Farmer Tom is a one man-show, unless you count the dozens upon dozens of animals that are slowly transforming the rugged land through rotational grazing patterns, proving, in short, that many hooves make light work.
After the ground freezes, gardeners look up to seed stalks and vines of flowering annuals and perennials to decide which to leave for wildlife and to disperse their seed in the landscape, and which to cut to collect seed for intentional sowing or to compost.
Check with your town, but most paper and tissue gift wrappings, as well as cards, are recyclable as long as they don’t contain foil, metallic inks or glitter. And all those cardboard shipping boxes could make a great first layer of sheet mulching next spring.
Foraging through garbage and picking through the houses and property of the dead, the rag-and-bone man became a figure for dark shadows and dead ends. So watch out for him on Halloween.
As you prepare for succession planting and look ahead to new growing spaces, please consider that creating and maintaining permanent planting beds is the starting point for recognizing soil as an ecosystem of micro- and macro-organisms.
While cool weather prevails, make it a priority to plant onion sets or plantlets, shell and snap peas, lettuce, arugula, spinach and radish, all direct seeded.
By day’s end, 15 inches of snow had whitewashed whatever we’d wished to accomplish in the garden before winter. Snow accentuated every landscape and architectural feature, creating new beauty.
Good garden hygiene in the fall is preparation for a healthy start in the spring. Clear dead, dying and weed plants before cold weather discourages the effort.
