Harvesting in the colours of the season
The second life of fallen leaves
Fall: a harvest festival to suit every taste With fall just around the corner, many varieties of fruits are ready to be harvest- ed. To highlight the moment, many fruit festivals and other events take place, both in town and out in the country. THE GRAPE HARVEST uglies, if they’re for Halloween) right out in the field. In the fall, harvest time is a pretty good reason to go for a drive and make the most of the last mild days of the season. Let yourself be guided by the big names of the harvest in your region — make some apple pie; decorate your pumpkins; drink your local wine. Enjoy!
After making a highly colorful show on the branches of the trees, the leaves swirl to the ground. But there is no need to feel over- whelmed by the raking and bagging of all those leaves. If the leaves are healthy, they are like gold falling from the sky. FERTILIZER If the leaves fall on an unpaved area, it’s best not to do anything. They will naturally
decompose on their own and restore to the soil part of the nutritional substances that were used by the tree. This is how carbon and nitrogen are returned to the earth. However, you can rake up extra dead leaves to keep for the fertilization of your lawn. Use some one-metre-wide fine-gauge wire mesh and roll it up on itself to form a cylinder. Attach the extremities of this wire mesh silo to one another and place it in an isolated cor- ner of the yard, where it can be attached to the ground with small stakes. Filling it with leaves will provide you with good reserves of fertilizer. SOIL Arm yourself with a good leaf rake and some 100-litre garbage bags to begin making your very own bags of quality soil. Rake the ground and place the still-damp leaves in the bags. Avoid any leaves that are too thick. Fill the bags without compacting them, close them without tightening them excessively, and pierce holes all over their surface to promote aeration; now forget the bags in a corner of the yard for at least 18 months. So-called “dead” leaves still have a lot of life, don’t they?
The grape harvest is at its peak in the fall. Each wine region provides the opportunity to celebrate the culture of the vine and to sample the wines. Not to mention that several areas create tourist routes that enable visitors to dis- cover local specialties in all their glory. Sometimes you can even lend a hand with the harvesting of the grapes! APPLES Fall is also the time when apples are har- vested. Orchards open their doors wide to allow visitors to pick their own favourite kinds of apples or to purchase large quan- tities of the delicious fruit directly from the producers. Many orchards offer various on-site activities, including tractor-pulled wagon rides and cider tastings. You’ll find everything that is required for a wonderful time. PUMPKINS Of course we can’t talk about the fall harvest without including pumpkins. A growing number of places now allow visitors to pick their own beauties (or
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