September Harvest

With a forecast of frost for the coming night, we thought that it would be best to harvest whatever we could from the gardens.
There's not much we can do to keep the frost off the plants.
We did cover the remaining tomatoes in hopes of some more ripe fruit, but it has been a good year for them anyways.
The entire basil crop would be laid waste if left out so in it came.
Also, the ground cherries, tomatillos, peppers, and lemon cucumbers were picked.
Everything else is either finished, or hardy enough for a light frost.

Alex from 'Gardening for Chumps' came for a visit today.
It was our first meeting in person.
We are very glad to have met her.
She helped with the harvest and played with the kids.
We're hoping to have her visit more often to give us a hand.
For her part, she would like to get a feel for the rural homesteading life;
to see how it fits.

It would be nice to have frost protection of some sort in place.
The last few years have given us frost in early September, only to stay warm afterwards for some weeks.
Last year it came on the 16th and killed everything dead outright.
I'm hoping it's light tonight and that we get a few more weeks of fresh produce.
A longer season on both ends would help us out here,
but I would prefer if it was due to ingenuity rather than climate change.

As the garden is brought in, we need to make sure we store as much as we are able.
The basil will go straight to pesto and the tomatoes to sauce.
Salsa makes good use of more than one item.
I'll bet that Kira does a batch soon.

For those who shun the year-round produce of the supermarkets, this time of year is truly wonderful.
There is a seemingly endless bounty of fresh fruit and vegetables for the table.
This year we even have potatoes to add to the harvest.
Soon there will be meat too.
I feel like a king feasting endlessly on tomatoes and smothering fresh bread with pesto.
There is certainly incentive enough to set up a year-round growing system.
You can be sure that the plans are in the works.