Garden Update

Today was the day I took all of the last useful bits out of the garden. The things you see still in there won't likely grow anymore (e.g., feverfew, oat grass, some peppers that never grew much in the first place), but I didn't pull them out and probably won't. I'll just leave them in there to compost themselves over the winter. As far as I know there aren't any seeds left on anything, so I'm thinking that should be ok, but I'm just sort of winging it here.

I've mulched the strawberries with timothy straw - the hard and stemmy bits Corky and Scooter, our two guinea pigs, leave behind. I'll probably keep adding to this mulch for a few weeks yet so there's a good layer of insulation over the winter. From what I've read it's good to do this to the garden too, so with Corky and Scooter's help, I'll have a fair amount of straw bits to add to the garden until the snow comes.

When I picked out all of the remaining salad greens and carrots, I had a little surprise: A 'white' carrot. This is the only one of these I came across all year. I don't know if it's just an anemic carrot, or actually a different type of carrot altogether that was mixed in with my other carrot seeds. I haven't tasted it yet - I'm waiting to show it to Gord when he gets home from work.

I really enjoyed our little garden this year! I plan to add another 4X4 bed next year and change my plantings a bit based on what did well and what else I want to try, like potatoes and maybe some cucumbers or squash. I also want to expand the herb garden, but I'll probably do that in a permaculture-style, with herb plants strewn about among the annuals and decorative perennials. Eventually I'd like to have virtually all the plants I grow be edible or otherwise useful. I've got a lot to learn, and a lot of winter reading to do!