Chronicles of a Dirt Farmer
Well folks, October is here and there is still much to do in and around your garden. It’s time for you to be shutting off your sprinkler systems, and draining and winterizing your irrigation. Now is also the time to plant your bulbs, onions, and garlic, along with seeding your wildflowers. Pick your potatoes now before the ground freezes. Cut back your perennials and tie up your shrubs and trees. Turn over your vegetable beds and mulch your carrots and beets so they will last you for the winter.
If you are still looking for the freshest produce you can find locally, here is a list of what’s still available this time of year:
Farmers markets: All the farmers markets have closed in the Reno/Tahoe Area. The nearest year round market is in downtown Auburn every Saturday from 8 a.m. to noon.
Sierra Valley Farms: We’re finished with our farmers markets but continue to supply New Moon Natural Foods, Moody’s, Longboards (Graeagle), and other restaurants with lettuces, arugula, beets, carrots, and horseradish.
What you will see coming to the Truckee/Tahoe Area
Vegetables: The foothills should be providing herbs, butternut, acorn, spaghetti squashes, winter squash, and cool season leafy greens like arugula, lettuces, cabbage, chard, collards, and kale. Potatoes should persist through October. Pumpkins, gourds, and banana squash, along with Indian and strawberry corn, are in abundance. Heirloom tomatoes should hang on along with onions, garlic, and peppers.
Fruits & nuts: October is the time for nuts and seeds. Just look out your window and watch the chipmunks! Fresh almonds are ready to go along with walnuts and chestnuts. Sunflower seeds are ready for roasting and you can collect your own pine nuts. (Sugar Pine are the best!). October is harvest time for wine grapes and trailing off for table grapes, which means it’s time to visit your favorite wine tasting regions. Apples are in their prime along with Bartlett and Asian pears. Late October begins kiwi season in the foothills and Chico area, along with a few persimmons and mandarins. Central Coast avocados should appear with a few strawberries hanging in there.
What you won’t see
The hot season crops are about gone, including melons, sweet corn, and squash, along with blueberries and some varieties of blackberries, cucumbers (lemon and pickling), eggplant, and most zucchini, summer squash, and beans. Tomatoes are on their way out at the end of the month, along with late–season peaches, nectarines, plums, and pluots. Forget about asparagus and artichokes.
Truckee/Tahoe plantings
For those of you bold enough to tackle our climate, here are some suggestions:
Outdoors: As I mentioned above, it’s time to plant your flower bulbs, seed your wildflowers, onions, and garlic. Garlic and horseradish are best planted in October to emerge for a great Fourth of July harvest. The best way to prevent vole damage on your lawns is to mow them as short as possible and shut off your water. Don’t forget to mulch your flower beds and gardens, and tie up your trees and shrubs to prevent snow damage.
Hoop houses/greenhouse: Take this month to seed spinach, arugula, kale, collards, and lettuces, along with establishing your starts of herbs of thyme, tarragon, oregano, mint, etc. October is perfect for beginning your herb pots; just put them in your sunny window sills for a winter treat.
Let me leave you with this thought for October: ‘While the sower sows, the reaper reaps, beneath the mountains of the sky, and the meadows dimple to the Village Bell’ ~ Vita Sackville-West
~ Gary Romano owns Sierra Valley Farms, which sits on some of his family’s original 3,600-acre ranch in Beckwourth, Calif. Visit sierravalleyfarms.com.
