SCOTT: Mike, can you believe this is our last article of the growing season?
MIKE: Well Scott, the days are getting shorter. Some plant flowers, ornamental shrubs and perennial flowers are starting to change color. For instance, the burning bush and paniculata hydrangeas leaves are turning, changing to pink, red or brown. Even folklore has its value as an indicator that days are getting shorter. Generations before us have even used sound indicating summer is nearing an end. For instance, when one first hears annual Cicadas singing, it’s an indicator that there is only seven weeks of summer left. In reality, they begin to die off within three-to-six weeks of first hearing them.
SCOTT: You mentioned fall folklore and superstitions. Maybe a pre-Halloween/harvest spooky story to tell?
MIKE: Well, kinda scary. Did you know that scarecrows’ duties were more than shooing crows? Folklore states that the scarecrow was to ward off evil spirits or absorb them to ensure success. The gardener/farmer should have a pair of them, representing male and female. Truly there would be a Mrs. and a Mr. Scarecrow, dressed as such. Then at the end of the harvest, the gardener/farmer would bury them. Yup! Right in the middle of the garden, discarding the evil and harm within. Some cultures would burn them and spread the ashes back onto the harvested garden.
SCOTT: I have one, did you know to ward off the evil spirits the villagers would carve scary faces into turnips? It wasn’t until years later when Americans swapped out turnips for pumpkins!
MIKE: I did know this. It was an instrumental part of the celebration of Samhain, now days known as Halloween. Using carved root vegetables to ward off evil during the thin veil of the living and dead. It would help guide the souls of dead loved ones during SAMHAIN. The Irish would tell of a man named Stingy Jack, who tricked the devil. Upon doing so, he was not allowed to enter Heaven or Hell. He was damned to wander the afterlife, only with a burning coal inside a turnip. Otherwise known as a “Jack O Lantern.” 
SCOTT: Foxgloves are not only fabled to have powers to make witch’s broom sticks fly, but also are a favorite of garden fairies. It is said that if you see speckles on the trumpet bloom, a fairy has been inside it.
MIKE: Foxglove is also associated with the Celts, believing that fairies did live inside the petals. Disturbing the flower would anger them, bringing bad luck. Legend also has it that the fairies taught foxes to ring the flower bells signifying danger. Last, but not least, stories of the Woolly Bear Caterpillar’s brown bands have been around for a very long time. But in 1948, Dr. Howard Curran performed a study of 15 different caterpillar’s bands and made his prediction for the upcoming winter. This story spread throughout the country and has been a fun indicator of forecasting the upcoming winters. 
SCOTT: Well, this is it for the season. It’s been fun sharing our Midwest Gardening information with all of you!
MIKE: Until next time Scott and Mike … signing off!

Your Midwest Garden Podcast guys, Mike O’Rourke and Scott Sandstrom, share gardening advice with readers throughout the growing season. O’Rourke, retired from Black Diamond Garden Center and known as the Garden Guy for many years, discusses landscape issues with Sandstrom in a casual conversation designed to educate listeners, and now readers, on a wide variety of topics.