Rocktober

Goodbye summer crops.  Tomatoes are still hanging on, but the weather just changed and the days are short. The chickens go to bed at 6:40 pm. Most of the winter squash is done (would have had more if the chickens hadn't gotten out so many times). I pulled out some zucchini and all of the melons.

The corn is over and I have been pulling out the stalks.  Not as much corn per plant as I had hoped for, but maybe better luck next time. Some of the fall winter things I planted are almost ready like fennel, beets and potatoes.  I have been replacing summer crops with broccoli, romanesco broccoli, brussels sprouts, green onions, lettuce, chard, kale.  I need to clear some more space for the starts I already have and for the peas, carrots, spinach and fava beans I intend to plant.

I am going to harvest the remaining peppers and tomatillos this week.  The lady at the seed store told me that tomatillos freeze well.  I hope so.  I dried a bunch of tomatoes in an electric food dehydrator and now we have three big jars full.  I keep meaning to build a solar chimney dehydrator or something like that but I keep having other things to do like painting the outside of the house (which also kept me from updating this blog).

The Hungry Hungry Caterpillars

It is so heartwarming to go outside and see these Small White Butterflies aka Cabbage Butterflies. They fly around, sometimes in pairs. They mate and lay tiny little eggs and cute tiny little green caterpillars come out and eat the leaves of my tiny fall starts of brussels sprouts, broccoli, kale, bok choy and collard greens.

They get on bigger plants, too. I don't like getting upset at butterflies, but they are cramping the style of the garden. I am trying to control them by seeking out their eggs and larve and squashing them with my fingers (digitally, as a farmer once described it to me). If they are big enough, they go to the chickens. They are really easy to miss because they are usually on the bottom of the leaf, so you have to turn every leaf. I read that parasitic wasps are a good biological pest control for cabbage butterflies and aphids. You can attract these wasps and other predatory insects by growing plants with lots of tiny flowers like yarrow, fennel, corriander, etc. I have some in other parts of the garden already. I will get some more of those plants going today.