My main garden season has ended with the beginning of the cooler days. The mornings are around the frost temperatures; daily temperatures are below 5°C(41°F), which means there’s no chance of growing any more vegetables. So it’s time to wrap things up.

Digging the garden

October and November are my digging months, so this year was not much different. The initial plan was to deep-dig the entire garden and make a couple of new beds in the orchard. As always, during the process, my plans changed, so instead of doing everything I ended up digging only two new beds in the orchard, and I left three beds in the main garden intact.

The main reason for doing this is the weather. After an extremely dry summer, autumn brought us lots of rain. We needed all the rain, but with extreme rain came problems with finishing the digging on time. After the second heavy rain week, the garden became so wet that it was impossible to dig anything, so I decided to leave some of the beds intact. This isn’t a problem since these beds have vegetables that will be able to survive winter, and I should have an early harvest.

I’ve also dag the paths in the garden, so now other than the three covered beds, I have an empty big plot ready for next year. I’m planning to do some things differently next year, so I will redo the path in the other spots. The beds that were left without digging will be dug in the spring after I harvest the vegetables. These beds are meant for zucchinis, tomatoes, and peppers, so there’s still enough time in the spring.

With winter came the thieves

Since October was very warm I left some of the zucchinis in the garden for a late harvest. I was planning to harvest them before the first frost morning. But, I was very wrong about it. I did manage to harvest a couple of zucchinis in the middle of November, but the last ones became the meal of some hungry animals.

At first, I thought that again I had some roe deer in the garden, but later I found some evidence in a half-eaten zucchini. It seems that rabbits have discovered my garden. I have been seeing them around the house, mainly on the road and in the neighbor’s garden, but now it seems they found a way to my garden. They ate all the zucchini and chard leaves and left the rest of the vegetables intact.

This could be a potential problem since I can’t stop them from getting in. The garden has a tall fence, but since this is a hill they can still find a way in. Especially now that we are alone on the top of the hill. Most of the old neighbors died, and now all the houses are empty during the week and winter. Animals know this and run around the village without any worry. Hopefully, the animals will find some other spot to feed off or I’m in for a very difficult gardening year next spring.

Now we wait and plan

After I’ve finished with the digging, there’s not much to be done in the main garden until February. If the winter won’t be too harsh I will try and sow some broad beans in January, but if we get a lot of snow, who knows when I’ll be able to enter the garden again. I’ve stored all of my tools in the basement and covered the spring vegetables with agro textiles and now I’ll start planning a new year.

I have a lot of ideas for a new season. Luckily most heavy garden jobs are done, and next year I can concentrate more on growing vegetables and flowers. I’m planning a new forest garden alongside the steps, a new orchard field garden, and a tiny balcony garden. Also, I will try new/old methods of growing vegetables in the main garden and we’ll see if they will work.

The seasons are changing. Summers are much warmer and dryer than they used to be, and I need new ways to keep my vegetables happy. Luckily I have two months to plan everything well.