Fall/Winter Garden Log -- October 5, 2017

My poor sweet Gypsy peppers....I cut them back months ago, and they came back real strong, then the chickens got into the garden and completely stripped them. They grew back (surprisingly!) and then it happened again. I know, I know. I really need to check that garden gate, but these and the sad tomatoes were the only thing growing in there, so I wasn't really going out there much.  

Well, here they are again. These 6 plants have the WILL TO LIVE! I just finished mulching and fertilizing them (after this picture was taken), so they will probably look even better in about a week.

 These are the mystery green sweet peppers I had potted up that were supposed to be Bishop Hat (hot pepper) but obviously there was a mix up somewhere. These are quite good, so a happy accident.

Mystery solved. I made the mix up. These are Beaver Dam peppers. 

This past weekend I pulled out all of the hot peppers that were in my potted garden.  These were the Aji Golden - I pulled them all up, harvested the peppers, and gave the plants to the chickens. They proceeded to completely strip them down. 

I also pulled up the Aji Angelo which were still green, but I'll use them anyway.  

The Violet Sparkle was repotted for the greenhouse - I gave it some new soil and fertilizer, and I repotted some plants that are supposed to be a small sweet orange pepper. We'll see what they turn out to be. Ha! 

Then yesterday John and I made our first ever hot pepper sauce! It was fun to work on this together. I cut the peppers in half and de-seeded them using a grapefruit spoon - the serrated edge works great to remove those seeds and membranes. We used this recipe but John added cumin, cilantro, onions and apricots.

The garden is coming along - small chard, carrots, spinach, and kale plants are starting to show up. Not much germinating with the lettuce.  I may need to seed again. Sigh....

I've had a few little tomatoes starting to turn, the Japanese Black Trifele and Blueberries are about all I'm hoping to see in the fall.  I started a tomato plant for the greenhouse called Green Grape. It's coming along.

The cabbage and broccoli starts that I planted a few weeks ago are really growing well - they're all looking great.  Of all of the cabbage seeds I started only one cabbage plant survived and I planted that one today.

The pineapple continues to grow!

Close up of the pineapple - weird!

And this is why you don't get too close to the pineapple plant -- look at those serrated edges. Ouch!

The Brown Turkey fig looks fabulous, this is the one I started from some cuttings I purchased last fall.  

And speaking of cuttings, all of the berries have grown and flourished. I think these are the black raspberries.

I've been a little worried about this Warren pear tree -- it's not been taking the heat and dry weather well, but now that we've had some good rains, I'm hoping it will pick up. 

I brought the little Truly Tiny banana trees down from the pool deck and added some new soil and fertilizer.  They really did just fine on the deck all summer, even through all that heat.  Pretty little ornamental banana trees.

And those crazy mulberry trees are starting to put out a few more berries.  They just keep chugging along!

We're so happy to have gotten some good rain the past week - about 4-1/2 inches in total. Everything is greening up again and John is having to mow the grass again. Nice problem to have!