Clearing the decks for fall crop

Was I overly optimistic when I declared "There is Still a lot of Summer Left"? It bothers me when the stores and media start rushing fall in August. Halloween candy in the isles at Safeway, the start of meteorological fall, my friends in northern New England reporting a tinge of color in the leaves. Makes me crazy.

Fall Plot Prep
Alas, yesterday I cleared out the beans, pulled the rest of the carrots, picked some kale (my spring plants are still going strong). The Brandywine tomatoes are still really green. Actually all of the tomatoes are still really green. I am now going to remove any flowers that form on the tomato plants in order to direct all of the energy to ripening. And I started the plant list for the fall crop:

• Spinach
• Carrotts
• Radish
• Kale
• Beets
• Lettuce
• Arugula
• Onions
• Garlic

When Are Carrots Ready for Picking
I ask myself this question every time I go in and pull them out. I have been relying on the size of the leaves. Yesterday when I picked all of the carrots that remained in the ground, I discovered that the size of the leaves do not correlate to the size of the carrot. I had one PERFECT beautiful carrot (pictured on the right) and the leaves were quite small. I have other kind of smallish carrots with very large leaves (pictured on the left). Good experiment!

On the left, skinny carrot, dense leaves. On the right "Perfection." Large carrot, no splitting, evenly tapered, straight. Very skinny leaves.