{"id":1715,"date":"2014-11-12T15:21:35","date_gmt":"2014-11-12T15:21:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/gardenfreshveggies.com\/?p=1715"},"modified":"2014-11-12T15:21:35","modified_gmt":"2014-11-12T15:21:35","slug":"first-freeze","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/gopherknoll.com\/?p=1715","title":{"rendered":"First Freeze"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>According to <a href=\"http:\/\/cdo.ncdc.noaa.gov\/climatenormals\/clim20supp1\/states\/TX.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">NOAA <\/a>,\u00a0November 14 is the\u00a0calendar average first freeze date in our neck of the woods. \u00a0 We may well be experiencing that freeze in the lower garden right now. \u00a0 So we spent the last few days getting ready.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<div id='gallery-1' class='gallery galleryid-1715 gallery-columns-3 gallery-size-thumbnail'><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon landscape'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='http:\/\/gopherknoll.com\/?attachment_id=1718'><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" src=\"http:\/\/gopherknoll.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/first-freeze-2014-150x150.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div><\/figure><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon portrait'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='http:\/\/gopherknoll.com\/?attachment_id=1716'><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" src=\"http:\/\/gopherknoll.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/fall-mulch-on-blueberries-e1415806023336-150x150.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div><\/figure><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon landscape'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='http:\/\/gopherknoll.com\/?attachment_id=1719'><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" src=\"http:\/\/gopherknoll.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/fall-harvest-2014-e1415806067587-150x150.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div><\/figure>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The first activity, of course, was to harvest everything left in the garden that couldn&#8217;t be protected to withstand a hard freeze (25 degrees predicted later in the week). \u00a0So all the tomatoes and peppers, eggplants, french beans, red ripper peas, rat-tail radish, basil and daikon were picked and packed for bonuses in CSA boxes, restaurant delivery and home canning. \u00a0I&#8217;ll be spending the next day or two making chow-chow and green tomato pickles, pesto and freezer meals.<\/p>\n<p>Next step &#8211; cover everything else that could continue to grow &#8211; kales and kohlrabi, rutabaga and radicchio, turnips, carrots, cilantro and collards and more &#8211; all the cold-weather crops. \u00a0 These would have been fine for a 30-32 degree chill, but we&#8217;ll get substantially colder than that, and the few degrees of protection from row cover could make the difference.<\/p>\n<p>We mulched the blueberries with a little extra chopped leaves to protect the shallow root systems and made sure everything was watered. \u00a0Moist ground conducts the heat of the earth more efficiently than dry, and watered plants are less likely to suffer leaf-burn.<\/p>\n<p>Moved potted herbs and took cuttings of others for greenhouse propagation.<\/p>\n<p>Drained the irrigation system.<\/p>\n<p>Lit the greenhouse furnace and checked out the thermostats.<\/p>\n<p>All good. \u00a0 Time to make a great pot of red ripper peas, \u00a0bake a pumpkin bread, build a fire in the fireplace and kick back for a cold evening.<\/p>\n<p>Y&#8217;all stay warm!<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>According to NOAA ,\u00a0November 14 is the\u00a0calendar average first freeze date in our neck of the woods. \u00a0 We may well be experiencing that freeze in the lower garden right now. \u00a0 So we spent<a class=\"excerpt-readmore\" href=\"http:\/\/gopherknoll.com\/?p=1715\">&hellip;Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1715","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-random","odd"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/gopherknoll.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1715","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/gopherknoll.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/gopherknoll.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gopherknoll.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gopherknoll.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1715"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/gopherknoll.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1715\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/gopherknoll.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1715"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gopherknoll.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1715"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gopherknoll.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1715"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}