library. 

This was a very well written book about falconry where the writer focused on one man's story, but zoomed in and out to talk about history, culture, the west, and even the tensions surrounding gas drilling in Wyoming in the early 2000s. It is a wonderful blend of voices; journalism, essayist, and biographer. Also fascinating is that Ms. Dickinson is the spouse of Tim Gallagher, major player at Cornell and author of a book about the search for the ivory billed woodpecker, which was thought to be extinct. 

I have other books I've read, for other posts. 

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