It seems to be a continuous theme: Where did October go? To add to that, I still need to clean out my garden, plant garlic and mulch my strawberries! All these fall activities seem to be crying out to me, "Do it!" Due to a myriad of reasons and excuses, I still have much yard work to do!
In my education as an extension master gardener and gathering of information over the years, I know that these (and other) things need to be done. The garden should be cleaned out to remove any potential diseases. My tomatoes were relatively healthy this year, so I'm not really worried about diseases. However, the garden looks better if I clean it out. If I had disease in my garden this year, it would be important to remove dead plants and fruit and dispose of it at the brush dump or by burning.
And the removal of leftover fruit is important, too. Tomato seeds will germinate after chilling in the garden all winter. Hybrids will probably revert to a parent plant or other ancestor. Open-pollinated tomato seeds will come back as they were the year before. Volunteer tomatoes are fun and I have heard of people keeping a "wild" tomato patch that grows every year from seed. While this is tempting, the truth is that we (including me) should rotate crops in our gardens. It is rather difficult to do minimum three-year rotation when I love tomatoes so much!
Now, there is the planting of the garlic. I don't think I've ever been on time with planting my garlic or other fall bulbs. These should be planted toward early or mid-October so that they have time to grow some roots before freezing. Ideally. If there is a break in the weather, I will plant garlic as long as the ground is not frozen. That way, in the spring, it can start growing as soon as conditions warrant. Getting it in the ground now is better than waiting until spring.
And finally, it's important to mulch my strawberries and the garlic that I WILL get planted. These things may do okay if temperatures are mild or we have a good amount of snow cover. Since we cannot predict the winter, our insurance in this case is mulch. Just about anything can be used for mulch. I am still hoping for one more cutting of grass to use as mulch or general cover for my bare garden. Cut grass will develop layers and a harder cover. This is not always so good, but I've made it work by being careful when I remove it. If it's left on too long, the plants will die soon after they start their spring growth. Leaves are a good mulch, as long as they do not blow away. I am hoping to find some good, cheap straw this fall. Unfortunately, I've heard that straw and other bedding might be expensive this year.
Happy Gardening and I hope you're ahead of me!
