Gardening, Puttering and Adventure Thread, Oct. 12

“I'm so glad I live in a world where there are Octobers.”
~ L.M. Montgomery, Anne of Green Gables

Edible Gardening/Putting Things By

From the famous Pat*

Part of my fall harvest: All the pie pumpkins (5) - all the purple sweet potatoes (about a pound) - half the fingerling potato harvest (27 pounds) - and some representative green zucchini, onions, and Sun Gold cherry tomatoes.

Tremendous!

Hurricanes and Trees

One thing we learned in the recent hurricanes was that trees can pose a danger when they come down in hurricanes, tornadoes or other high winds. The University of Florida has a fact sheet with several lessons learned from hurricanes about wind and trees and lessons learned about soil and rooting conditions. Plus recommendations. Which do you find that might be applicable to you?

The first recommendation is to plant trees in groups.

Palm trees are generally considered to be wind-resistant and are often planted in hurricane zones. But some are more wind-resistant than others. Here are some data on hurricane survival of various trees. And some tips on tree choices.

There may be some tips to make even palms safer.

Florida Problems are real! These palm trees grow too fast and have to be maintained in #Hurricane season. #Florida pic.twitter.com/STIm1Cpptt

— Butch Newell (@GottaGoOutdoors) July 25, 2024

Cut Flowers

Dahlias in Switzerland

Puttering

Hubs built an owl box last month hoping to attract a mouse catcher. While raking hay he snapped this pic of a barn owl already checking out the new digs.

S.Lynn, Idaho

What a great project!

Adventure

Visited the Boyce Thompson Arboretum with the grandkids, Arizona's oldest and largest botanical garden, located in the heart of the Sonoran Desert, just outside Superior AZ, and had a fun day. Definitely worth the visit.

Lots of hikes available.

We saw quite a few beautiful butterflies.

Recognize the butterflies, or the plants?

They have a fall plant sale starting tomorrow. It's their centennial!

It might be possible to get enough starts to create a cactus fence. Looks like it could be effective.

A cactus fence built to keep intruders out.

[📹 theregrowthproject]pic.twitter.com/XyI7LLRNgU

— Massimo (@Rainmaker1973) October 7, 2024

Gardens of The Horde

Garden report from OrangeEnt

Sorry, I bailed out early on the thread. Most of the time no one replies to me, so I leave.

Anyway, We live in LV and it gets hot in May. We're still getting 100 plus temps for at least the next week. That's usually fine because I drape that green outdoor netting over the plants. Maybe it's because I used Miracle-Gro stuff. I'd seen a story a while ago that their stuff wasn't any good.

We planted cherry tomatoes, and Early Girls in a different bed than last year. We had the tomatoes all over the place last year and got bowls full of toms. This year, the plants wouldn't even grow. One or two green ones that shriveled up. I pulled them. A second bed had two zucchini plants. The flowered, but it seemed we got only a couple female blooms. One set and started to get good sized, then we saw it turned yellow on the end. There were a few more, but they all yellowed and shrunk after a couple days of good growth. On a third bed we planted two rows of carrots. They grew up, then stopped. I'm not sure, but maybe the watermelons nearby took all the water. The melon plants grew well and I kept them trimmed. Had a few good sized ones and waited and waited for the yellow spot that indicates ripeness. Cut one open and it was completely white inside.. Some of the others were the same way. The last one was overripe. I pulled everything out after that.

I planted garlic, marigolds, and basil in between most of the plants for pest control. That part worked at least. Couldn't get very many bees or butterflies to pollinate. So, I don't know if it was over or underwatering, poor soil, or no pollinators. I'll amend the soil and deepen it in the new bed to see if that works. I'll put the tomatoes back where they were last year. I'll keep trying because you never know how the economy will be in the next few years.

Thanks.

OrangeEnt

Any tips for OrangeEnt for next year?

Hope everyone has a nice weekend.

If you would like to send photos, stories, links, etc. for the Saturday Gardening, Puttering and Adventure Thread, the address is:

ktinthegarden at g mail dot com

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Week in Review

What has changed since last week's thread? Gardening, Puttering and Adventure Thread, Oct. 5

Any thoughts or questions?

I closed the comments on this post so you wouldn't get banned for commenting on a week-old post, but don't try it anyway.