Although grasshoppers and two hurricanes invaded, my October garden survives. Well, there are things growing in it anyway.
After the grasshoppers, helped by escaped chickens, mauled my plants, and a hurricane and various rainstorms flooded them, I pulled out two separate plantings of fall broccoli, collards, and cabbage and officially gave up for the time being in late September.
Instead of putting out more transplants and battling the effects of nature, I formed beds and put in cover crops (I’ll share more about the bed-forming process later).
The beds, and the cover crops, helped hold the soil in place during Hurricane Michael. I will cover them with tarps to kill them to speed decomposition into my soil later.
In a protected environment, safe from grasshoppers and hurricanes, I started a new round of seedlings. Pictured above are flowers, broccoli, and beets.
Two hurricanes are surely enough for one fall, and the weather is finally turning cooler, so I planted a carrot bed this week. I also soaked and planted some spinach seeds. Now my challenge will be keeping the cats from using this luscious, freshly dug area as a bathroom when they need a break from their grasshopper-hunting.
Carrot bed