Harvest Monday - 28 October 2013

Welcome to another Harvest Monday at Eight Gate Farm!

The National Weather Service began posting "Frost Watches" on Tuesday. The actual frost did not occur until Friday night. But I took all the remaining tomatoes and peppers, as well as the tender herbs, well before that. I figured nothing was going to grow or ripen further.

The very, very last of the tomatoes:

 

The tiny peppers, and some raspberries:

 

 

And the herbs; basil, rosemary, tarragon, cilantro, parsley, winter savory:

 

So, as I said, the actual frost came Friday night, when it got down to 30F (-1.1C). On Saturday I pulled out all the tomato, pepper, and broccoli plants. I also pulled out the chard. It could keep going, but I wanted to clean out the beds.

 

 

I also took a pound of Brussels Sprouts, which had gotten their first "frost kiss," plus the few remaining raspberries:

 

There should be lots more Brussels to come. Everything else has gone south for the winter. But I did want to show our white-trash "cold frames," made from re-purposed skylights. They are now covering some of the teeny-tiny kale, and the fall carrots.

 

A look up the fenced garden, now forlorn and ready for its winter rest.

 

With that, the Eight Gate Farm blog will probably go dark. Nothing really to show you until maple syrup season starts in February. Here's one of the trees we will tap:

 

That is, unless I'm lucky enough to "harvest" one of these puppies recently nosing around in our woods:

 

 

 

Muzzle-loader deer season starts this Saturday!

 

I hope this doesn't offend any of you. But here in New Hampshire it's part of "country living."

 

Oh, now that I think of it, I may post a 2013 garden "report card."



Thanks for reading, and thanks especially to Daphne for giving me the opportunity to share my gardening experiences this season.