I love this picture mostly because it has our youngest gardener with our oldest gardener behind him. I’m pretty sure he’s showing one of our newest members standing beside him how to use the scuffle hoe.

The group attacking the weeds in our fall crops.

A closeup of saved bean seed for 2018.

Me showing off containers of 9 kinds of bean seed ready to go in the freezer. We had spotted quite a few bean borer beetles whilst shelling them so into the freezer the must go until planting time next spring.

This photo dwarfs how well our fall crops are coming along but it gives you an idea. Our gardeners have already taken countless bags of mustards, kales, lettuces, summer squash and radishes just in trying to thin them out.  Oh you can also see our valiant attempt to put scary things to deer up.  We have plastic bags, swim noodles, tin pans and christmas tinsel rope.  We will see if it keeps them away.  They started tasting beets last week.

Yellow patty pan squash. Our squashes are doing so well as a fall crop. They were planted 7/28/17. We can’t hardly get anything off spring plantings because the bugs and fungus get them.

Fall spinach. We’ve been lucky with our spinach too. This is the best spinach crop we’ve ever had.

Basil’s and zinnias going to town in the tomato patch. They make us, the bees and butterflies sooo happy.

We got lucky this year when we planted our fall garden.  RAIN!  Usually when we plant in late August we don’t get any rain.   The seeds don’t like water out of a hose to well and don’t want to sprout and thrive.  So, we are delighted that the rains got everything up and growing.  We’ve had to water this last week because we are going into our 3rd week with no rain but the plants don’t care now where the water comes from.  We are still harvesting lots of peppers, pumpkins and winter squash.  We are having a few cabbage worms and loads of Harlequin Beetles.  I’ve found over the years of experimenting the only thing that works is to water in the morning. Then immediately walk the rows looking for them and picking them and squishing them or dropping them in a cup of soapy water.

October will be busy with our fall crops.  I also must have a class on digging our horseradish and then making horseradish sauce.  We will plant garlic this month.  The sweet potatoes need to be dug in the next week or so.  We are going to the University of Tennessee’s Organic Farm Day on the 26th.  Then we have our fall harvest party on the 28th.  Always fun with lots of delicious dishes to pass, games, pumpkin carving, Mr. Bill’s hay ride and more.  Happy fall all!