Getting the garden ready for winter

[Gardening with Rabbits]

I raked up a lot of tomatoes, some peppers, squash, cucumbers, some rotten and falling apart, others that froze on the vine. I am pulling up the plants, and there are weeds. Over on the other side there are apples all over the place down in weeds. These apples just do not taste good and have bugs, but tons of them. Next year I may make jelly or cut this tree down. I know last year some of the apples just rotten on the ground, others went in the compost. This is a big mess. It was a healthy garden and kale and collards are still out there. I am not sure what I should do. Part of the problem is not building compost bins correctly and the weather not hot enough to cook all this stuff down, so I am probably going to haul a lot of stuff to the dump, but seems crazy. I have rabbit manure and now leaves are falling, and some half finished compost. Should I do 1, 2, 3, or something else?
1. Finish pulling weeds, throw the old tomatoes, apples, etc. in a compost bin, put the rabbit manure on the garden, and shred leaves and spread on the garden?
2. Leave the weeds, get up the tomatoes and things the best possible, spread rabbit manure, old compost, and shredded leaves, cover with plastic for the winter?
3. Leave everything on the ground except tall plants or weeds, spread rabbit manure, old compost, and shredded leaves?

 

[digitS']

These Autumn days, I either bury everything in the garden beds or just get everything onto the soil surface and leave it for the tractor guy. It depends on the garden but I won't dig out beds where that tractor will be tilling.

The digging out of beds isn't as tough as it sounds. I go for using mostly frost-killed material from 3 beds combined. So, there are 2 beds where I have done no more than clear the ground. Everything has gone into the 3rd bed. Depth has been the depth a shovel can reach with one pass. Really, that is about the depth of the topsoil around here ... at least, from my perspective and experience. The soil to cover amounts to more than the 8" of the shovel blade, since it has been loosened.

Composting works quite a bit better for me if the bottom of the pile is a little below ground level. It helps the pile maintain moisture during the summer dry weather. So, I dig out the compost bin just about the same as I do some of the garden beds. That pile-building ended about a month ago. The piles are full and it all can stay right there for months and months.

I don't remember the last time I turned a compost pile. It used to be a very conscientious program of leaving a pile a second season with no additions. That season, a second pile would take all the material. I often grew something like squash on the pile from the previous year. The locations of these piles were IN the gardens, where the sprinklers helped keep them moist. Sometimes, I didn't really do anything with the compost. Where the piles were in the shape and location of a bed, it might grow squash the first year and be used for about anything in the following year. It "evolved" from pile to garden bed.

This doesn't sound like much help for you, GWR. It's just how I have been doing things for a long time.

Steve

 

[baymule]

I'd do #1. Sounds like you have a wealth of apples, even if you don't like them. You need some chickens or a pig to eat them!

 

[Gardening with Rabbits]

These Autumn days, I either bury everything in the garden beds or just get everything onto the soil surface and leave it for the tractor guy. It depends on the garden but I won't dig out beds where that tractor will be tilling.

The digging out of beds isn't as tough as it sounds. I go for using mostly frost-killed material from 3 beds combined. So, there are 2 beds where I have done no more than clear the ground. Everything has gone into the 3rd bed. Depth has been the depth a shovel can reach with one pass. Really, that is about the depth of the topsoil around here ... at least, from my perspective and experience. The soil to cover amounts to more than the 8" of the shovel blade, since it has been loosened.

Composting works quite a bit better for me if the bottom of the pile is a little below ground level. It helps the pile maintain moisture during the summer dry weather. So, I dig out the compost bin just about the same as I do some of the garden beds. That pile-building ended about a month ago. The piles are full and it all can stay right there for months and months.

I don't remember the last time I turned a compost pile. It used to be a very conscientious program of leaving a pile a second season with no additions. That season, a second pile would take all the material. I often grew something like squash on the pile from the previous year. The locations of these piles were IN the gardens, where the sprinklers helped keep them moist. Sometimes, I didn't really do anything with the compost. Where the piles were in the shape and location of a bed, it might grow squash the first year and be used for about anything in the following year. It "evolved" from pile to garden bed.

This doesn't sound like much help for you, GWR. It's just how I have been doing things for a long time.

Steve

I think this did help!. Since I have been thinking of making the garden smaller anyway, I could put the compost bins IN the garden like you and I think one of the reasons the compost has been so slow is in the summer it is not wet. DH loved working with the bins and moving it all around, so I did not have to do the big work on composting. Where I would put the bins, would be in the worst part where most of the weeds are. Like you growing squash on the compost, I could do that, and if I use wire or pallets for the sides, I could grow something like peas or cucumbers to climb.

 

[journey11]

I am a big fan of let it rot myself. But there are also bugs and diseases to consider that might haunt your garden next year. Badly infested stuff I burn. The rest I would pile up out of the way, toss on some hot horse, chicken or cow manure, leaves, all that good stuff, and let it sit til next year. But I'm a lazy gardener like that.

 

[flowerbug]

i bury almost everything grown and try to bury it in the garden it was grown in to keep the nutrients cycling in place.

the things i do not bury are weed roots which may regrow (those get tossed on the weed pile to dry out).

for weeds with a lot of seeds i might dig down extra deep and scrape the top of the garden soil to sequester those weed seeds down deep below the germination zone. the worms may eventually eat them.

this way i am usually only digging up a small part of any garden to bury things (often 10% or less) so it is nearly no till gardening.

i wish i could then plant cover crops for the winter, but i am not the owner here so i have to leave things barer than i'd like. she likes things naked.

with the number of gardens i have to do here and how large they are some of them get done right up until before the ground freezes.

i also bury leaves and any other woody debris some friends bring me from their yard in a nearby city. leaf mold is similar to peat moss when i dig it up again in a few years (when i get back to digging in that part of the garden, i try to cycle my digging through so the whole garden gets turned once every five years and then keep on with the cycle).

 

[Beekissed]

I'd go with option 1 as well....pulling those weeds and composting the rotten fruit and veggies will help keep weed seeds down and also help alleviate volunteer maters, squash, etc. from popping up where they are not wanted.

Next year advertise those apples in your locals...someone may just want them for deer or hog fodder. If you have or know someone who has chickens, they will eat them also. We really scrambled to find apples around here this year...seems like all the bountiful bloom we saw all over the state was taken down with a late, hard frost.

 

[Nyboy]

My rabbit loves a rotted apple every now and then. Rabbits what size is your property ? If space is a issue take down the tree. If space not a issue I would leave tree just for spring flowers. Nothing prettier then a fruit tree in flower.

 

[Gardening with Rabbits]

I'd go with option 1 as well....pulling those weeds and composting the rotten fruit and veggies will help keep weed seeds down and also help alleviate volunteer maters, squash, etc. from popping up where they are not wanted.

Next year advertise those apples in your locals...someone may just want them for deer or hog fodder. If you have or know someone who has chickens, they will eat them also. We really scrambled to find apples around here this year...seems like all the bountiful bloom we saw all over the state was taken down with a late, hard frost.

Apples are everywhere around here. Just going through streets in town you will see apples all over the ground. I am going to talk to somebody about these apples. It is a Pixie Crunch. It matured in 3 years and had a few apples. I bought a Sundance pollinator, which was recommended. They are both 8 years old now. The Sundance started producing a few apples last year. On the property across the alley there is a crab apple and I am wondering if it is effecting the taste of the Pixie Crunch. The Pixie has flowers before the Sundance, so I do not see how it can be a pollinator. I will pay more attention next year. I just did not have time to think or pay attention to things. I know some people with chickens and hogs, so I will either eat them myself or give away next year. When DH was in the hospital I offered several people to come to the garden and pick all they wanted of tomatoes and things and not one person wanted to. I asked at church who wanted squash, tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, and one said she would take green beans. LOL. Nobody wanted squash. I picked tomatoes, squash, peppers, cucumbers and DELIVERED to people.

 

[Gardening with Rabbits]

My rabbit loves a rotted apple every now and then. Rabbits what size is your property ? If space is a issue take down the tree. If space not a issue I would leave tree just for spring flowers. Nothing prettier then a fruit tree in flower.

Yes, the rabbits love apples. I just have a small yard. I think it is a 1/4 acre lot. I hate to cut it down. It is a beautiful tree and the flowers are something else. I like the idea digitS had of the compost bins in the garden and right behind that tree would be a good place. These apples might make good applesauce.