Garden Notes: October 2023

 Rainfall 

• 12th: 0.55"
• 14th: 0.33"
• 16th: 0.01"
• 20th: 0.31"
• Total: 1.2 inches

Temperature

• range of nighttime lows: 38 to 59°F (3.5 to 15°C)
• range of daytime highs: 59 to 84°F (15 to 29°C)

Weather Notes

About mid-month the mornings were getting cool enough to switch to my winter work schedule. That means I do my garden and outdoor work in the afternoons. Mornings are indoors. That's when I used to do most of my writing, but now I mostly weave and sew (which I talk about on my other blog).

According to the weather forecast, a cold front will push through any time now. Our first frost looks extremely likely after that. 

Planted (all early in the month)

• carrots
• daikons
• turnips
• lettuce
• kale
• Egyptian walking onions

It's been pretty dry, so many of my seeds sit dormant in the ground. Maybe they'll make for an early spring garden.

Transplanted

• hazelnuts 
• chestnuts

These are saplings I traded hopniss tubers for.

Harvested

• greens: kale, turnip, daikon
• turnips
• cherry tomatoes
• slicing tomatoes (which don't want to ripen)
• sweet peppers
• sweet potatoes
• first sweet potato squash (the others are still greenish)
• peanuts
• pecans
• quince

1st quince

I planted two little Chinese quince trees back in March of 2021. I've kept an eye on them for fruit, but missed this one entirely. I found it on the ground! I have no idea what to do with it yet, but I'm looking forward to learning.

Okra and green bean plants are fading but still manage to put out a few. I'm letting these dry to save the seed for next year.

Salads, of course.

Kale, Swiss chard, daikon greens, cherry tomatoes, green pepper,
and aged goat feta. The dressing is a commercial chickpea dressing.
It's tasty, so I want to experiment with trying to make my own.

Things to do before first frost

• Harvest sweet potatoes
• Harvest sweet potato squash
• Bring my potted ginger indoors
• Try potting one of my green pepper plants again this year. Last year's didn't make it, but I didn't have a good place to store it. This year, I have the greenhouse, so I'm hoping for success.

Parting shots

Not much fall color this year, but the forsythia bushes never disappoint.

Spotted this little guy on a leaf of one of my potted chestnuts.

Garden Notes: October 2023 © October 2023

by Leigh at http://www.5acresandadream.com

More Progress on the Greenhouse

Continued from Progress on the Greenhouse.

We had a week of beautiful weather, so Dan was able to make quite a bit of progress on the greenhouse. First up was a cover for the solar vent fan.

He was thinking he'd have to make something, but then he remembered this . . .

That vent cover has been sitting in his workshop for the past eight years! It was the one he removed from the back gable end of the house when he installed our solar attic fan. He washed it off, painted it, and added new hardware cloth as a screen over the back. To install, all he had to do was slip it under the trims and screw it down. It fits perfectly. 

An opening for a rainwater pipe from the gutter will be added after he gets the rain barrels in place. 

Then it was on to finish the gable end at the back.

Unfortunately, it means Katy will lose one of her favorite perches.

But it can't be helped. Since he only bought one piece of the double-walled polycarbonate, Dan did something different in the back. He used a leftover piece from leak proofing the roof. 

Then he finished up the trimwork on the back.

Still to do: flashing, caulking, sealing, painting.

More Progress on the Greenhouse © Oct 2023

by Leigh at http://www.5acresandadream.com

Progress on the Greenhouse

Even though we haven't had a lot of rain in recent weeks, we've had enough to test Dan's roof solution to the little leaks we had. It definitely fixed the problem. The next step was the gable ends (are they half gable ends?). 

This side of the greenhouse gets the afternoon sun, so this side is where we wanted a solar vent fan to exhaust the heat. 

Also, we plan to put a couple of rainwater barrels inside, so a pipe will be needed to collect rain water from the front gutter on the house and run it into the barrels on the inside.

The fan is a solar attic fan, similar to the one we installed in the attic. As you can imagine, the greenhouse holds a lot of heat in summer! I doubt I'll be able to use it for growing anything then, but the heat and humidity need to be vented. It kept my sewing room quite warm last summer!

Dan chose to cover the rest of the opening with double-walled polycarbonate. 

I don't think there was any special reason for this choice, other than price and availability (of which there seems to be less these days.) We originally looked for used triangular windows, but found none that came close to fitting. 

Trims were next.

Then it was on to the side.

There's still the back side to do, and then, we can paint.

Continued here.

Progress on the Greenhouse © October 2023

by Leigh at http://www.5acresandadream.com