Our club met on the 13th of September for an evening of togetherness and an excellent class.
Our club members decided to order green (not Kelly green!) tee-shirts with a white club logo boldly centered on the front. I'll send around an e-mail collecting names and tee-shirt sizes from the club paid members in a week or so – I'm gathering competitive bids now.
Club members were reminded of their annual Harvest Dinner meeting on the 11th of October; we passed around a side dish/dessert/bread sign up sheet, and club garden gnome representatives were asked to bring their height-challenged buddies.
Master Gardener (and guest speaker) Steve Nokes presented LOTS of information on closing down our gardens prior to winter's icy breath, and answered a bunch of related/unrelated questions. some of his garden hints: remember to cure your freshly harvested onions for a week before storing (Steve recommended using old window screens on which to dry the onions); now is the time to harvest carrots and beets (unless you leave them in the ground, and mulch heavily with straw or leaves, which will allow you to dig around in the unfrozen soil and bring those root crops indoors all winter); pruning fruit trees in autumn produces fewer sprouts next spring; deer don't like to eat ornamental grasses; mulch your strawberries with pine needles ("pine straw"); Steve successfully grows ripe peaches ("Red Haven", "All Star") in his 45 tree orchard; Steve sprays for apple/pear coddling moths with an organic product called "Captain Jack's Deadbug Brew", from Bonide Home and Garden) starting on or about the 15th of June, every week for 6 weeks; and we had a BIG discussion on trapping/releasing/paying for someone else to remove offending skunks.
it was a great meeting.
RANCHO MCGINTY SQUASH TRELLIS RESULTS UPDATE:
Pat and I harvested assorted squash from the trellis after the second killing frost, and the results were placed on a sunshine-oriented table for further maturation and curing.
So, the trellis paid off for our chickens - lots of squash ("Karoke" summer squash, "Buffy Ball" decorative squash - bred to be painted for Halloween?, and "Small Wonder" spaghetti squash), and pumpkins ("Porcelain Doll" in both blue and pink colors). Not a bad result from a small investment in time and money - try the trellis (construction and installation details in an earlier blog post) method - it really works, and it was Pat's idea - win-win situation!
jim
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