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| I can taste these by just looking at them |
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| A few beets are still left. |
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| Onions have been pulled for a while so that they can dry and be stored. |
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| The onion crop was poor this year as they didn't have time to complete growth. |
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| I will leave the miserable sunflower for birds to pick through. |
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| The remains of the bleeding heart |
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| The bleeding heart in prime time. |
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| Who couldn't like bleeding hearts |
My Dad and maternal grandfather were skilled gardeners. I guess my brothers and I were influenced enough that we all like gardening. For my Dad the vegetable garden produced a major proportion of food. Vegetables were processed or stored and had to last to the next summer. In Dad's day produce was not sold in stores. A vegetable garden was vital.
Sadly gardening comes to an end each fall. I have to harvest the late produce, clean things up and work the soil. I have just a small garden patch and I work everything by hand. I use a fork to work up the soil. My soil has become very hard in the last few years so I'm trying to add plant material to soften the soil. I get two loads of shavings and work them into the soil. So as well as good food I get a tremendous amount of exercise and fresh air.
So I've had a wonderful summer with these plants and will be ready next spring to start over again.
love fresh dug carrots. my fave - next to fresh dug potatoes. :)
ReplyDeleteI'll take the potatoes first!
DeleteI commend people who can successfully grow a garden. I don't know what it is, but I have never been able to produce any produce! I have 1 apple on the tree. :( We always seem to get a real late frost in the spring and all the blossoms die. So sad. But I still try!
ReplyDeleteEvery place is different. Some places are easy to grow gardens and some places are challenging.
DeleteLooks like you have some fine produce there, Red. I am so looking forward to enjoying our garden in our new place next summer. I'll be watching yours and DJan's blog for tips!
ReplyDeleteI am going to be making two kinds of carrot soup once I spend more time inside. Have fun gardening.
DeleteBoth of my parents were gardeners, too, and my mom canned and froze enough to have garden-grown veggies all year round. My husband and I are building a raised garden and hope to have our first garden next spring!
ReplyDeleteRaised gardens can be very productive. In the little garden I have I can have frozen veggies most of the year.
DeleteYour love of the earth shines thought in this blog. I love the bleeding hearts. So gorgeous. My carrots are about the size of your . My carrots are still in the ground for a few more days and that will be it. I have many to pull and cut. My onions have been out for awhile dried and stored. It was a wonderful growing season here also. I enjoyed my visit here.
ReplyDeleteI try to leave carrots in towards the end of Oct. Yes, my onions have been out for a while and are close to coming in.
DeleteI used to enjoy growing food. I am envious.
ReplyDelete...and I would like to live on the road like you do! I guess we can't have it all.
DeleteWe're getting ready to put our vegetable garden to bed, too. Tom digs in raw compost each fall to enrich the soil. the compost comes from yard trimmings. The ornamental borders will also be cleaned up and mulched with shredded leaves. There's a lot of work to do in the fall for gardeners, but it pays off next spring when the growing season returns.
ReplyDeleteYour season is a little longer than ours.I also have compost to dig in. The shavings I get from David the bowl maker.
DeleteYou did a good job, would you could come along here. I am a bad gardener and it is a mess here, I am a city girl who tries to gardening... But my cat loves the garden to hide and run through the growing plants ha,ha.
ReplyDeleteI feel sorry for urban people who never learn about gardening. Good for you to try gardening. It can be learned.
DeleteOh Red that is a nice bounty you have there. Good job. B
ReplyDeleteI think my biggest love is just to watch things grow.
DeleteLooks like you've had a great gardening season. It's sad to see the season coming to an end, but it's nice to be able to take a break for awhile and recharge for next spring. I enjoy gardening, too. It is wonderful in so many ways. It's very relaxing, gets me outside where I enjoy the sights, smells, sounds of nature, and it's a fantastic way to exercise. What's there not to love?
ReplyDeleteI don't have an answer for your question. It's a good way to look at gardening as well as a lot of other things.
DeleteYour garden veggies look great Red and I have to say More people should be doing it. We have a small garden here, and as I drive locally around I notice more and more people are having their own gardens now. I can remember the last time I bought a tomato at the grocers and there was simply no taste to it - I think it was genetically altered - looked like tomato - lovely colour, but tasted like wax?? Last tomato I bought. WE grow enough ourselves now to use through winter and stew n bottle rest. I've just started cleaning out the garden here and then usually help my neighbour with hers. I guess it won't be finished today as the rain is falling. Have a good one.
ReplyDeleteIt's good to hear more people are trying to grow vegetables. I call the store bought tomato taste "cardboard."
DeleteWe freeze quite bit of stuff and it's surprising how much we get from a small space.
The shavings use a lot of nitrogen to compost so maybe add lots of manure. I like to use leaves also, and my neighbors are eager to give them up. Don't use walnut, it stunts and kills tomatoes and peppers. Seedy trees give one headaches. I used to try and grow a years worth of veggies that my family would use often.i also grew all my baby food for the kids.
ReplyDeleteI also have lots of compost. Stuff grows extremely well. The soil is rock hard in the fall. This comes from having to redo my sewer line few years ago. The excavating was right through the garden so clay got mixed in with my loam.
DeleteWe don't have a garden, but there's always good folks around that are willing to share! Nothing like fresh, home-grown produce!!
ReplyDeleteTo me the effort is worth while if I don't have to eat the poor tasting store stuff.
DeleteI admire people who can grow things. Our family isn't known for having green thumbs. Have a great week.
ReplyDeleteYou've never lived until you eat the food you can grow!!!
DeleteI went out to my little plot on Saturday and worked the soil, getting rid of the weeds and pulling up old stuff. I left some nasturtiums since they are so pretty still! It's raining now. Love your carrots! :-)
ReplyDeleteGardening is a lot of work but I don't mind as it's great exercise.
DeleteFor a small space you seemed to reap the benefits.
ReplyDeleteMy Dad always raised a garden. It was what we ate all winter long. My husband tries to raise a small garden. We have to keep the deer away and this year it was way too wet but we had peppers and tomatoes and cucumbers so it wasn't all bad.
Your bleeding hearts were gorgeous!
Exercise and wonderful tasting bounty. Veggie gardening has it all. Yours looks great and yummy!
ReplyDeleteThis looks like a great harvest ;-)
ReplyDeleteWarm greetings from the Netherlands,
dzjiedzjee.blogspot.com
Gardening gives me a good work to, and I love working with the soil too Red.
ReplyDeleteYour Bleeding Hearts are beautiful! Mine froze out. You had a good crop of carrots they taste so good! Did you braid the onions together? I used to do that and would have onions all winter:)
ReplyDeleteYou have such varied interests and talents! I think I better give up on the veggie garden next year. I'd love to rent a rototiller, but that ain't gonna happen! It's been a tough go. I'm happy to share yours!
ReplyDeleteRed gardening has to be a passion I feel, and you most definitely have the passion. I too love to garden but unfortunately this year no garden, nor do I see one in my near future but at least there's the flowers in my beds. The taste.... yummm I'm imagining those carrots and beets, they seem to taste so much better after all the back breaking work. You can keep the onions though, I don't much care for them! lol
ReplyDeleteCheers.
You did a great job with your little plot o' land. Yummy!
ReplyDeleteGreat effort, Red. I wish I had someone in my family who would help me with a piece of advice here and there in terms of vegetables growing. Every year I try to plant onion or carrot, regularly peas but when it comes to tomatoes or cucumbers, I'm a bit lost...
ReplyDeleteBleeding hearts are lovely, I just wish they had longer span of flowering.
Happy Thanksgiving Red. B
ReplyDelete