OCTOBER 2024 E-MAGAZINE
OCTOBER 2024 E-MAGAZINE
It doesn’t feel much like Fall yet though the trees are getting colorful. The grasshoppers have discouraged me from planting much of anything new and edible this fall, but this extended growing season means the veggie garden is still packed.
I’ve got loads of tomatoes & tomatillos for salsa, broccoli, onions, pumpkins, beets, potatoes, peppers, arugula & herbs. The wild plums are teeny but delicious right now, and the salvias and agastaches are putting on a great late show, even if they’re smaller than usual. Time to plant garlic!
In this issue we have a feature on the versatile and nutrient-dense pumpkin by mountain gardener, Penn Parmenter. I’ve also reprinted a nice piece on spring flowering bulbs by the late David Salman, (founder of High Country Gardens) that he wrote for Colorado Gardener a decade ago. And Keith Funk answers more timely Fall gardening questions. Enjoy!
– Jane Shellenberger
by David Salman
Plant a surprise this fall. Get some spring blooming bulbs into the ground in October or November, water them in and forget about them. With the arrival of spring, enjoy the surprise as your forgotten bulbs burst into bloom. Bulbs are some of the most beautiful, inexpensive, low care flowers you can plant in your garden. The trick is to understand the best varieties to use and how to mix them into the fabric of your landscape.
Mention the word “bulb” to a gardener and most often a tulip comes to mind. But the bulb palette suitable for Western gardens extends well beyond just tulips.
There are daffodils, Grape Hyacinths (Muscari), Crocus, miniature Iris, Ornamental Onion (Allium), Spanish Bluebells (Hyacinthoides) and many other genera that are well suited to our climate and growing conditions. And yes, there are a lot of wonderful tulips as well, especially perennial wildflower tulips, also known as species tulips.Many of the big hybrid tulips don’t come back true after the first year and some don’t come back at all, especially if we don’t have a wet spring. By choosing perennial bulbs, commonly referred to as “naturalizing” bulbs, your bulb plantings multiply and become showier each year.
PUMPKINS ARE KING
by Penn Parmenter
Pumpkins are King in the Parmenter mountain gardens. We love everything about them and have grown them for over 25 years. They are a particularly generous plant, capable of providing hundreds of pounds of easily storable, nutrient-dense, delicious food. Pumpkins are versatile and can be used in more ways than I can list here.
For a nation that celebrates pumpkins by carving faces in them and then smashing them in the streets, there is still a pumpkin for everyone. There are fast pumpkins, bush pumpkins, huge pumpkins, vining pumpkins, tiny pumpkins, white pumpkins, and pumpkins with warts. No matter what varieties you grow, the yield will delight you. Voluptuous plants with stunning flowers that make any garden look good, they can also feed the world.
We have grown a 90-day full-sized pumpkin called Northern Bush for over 20 years. It has always produced and now that we save the seeds, it produces more, faster, and is beginning to ripen on the vine. Up here in the mountains we have to bring pumpkins in before the first hard freeze to finish ripening indoors. We cure our winter squash for at least 2 weeks after they are ripe to toughen up the skin. The sugars will concentrate after harvesting making them sweeter than ever.
Besides being fun to grow, pumpkins are incredibly useful. Pumpkins and their seeds are Top Dogs in the nutritional world; they are healing agents, cancer fighters, prostate protectors, eyesight enhancers, menopause minders, skin beautifiers, free-radical chasers, cholesterol-reducers, age delayers, blood-pressure correctors, mood lifters, sleep promoters, muscle restorers, and heart heroes.
Blue mist spirea, Caryopteris x clandonensis
By Keith Funk
Q: Can I prune back shrubs like butterfly bush, roses, and bluemist spirea in the fall or should I wait until spring? What about clematis vines?
A: Trees and shrubs store energy in their stems and buds during the winter, to be utilized in the spring as the plant breaks dormancy. Heavy pruning in the fall removes that stored energy and can affect the plant’s ability to survive the winter or leaf out properly in the spring. Tall, whippy branches could be subject to breakage during the ravages of winter storms and would benefit from a light pruning in fall. Any shrubs or trees that bloom in the spring before Memorial Day have already set their flower buds for next spring’s display, so any pruning in the fall will be removing spring flowers. Prune back clematis vines in late winter.
Origami in the Gardens at The Gardens on Spring Creek, Fort Collins
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