Next to the computer I have a picture of our strawberry patch from a few years ago. My youngest daughter is perusing a nearby peach tree, inspecting the crop of fruit. We used to have a commercial orchard and patch from which the kids regularly grazed to their heart's content.

In our new home I can hardly wait to plant a few trees and a small strawberry patch just for home use. There is something about fruit that's really attractive to gardeners. Even on a cold, rainy, fall day, you can the recall the taste of a ripe peach or strawberry.

Fall is strawberry planting time in the south. If you set out plants in October, they will grow and establish through our warm southern winter and start bearing in March. This is called the annual system, and it's quite different from the perennial system used in more northern parts of the country.

Our family works together to build up the raised beds and cover them with black plastic. I love organic mulches and use them extensively, but with strawberries we go with plastic to avoid attracting so many pillbugs, slugs, and other uninvited pests which are attracted to the mulch and love the berries as much as we do. I don't like sharing my produce with the little vandals.

The plastic also keeps the berries off the dirt, greatly reducing disease problems. After the strawberries are through producing in late May, we plant a summer veggie, such as okra or winter squash, into the same beds. A drip irrigation tube under the plastic keeps the plants moist and happy.

In the veggie garden, broccoli and other cole crops are really growing vigorously in this great fall weather. Now that it's cooler, I think I'll seed some more lettuce and spinach. If a cold snap comes too early, a quick covering with a fabric row cover will give them enough protection to get them through. Southern winters are mild enough to keep us gardening all winter with a little help from row covers.

The lighter fabrics do not give a lot of cold protection, but they are fine to leave on the plants all winter. They allow enough light through to permit good growth and development. They also keep the plants a little warmer, promoting faster growth and development. Another thing they do for us in the garden is help exclude pests. That ol' cabbage looper moth just can't get to the plants to lay her eggs. Just remember to cover the edges with a little soil or some boards to hold them down. It's time to start stockpiling leaves for composting and for next season's mulching. I can never seem to get enough leaves. Each year I rescue hundreds of bags from curbsides around our town for use in my garden. Although the pile looks formidable in fall, by summer it is dwindling to a woefully short supply. Those leaves have turned my garden spots into some of the best soil you can imagine. I'll talk more about this infatuation with leaves in a later column.Have a great time out there in your fall garden!

Skip Richter has been an avid gardener in the south and southwest for 30 years. He appears on local radio and television gardening shows, and writes a weekly newspaper gardening column. He has trained Master Gardeners in several Texas county programs, as well as at state and national conferences. He is the county extension agenc for Travis County, TX