The Garden in September

The autumn clean up has started and plants are slowly coming to the end of their lifespan. Now is the time to continue harvesting and start getting ready for winter.

Our monthly garden series is slowly coming to an end, as this will be the second to last update before the winter. The garden is currently still producing fruit and veggies, however it is also slowing down and starting to get ready for colder temperatures. Leaves are turning brown and the increased amount of rain has caused some issues for sun loving plants.

The strawberry plants are still going strong and producing new fruit throughout the whole month. I give them fresh compost every now and then to encourage new fruit and help them regenerate. If we’d have fruit trees I’d also be harvesting apples and pears, like my dad is currently doing in his garden. But that will have to wait till we move!

Another busy plant, or rather plants, are our bell pepper plants. The bell peppers take quite a while to ripen as they are sun loving and heat loving plants that only grow in warm environments. Since we have had a few cooler days, they are taking a bit longer to ripen. However, the wait has been worth it since they are incredibly delicious! We have been enjoying quite a few Mexican stuffed peppers lately. 🙂

The pumpkin plant has been slinging its way through the vegetable bed. It has been growing so fast and taking up quite a bit of space that I removed the adjacent plants to give it more room to grow. You can already see the baby pumpkins growing from the flowers. Adorable!

The arugula needs to be continuously cut back as it starts to flower when it gets too big. While the flowers attracted quite a few bees, I decided to cut them back so the arugula would continuously grow and we can harvest it throughout autumn.

Our two melon plants have caught a disease and I had to rip out the plants as the fruit were already moldy on the inside. I have come to the conclusion that our climate is not suited for them (too much rain) and I would need to grow them in a green house for a successful crop.

The tomatoes on the other hand are loving our climate and are still going strong throughout September. While they are starting to produce less, (which I am almost relieved about since I have had a complete overload of tomatoes) they are still yielding enough tomatoes to feed a household of two. Our diy tomato roof has done a great job at protecting the plants and has been a great investment. I can only recommend it!