Farm Blog Fall 2015
September 21 - December 31
Fall is the season for changes in temperature and weather. Frost in northern New Mexico can occur early, usually in mid to late October. Tomatoes, squashes and peppers are finished after the first frost. The tomato plants are not put into the compost, but the others are composted.
In the vegetable garden the collards and chard will still be OK until the nighttime freezes get below 20 degrees.
All of the summer herbs (oregano, marjoram, basil) have been picked and dried. The other herbs (tarragon, thyme, sage, rosemary, spearmint, lemon balm) have been trimmed and are being dried as well. The chives, parsley and lovage don't dry well, so they are only eaten fresh. We grow herbs in various locations on the farm. Some in an area in the vegetable garden and some in the flower garden both in pots and in the ground. I have one plant of lemon verbena that I always dig up in early October, pot up, trim and bring into the sun room until after May 15 when there will no longer be a chance of frost. There are also three large fig trees (brown turkey, Penasco and negronne) in the sun room. I used to take them outside for the summer, but now I leave them indoors all year long. I trim them back every winter when they go dormant. This causes them to put on more branches with more leaves and figs. This year the brown turkey produced about 40 figs, and the Negonne about 20.
The fruit trees will loose their leaves by early November. One of the smaller Montmorency sour cherries had to be removed because of a fungual infection. We will go into the winter with 24 fruit trees in all.
All of the water catchment barrels have been emptied. Not that the water in them will freeze, but the faucets would freeze.
The bees are doing well in all of the three hives (2 topbar and 1 Langstroth). After the chamisa, Maximillian sunflowers and purple asters go to seed there are very few flowers around for them to gather nectar or pollen. After a last check in late-October, I will not open the hive again until a warm day in February to check to see if they need to be fed. At that time I will feed a mixure of sugar and water (1:1) until the fruit trees begin to flower. I will leave each hive with at least 14 bars of honey and brood. On November 10 a friend added two shallow supers of bees minus a queen to the top of my Langstroth. We separated the new ones from the old ones with two plys of newspaper.
The flower garden is coming to the end of the growing season. There are still some flowers (catmint & agastaches) blooming, but most of the perennials will need to be cut to the ground. The bushes will also need to be pruned once they loose their leaves in November.
All of the lavender plants that were planted this year except two are doing well and are ready to go into their dormant period for the winter. I am focusing on the culinary varieties, since they were the ones that I planted this year.
All of the fruit trees were mulched on November 14 with redwood pulp.