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Monday, September 25, 2017

Monday September 25

At this point there's not much left of the vegetable garden.   Last weekend I removed the two cages of Mountain Magic tomatoes, but not before picking any that were ripe or at least orange.  That is the end of the indeterminate tomatoes for the year.

The tomato plants were thrown into the woods.  I don't like putting them in the compost bin because it may not get hot enough to kill the pathogens inside the plants. 

This picture shows some of the raised beds.  Two of the beds have a young cover crop of field peas and oats.  The bed on the right has a couple rows of bush beans.  It will be planted in spinach and garlic in October, for overwintering.  The bed on the left had the tomato plants and still has peppers.  Before planting the oats and peas, I had to come up with a rough plan for next year's garden so I knew which bed would get the overwintered plants.

Speaking of beans, after several weeks of no beans, since the pole beans are long gone, those 2 rows of August planted Provider bush beans gave me the first picking of beans.  It's sure nice to have fresh beans again!

Except for a few vines on the trellis, the winter squash are mostly done.  It's been a difficult year for winter squash here.  All of the first plantings died from wilt, as did many of the second plantings.  Finally, the seeds that were planted in late June survived and set squash, better late than never I guess.  Everything looked good until about two weeks ago when another disease overtook them.  The Butternuts growing near the trellis have a shot at maturing, but the ones left on the ground will probably not ripen, since the rest of the plant has died.

The Buttercup squash set earlier and produced some mature squash.  I picked them and a few ripe Butternut squash and put them on the screen to cure.  At least I'll get something but it certainly won't be like the 140 pounds of squash from last year.

There's still 2 cages of Plum Regal tomatoes hanging in there.  There's not enough to can, but I could probably make a couple of pints of refrigerator marinara, if I could find the motivation.

To see what other people are growing, head on over to Our Happy Acres.

5 comments:

Eight Gate Farm NH said...

Wow, things are ending early for you aren't they? Still, some nice looking harvests. To me that looks like plenty of Plum Regals, certainly more than I have now (i.e. none).

Dave @ HappyAcres said...

That's too bad about the winter squash. It sounds like my experience last year, when I had plants rotting and wilting. I've got a few paste tomatoes hanging on too but I'm tired of cooking and preserving them, plus the freezer is full.

Michelle said...

Interesting that your tomatoes are about done and mine are just hitting their stride. That's a sorry squash tale, it sounds much like the tale of woe about my onions this year.

Margaret said...

I always love those unexpected pickings - I've had the same thing with my favas. I should have pulled the plants in weeks ago, but I just left them and now, I'm getting a few more favas out of the deal.

Kathy said...

What a shame about your squashes this year. WE had a similar disappointment last year.. it just shows that nothing is ever a certainty when it comes to growing, so when things crop well you are extra pleased

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