My leaves are now falling, and the grass is green and long enough so that when I mow, I'll have a pretty substantial amount of mixed greens and browns to mulch the veggie garden beds and around the trees. We not only got some rain, but the irrigation water only shut off last week, so I was able to get the whole place soaked down pretty well. By they time the leaves fall, I use the blower to get them out of the rain gutters and off the porches, then its a day mowing it all up and hauling it here and there.

We are still irritating the pastures. Looks like another week or two of that!

Only a few tomatoes to go, everything else in the back garden is done and most beds are "put to bed". Even got the garlic plated last week. Will probably mulch the carrots and parsnips. A few beets still to pull and make into relish. The raspberries are still producing.

What a fall to remember.

Yes indeed, Treebarb & Luckybottom - this has been quite a lovely fall! I'm still keeping the lawn watered with this warm weather - starting to wind it down a bit, but it just looks so nice and green right now, I kind of hate to let it go dormant just yet!

I pulled up our tomato plants last weekend - could have left them a bit longer, but just decided they were getting so small with the cooler weather, I may as well as quit for this season.

Been rearranging some irises (taking the extras from a couple of beds and putting them around the border of the lawn in the back), thinning out some of my hostas and pulmonaria and spreading them around in other spots, as well as putting a better edge around the two beds I made last fall. Feel'n good about how the backyard is now taking shape!

Other than that, putting out the deco for Halloween :)

Marj

Cold came early. Counting the days til Spring.

Pulled the squash and sweet basil plants today as they looked done. Surprisingly the Greek Columnar basil still looks good. Garlic and shallots went in last week where the last of the potatoes came out. Pepper plants are still looking good though I have harvested a good portion of the pods already. Cover crop planting is ongoing with field peas, winter wheat, oats, hairy vetch...

Been getting my transplanted cool season greens in place in the tunnel areas. Lettuce, spinach, tatsoi etc. are looking nice.

Spreading grass clippings far and wide as mulch and preparing to build the cool season compost pile. Leaf collection will be getting into full gear soon.

I need to inspect, repair and prepare the greenhouse film and cold frame materials asap.

Well, we didn't get any 4" to 5" of recent rain but the warm weather may be much the same here, about 700 miles north of Colorado.

The year's precipitation is just a half inch below normal. It isn't all that much since "normal" is semi-arid but the evergreens were beginning to go up in flames after last winter's serious deficit of moisture.

This will be the 2nd day with an afternoon high in the 70's! This is about it the weather service tells us. Nothing in the future within 10 degrees of that mark. My gardens have been hit repeatedly by light frosts for right at 6 weeks. Still, I picked quite a few cherry tomatoes, today! A sheet of ice from the sprinklers on the coldest night just means that there is quite a bit of frost damage but few of the plants are actually dead! (Nothing is growing but the tomatoes are still ripening. :o)

I was out with the tiller killing weeds in the paths. I see little reason to keep the gardens going and have discombobilated all irrigation. There is lots of clean-up and I hope snow doesn't come before I can feel enuf has been done to bring a curtain down on the year!

Like Greg, I'm getting things ready to grow or "maintain" in the greenhouse over the winter. Benches were moved out Sunday and the ground cultivated. I don't have anything to move in!! The weather has been so warm that the Asian greens have all gone for food rather than transplanting into the greenhouse. I've started more seed but those plants need another 10 days or so, before they can be moved out of their container. I'll get seed directly into the ground in there, tomorrow.

Steve

Just checked the forecast on noaa.gov and they're predicting 28 degrees Monday night for Fort Lupton, the closest town. We are usually several degrees cooler. Time to end my grasshopper ways and become the worker ant this weekend. I'll dig and pot up the geraniums first, clip and pull the dahlias second, then on to the veggie garden clean up.

David, I've been wondering if you'd gotten some relief from the drought. I'm glad you have access to irrigation water. I'm hand watering the baby trees. It's getting dry again.

OldFixer, where are you? The zone 10 threw me.

I'll enjoy these couple of days of mid 80's. It couldn't last, but it's been lovely! Looks like we're heading into 50 to 60 degree daytime temps next week.

Barb

This post was edited by treebarb on Fri, Oct 24, 14 at 16:04

Hey Barb, I got the oaks from the swap in the area we talked about. They seem very happy. My question is: Do i need to provide any cover? Like slaps to the North West for wind protection and/or mulch and if so when? bonnie

Hi Bonnie!

I'm glad they got a good home! Yes I think it'd be good to put a couple of inches of mulch around the bases. It's advised to keep the mulch off of the trunks of the trees, but those giving that advice aren't dealing with our winds! I'd put mulch down soon, it's been dry enough that they'd appreciate a drink and the mulch to keep moisture in the root zone.

More importantly, I think is to avoid sunscald on the south/west sides of the trunks. The winter sun heats up that side of the tree during the day, then the night cold can cause the tissue in the bark to rupture, basically. I wrap my deciduous trees around Thanksgiving with the tree wrap in the link below. I take it off around Easter. I do this the first 2 - 3 years, until the trunks reach some size and are more used to our intense winter sun. It'll be tricky since the trunks are tiny.

Another option, which I do for conifers that can't be wrapped is to cover the tree with an upside down tomato cage. I secure it with 3 landscape pins pushed into the soil. Then I wrap the tomato cage in burlap.

I get a lot of mail order conifers from the Pacific Northwest that have never seen anything like our sun and altitude. I lost a lot of them till someone on the conifer forum suggested they would benefit from screening the first couple of years. You didn't realize I was giving you a project, did you?!

I'm taking some time off around Thanksgiving and would be glad to come over for a tree wrapping visit. I have a lot of tree wrap, so no need to buy any. I'm very high tech, so I use duct tape to secure the wrap, lol!

Barb

Here is a link that might be useful: Tree Wrap

WOW, Tree wrapping visit is very high on my list of things to do. Email a time and I will provide the meal for hunger tree wrappers. Do you want to make up some potting mix to take home?

Got the leaves and grass all mowed up this past weekend, heavily mulched most of the veggie garden and put a nice lid of chopped leaves on the compost. Still have a few dozen carrots and beets to pull, I'm tempted to just get them out of the ground, clean them up, roast them in butter, and freeze 'em for Thanksgiving and Christmas.