Beautiful days, buried treasure, and my nemesis....

October 26, 2026

 What a noisy affair it is now, to walk in the woods. The weather has been very dry, with no rain and warm sunny days for over a week. The leaves on the ground are totally crisp and aromatic. Trees are mostly bare of leaves, except the oaks, beeches, and some poplars, although those leaves come pelting down in a golden shower with the slightest breeze moving through the tree tops. 

With frosty mornings and warm sunny days, the list of outdoor chores is rapidly getting shorter.

The cold frame that was in front of my garden shed has become invaded with roots from the soft maple behind the shed. It seemed a good location at the time we built it there, but in the spring and fall, it is shaded by the trees on the east side for a good part of the morning, so doesn't receive optimal sunlight.  

A major chore on my list was to dig it out, sieve the good soil to remove the roots, save it in pails and move the box. It is now in the SE corner of bed number 7, where is will get full sun all day and be so much more convenient to use, being closer to the back door. 

Hubby built a new base and the box is sunk into the soil of the bed so it can take advantage of the ambient warmth of the earth as well. I'm hoping the small section to the north will be a good place to plant some greens in spring and summer, when there will be less shade than there is now, but maybe enough to delay bolting. 

Within the past week, I went digging for buried treasure, and was successful! 

It is always fun to dig potatoes. You never know how big or how many you will roll out of the soil. 

In the case of these red guys, they put their time underground to good use. 

I have always been confident that I can grow just about anything, but have to admit that I have met my nemesis. Chinese cabbage is it. It bolts to bloom no matter what time of year I plant it. I thought that this fall I was finally going to be successful, as the bases of the plants expanded and the leaves got big. I looked down into the middle, they appeared to be starting to make heads, yeah!.....then little tight clumps of green buds started up from the base. Darn. Those thick white ribs sure are delicious chopped into a salad though!

A recent fall selection of produce; romaine lettuce, green onions, and the last 4 rutabagas. 

The main crop of carrots, some more leaf lettuce and a cabbage that is hinting at heading up, are still in the ground. Time to assess my seed jar and make plans for next season. 



 

 

 

Winter preparations

October 19, 2026

This is a very busy time of year for those of us who garden at this latitude in this hemisphere, and we are having the most perfect weather to get all the outside work finished up before the cold settles in. We've had quite a few mornings with frost, and one morning there was also a very faint skiff of fluffy white stuff, barely discernible. Despite the frost, the calendula and asters in the flower garden soldier on. 

The leaves are really starting to come down now, any sort of breeze sends showers of colourful leaves drifting down off of the tree branches. Dry sunny days and falling leaves equal one thing for me...it is time to get them bagged for future mulching and compost making.

The bagger attachment for the mower has made the job actually enjoyable. Previously I used to lug around a leaf blower/vacuum and spend days collecting leaves. With perfect weather like we are having now, an afternoon will suffice to complete filling as many bags as I wish. 

Yesterday we dug about a third of our potato patch and have them curing on screens in the barn. 

These are the gold potatoes, the red ones are still in the ground. I had to put screens over the spud patch a while ago, as some critter had rolled out a few potatoes from the hills, and nibbled on them. Once these spuds are dry, they'll be checked over before they go into the root cellar.

This little red helper has been wonderful for chopping up all the stalks and stems from the gardens. 

Finely chopped greens will compost much easier and faster. Even the big, thick broccoli stems that I used to toss over the back of the bins into the bush edge, were pulverized through this beastie. We bought it second hand this spring, and it needed Hubby's magic touch to get it going. 

So the garden beds are mostly empty now, and a layer of compost has been spread on them.

The garlic has been planted.

The only remaining plants are some lettuce, a cabbage, about the fourth planting of green onions, the caged carrots in the bed on the left, and 3 rutabagas in another bed.   

The row of fruit trees have had their bases wrapped with anti-vole protection and the little apple tree that the deer pick on, is protected as well. 

In the barn, my kindling supply is growing. 

 It is a satisfying feeling to have preparations well on the way, or completed for the coming winter. 

Human artists and Nature's art....

 October 4, 2026

The fall edition of the Madawaska Valley Studio Tour is on this weekend. https://madawaskastudiotour.com/ 

Seeing as a friend and I had done the summer edition back in July, we wanted to continue our explorations, as there were more artists listed on the fall tour than there had been on the summer one. We chose yesterday, and we chose well, as today it is dreary and raining. Saturday was a sublime, sunny fall day with temperatures in the high teens...perfect.

We visited a copper and silver jewellery maker,

an ink drawer and print maker, potters, a leather worker, artists with beautiful paintings of all things Renfrew county, a glass sculptor, a loom weaver, and a blacksmith. Most of the studios were indoor, and even though I brought my camera, I usually forgot it while exploring the beautiful creations. At the blacksmith's, who had his work displayed outdoors,  I finally clued in and took some pictures! 

 https://mikedesrochers.com/

 His drive entrance...

His coal fired forge in a beautifully restored old log building....

and one of his metal sculptures.

At all the venues, talking to the artist and learning their story was the best part. 

This morning on our trail walk,

I came across a very visible patch of Indian Cucumber root, (Medeola virginiana) which has stopped photosynthesizing for the season. 

It is a pretty whorled forest plant with two tiers of leaves, the lower one bigger than the upper, separated by a good length of stem. In the spring, I took pictures of one of the plants when it was blooming,

then later, when the blooms were changing into green berries.

 The berries then turn burgundy, as does the top whorl of leaves. 

The blooms curl downward, but as the seeds set, they curl up and then are on top of the top whorl of leaves. 
It has been on my list of wild edible plants to try, and finally, this fall, I dug up a root and we sampled it.

The root/tuber is small but very crisp, juicy, and yes! it tastes like slightly sweetened cucumbers. 
Who knew that Mother Nature does 'splatter painting'?

Here and there in the bush, one sees these pale apparitions. Striped maple or 'moosewood', (Acer pensylvanicum) have lost the chlorophyll in their large leaves, and stand ghost-like among the still mostly green understory. 

 

Who likes apples??

 September 27, 2026

 A number of apple lovers showed up when we took a trailer load of dead fall apples and dumped it in front of a camera along the trails.

Lots and lots of deer.

 

The camera had close to 2000 pictures. As you click through them, the deer heads appear to be on swivels, constantly looking around, alert to any sound or movement. The same individuals came back over and over.

A family of raccoons appeared often.

They are sure fat and healthy looking.

A Fisher showed up and checked out the pile,

and then it's small relative, an American Martin.

He's hard to spot, the dark lump in the lower left quadrant.

Foxy checked out the pile a couple of times. We have watched him eating apples under the trees in the yard.

We were expecting to see a bear, but so far, no luck. As of yesterday, that pile of apples is pretty much decimated, and someone not knowing the spot could well walk through without noticing any residuals              

The leaves on the trees around the clearing are really starting to show their true colours. Most of September here has been without rain, and things are very dry. The nights are cool, but days are sunny and warm. In the garden, I'm keeping up the watering on the fall greens and the carrot patch. The broccoli patch has been producing side shoots almost constantly until just recently, when they are getting  small and scarce, so the chore of pulling/digging those monster stems out is nearing the top of the list before the deer discover them, as the plants have been un-caged for a while.  
The large rutabaga harvested a week or so ago, 

was perfectly sound throughout when cut open.

Onions and garlic are cleaned and stored, a few potatoes dug, but most will safely stay in the ground until the root cellar cools down. The processing and canning is slowing, the shelves are as full as we need them to be. I have a couple of boxes of tomatoes ripening, and when they are ready, that will probably be the last filling of the canner this fall. 

The chimney was cleaned yesterday, the wood boxes are full, and we are very thankful for our good fortune.  

 

Almost had to build an ark.....

August 3, 2026 

A weekend of pretty near continuous rain, at times practically a monsoon....170mm in the gauge. The grey overcast skies slowly cleared this morning, and now the sun is out in a blue, blue sky, with big fluffy white clouds.  

The 'monsoon' was too much for one of our old apple trees, and a big, apple laden branch broke, so sad. I had been thinning apples as far up as I could reach with a step ladder, but it is an impossible job. Here is the trailer load of fruit that fell with the branch.

In other news.... the igniter in my stove called it quits, and to replace it would cost more than half the price of a new stove, so new stove it is! This one has electric ignition, (vs battery ignition in the old stove), plus it has a glass door!! and a light!! Small luxuries, like fresh, sun-dried sheets on the bed, some of life's best things.

Someone has been getting naked in my garden...

A garter snake has left his old garment in the garlic patch, found when I cleared out the rocks holding the mulch down, and dug the bulbs. 

 

 Peter Piper could easily pick more than a peck of peppers in my pepper patch. Green bell, 

 and sweet red.

 The celery is a beautiful green forest.

Pumpkins are growing on the fencing with some Scarlet Runner beans, and I've been slinging the fruit up in pieces of old T-shirts for support, although they seem sturdy enough without. They are small sugar pumpkins, so they won't get too big. 

Cucumbers are really starting to take off, and despite rigorous pruning, I am beginning to be inundated. Note to self: plant fewer vines next summer! 

In the tomato department, the cherries are ripening slowly, 

and there are lots of beefsteak and paste guys growing.

This year I have tried to refrain from taking off the suckers, just pruning out some of the lower leaves for air flow, to see what, if any difference it makes for fruit production. The jury is out.