We've had frost here in the southern Appalachians for the last few nights.
The summer garden is gone, the okra, peppers, eggplant, and tomatoes look so
sad. The sweet potatoes looked scorched over a week ago. This summers crop
was one of my best ever. 23 sweet potato plants survived and produced just
over 3 bushels, the largest being 7 pounds 1 ounce. Squash, tomatoes,
peppers were bountiful. Green beans and edamame were only fair. Weeds were
especially abundant due to the 2 truckloads of horse manure I think. The
fall garden is now in its' glory. The Florida broadleaf mustard is just
amazing, the leaves on some are 2 feet long and over a foot wide. The stems
are as big as my thumb and still tender. The turnips are the size of tennis
balls and very sweet. Carrots, collards and spinach will soon be ready. I
was gifted about 25 pounds of chestnuts, my hives gave me about 40 pounds of
honey. My fledgling blueberry enterprise produced almost 30 gallons. The
cider making crew will be here on Saturday. Life is good!

Sorry, don't mean to brag, I'm just feeling good about my endeavors this
year.

I hope your year was at least as good as mine,

Steve

Steve Peek wrote:
We've had frost here in the southern Appalachians for the last few
nights. The summer garden is gone, the okra, peppers, eggplant, and
tomatoes look so sad. The sweet potatoes looked scorched over a week
ago. This summers crop was one of my best ever. 23 sweet potato
plants survived and produced just over 3 bushels, the largest being 7
pounds 1 ounce. Squash, tomatoes, peppers were bountiful. Green beans
and edamame were only fair. Weeds were especially abundant due to the
2 truckloads of horse manure I think. The fall garden is now in its'
glory. The Florida broadleaf mustard is just amazing, the leaves on
some are 2 feet long and over a foot wide. The stems are as big as my
thumb and still tender. The turnips are the size of tennis balls and
very sweet. Carrots, collards and spinach will soon be ready. I was
gifted about 25 pounds of chestnuts, my hives gave me about 40 pounds
of honey. My fledgling blueberry enterprise produced almost 30
gallons. The cider making crew will be here on Saturday. Life is
good!
Sorry, don't mean to brag, I'm just feeling good about my endeavors
this year.


Seems fair to me.

I hope your year was at least as good as mine,

Steve

Yes but with seasons reversed, I am pulling the last cabbages etc to make
room to plant tomato seedlings.

David

"Derald" wrote in message
m...

"David Hare-Scott" wrote:

Yes but with seasons reversed, I am pulling the last cabbages etc to make
room to plant tomato seedlings.
And my first winter cabbages are just emerging, the turnips and
mustard greens and "English" peas are a few inches tall. Overnight
lows in high 40s to mid-50s (7-12?) portend the end to the tomatoes,
cukes, basil to be replaced by more peas! Bulbing onions and garlic go
in this month, too. Root knot so debilitated this year's eggplants
(aubergine) and bell peppers that I uprooted them early this year.
Definitely gonna try some of those cannibalistic nematodes!
I'm in west-central Florida, USA. Although we're having a taste
of autumn, plenty of hot weather remains in store.

OT Aside: Did you settle on a "most droolworthy" melon for this
season?
--
Derald
I can't grow melons in my present location. I have cucumber beetles by the
millions and all the disease they carry. Years ago Yellow Doll watermelon
and Ambrosia cantaloupe were favorites.

Derald wrote:
"David Hare-Scott" wrote:

Yes but with seasons reversed, I am pulling the last cabbages etc to
make room to plant tomato seedlings.
And my first winter cabbages are just emerging, the turnips and
mustard greens and "English" peas are a few inches tall. Overnight
lows in high 40s to mid-50s (7-12?) portend the end to the tomatoes,
cukes, basil to be replaced by more peas! Bulbing onions and garlic go
in this month, too. Root knot so debilitated this year's eggplants
(aubergine) and bell peppers that I uprooted them early this year.
Definitely gonna try some of those cannibalistic nematodes!
I'm in west-central Florida, USA. Although we're having a taste
of autumn, plenty of hot weather remains in store.

OT Aside: Did you settle on a "most droolworthy" melon for this
season?

Not OT one little bit. I am going to try Ha Ogen melons

David

On Tue, 19 Oct 2010 18:36:48 -0400, "Steve Peek"
wrote:

We've had frost here in the southern Appalachians for the last few nights.
The summer garden is gone, the okra, peppers, eggplant, and tomatoes look so
sad. The sweet potatoes looked scorched over a week ago. This summers crop
was one of my best ever. 23 sweet potato plants survived and produced just
over 3 bushels, the largest being 7 pounds 1 ounce. Squash, tomatoes,
peppers were bountiful. Green beans and edamame were only fair. Weeds were
especially abundant due to the 2 truckloads of horse manure I think. The
fall garden is now in its' glory. The Florida broadleaf mustard is just
amazing, the leaves on some are 2 feet long and over a foot wide. The stems
are as big as my thumb and still tender. The turnips are the size of tennis
balls and very sweet. Carrots, collards and spinach will soon be ready. I
was gifted about 25 pounds of chestnuts, my hives gave me about 40 pounds of
honey. My fledgling blueberry enterprise produced almost 30 gallons. The
cider making crew will be here on Saturday. Life is good!

Sorry, don't mean to brag, I'm just feeling good about my endeavors this
year.

I hope your year was at least as good as mine,

Steve



I am in the foothills of the Blue Ridge mountains. It has not frosted
yet but I am keeping my eyes on the nighttime temps.

My garden was not very successful this year. Blight got most of the
tomato plants but we had enough to eat and I made some pizza sauce and
pasta sauce. The peppers and eggplant went in late and are just now
really producing.

The muscadines and scuppernongs did well this year. So far I have
juiced over 60 pounds of the grapes from our vines plus another 20
from a neighbor's.

Hoping for a better year next year.
--
USA
North Carolina Foothills
USDA Zone 7a

I've already mentioned, but it's worth another mention.

Courgettes were my biggest crop this year. Far TOO MANY of them to be honest. Next year I plan to have only 1 or 2 plants, rather than 10-15...