I agree. This year the trees have developed some fungal and bacterial diseases and the leaves are turning to brown and falling without turning color, from a wet and cool summer.

Now we've gone without rain (till this morning) for over a month, with warm temps and the grass is dead (except for the stiltgrass of course). Flowers cut back are reblooming.

The veggies keep producing though! That's nice. Mosquitoes are gone. Migrating butterflies have something to drink nectar from.

Susan, I am envious that your mosquitoes are gone; mine chase me inside around 6pm most days.

I will admit that we don't know whether to close down for winter. We actually had the air conditioning on last night because it was so warm and muggy.

No frost damage yet in most of the garden. I still have basil next to the house. Still have tomatoes and peppers to pick. I aim to have some peppers turn red so I can roast and freeze. Very happy with a new variety - Buran which is extremely productive. I haven't had time to process all the tomatoes so have had some rot on the vine. I take a 5 gallon bucket with me to clean up things like that but I was away last week. Impatiens show some damage but perhaps it is from lack of watering. I saw a mosquito in my bathroom yesterday!

Jwhittin,

you’re very right!

I know my roses are all extremely confused and have been sending out new buds like crazy only to have them look funny or not open haha.

best of luck this fall!

Weird about bugs. We have not had a frost. Our coldest might have been 38 one night. But, all our bugs are gone and have been for 2-3 weeks at least. Screens are off the windows and we keep them open in the evening with the lights on. Wonder why you had them, NHBabs, and we didn’t.

Deannatoby, we have wetlands, lots and lots of sheltered wetlands. And IME it only takes a few days of warm nighttime temperatures for the mosquitoes to hatch out another batch.

NHBabs, very frustrating! Mosquitos. I know they're important to the food chain, but I just wish we weren't the food. I'm glad they don't hatch in salt water.

Well I'm not sure if this very recent news article is good news or bad. Certainly for the environment it is bad news, but for mosquito haters, perhaps it offers a ray of light in the short term (before the drop-off in insect populations leads to a total collapse of the environment). http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2017/05/where-have-all-insects-gone

Flowers are not the only ones who are confused. My poor bees would have been killed by cold in a normal year, but now they have been clinging to life and feeding from flowers that should have also died. One bumblebee I think was spending nights in a pot of marigolds on a wall, and during the day could be seen climbing about from flower to flower. Honeybees have been hovering about by the side of the house, looking for an opening. I'm guessing that the white siding resembles the bee hive where they once lived.

The last frost we had has killed most of my annual flowers. Sunflowers, cosmos, morning glories, most of the marigolds and nasturtiums are history now. A single pot of petunias, a pot of marigolds, and another of nasturtiums still are blooming on the front porch. I'm really hoping for a killing freeze so that I can clean up the gardens. I still see wasps and hornets, moving slowly, but alive. I really, really need them to be safely gone before I can move about without fear. I'm surprised that they seem to be thriving, given the decline of the insects they feed on.

An interesting thing is that many flowers seem to have a built-in expiration date, not dependent on frost. The jewelweed, for instance, shriveled and died before that first frost, flowers and foliage alike.

Very very sad...sometimes there is good news, like the bluebird coming back from near extinction. Makes me more anxious for my pollinator beds to be established. The more we learn the less we know...

I had one crocus bloom this weekend. I'm in a new house and I didn't realize I had crocus until I saw pop up.

Isn't there a fall crocus? Could it be that?