Plant-a-Patch

10/14/2026

I’ve never harvested these warm-loving vegetables this late in the season!

Thanks to frost covers, they survived several cold nights and the first frost. Today I’m grateful for their abundance and saying goodbye to them for this season.

10/05/2026

😍 Had to capture this beauty before tonight’s possible frost (although I think she’d make it through)

If you still have tender plants outside, now’s the time to cover them! Frost-tolerant plants like kale, other brassicas, and root vegetables will be fine (and likely tastier) with a light frost-kiss.

09/25/2026

It’s the Farm Fest at Just Food in Blackburn Hamlet (where I have my plot) this Sunday. Lots of farm fun and fresh local goods!

09/21/2026

There’s a frost advisory for tonight…

I find that in my urban backyard garden, I usually don’t get these early frosts when they’re announced. However, I noticed that at the plot some plants that weren’t covered have already been affected by last week’s cooler nights.

You know your garden… or your anxiety level in protecting your precious plants! 😅

If you have some tender, warm-loving plants you’re still nursing to maturity — tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, squash, zucchini, cucumber, beans, basil — then here are some options:

☀️Cover them, with a frost cover, light sheet, or an old curtain

☀️Bring them inside, if they’re in a pot and easily movable

☀️Pick, and have a vegetable feast! Tomatoes and peppers that have started ripening will continue ripening inside. I regularly pick them half-ripe then place them in my basement to ripen completely

Let’s see what Mother Nature decides for tonight!

09/21/2026

KALE PATCH

Kale loves this weather and I think it shows… I feel like my kale patch is really peacocking! 🦚

The cool weather is making the kale’s colours more vibrant and will gently sweeten the plants as they produce sugars to protect themselves from the cooler temperatures.

I’ll continue to harvest the kale once we get frost, into December and even later (or until it’s all eaten). I’ll eventually cover it with a frost cover to prevent it from drying out from wind exposure.

09/19/2026

SUNSUGAR CHERRY TOMATO PATCH

This is definitely my favourite cherry tomato. It’s my garden candy! Sweet and delicious and absolutely radiant in colour. It’s like popping happiness.

Sunsugars are steady and prolific producers in my backyard garden. Still going strong. I have them in the ground and fertilized the plant twice since planting.

09/18/2026

Not surprisingly, private gardens showed more soil diversity than lawns. Long live our gardens!

🩲 More than 2,000 pairs of underwear were buried across Switzerland. For science. 🔬

In 2021, researchers from the Universität Zürich and Agroscope, Switzerland’s federal center of excellence for agricultural research, asked around a thousand volunteers to help study the biological activity of Swiss soils.

It was a citizen science project, meaning members of the public took part directly in the research. Participants buried cotton underwear and tea bags at around a thousand locations, including private gardens, fields, grasslands and urban areas.

Why underwear?

Soil organisms break down the cellulose in cotton. After two months underground, researchers could compare how much of the material had decomposed. More decomposition indicated greater biological activity in the soil.

The results were published in 2026. Land use turned out to be the strongest factor explaining differences in soil life. Private gardens showed the highest biological activity, while lawns showed the lowest.

The project also became a large public research collaboration. Around 240 citizen scientists were credited as co-authors of the resulting study.

And in September 2026, Beweisstück Unterhose received the Ig Nobel Prize in Soil Science, an award which recognizes unusual research that first makes people laugh, then think.

And you? Would you have volunteered your garden or a pair of underwear for science?

09/15/2026

I planted my garlic yesterday!

🧄 Siberian 🧄 Red Russian 🧄 Messidor 🧄 Belatic Croatian 🧄 Wildfire 🧄 It’s all tucked in until next summer.

There was a study done a couple of years ago in Ontario that showed that garlic planted as early as late August grows bigger. Earlier planting gives it more time to establish roots before the winter, which gives it a head start come spring. If you want the details, there’s a link to an article by the study’s leader in the comments.

Because I’m always trying to grow bigger garlic, I’ve started planting earlier. I’m still collecting my own data, but I can say that last year’s early planting had no negative effects.

✅ Another fall task checked off the list!

09/14/2026

The cabbage moth caterpillar battle is won for now — no creepy crawlers today! A small harvest while my plants recover, but a harvest nonetheless.

09/11/2026

If you, like me, find cabbage moth caterpillars on your brassicas and take the time to remove them, check back several days later!

As I suspected last weekend, I missed a lot. I removed another 50 odd larvae today, double to triple the size they were last weekend. Check the stems all the way to the ground as well as the surrounding soil. I found a surprising number crawling among the plants.

As they get bigger, they eat more. Some leaves are just skeletons. In this state, the plant weakens and becomes more susceptible to other pests and simply produces more slowly as it needs time to recover.