By Tamara Galbraith

The temperatures are getting cooler, and your herbs are slowing down. Time to harvest, enjoy...and prepare for next season where possible.

Pull off and dry all the leaves you can from parsley, French sorrel, coriander/cilantro, and basil.

For woody perennial herbs such as thyme, rosemary, lavender, savory, and tarragon, don't cut too much off. A few sprigs is okay, but discontinue heavy pruning of woody herbs 45 days before you expect the first fall frost.

To overwinter non-hardy herbs indoors, dig up the plants about a month before the first fall frost. Put each one into a pot that's slightly bigger than its rootball, and then let them rest in a partly shaded outdoor location for a week or so. Then move them into deeper shade for another week to get them ready to come indoors. (Chives are an exception, however; leave them outside to enjoy a little of winter's brisk temperatures before potting up and bringing in.)

Whiteflies and spider mites can be a problem for indoor herbs. Spray with an insecticidal soap, such as Veggie Pharm, and try to increase the humidity around your plants - either use a pebble tray or spray plants often with a mister to increase humidity.

By Tamara Galbraith

Want to add some "wow!" as well as some "rrrowr!" to your fall landscape? Put a tiger in your garden.

Tiger Eyes™ Sumac (Rhus typhina Bailtiger) is a relatively new plant, as it was introduced to the gardening industry by Bailey Nurseries Inc. of St. Paul, Minn., in 2004. But don't cringe when you see "sumac"; this tiger needs nearly no training. A staghorn-leafed non-invasive variety, Tiger Eyes™ grows into an upright rounded shrub about six feet high and wide, and is extremely slow to spread.

Every part of this lovely plant is eye-catching, from the fuzzy, purplish-pink stems to the jagged-leafed yellow-green foliage that puts on a show most of the year. In late summer, the chartreuse coloring gives way to yellow, then a burning orange, gold and scarlet in fall.

Tiger Eyes™ is not picky about soil or sun conditions -- mine loves its spot in heavy clay and part sun -- and it is hardy to USDA zone 4.

This tough tiger is also both heat- and drought-tolerant once established, making it a near-perfect choice for gardeners who love fall's brilliant colors.

...that we have a soil and mulch calculator? Very handy if you want to figure out how many cubic feet of mulch you need to fill your garden.

You can always find it over on our right sidebar - but since it's mulching season, we thought we'd make sure you know it's there.

No matter where you live, the growing season is never long enough. In the North, the season can be as short as 90 days - barely enough time to ripen tomatoes or melons. In the South, drought and intense heat often limit gardening activity to the spring and fall months. The good news is that by using a few simple season-extending techniques and plant protection devices, you can shield your plants from extremes of weather and stretch your gardening season.

Contending with the Elements:
Extending your growing season requires protecting your plants from wind, frost, cold soil, heat, and too much sun.

Wind:
If the plants in your garden must battle the wind, they will end up using most of their energy simply to survive, rather than developing strong roots systems and putting on healthy growth. A permanent solution, which may be a worthwhile investment if you live in a windy spot, is to enclose your garden. You can build a wood fence, plant some shrubs, or put up windbreak netting. Creating dead calm is not the goal. Your objective is to reduce the wind speed. If there’s a prevailing wind direction, a fence on that side of the garden may be all that is needed. If a permanent fence or hedge requires more of a time or financial commitment than you are ready to make, you can try covering your plants with a polypropylene garden fabric. Seedlings grown under the shelter of garden fabric will often put on twice as much growth as control plants.

Cold Soil:
If you protect your garden over the winter with a thick layer of mulch, be sure to pull the mulch off the planting beds in early spring to expose the soil to the sun. Building raised beds is another way to warm the soil more quickly. Covering cold spring soil with black plastic can boost soil temperature by several degrees. The plastic can be left on all season, or removed prior to planting.

Combining black plastic mulch with a clear, slitted plastic tunnel will raise soil temperatures enough to get melons and other heat-lovers off to a fast start. In the fall, polypropylene fabrics will retain heat and keep soil temperatures several degrees warmer. This can give heat-loving crops such as peppers, okra, and tomatoes a couple extra weeks to ripen.

Sun and Heat:
Hot weather can be just as challenging as cold weather. Young plants can be stressed and stunted by too much direct sunlight, and once the weather gets hot and soil temperatures rise, getting seeds to germinate becomes very difficult. Cool-weather plants, such as most salad greens, turn bitter and go to seed in hot weather. Shade netting can be laid right over wire hoops or a movable wooden frame: reducing the amount of sun reaching the plants can keep soil temperatures cooler and reduce moisture loss from the foliage. A piece of wood lath attached to a frame can serve the same purpose.

Frost:
For most gardeners, frost is a limiting factor in both spring and fall. One 32° night will usually put an end to all but the hardiest of garden crops. Sheets, blankets, and cardboard boxes are a good emergency solution, but polypropylene row covers are far easier to handle and much more effective. These row covers are available in a variety of thicknesses, and some will protect to temperatures as low as 25° F. Cold frames and portable greenhouse structures can offer even greater cold protection, allowing you to extend your harvest season of cold-weather crops right through the winter.