I went out to the garden this afternoon. It was very foggy, around 40 degrees & the fog started to “sweat” while I was out there. I put a lot of the tools & garden stuff in the old farm house, pulled up the last bit of plants still in the beds & laid out more cardboard.

I did notice that the trees that were cut away in the property across the road were removed so utility poles could be put in. I saw 2 of them. I don’t feel so uneasy about the new owners now. I think there will be 1 or 2 homes at the most.

The past month has seen an amazing pecan harvest around here. My parents & uncle trees have dropped so many pecans – I was given half a brown grocery bag of cracked & blown pecans. I did have to sort for shells, which I saved to put in the compost pile. Here is what I ended up with minus a bag in the fridge. The pecans in the green bowl are whole (not cracked) but they crack so easy. They are called paper shell pecans & it is no joke. They crack especially easy – you can crack & pull them apart with your fingers.

I’m going to be going out to the garden area over the weekend to scout good places to plant the new fruit & nut trees I have on my list – really looking forward to that!

Last week I was at the garden to have a great time and as I drove up I saw some city utility vehicles across the way from the garden on the property that just sold. They were cutting down trees which made me a little uneasy. Are they going to be filling that 160 acres with houses? Or just one or two houses for the 2 men who bought the property? Perhaps they are cutting down all the trees? Or perhaps they are just cutting down trees to make way for some utility poles they are going to erect to send electricity & phone service to wherever they are going to build the houses? Either way, it was a little distressing to be honest.

A few days later I went back to see what had been done & they had cut down a 10 foot wide path down to the pond about 100 yards back from the road. There is also a new gate across from our driveway. I just hope the privacy remains. I also picked all the green tomatoes & peppers that were left on the plants because we had a frost coming up. Many of them have turned already so I have been enjoying them. I need to finish preparing the garden for next year & paint the words on the sign. Luckily the weather is still beautiful. 76 with a light breeze today – beautiful!

Last night was beautiful. I was at the garden in the evening & took some wonderful photos of the full moon & the sunset. While I was out there taking the photos I heard this crazy noise which was definitely an animal (not machine) but I have no idea what it was. It was like this strange screeching/clearing throat noise that sounded way too deep/low to have been a bird. Perhaps there was some kind of a wild cat out there?

Last Sunday my parents joined me at the garden & my wonderful father mowed & weed whacked the garden area for the last time this year so everything is low enough to decompose over the winter under the newspaper/cardboard/mulch I lay down on top of it.

I am already thinking of what I am going to do different next year, what I want to grow more of, what I don’t want to grow & how I want to maintain the garden area from now on.

We had two days of rain since my last post – about 2 inchs total. I have found more cut worms on the tomato plants & they are hungry. I have removed about 7 of them. My mom tells me that when I was 6 or 7 my neighbor friend down the street and I would feed the cut worms to my friends chickens. I don’t remember that.

Today was cleanup day – sort of. I knew that the boxes that I had laid out a few days ago would be all over the garden due to the 60 mph winds we had on Sunday night. I was right – they were all over. I decided to just round them up & throw bricks on them until the grass gets mowed one more time.

I took the boys (Boomer & Doc) with me to the garden today. They had a really great time exploring & just hanging out. There were quite a few tomatoes ready today & I even had two to give to the boys. They had a great time & I had no trouble at all keeping them out of the beds. I think they seem to remember where they were free to go from last time they were out here.

It is now the middle of October & I see a month has passed since I last posted. The garden is still flourishing & actually producing more tomatoes & peppers than ever. There are 6 little watermelon growing & a ton of blooms waiting to open. I don’t think they will make it unless our first frost is way off in the future. After this years rain deluge I won’t rule anything out.

Since I wasn’t able to dig all the beds I wanted to the past few months I have decided to cover the area with cardboard & some kind of mulch/compost through the winter. The field next to the garden was mowed down a few weeks ago & I am thinking of filling up the wheelbarrow a few times (100) with the cuttings & placing it all over the cardboard. I started yesterday & after two hours got some cardboard laid down.

Over the past month I must have made over 10 batches of pesto & dried a few lbs of basil & given quite a bit of it away. I still have plenty left to harvest before the first frost. I think I will dry a bunch & make more pesto to freeze for the winter.

We had a few rain storms over the past month & one brewing when I finally took the dogs out to the garden. I will be taken them out a lot more now that I have a better way of bringing them out on my own. They really love going to the farm & it wasn’t as hard as I thought it would be keeping them out of the beds.

There were also beautiful sunsets and sunrises that I was able to witness at the garden. I can’t help but take a ton of photos and just stare at the sky instead of work in the garden. I feel like I am missing something if I don’t take it all in.

It seems the tomatoes are more abundant than ever now, not only are there more fruit on the vines but the vines have grown like crazy. I have had to put up more support for them & now that it is cooler again, I am finding more pests on all the plants. It is still in the high 70’s mid 80’s during the day so hopefully we will have another month or more to harvest the garden.

We have been having such hot &/or humid weather the past few weeks that it was such a nice change to have clouds fill the sky & a nice breeze while I was working in the garden this morning. I got a later start than usual & had to take a ton of photos starting in my driveway & all along my drive to the garden.

I spent most of my time harvesting basil & enjoying the sky & my surroundings. Not much else to post except I have added quite a few photos sets today. Here is one of my favorites