October in the Pea Patch

It was the best of times, it was the, well, not the worst of times; it was October. The temperature dropped and daylight receded. Our garden received its first frost of the season on October 6^th, which spelled the end of tomatoes, peppers, beans, and other sun loving plants. Unfortunately, it hasn’t yet taken care of our little black and yellow flying friends, and they are getting aggressive as tasty plant things become scarce.

With the expertise of fellow AmeriCorps Volunteer Michael Bowe, I constructed a small cloche over plot B6 to keep things going over winter. The lettuce is especially pleased with the new arrangement. A garden volunteer is planting lettuce starts to be transplanted in the next few weeks. Wind has been by biggest challenge with the cloche, as our first few securing methods were scoffed at by Mother Nature. Wobble was also a concern since the plastic sheeting pulled against the plastic hoops (especially when heavy with rain) and I didn’t have space to anchor a guy wire on the North end. My final decision (well, final October decision) was to move the last hoop to the front end in order to run a guy wire to connect all five hoops, thus forming a spine for the ribs and preventing rain from sagging the plastic sheeting. I also used an extra section of fishnet to anchor the plastic sheeting to the legs and at each end. We received a windstorm towards the end the month (with gusts up to 35 mph) and the cloche survived. Some of the beet starts that were under cover are now exposed, and I expect they will continue to grow, though simply slower than their covered compatriots.

B6 is home to some little Swiss Chard plants which I transplanted from a self-seeded patch outside the North gate. Speaking of gates, Michael also coordinated the construction of our entry gate, so we now have a proper wooden entrance to our garden.

Many media events took place around our garden in October. We received a feature article on the front page of the Peninsula Daily News, as well as were part of a WBCS radio program about Community Gardens(http://www.radio4all.net/index.php/contributor/2968).