Season’s end

[moonhare]

Two weeks ago I pulled up the pumpkin plants. Last weekend the beans and remaining cucumbers and gourds were removed. Yesterday I cleaned out the rest of the garden: tomatoes, peppers, and eggplants. In each instance I rototilled and planted cereal rye (Secale cereale) as a cover. All set until Spring!


The pumpkin patch- the rye germinated nicely.


The main garden- the dark strip was seeded the week before.

-Pics expand-

Comments

[tielan]

How was your harvest, if you don't mind my asking?

And I'm curious: will you get a crop out of the rye, or will it just be a cover that's mulched back into the ground next season?

[moonhare]

It was an excellent harvest! This was the first year we had a bonafide soil test done through an agricultural school lab and their recommendations made a huge difference in yield. We were still getting cherry tomatoes and some peppers, but frost is overdue and it was time to get the cover down. The only main plant failure was my doing. I didn’t realize I purchased pickling cucumbers until late in the summer: I wondered why they got so yellow when growing large.

We also had a slug infestation- they really decimated the larger tomatoes near mid-season, and would get onto some of the peppers as well.

The rye will be tilled under as I doubt it will grow to maturity anyway.