So...it is the end of October. Finally getting colder here next week. Leaves are starting to drop, many still green. This is when I start really losing touch with the gardening. I have some cover crops in, peppers and beets and some others still producing. But come March April May, I will look back and lament. "I forgot to do this." "I wanted to do that last year!"

What are the things I am forgetting?

Garlic has to go in soon. The December planting last year was late but did fine.
I want to seed onions in pots for starts next year.
Try to overwinter some pepper/eggplant (that never happens).
Get a load of horse manure down on the raised beds. Also for paquebots carrot method.

How about everyone else? What needs to be, or wants to be tried, but gets forgotten at the close of the season?

Fall and winter gardens going in here. Cabbage, Kale, Chinese Cabbage and spinach all in there now. I’ll be putting in lettuce, carrots, bok choi, Onion sets in before too long. Maybe some others. Some from seeds, others from sets. The winter gardens often end up being prettier with the leafy greens and various colors. Spinach, carrots, bok choi, lettuce, some of the kale from seeds. Others like cabbage from store bought six pack sets.

Okra is still out there drying out I hope. I resorted to breaking some tops and pod stems to hasten the process. Some pods I cut of to dry. Plan is to save a bunch of seed, why, I’m not sure. I’ll have some surplus to trade or whatever. Maybe there will be a seed shortage. I could live on just okra if I had to. But the okra plants are about to come out. Same for the bitter melon. I want to see if I can ripen the two bitter melons remaining on the plant, how much cool weather can they take, gathering up information, that sort of thing.

I have some of the same things on my list that you do: plant cover crops (bought seeds and didn't plant them last year; probably won't plant them again this year), get manure (every year I say this and every year I don't do it). I try to mulch the empty beds each fall, but this year I haven't done it yet because the garden plants are still producing. Now there's no more mulch available until late winter when this year's leaves have been composted, so I won't be able to do it until then.

My big fall project after basic cleanup will be digging out all the wiregrass that infiltrates the garden each year, and reinstalling the metal flashing I use along the fence to try to keep it out.

The other thing I always intend to do at this time of year is get the beds ready now for the spring crops, especially peas. It gets so hot so fast here in spring that we typically need to plant peas in late February to have any hope of getting a crop, but our ground is usually too wet and muddy to dig in February. That means I usually plant peas in mid-March and get about one week of production in May before the plants die from the heat.

Then there are all the jobs like fence-mending and extending, gate repair, and water runoff/erosion management. I put those jobs on my fall list each year but am very skilled at procrastinating about them. Maybe this year!

I direct all the traffic to the tomato plants I cloned and have under lights or in the windowsill.
I had to use the electric toothbrush on a bell pepper plant indoors that had blossoms.
I had to stake a tomato plant in the window,definitely not a dwarf.

I still have a couple of garlic beds to mulch. Luckily more leaves have fallen, so I won't be short!
I was a little short of the cover cropping as well, because I hesitated... at least those beds have been limed and prepped for early spring planting of peas and grains.
The thing I really want to do and bet I won't is to dig some of the small trees that are coming up here and there, and to take some I already have potted, and get those puppies in the ground somewhere they can just get big (or eaten.. plant lots!). Shrubs and trees are on the list but have been getting short shrift for some time.

I need to find room in the garage for the grow bags and planter boxes with strawberries in them. I also need to figure out what to do with the full grow bags I want to empty and let dry for the winter...

I got my garlic planted last week and now I just have one okra plant left that I an planning on taking seeds from. The pod is starting to dry but I am leaving it on the plant a bit longer.

I also have saffron crocus which flowers in the Fall. It only started flowering 3 days ago so I am harvesting saffron daily. PA Dutch cooking uses saffron a lot but I do not cook those recipes. Middle Eastern recipes also use it a lot so I am planning on making some saffron orzo next week. I have only been growing this for 2 years so I don't have a lot of uses for it yet.

The purple and white crocus flowers sure are pretty at this time of year and the honeybees like them too.

brownrexx wrote: ↑Sat Oct 30, 2021 9:07 am I also have saffron crocus which flowers in the Fall. It only started flowering 3 days ago so I am harvesting saffron daily. PA Dutch cooking uses saffron a lot but I do not cook those recipes. Middle Eastern recipes also use it a lot so I am planning on making some saffron orzo next week. I have only been growing this for 2 years so I don't have a lot of uses for it yet.

I've been curious about growing saffron but wasn't sure it would thrive in this geography; nice to hear you're having success with it! Risotto Milanese is my favorite use of saffron, and it's not hard to make. Bouillabaisse is probably my second-favorite, but that's way too much work for an unenthusiastic cook like me.

@brownrexx it's only my first year with Saffron crocus....I
I might be lucky and be able to make paella for one....

@Seven Bends @Amateurinawe I think that I will be experimenting with recipes over the winter. I collected a good bit of saffron threads yesterday but of course it will be a lot less when dry. I have it air drying in my pantry and the whole area smells like saffron.

The bulbs spread pretty quickly so you will have plenty in another year or two @Amateurinawe Mine are only 3 years old and I already divided them and gave a lot to my DIL.

Here are some pics from last year. It is too wet any rainy to take new ones today but I have LOTS of flowers

Saffron Crocus 2020 by Brownrexx, on Flickr

Saffron 2020 by Brownrexx, on Flickr

@brownrexx I look forward to seeing some of your recipes

Seven Bends wrote: ↑Fri Oct 29, 2021 3:12 pm
The other thing I always intend to do at this time of year is get the beds ready now for the spring crops, especially peas. It gets so hot so fast here in spring that we typically need to plant peas in late February to have any hope of getting a crop, but our ground is usually too wet and muddy to dig in February. That means I usually plant peas in mid-March and get about one week of production in May before the plants die from the heat.

IF you don't get the beds prepped for early peas, one thing I have been wanting to do with the peas is the rain gutter transplants. Instead of planting the peas in March into cold ground and hoping for a quick germination, you can plant the peas in sections of gutter, lay them on the driveway in the sun, keep them wet, and guarantee they'll germinate fast. Once sprouted, you just dig a trench and slide them off into your row. This system works really well for starting Daikon and then transplanting it into the woods where seed won't even germinate in the shadowy, dry areas. I use both rain gutter and mesh trays with one side cut to help it slide out.

I may well try this system for peas exclusively this year. These last two years have been very spotty, slow pea germination compared the previous three or four.

@JRinPA another thing that you can do to speed germination on your peas is to soak the seeds for about 24 hours. They are ready to plant as soon as the little root (radicle) starts to unfold.

This gets them ready to grow as soon as you plant them. I get great germination by doing this.

My saffron is going nicely. We only have enough to make one rice dish though lol.

I have had the soaked peas freeze and rot though...one year I did the 20 foot raised bed in sugar sprints and we had an unexpected cold snap soon after sowing. A few weeks later, about 12 foot of it was practically barren, the rest spotty. The best earliest peas I have done were early March in raised bed under a plastic tunnel, and that had snow on it for a couple weeks in late March. I consider spring weather the most unpredictable season, here.

JRinPA wrote: ↑Sat Oct 30, 2021 10:40 pm IF you don't get the beds prepped for early peas, one thing I have been wanting to do with the peas is the rain gutter transplants. Instead of planting the peas in March into cold ground and hoping for a quick germination, you can plant the peas in sections of gutter, lay them on the driveway in the sun, keep them wet, and guarantee they'll germinate fast. Once sprouted, you just dig a trench and slide them off into your row.

Good suggestion, thanks. I had poor pea germination this spring with one of two varieties and had to replant, which put me even further behind. This would solve that problem, and the problem of needing to work the ground early. I'll be setting myself up for another battle of wits with my squirrel and chipmunk friends; they dig in absolutely everything on my deck and would enjoy the new challenge of pea seeds in rain gutter. Sounds like I'll be building another chicken wire fortification.

@Amateurinawe I made this Saffron Orzo recipe from Food Network tonight and it was really good. Hubby said that he could have made a whole meal out of just that.

https://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/foo ... o-10024679

I need to gather some cow manure from the adjacent pasture and prep a few beds for spring. It'sa just a matter of getting myself out there and doing it. This involves doing the low crawl under the pasture fence with a flat shovel and 5 gallon bucket. Once the bucket is full of scooped up patties it gets dumped over the fence into the garden cart. Rinse and repeat. Nobody around here has barns where you can just shovel up a pile. And for sure I know that the pasture these cows have been grazing on hasn't been treated with anything.

Radishes. I always forget to plant succession batches. And thanks to posting this, it jogged my memory that today through Wednesday the moon is right for planting the next round!

@GoDawgs be careful with cow manure as it can carry E.coli. You said that you will be prepping beds for spring so that should be fine but never use it for actively growing veggies.

GoDawgs wrote: ↑Mon Nov 01, 2021 7:47 am Nobody around here has barns where you can just shovel up a pile.

@GoDawgs Are there no horse stables nearby? Or do you prefer cow manure?