We have big plans for our fall garden.  We are currently reading through The Winter Harvest Handbook by Eliot Coleman, a very inspiring work.

We moved the two outdoor chick brooders out of the garden area as we are finished brooding chicks for the year.  We spread the manure and bedding around and are planting a large area of beets to feed the cows through the fall/winter.  Then we began moving the hill material out of the potato beds onto a compost pile nearby.  We spread sifted 2-year old compost over the bed as we planted carrots, spinach, radishes and lettuce.  We will continue planting down the 30′ row, week by week as long as we can.  Eventually we’ll be forced into the greenhouse.  Can’t wait.

We limed the other potato row with raw aragonite, spread compost and began planting broccoli.  This row will eventually be home to cabbage and cauliflower as well.

The compost is mostly the bedding and offal from chickens we harvested two years ago along with garden waste from the same time period.  This is my first effort at a compost pile we didn’t turn.  As you might expect, we found a fair number of chicken bones and quite a few undigested wood chips.  Those were sifted out and added to the current compost pile.  No sign of the mountains of feathers I loaded into the pile.

I have high hopes for the fall garden.  We are planting in a hybrid of Jeavons’ methods and Coleman’s.  Broccoli gets staggered in the hex pattern.  Carrots in tight rows.  We’ll see how it goes.

What’s in store for your fall garden?  Getting started yet?