2003-11-14 - 9:31 a.m.
Well it finally came. The first freeze of the year arrived last night. All day yesterday was spent on one last flurry of picking. I called a few folks that I call every year when the first freeze is forcast. They come pick green tomatoes to make chow chow (whatever that is) with. I went out before they got here and picked off all the ripe, near ripe and just turning tomatoes I could find. I picked about 50lbs. and I'll sell a few, give some to family, and save some to eat on for a while. Then I picked about 30lbs. of bell peppers. Next I dug up the Jacons. Jacons are a relative of the Jerusalem artichoke from South America. The tubers are much larger than Jerusalem artichokes, about the size of a sweet potato, and are much easier to peel. We sold them for several years but now I just grow a plant or two for Sue to make pickles out of. I got about 17lbs of tubers from the 2 plants.
The last thing I gathered in were the Seminole pumpkins. This is an heirloom pumpkin variety the Seminole Indians have grown in Florida for over a century. They're a small pumpkin of about 4lbs or so and have the color of a butternut squash. I told Sue as we were gathering them that it is the only pumpkin I'll ever grow from now on. We started with them about 5 years ago and I've always been impressed with them. I never have to spray them and they take almost no care. They have fantastic yields, I only had 2 vines this year but we still had over 60 pumpkins from those 2 vines. They store better than any pumpkin or winter squash I have ever seen. We sell most of them but Sue puts some in storage each year at room temperature and they will eaisily keep till the next pumpkin harvest a year later. Sue makes pumpkin pies out of them and because they keep so well she doesen't have to can any pumpkin. When she wants a pie she just gets one out of storage and cooks it to make a pie with. I also prefer the taste of them to other pumpkins. If they have any bad point it would be there growth habit that can be summed up in one word, everywhere! A vine can easily reach over a 50 foot diameter in all directions. I leave part of the garden out each year and just cover it with mulch to rest. I plant a few Seminole pumpkins in it and just let them ramble. One year we must of had 10 to 20 plants covering about a third of the garden and we picked small trailer loads of pumpkins, I won't do that again. I gave a few seeds this year to a friend of mine who lives about 30 miles north of us. He planted them around a compost pile and said he'd tell me how they did. Late this summer I was talking to him and asked how the pumpkins were doing. He started to laugh and told me if I saw a pumpkin vine growing across my yard it was probably from his plants.
After we got everything gathered I went to run some errands, confident I had done all the first freeze chores. I stopped to talk to a friend and got back hame about 4:00. I must of looked to smug because Sue looked hard at me and asked, "Didn't you forget something?", I replied no and she said, " What about the water lines?", OOPS!! I forgot all about shutting off and draining the waterlines to the garden and orchard. So all my confidence just vanished in another flurry of activity till well after dark.
Now that the freeze has come we'll offically close for the year in a few days. I'll still sell what we gathered in yesterday till it's gone but that won't take long. About early spring I sorta get to missing all the activity and folks of the summer months but for right now I won't shed any tears. This last taste of the hustle and bustle that is our normal summer routine will keep me satisfied with the slower pace of winter for a good while.
