Almost time to heat up the old wood stove, place some cinnamon water atop, then, snuggle up with the family and watch movies.

:D

Hmmm... Weather.com is saying a low of 31 here tomorrow night. I wonder if i should harvest most of my winter squash, just in case. Thoughts?

I plan on harvesting most of my winter squash. Will probably take any which are close enough to finish hardening off on their own. It's hard to cover an entire squash plant.

On the other hand, I plan on covering at least one of my plantings of bush beans. They are producing at a high rate and I think it's feasible to prolong that. I plan on picking all my pole beans and harvesting okra seed this evening.

Am making a list (and checking it twice) of things to bring indoors, like lemon grass, aloe and ornamental cacti.

George
Tahlequah, OK

this cold front really caught me off guard. I am usually all over the frost watch since I grow a lot of tender tropicals. You all would laugh if you saw me last night. 10:30 PM i was out with a headlamp digging up inground plumeria and bananas and moving potted stuff indoors. Last night was the only chance i had to do it before the cold saturday so I did what I had to.

veggie garden got forgotten about a while ago. I think I still have some basil I can harvest.

kfrinkle, I'd either harvest or cover them. My forecast is for 35, but even though I'm a good bit southwest of you, it wouldn't shock me if we go down to 30 or so.

My experience with weather like this, where the freeze warnings and freeze watches are well to the north of your location and mine, is that often, we think we are in the clear and not too seriously worried about freezing, and then late in the afternoon before the overnight freeze/frost are expected, the forecast will change and suddenly we will have either a freeze or frost watch or warning. I've seen these warnings pop up well after dark, or even at midnight or 2 a.m., so we go to bed thinking we are in the clear and we wake up to drastically worse weather than what was expected. So, any time our forecast is for any thing lower than 40 degrees, I mentally subtract 5-10 degrees and expect that sort of weather. Better to expect the worst and be surprised.

Aren't you growing Seminole? In a year when I have a lot of Seminoles, I try to harvest them all before the first frost or hard freeze and put them indoors (usually in the garage, which is well-insulated). Even the dark green ones will tend to color up and mature over the next month or so. Even the ones I miss and leave in the bed and only find after the foliage has frozen often will be fine if I harvest them the next day and get them into that garage (or the house). I think that they have extraordinary cold tolerance in autumn because their rind is so thick and so hard.

I have a plant with three green winter squash that I intend to cover up, though it may be hard. I might not get all the vines that run out beyond those three covered, but I'll cover everything from the crown of the plant where it comes out of the ground to a couple of feet beyond the green winter squash. If I had 30 or 40 of them, I'd likely think that was too much to cover and just would harvest them. It is one thing to cover up a relatively small portion of a large winter squash vine and cover a handful of fruit. It is another thing entirely to try to cover a huge mass of vine running everywhere and covering tons of square feet. I've done it before, most notably in 2012, and it took a lot of floating row cover and a lot of time. I don't know that I'd do it again.

George, Thanks for the reminder to move the potted things indoors. I don't think I would have forgotten to do that, but since you mentioned them, now I am sure I won';t forget them.

Everybody, I've linked the NWS Tulsa webpage below. A lot of you now have had your Freeze Watch replaced by a Freeze Warning. You can click on any of the graphics and maps on the webpage for more info. I am shocked by how many hours some of you may remain below freezing. Check the timing of the Freeze Warning for your county to see specifics as they apply to you. The one I clicked on to read the warning said 11 pm to 10 am. Sometimes the timing is not the same for all counties, so check your specific county to be sure. Sometimes it is the same for a huge area though. That's a long freeze, particularly this early in the season. Those of you in the area with forecast lows in the 20s are likely to have a really hard killing frost. Even though Lee warned us earlier this week that temperatures now were expected to drop lower than what was believed earlier, it still is shocking to see those forecast lows of 22 degrees in some parts of NE OK and NW AR.

Last week it was so hot we wondered if the summer weather ever would end. Apparently it ends for sure on Friday night and Saturday morning.

Dawn

Here is a link that might be useful: Webpage of NWS-Tulsa Weather Office

Yeah, I have about 30 seminole pumpkins still out there, in various stages of maturity. I guess I know what I will be doing this afternoon, take off from work early. I go back and forth too, I usually think our little micro-climate where I am at will not get us to freezing. We are sort of at the top of a hill, and the weather up there is usually a few degrees warmer than what the mesonet weather station at the airport says. But why risk it, no?

Interesting thing, I have one seminole squash that is about twice the size of ever other one. He is still pretty green, I think I may cover him, just to see if I can let him go a bit longer. Time to get out some cardboard boxes!

Check out the map linked below. The Freeze Warning and Freeze Watch are sliding further south. I believe your county is caught up in the Freeze Watch now. It is very close to Love County (Marshall County to our direct east and Carter County to our direct north) but does not yet include us. I expect it eventually will include Love County but even if it doesn't, I'm expecting both frost and a freeze. It might not hit evenly all over our property, but I bet the low-lying parts of the garden will take a hit. Since you're on a hill, and warm air rises, your garden might escape damage, but I'm watching the evening news and Steve LaNore seems firmly on board with the freeze and frost talk.

Seminole has begun throwing off larger squash here and there the last few years. It has become such an obvious trait that now Southern Exposure Seed Exchange is offering two kinds of seed separately: the traditional strain that produces smallish squash and the larger strain that produces the larger ones. I think Carol had some of the larger strain a couple of years ago because her Seminoles made mine look like midgets.

Here is a link that might be useful: Latest Freeze Watch/Warning Map

Picked all but 6 or so seminole. Ended up with about 45 off of three plants. Pretty awesome. None were that large, but it was great harvesting some winter squash as a northerner transplant.

I love Seminole. I've had them last up to 18 months in storage. The only other winter squash that has lasted that long for me is Turk's Turban, and Seminole has such better flavor.

Maybe some day I will get to grow the 'real' Seminole. I have tried two different years now and still haven't succeeded in getting what I think I should get. I would be happy with a smaller squash since Al doesn't really like winter squash and I can't eat a big one alone. One year I planted twice and didn't get one plant, then a couple of years ago I got that size and shape that no one had seen before. I bought new seeds but didn't get them planted this year.

This year I have several huge Zucchetta that hardened on the vine. If I use them I will need to cook one and freeze many bags for later since there is no way I could eat one of these. I usually only use this as summer squash, but I have always known that you could leave it on the vine to mature. I saw a mature one at Baker Creek several years ago, but it wasn't nearly as large as a couple of these that I have.

I will probably search through the vine tomorrow and see if it has more squash worth saving before the freeze comes. It is a huge vine so I may have missed some.

Yesterday I went out to the "pumpkin patch" and counted at least 20 Old Timey Cornfield Pumpkins which are ripe or will ripen. There may be more, which is pretty good for six plants, planted in my lawn, and under fruit trees. Here's a picture of nine or ten of them. Today I need to get the rest.

I'd love to try Seminole. But it's not a priority, as this one works very well for us. I had one plant, this year, which was obviously a cross between Warsaw Buff Pie Pumpkin and Old Timey Cornfield Pumpkin. Every fruit was much much smaller than OTCP and the plant was WAY less vigorous and resistant to insects.

George

George, That's a lovely autumn photo.

The only thing about Seminole that you might not like is that the fruit stays so small. You're used to growing the bigger ones. : )

If you ever decide you want to grow it, let me know and I'll send you seeds.

I hope you get all the pumpkins harvested today because the weather forecast is not very nice.

Dawn

Nice, George! I got my tiny harvest all wrapped up. Not an end of season bumper crop, but a path well carved. Happy winter everyone!

I have been busy, and not thought to much about the coming cold. Thanks Dawn for this post.

I promptly went out, and harvested all my bell peppers. They hadn't done much all summer, but I have gotten quiet a few lately.

Had some from bright red, to tiny, not much bigger than the size of my thumbnail.

Thanks again.

Moni

George, those look wonderful. Great job.

Saturday, November 1

Tahlequah City Airport reports 23 F. at 7:00 AM. Our outdoor thermometer reports 26 F. I covered some bush beans with blankets, last night. We'll see if that was enough to save them. I'd say it's touch and go.

I got in all of the Old Timey Cornfield Pumpkins: lost count after twenty.

George

George and Bon, that looks like a nice harvest.

George, I had never tried to grow pumpkins till last year. The Old Timey Cornfield pumpkin seems to be a real producer.

Larry

George, Y'all were too cold! We were only 28, but the forecast had been for 32, so I expected 25-28. I finished the last of my harvesting about an hour before sunset last night, and then ran back outside right at sunset to say farewell to the garden.

Larry, Both Old Timey Cornfield Pumpkin and Seminole are huge producers. That might be typical of most moschatas, but some of the ones I've grown (Lunga di Napoli and Musquee de Provence, for example) did not produce nearly as many per plant as Cornfield and Seminole do.

Dawn