What’s happening in the garden this week: Sept. 1 - Sept. 7

Signs of fall and the pollinator meadow survives its first summer

Sep 06, 2024

Fall herbs

I planted another round of parsley, dill and cilantro. If we get a warm autumn I should be able to harvest some fresh dill and cilantro from the bed, and possibly parsley, too. If the parsley isn’t mature enough when the cold sets in I could cover the bed with protective fleece cloth in late October and let it continue to grow over the winter. I planted the herbs in a bed where until a week ago I had been growing bush beans. The bush beans usually run their course in about 3-4 weeks so it was time to pull them out and throw them into the compost bin. The pole beans are still producing on the arbor, so we’re still getting more beans than we know what to do with.

Speaking of compost, before planting the herbs I spread an inch or two of compost onto the bed. The compost not only adds nutrients to the soil and keeps weeds down but also helps with water retention.

Meadow update

Some of you may recall I wrote last spring about when we planted a new pollinator meadow in a small area of the field near the vegetable garden. You can read about it here (free from the “archives.”) It was an experiment as much as anything but for year one, it really has done well. I was walking past it the other afternoon and what is now an expanse of grasses and native flowers was alive with the low buzz of insects. It told me they were feeling welcome. I’m not sure we put it in exactly the right spot, but I’ll let it go for the winter to provide the bees, wasps and other insects a refuge for the colder months and cut it down to about six inches in the spring. And then we’ll see. Here’s a photo taken the other day:

Slowing down

We’ve had a string of beautiful but unseasonably cool weather, especially in the evening with the temperatures dropping into the 40s. It hasn’t gotten much warmer than 70 or so during the day. That, coupled with the declining amount of daylight, is forcing many of the top summer performing plants to ease back. This includes the cucumbers, eggplants and basil. I’ve snipped the tops of the tomato vines to keep them from growing and focus their energies on the fruit already on the vine. But the tomatoes aren’t ripening as fast either. I’m staring at 20 or 30 pounds of tomatoes still green and on the vines. Fried green tomatoes anyone?

Other signs of fall

The pumpkins, which had been white all summer, are starting to turn a shade of pinkish yellow. This variety — Long Island Cheese — will never be truly orange. The asparagus ferns, which have reached five or six feet high, are starting to brown. They’ll dry out in the weeks to come and I’ll trim them all down to the ground when they do. The shadows are longer in the afternoon, and the birds have begun their miraculous migration south, stopping in our area to rest on their way toward their winter homes.