Winter Update

Last week, I stopped by the garden.  I wanted to check the cold frame after the Christmas freeze when it dropped into single digits.  Also, I wanted to get more turnips.  I was pretty sure the arugula and kale were dead.  Right before the freeze up last month, I went out and got more arugula and harvested the broccoli.  Good thing, as they were reduced for the most part to compost.  The arugula will come back in the spring, but the broccoli is gone.

Broccoli bottom right, arugula middle right. That patch in front of the cold frame was kale.

Last time, I got some nice greens on the turnips, but after the extreme cold, there were only a few small inner greens left.

The greens in the cold frame had been nipped a little, but for the most part, I don’t think I’ll be needing to buy any lettuce for a while.

Unfortunately, there was quite a bit of winter kill on the rosemary bush, which I had neglected to wrap.  It’s hard to know whether to wrap each fall because for the most part we don’t get temperatures lower than the 20s F at night.  It’s a large plant, so I think it has a pretty good chance of recovery.

On my last trip, I discovered I had left my tool tub open and the torrential rains we got as part of the storm that blew across the country had filled it half full of water.  I did my best in the falling temperatures to salvage what I could, set things out to dry, and toss things that were no longer useable.  This week, I brought my hand tools home and cleaned, sharpened and oiled them, which they needed after being soaked, frozen and set out to dry.  Yesterday, I went through the Southern Exposure Seed Exchange catalog.  Next step is to check seeds I have on hand, check their dates, and whittle the order down a bit.  It’s still early, but I like to start thinking well in advance.