The early frost and freeze of Oct. 9 was not kind to the pantry garden. Given its location and with no protection whatsoever, we lost all our summer plants, including tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, winter squash and basil.

As a result, we picked everything, despite some vegetables being small, for a total of almost 59 pounds. These were distributed at the pantry Oct. 16, along with the butternut squash we had picked throughout September and October.

Our fall garden is doing well. We picked the final radishes, a few red beets, cilantro and parsley. These were also distributed at the pantry Oct. 16. Our fall bed has several rows of red beets that need to get to size for distribution in November.

We had a few swallowtail caterpillars in our parsley bed, so I avoided that section of plants when cutting for distribution. It seemed very late for caterpillars, but they surely needed the food source to make it through October’s cool nights.

At our garden work night Oct. 21, we began the process of putting the garden to bed for the winter. Sue Butchinski, John Halko and Jenn Dietz cut down some of the tomato plants, pulled the tomato cages and stacked them for storage, while I rolled up the irrigation supply lines and stored them in the shed.

We started our work night at about 5:45 p.m., and we had to end by 6:30 p.m. because of darkness. On our upcoming work nights, we will continue to cut down plants and remove cages and stakes to store for winter.

For the first time in three years, we have made it through the gardening season without running out of water. Thanks to an abundance of rain early in the season, and due to the addition of a second water tank with rain catch system, this was the first year I didn’t have to haul water to the garden in the trunk of my car. Thanks to Sue, who donated the water tank; Bill Meltzer, who picked up and rinsed the tank for us; and the township parks and recreation workers for installing the rain gutter and catch system.

As of Oct. 26, our year-to-date pantry garden harvest total is 1,500.57 pounds. This is the highest total in our garden history.

I want to thank everyone who dropped excess produce 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Mondays-Fridays at the Re/Max Unlimited office, 1080 Schadt Ave., Whitehall, and at the pantry on distribution days. Year to date, we have received 337 pounds of assorted vegetables and herbs, including tomatoes, sweet peppers, hot peppers, cucumbers, yellow squash, zucchini, eggplant, tarragon, basil, chives, oregano and sage. The community’s generosity has been overwhelming and is greatly appreciated.

Year to date, our pantry has donated 687 pounds of vegetables and fruit to the pantry network through Lehigh Valley Plant-A-Row. Included are pantry garden vegetables, community-donated vegetables and leftover vegetables and fruit provided to us by Second Harvest Food Bank.

Year to date, Plant-A-Row has collected and distributed more than 15,000 pounds of garden donations to pantries and soup kitchens throughout the Lehigh Valley.

Due to loss of daylight, our pantry garden work nights are now 5-6 p.m. Tuesdays, and I expect these will continue until the week of Thanksgiving. Bring your favorite work gloves or use some of ours. Everyone is welcome!

If you haven’t already done so, make a list of what went well with your summer garden, what didn’t go so well and what you want to change for next year. Then, set that list aside and enjoy the amazing fall foliage and your fall gardens while you can.

Have a great Thanksgiving!

Editor’s note: This column was written by Gwen Herzog, pantry garden chair.