A peal of thunder - the first of the day - peals across Arcadia as I sit down to write this post. William Elliot Whitmore's Ashes To Dust is playing on the iTunes, and Chewbacca sits perched on my desk, just below my chin so I can most easily bend down and nuzzle her head. She likes that.
I've spent the day out in the garden and down in the woods. Today was the day, seed in hand and "scattered sun" in the forecast, that I finished tidying up the veggie garden and planted my fall crops. I may have missed the window on one or two of the plants I set seed out for, but I'm not too worried. I'm sure winter will cooperate. Indian Summer is yet to come, if it comes at all this year, and first freeze still seems a few weeks away.
Crimson Clover,
Trifolium incarnatum, has been planted in Beds # 1 and #3. I pulled out all the plant matter that was leftover after tearing out the squash and nasturtium in Bed #3, and tossed it on the compost, scattering found nasturtium seeds around the fence and out in the trees and stump pile. Bed #1 had been cleared of brocolli and heat-killed, late-planted dill starts a week ago. I turned both beds over and sifted for large roots, then scratched what was probably a generous dose of lime in. Raking everything smooth, I reserved a bit of soil from each bed, broadcast seed over them, and scattered the reserved soil back over to barely cover the seeds. I don't know if that was the way I was
supposed to do it, but that's how I did it.
[Hoo-boy - big thunder and wind and rain, all at once!!! Boy it got dark! That's Mother Nature, watering my seeds in...]
And I have to say, that soil looks quite nice after a season of stuff growing in it. I was going to put some of that garden soil we recently had delivered in my beds to enrich them, but it's too weedy, Mike quite rightly recommended against it. And since I've planted crimson clover, the soils will be even better in the spring. I'm planning to plant root crops in Bed #1.
In Bed #2 I had mulched with compost a few weeks ago, while I removed much of the cabbage, all the dill (which would much rather grow in really crappy soil), the shallots, and the nasturtiums. I had left my transplanted miner's lettuce, a few nice cabbages and some French sorrel. After removing a couple ore cabbage plants, I added lime and turned everything over, rather shallowly - a couple inches at most.
Having removed some French sorrel last week, I realized after some reading that I really do want to try the very young leaves, or cook with the older ones. I had tried an older leaf raw, right out of the garden, and I didn't like it. I figure I should give it another chance or two. Today I discovered that it has a very long root, which I couldn't fully remove (think thistle), there were numerous little starts all around each plant that I could 'comb' out of the soil with my fingers. These were transplanted to their own rows, and I gave them each a little kiss of love and an urging to thrive. We'll see how they do.
I planted a patch of shallots from last fall's planting - while not all had multiplied, many had. I also stuck three white garlic bulbs in the edges on the other side of the bed. I left a row along the full long edge open for Inchelium red garlic, which I still need to go to the Olympia Farmer's Market to get.
I also planted seeds for Arugula, two kinds of mustard greens (Southern Giant Curled and Spinach), corn salad (or mache, if you know it as that), and lettuce (both Salad Bowl and Buttercrunch). I figure the mustard greens and arugula and mache will all do fine, but I don't know if the lettuces have been planted early enough. I expect they'll all be fine.
I still have a bit to do out three before I can kick back and let things go, and grow, for the winter. I want to plant crimson clover under the raspberries. I need to build that fourth bed. I am desiring a rhubarb root to put in a patch, and if I had straw I could build my potato patch.
So after I finished up in the garden, I took a wander in the trees, looking for chanterelles. I don't even know if I should expect them, but I look anyway. I didn't find any, but I did find very young coral mushrooms, and one red russula looking specimen, as well as numerous puffballs, all very young. There were a few other varieties that I didn't recognize.
And now I'm blogging and the thunder has passed. Chewie is still sitting beneath my chin, purring of course. I'm going to eat lunch, then maybe look for mushrooms elsewhere.
