The Cool Weather is Finally Here

 

We were pleasantly welcomed by cool temperatures last Monday morning. With the official start of fall, we went ahead and finished off our plot with purple cabbage, collard greens, and other cool weather leafy greens. We will most likely re-plant some snow peas as the warmer weather may have stifled their germination.

 

Emmylou applied some biostimulants around the base of plants. We used TerraGrow, which is a group of beneficial bacteria that colonizes the roots. It will help to break down fertilizer for easier plant uptake. She made small holes right next to the root zone to prevent leaching and to keep the biostimulant focused on the roots. We only applied it to half of our plants to see the difference in effects.

 

One week after planting, all of our buckwheat has germinated. We are using buckwheat as a cover crop and weed barrier at both ends of the plot. We also had major growth in our ryegrass cover crop over the one-week time period. The ryegrass is planted on the long end of the garden between our plot and the next group over.

 

Garrett is seen here spread worm castings around a pok choi seedling. We covered the root zones of all of our plants thoroughly and spread some along the ends with the buckwheat and ryegrass. We will continue to use soil amendments throughout the semester to keep up organic matter and nutrients around our plants.

 

Here is a fiery skipper butterfly feeding on one of our cucumber flowers. This butterfly is entirely harmless to our cucumbers and all other plants in our plot. Our cucumbers seem to have a magnesium or nitrogen deficiency. We plan to mulch the cucumbers and gherkins with hay to prevent water from splashing on the leaves and causing any disease.

 

We decided to plant some more marigolds in and around our crops. These will help attract beneficial insects like bees and butterflies to pollinate our crops. Marigolds also repel a lot of pests, root-knot nematodes being one of them. We may continue to plant some flowering plants around our crops throughout the season.