Notes for Monday November 23, 2009

On Saturday I was able to finish mulching the leaves in my yard.  Most of the trees have finished dropping their leaves while a few remaining trees will gradually lose them throughout the winter.  So until the next wind storm blows them in from my neighbor across the street, I am caught up.  I asked my son to help me and he was able to give me an hour and that helped.  I didn't have to do the complete front yard, there weren't that many leaves.  I was able to blow the leaves into smaller areas so I didn't have to do the whole front yard.  The areas in the back yard were thicker with leaves because I wasn't able to get to them the last few weeks so I ran them over with the mower a few times before I bagged them.  This makes nice finely mulched leaves and I pile them separately.  I use the finer leaf mulch to turn under in the veggie garden and to mulch in tight spaces (like my onions).  So right now all three of my leaf compost piles are over flowing but in another months time they will have settled about a foot.   I still have radishes and carrots to pick and I will be picking them on Thursday.  I test picked a carrot on Saturday and it looks like I will have a bunch of baby carrots for snacking on Thanksgiving.  Hopefully this variety will be sweeter.

Notes for Monday November 16, 2009

With the remnants of Hurricane Tropical Storm Ida passing by to our south and then reforming into a typical NorEaster, we got 1.4" of rain over a three day period.   On Sunday morning, I can't remember how many times I went back and forth deciding whether or not to mulch leaves in the afternoon.  When I got up it was cloudy and so damp it was dripping off the trees.  It didn't look like it was going to dry out enough to mulch leaves.  Then when I left for church it was getting brighter and it started to nag at me that if I didn't do it today then when? (especially since the long range forecast looks like we might get rain again just before the weekend).  So after I got home from church, I did end up mulching leaves that were still wet but picked up by the mower.  I kept telling myself as I was pushing the mower, "I have to do what I can, when I can," and it seemed to fit.  At least this time I did get a little further into the back yard and it looks like no more leaves will be falling.  There are still a few trees with leaves but those oaks don't seem to give them up until spring.  So after I finish the back yard (hopefully next weekend) then all I have left to do is to mulch the leaves as they pile up in my yard from the wind (from either of my neighbors).

Notes for Monday November 9th, 2009

Well the best laid plans are usually almost always foiled somehow.  I was boasting that I still had zinnias, marigolds, daisies and cosmos still in bloom AND I had planned to take pictures of them on Saturday.  But Jack had other plans.  Saturday morning I slept in and the temperature in the bright sun at 8AM was in the 40's but in the shade of my neighbors fence I noticed that the grass was white as I took out the trash.  Watching the news later on Saturday it was said that it got down to 31 degrees in the city of Philadelphia Friday night, so I know it was colder here. Everything had been touched by Jack Frost and not worthy of a photo.  Oh well.   Later on Saturday I did work on mulching the leaves in my yard and due to the thickness of the layer, all I got done was the front yard again.  It looks like the layer should be thinner this weekend and maybe I will get more of the backyard done.  I mulched leaves for about two and half hours.  I could have done more but with all the bending over to remove the bagger on the mower, it would have been really difficult to put socks on to go to church on Sunday had I done more.  So I stopped to work another day.   I did change my approach a little bit this year.  Instead of using the leaf blower to remove the leaves from my flower beds, I used a rake to remove the leaves.  This way I don't remove the mulch from the flower beds (last years mulched leaves).  I still use the leaf blower to remove the leaves from the driveway and out from under other shrubs and away from other obstacles so the mower can reach them.   I still have radishes and carrots and I did pick some radishes and watered the carrots and radishes.  I grow the radishes (which are so easy after thinning) for my father in law.  I don't eat them unless they are thinly sliced and mixed in with a good salad.  As I watered the carrots and radishes I began to wonder if my carrots will be sweeter this year (I like to pick them on Thanksgiving morning for pre dinner snack).  I grew a different variety this year and put additional helpings of wood ashes in the soil.  So all I am hoping to get is a bunch of sweet baby carrots.  I couldn't help to think that the local farmers are picking carrots right now and of course they are huge compared to mine.  So maybe I will plant them earlier next year and pick them earlier too.  Right now I plant them in my onion patch after I've picked my onions because I have read that carrots and onions get along.  I will have to research it and maybe I will plant my radishes there instead.

Notes for Friday November 6th, 2009

Wednesday morning the thermometer read 31 degrees when I got up, but there wasn't any visible frost on the ground or on my car.  What I did notice was the silence.  The silence of winter before the birds wake up when there are no crickets to greet you.  The silence that is only broken by passing cars or neighbors getting ready for work.   My cosmos, marigolds, zinnias and daisies are still doing fine.  If I remember, I will try to take pictures on Saturday as I mulch some more leaves.  There hasn't been many more leaves fallen since Saturday but its supposed to be windy today so I am sure there will be more.   This morning it was 34 degrees and with the recent time change to the clocks, I am now driving to work at twilight and returning home at twilight.  Combine that with the leaves falling from the trees and I have the right conditions and the right time to view hawks sitting up in the tops of trees near open fields waiting to spot there next meal.  It is always an awesome sight.

Notes for Tuesday November 3, 2009

As I was thinking yesterday that we really haven't had a frost yet...it was 33 degrees this morning.  Close but...my marigolds, daisies, zinnias and cosmos are still in bloom.  The cosmos next to my veggie garden are seven foot tall and finally in bloom.

Notes for Monday November 1, 2009

Here's a short note...   I ran the mower over my fallen leaves on Saturday but left about 3/4ths of the back yard left to do.  The leaves seemed to fall as fast as I was picking them up.  But at least the layer of leaves is thinner in the front yard.  Last week I completed the whole yard in four hours and it was difficult putting socks on for the next few days, so this week I mulched leaves for only two and a half hours.  What I mulched last week was three weeks of leaves and that amount seemed to have fallen in just three days.   It rained Saturday night into Sunday but I forgot to check the rain gauge.  I emptied the rain gauge on Thusday and there was two inches from Tuesday's rain.

Notes for October 30, 2009

Where to start? Who knows.  Most every fall, my gardening desires wanes (at least until I start receiving gardening catalogs around Christmas time).  This year it seems to be worse.  The thing that comes to my mind is that anyone over 40 knows that life changes and life doesn't always let you do the things you want to do and you do what you need to do.  I still feel guilty though.  I feel guilty I haven't written.  I feel guilty I haven't read your blogs and looked and commented about beautiful yards, your beautiful nature pictures and of course your silly dog (I've got one too).  I want to say I haven't had the time but whenever someone says that I always say "You would have the time, if it were important."  But when life changes as it does sometimes seasonally, you have to make do and somethings get pushed aside.  You find time enough to do other shorter/not involved things (unlike gardening) to keep your sanity, but I still feel guilty.  As I think of it, another factor is daylight.  One of my most productive gardening time periods is in the evening after dinner which diminishes as fall begins.  Saturdays and Sundays are usually filled with other activities as fall begins again.  This will probably change as my kids get old enough to leave the nest (one commuting to college and the other in High school).  And since I am the type of person that likes to do things the right way, I end up waiting until I have the time to do it right.  A specific change in the yearly schedule that happened this year happened back in June.  My mother had to have surgery and then she lived with us for a few weeks and that caused the priorities to shift and therefore time became lost for lower priorities and some things got put off.   I have had more gardening failures this year than successes.  I lost a bunch of perennials to the winter.  Some perennials that did survive became food for critters that also survived the winter (never seen chipmunks as often as I did this year).  I had ground hog take up residence under the concrete slab under my shed but I seem to have chased him off (for now).  We haven't had frost yet but it was cold enough in September that ALL my tomatoes died, BUT NOT my peppers.  It also was cold enough that all the Virginia Creeper that covers my back fence also died off.  I am usually picking tomatoes until Halloween. But not this year, I am still picking peppers (they have reached the point of diminishing returns and are getting smaller). I have an 8 year old stump that I wanted to dig up as a project but that didn't happen.  I did get a bunch of dead trees cut down and all the wood went to a friend of ours who uses wood burning stoves.  One of the trees had to be cut down by a tree company so it didn't come down on my holly tree, my neighbor's fence or my house.   In addition to the peppers, I still have carrots and radishes in the ground.  Not sure how the radishes are going to turn out, I think it got too warm for them for a little bit.  The carrots I am hoping to harvest Thanksgiving morning for pre dinner snacks.  That is the remaining garden experiment for this year.  I picked some on Thanksgiving last year but they weren't very sweet.  This year I planted a variety known for its sweetness (or so they say).  It has rained periodically lately but I probably should have watered a few times in late September and early October.  I also still have lima beans but I don't think they formed many pods and I should have watered.  I will definitely look at them and probably pull them when I next work outside to mulch my leaves.  I am starting to mulch/collect my leaves weekly as I do every fall up until about Thanksgiving.  We don't have leaf collection in my township and I don't have a place to dump them so I mulch them with the mower, bag them and put them in a compost pile to use as mulch in the spring.  With the loss of about 10 trees in the backyard over the last two years, there is considerably fewer leaves to mulch in the backyard.  Hopefully I will still get enough to have enough mulch in the spring.  The winter winds help me collect leaves from my neighbor across the street and one of my neighbors on the side.   We haven't seen the bluebirds since Spring.  We'll probably see them when its gets cold.  They come to my suet feeders during the winter.  Or at least they swoop down from the wire holding the feeders and get the pieces of suet that fall to the ground as other birds are eating.  I will be putting out the suet feeders soon.  I don't like to put the feeders out when its still above 60 degrees.   I got a new silo feeder for my thistle feed (for the goldfinches) and it is so cheaply made compared to the one I had for years.  I will probably look for a better one during the winter.  But in either case the silo feeders both collected moisture.  Does someone make a silo thistle feeder that has a screen bottom for drainage?   The box for my squirrel in the jar feeder needs to be replaced too.  Maybe this winter.  If the time presents itself and I have the materials...