Autumn sunflowers

The bees are still active getting some more nectar for winter.

Heads up

Lots to dig now – potatoes, carrots, black radish, leeks, as well as turning the dirt over for winter, so my eyes are invariably turned down as if looking for buried treasure. Occasionally I’m reminded to look up and view the birds flying over toward the south or sitting among the sunflowers eating seeds.

This one somehow survived the frosty weather. The birds love my sunflowers.

The mallows and a few other flowers are doing fine too. This purple mallow sways above my head as I dig around it. I try to leave the sunflowers and a few other flowers for the birds for the winter.

We are supposed to get heavy frost the next few nights. We’ll see what survives this time.

Planting Out Almost Done

I’m nearly done planting out all the pumpkins, sunflowers and maize in the pumpkin garden. Only a few late seedlings left.

I started in the middle with some sunflowers, then spiraled outwards with pumpkins, squash and more sunflowers and then finished off with a ring of raised beds with maize.

I have four main crop circles. One is the caged garden which remains in the same place from year to year. The others are the two mixed vegetable patches and the pumpkin garden. These three rotate between the three circles. Within the mixed vegetable gardens I try to rotate the crops too.