Continuing Fall Clean Up

The trees around here haven't lost all of their leaves yet, so although I've done a bit more raking, I haven't bothered to clean the gutters on the house yet.  I really don't enjoy the ladder-climbing involved in this chore, so I'd rather wait another week or two, and do it all at once.

Raking Leaves

Leaves, before shredding

Over the weekend, I was beginning to rake up this fall's leaves.  So many folks just rake them up and throw them away.  I see lots of huge bags of them out at the curb around town.  When I rake, I use my garden vac to shred the leaves, and then add them to my compost bins or bag them up to create leaf mold. This lets me keep all the nutrients used to grow these leaves to nourish my garden next year. There certainly are enough to provide all I want and more.

Final Harvest

Sweet peppers

After last week's hard freeze, I needed to clean up the garden bed where my sweet peppers had grown this year.  As the weather started cooling off earlier this fall, I'd covered that bed with a sheet of clear plastic, to help keep the pepper plants growing a little longer.  Every year, I get the biggest harvest of peppers right at the end of the season. By covering the bed with plastic, the plants live a few weeks longer, which gives a whole different "generation" of peppers a chance to grow to edible size.

Last Roses

Last night before the cold front came in, I picked the last three rose buds and brought them inside.  I'm going to enjoy these last roses for the year.

Morituri te salutant

Velvety blue petunia with frost-nipped foliage

We had a light frost last week, but not enough to kill things off.  The morning glories, roses, petunias, and zinnias continued to bloom, as well as expected late bloomers like asters, mums, and pansies.  But the forecast for tonight says it will drop to the lower 20s, so that will be the end of all the summer flowers for the year.

Preserving Fall Leaves, Part 2

Last week I wrote about preserving fall leaves by drying them between the pages of a book.  Another way to preserve leaves is to soak them in glycerine. This will keep the leaves moist, colorful and less crumbly than drying them, and they may last for years.

Preparing for Upcoming Frost

Over the weekend, I emptied out my little garden fountain for the fall and put it away in the garage.  One night this week the forecast shows it may get below freezing, so I need to make sure that everything in my garden is ready. All the plants I plan to save over the winter have been brought indoors, or put in my pop-up greenhouse.  I've taken cuttings of coleus and other plants to root over the winter and repot for next year.

November Morning Glories

Here's the photo I took today of the morning glories on the west side of the house.  It's pretty incredible to still have morning glories blooming in November, but there hasn't been a hard frost yet.  Some of the leaves are nipped a bit around the edges, but there are a few flowers yet every day.  I'm going to enjoy them as long as they keep coming!