The air conditioner has been taken out of the window and wrapped up for the year, the heating system has been turned on to deal with the colder nights, and I have been cleaning up the yard and garden in preparation for winter.
Because I have been behind on working in the gardens, thanks to recuperating from my knee replacements and the weather being too hot and smoky most of the time, things are a mess.
Granted, I was still getting compliments on my gardens, I guess benign neglect can be a good thing LOL!
As you can see above, the grass in the bed is happy. I am going to have a time getting most of it out, though I am not aiming at a perfectly cleared bed. I will leave some grass and detritus for tiny critters who may need to overwinter in my gardens. I won't be touching my long bed until next spring.
I decided to be ruthless and ripped out my hollyhocks. They were too prolific in the bed. I will be setting up a large planter made from a cut-down water tank to plant the hollyhocks in next spring, once I get it painted. Then I need to decide where in the yard to put it.
I will sow lupine seeds to replace the hollyhocks. I have also decided to make my plantings less orderly since the plants have their own ideas LOL! Especially my Showy Milkweed. I left a couple of pods to open and let the seeds fly off naturally in the hope of them establishing in other yards in the park. Alas, most of them seem to have ended up in my big bed and lawn.
I've filled up both my composters, which still had last year's compost, with this year's leaves and grass. I piled the overflow on the sunflower stalks I've left behind them for the last couple of years to give tiny critters a place to overwinter.
I still have a bit to do out in the Back 40. I need to take a weed whacker to the grass, dig out the garlic beds (I never did get around to harvesting any), and cut Humphrey the Comfrey back. I will split Humphrey into two or three pieces next spring and pop the pieces into some of the tire planters I have set up back there.
We'll be having some sunny days this week, albeit a bit on the chilly side with highs in the 50s, but it shouldn't take more than a couple of days to finish out back as long as I take it easy. Once all that is done, I will start planning next year's gardens.
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