Tag: Frost

Jack Frost’s visit – 10/25/2019
Jack Frost made his arrival 14 days after the average frost date for our area in the mountains. And he returned the next night too. Though neither frost was a “killing” frost, it did burn the leaves on the pumpkin vines, revealing the 4 dozen fruits hidden in their midst. Most are still green, but Google says they can be set on a sunny patio and will ripen. There are no more frost dates in the forecast for about 10 days (of course that can change in a blink), so they will sit and cure or ripen until it looks like the weather requires they be brought in to the root cellar.
These are Seminole pumpkins. They remain small and turn tan when ripe. Being a moschata variety, they are resistant to vine borers. I feared there wouldn’t be any as the vines took so long to take hold and grow, but in spite of the frost, there are still a few flowers blooming.

The frost wasn’t enough to totally kill off the remaining peppers, but to make sure they weren’t wasted, the last of them were picked, along with a handful of sheltered Calendula flowers.

The Calendula still has many buds and because of it’s sheltered position along a south facing stone wall, I may be able to continue harvesting them to dry for salves for another month or so. The peppers were all cut in half lengthwise and for the next couple of days, the house will be piquant with the scent of capsaicin as the oven is used as a dehydrator to reduce the moisture in them for storage.

My longterm to do list includes an arbor for the grape vine and a solar dehydrator. Short term, I need to clean up the mess that was my garden this summer. A few handfuls of weeds and spent beans were tossed to the chickens to pick through.

The asparagus tops need to be cut back and their bed mulched with hay. The spent sunflowers need to be cut or pulled and the bed nearest the compost turned and fed with shovels of compost in preparation for the garlic and onions in about a month. The beds that had the tomatoes and the overgrown mint bed are full of mint and weeds and need serious clean up and mulching. The bed that was peas last spring, that I planted oats, field peas, and vetch in as cover crop and then the chickens scratched up has a few of the cover crop plants in it, but is mostly weeds, so it too needs to be pulled up and covered with hay. I tried to control the mint with a tarp which failed miserably. Maybe the weed wacker will bring it down and I can cover it with a thick layer of newspaper and cardboard, a thicker layer of hay and let it sit dormant for a year. The mint that has escaped the bed is growing over the top of cardboard in the aisles and is fairly easy to pull up.

Each year in April, the University has a Saturday where you can sign up to have students come help you with projects. I am going to try to catch that date and see if some students can help me rebuild my boxes and reset my fence so that it doesn’t look like a drunk erected it. If I can get the posts set where I want them prior to the student’s arrival, perhaps we can get a tight run of 4 foot welded wire around the garden, the gate hanging hardware put in the wooden post that has the solar charger on it, and the gate moved. Both of my solar chargers need new batteries, perhaps that can get done this winter so it will fully charge and once the fence is repaired, new electric can be strung along the top to discourage the deer. There is a lot to be done, but the weather is cool now and not so onerous to be outside working. A couple hours a day over a few days should get the garden put to bed for the winter.
October 25, 2019
Sunday Thankfulness

Last night it got cold, down in the 20’s cold. The morning was bright and sunny and the two together created frost shadows.

Every trip out to the garden area reveals a few more pumpkins. I think I have harvested in the neighborhood of 100. At this point, there is a small pile collected on the edge of the garden to throw to the chooks. They aren’t producing many eggs lately. Of the dozen hens, we are only getting 4-6 eggs each day. One is in a serious molt, one just got over her broodiness, but that leaves 10 that should be giving me a few more than I am getting. It is enough for us, but not really producing for my neighbor and knitting buddies.

On the knitting front, Granddaughter 1’s sweater for Christmas is progressing well.

The pattern is In Threes which has a cap sleeve, but I am modifying it to add long sleeves. I need to find some buttons and finish the sleeves. I still have two more kids sweaters to get knit before Christmas. One of them is another 3T, so it won’t take too long, but the other is for an almost 8 year old and it will take a bit more time.

We are due for two beautiful days before we are faced with a few very cold days due to the Polar Vortex headed our way. I need to get some extra hay in the coop and figure out how I am going to keep their water thawed. The heavy barn coat has been moved back to the utility room near my gum boots for dealing with the coming winter woes.

November 8, 2014
Arctic Zone

Yesterday was cold and wet, rain at our elevation, snow about 800 feet above us. With the cold was wind, stripping the gold and red leaves from the trees that had not lost their leaves yet. A good day to stay indoors, but it was Farmers’ Market day and if we were to have meat this week, other than chicken, a trip to town was necessary. We dallied, not leaving to have breakfast as on most weekends and knowing that there was a home game at the University in town, an attempt to try to miss the traffic seeking to find parking on side streets or failing that, paying $10/car in church lots or people’s yards. Home games are madness in our little town as the university is huge and the alumni dedicated, even in a cold rain. The market was done, the vendors all thanking us for coming out in such nastiness, but we came home with ground beef, stew meat, onions and radishes, still having greens in the garden and a bit of the last salad in the refrigerator. Our usual meat vendor wasn’t there, so I was unable to get the ground pork that I wanted to make a stuffed pumpkin this week, unless I can find a package in the chest freezer. Or perhaps, I will make a pumpkin, chicken curry in a pumpkin shell, there is plenty of coconut milk and red curry in the pantry.

Once home, the winter squash picked over the prior two days were toted down to the root cellar in the basement, two big canvas sacks at a time, many, many trips up and down the stairs. The shelves look ready to provide well this winter.

Pumpkins, sweet potatoes, garlic and canned goodies. This is what is left after loads to northern Virginia and what is upstairs in the pantry. The freezer stocked with green beans, peas, apples, chicken and a bit of pork and beef stockpiled from weekend trips to the Farmers’ Market. Our favorite meat vendor toughs it out at the market on all but the worst winter Saturday’s throughout the upcoming winter.

As the wind blew last night, and the temperature dropped, our power failed. Quickly gathering up the battery lanterns and flashlights and tossing a down blanket on the two quilts on the bed, I settled in with my tablet that had a good charge and the ebook that I am currently reading. Fortunately, the power only stayed out a couple of hours and we were awakened by the TV and lights coming on and the computer printer doing a self start, though it had been powered off before.

The morning dawned an hour earlier, thanks to the time change last night from daylight savings time. Yes, I know, an extra hour to sleep, hmmmph, I awake with the sun and get up once awake, my body doesn’t just switch gears like the clock. As I let the pups out, I realized that we were seeing our first snow flurries and the lightest of dusting on the ground and decks.

Mountain snow showers are a common occurrence, rarely amounting to anything, whenever there is moisture in the air and the temperature below freezing. The freeze last night, the first freeze burned back the pumpkin patch and the bean patch. The greens look sad this morning but will perk back up as the daytime temperatures rise above freezing.

After feeding the chickens and breaking the ice on their water, a walk through the ruined patch revealed as I suspected, several more pumpkins. The largest, not damaged ones gathered and brought in, like I really need more in the house.

Happily, several of them were Buttercup squash. A couple were tossed into the chicken pen and the rest left to be gathered in the garage or thrown immediately to the chickens over this week once the wind dies down and the temperature rises to a more comfortable range. This was the first morning that I had to don the heavy barn coat to go deal with the birds.

The peppers that were gathered prior to the expected Arctic chill have all been processed, the tiny jalapenos sliced and frozen, some used in last night’s chili with cornbread for dinner. The small bell peppers, sliced and frozen, the ripe habeneros packed whole in freezer bags, the green ones set in a bowl to ripen as you can see they are doing. They too will be bagged and frozen. The tiny hot orange pepper that I still haven’t identified, was pureed with vinegar they had been soaking in for the past few weeks and a Tabasco-like sauce made that a single drop burned my mouth for an hour. The rest of them are ripening on the upside down plants in the garage. The tomatillos that we gathered were rid of their husks, washed and packed whole in freezer bags, another 3 pounds to be used in Pozole this winter. A chicken, some tomatillos, a bag of dried hominy soaked, a handful of Mexican spices and a hearty soup to feed a small army is made.

We are lovin’ life on our mountain farm and now must accept another winter is upon us. We were lucky this year, we got an extra 2-3 weeks before the first frost.

November 2, 2014
Pumpkins and Squash, Oh My!

It didn’t quite get to freezing last night, but we did get a light frost. Thinking that 20 something nights wouldn’t do the pumpkins and squash any good, a morning harvest was set in motion.
Last night we brought in 19, most of them seen here.

This morning I harvested 53 more. They were stacked around the perimeter of the garden as I debated how to get them all over to the house and the idea lightbulb flashed.

The two tobagans hanging in the garage awaiting grandkids and snow were put to use. I have no idea how many pounds of goodness are there but each was a challenge to drag them individually across the yard. This isn’t all of the year’s harvest, some were taken to NoVa, some to the neighbor that helped last night, several already cooked for us, a few damaged or small ones tossed to the chickens. Are there more out there? I am certain of it, many tiny baseball to softball sized ones, probably a few larger ones hidden in the jungle of dying leaves. Each time I go out I spot another.
A tiny white tailed denizen of the jungle was perturbed that I dared tromp through his habitat and took off through the garden.
Earlier this fall, I was certain that the Burgess Buttercup squash were the predominant winter squash and the Seminole Pumpkins lost to the overgrowth of leaves as none of the squash were turning the characteristic tan of the pumpkins. The harvest revealed very few Buttercups and predominately Seminole, most tan or tanning on the lower side. Next year they get the orchard to cover. We will enjoy the harvest as will our neighbors, chickens, and family.

October 31, 2014
Garden’s Swan Song

We are past our “Frost Date” and have had mild nights except a couple of weeks ago. The garden survived those two nights with row cover fabric draped over the peppers and tomatillos. We are expecting two nights in the 30’s tonight and tomorrow night and nothing is going to be done to protect what is left. If the plants survive, great, we might get a few more tomatillos and peppers, the greens will be fine for a while. If they freeze, it has been a good year.

To prepare, a harvest of 5 types of peppers, a basket of tomatillos, a handful of bush beans and two golfball sized turnips were brought in. The Jalapeños were pickled into two more pints for winter. The bell peppers sliced and frozen except for a few to stuff tomorrow. The Anchos have been put in the window sill hoping they will turn red and can then be dried for Enchilada sauce. The tomatillos and habeneros will be cooked down with onion and garlic for more of Son #1’s favorite XXX sauce.

With the garden waning, the chickens get to visit, eating bugs, weed seed and scratching around leaving chicken fertilizer. When they aren’t in the garden, they wander around the orchard, the yards and out into the fields, but not too far from the house.

They are healthy, producing plenty of eggs each day and live a good life.

On Saturdays, we generally go to town, have breakfast at the local diner then shop the Farmers’ Market. We came home with some beef and pork for the freezer, a peck of eating apples and some carrots and onions.

Between our garden goodness and the Farmers’ Market take, we will eat well.

Lovin’ life on our mountain farm.

October 18, 2014