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Garden Tales >>> October 2025

3 months ago

Autumn has been nice to us so far, warmish days, coolish nights, adequate rainfall. I may have 2 cucumbers left to pick before the last late plant dies. Tomatoes are still trickling in but smaller in size, peppers too. Sweet Potato vines are going strong, will dig them up before Halloween. Cabbages and Broccoli are heading up now, been busy picking off the loopers twice a day, minimal damage thus far, thankfully away from the core heads. Collards are almost at pickable size and the carrots looks strong but still have a few weeks to go. The Persimmons are turning a nice autumn orange, but the pears have done their job and are all gone other than a few way out of reach. Hope to have some pics soon....

Comments (10)

  • 3 months ago
    last modified: 3 months ago

    Got the last of the covers put into place over my raised beds, one 3x7 bed each of

    Flashy trout's Back, Red Sails, Rouge d'Hiver, and Winter Density lettuces, and one bed each of Pacifico, Sangria, and Lentigini radicchio.

    Still have a few peppers producing but the majority of my Aleppos are picked, dried, ground, and currently being sprinkled on everything except ice cream at this point!

    Just waiting for the last peppers to peter out so I can pull them up and get my garlic in. And then I'm hanging up the garden gloves until spring!

  • 3 months ago
    last modified: 3 months ago

    Started picking from my fall crop of broccoli and should have heads of cabbage soon. This is the first fall crop I planted and I'm getting beautiful tight heads. I'm letting my Brussels sprouts go into November because they say I'll get tastier sprouts after the plant after going through a couple of hard frosts. How hard I don't know but will find out.

  • 3 months ago

    Some pics from yesterday...

    Carrots...

    Collards - Turnips - Carrots - Cabbages - Broccoli....

    Collards & Turnips close up....



  • 3 months ago

    ...plus,,,

    Sweet Potatoes....

    Cabbages...

    Broccoli...

    Persimmons...

    Kevin, I tried to grow Brussels sprouts but aphids would cover them like a blanket and suck the life out of them. I find that carrots grown in the fall (seed planted by Aug 20th) are much sweeter than summer carrots. I'll be picking the broccoli starting today, while I keep picking off the loopers from the cabbages. Loopers seem to prefer the cabbages over the Broc which is easier to manage. I'll see if any loopers are hiding in the Broc when they are blanched for freezing, loopers float to the top.

  • 3 months ago

    Oooh So jealous of your persimmons - I harvested one (1) this year...

    But the radicchio is thriving!




  • 3 months ago

    I dug up four 25' rows of potatoes yesterday, Kenebec, Pontiac red and Dakota Pearl. these 3 are determinate plants and require no hilling which I discovered last winter. So I didn't hill them, I just raised the beds about 3" and planted them 7" deep and it worked great. Easiest potato digging I ever had.

    I have three more rows in Burbank, Canela and Caribou. All are indeterminate Russets I did hill, and figured I'd dig them out today but it's been raining since early morning so they'll need to wait. Caribou and Canela are new to me and my plan is to kick the 120 year old Burbank russet to the curb because it just doesn't grow good for me.

    Bushman's potato farm's in Wisconson supplies store potatoes in my area and are really good potato better than Burbank. They specialize in Silverton and Caribou so I figure if it grows in WI it should grow in my garden, so I bought Caribou. It's a cross of Silverton and Reeves Kingpin so figured I start with Caribou first. Canela was a spontaneous purchase because of the percentage of acreage planted year over year was big, and it's stated long storage time.



  • 2 months ago

    I harvested the early planted and the late potatoes in the last couple weeks. Mostly Kennebecs and some Goldrush russets. The Kennebecs were pretty good and the seed potato russets were quite small that I bought. They did not reach the size I want and may sprout a lot. The late planted Kennebecs do not sprout during the winter.


    I harvested the sweet potatoes this past week and they grew and produced like a jungle...tremendous harvest. I have O'Henry yellow [my favorite], Yellow Jewel [orange and quite good], and Dianne [red on the outside and orange on the inside]. I bought them all from George's Tator Farm.


    The June planted carrots are excellent. The cauliflower huge and the broccoli excellent. The Pink Brandywine Suddeth strain tomatoes are are really sweet. The Quantum butternuts are also excellent.


    The spring planted strawberry patch for next year is quite nice. I am raising rows about 24 to 30 inches wide and kept thinned in the row.I have Galletta early, Flavorfest mid-season, Jewel late mid-seson, and Dickinson late.


    It has been a bumper year. The Lord has been good.

  • 2 months ago

    Wow that's a nice haul of spuds Kevin and you too Wayne. I kinda miss growing potatoes but had to cut back on some things. Yukon Golds were the only ones I attempted but they were good, nice to eat the skins knowing what we spray on them, or not.

    Sorry you only got one persimmon Stacy, my tree is about 15 YO now and it's been a big producer ever since turning 4-5. We picked about 1/2 of the tree over the weekend (the easy ones to reach) and here they are in the garage...


    You need clippers for these babies...

    We're delivering a bunch to the neighbors tomorrow, VgQn will make jam as they soften up. I like them firm like a crisp apple, they're sweet as can be with a tropical flavor. They're the last fruit of the season to harvest and very carefree to maintain.

    All broccoli has been blanched and frozen now, Cabbages are next in line and then the Carrots before Thxgivin'. Turnips are about 1/3 harvested as they fatten up. Plant to plant Spinach seed around mid-Nov for an extra early Spring harvest. I'll plant it where the late Sweet Potatoes will be dug up within the next week or so. It's been a good year fer sure!

  • 2 months ago

    We dug up the last of the Sweet Potatoes today, got a decent haul from one 15' ft row with 2 side rows which should get us through next Spring, Also pulled more turnips for fridge storage. The Cabbages are almost there, at least 2 are pickable now and maybe a few young carrots for some slaw. The collards are ready too but tonight we're trying out some turnip greens for a change, I'm betting that they're a bit bitter which is why we also grow collards.

    The tomatoes are done now with just about 10 small/med ones on the shelf, the Peppers are shot too. We had a close call for our first frost last night but got lucky, the long range looks to avoid a frost for at least another week so the flowers will survive a bit longer. Nice weather now but we could use some rain which might return later next week.