Wyoming · Western Mountains & Interior Plateaus · hardiness zone 4b
Now
23°C · Clear
Today
25° / 13°
Soil 6 cm
18°C
First frost
~14 days (Sep 28)
Peak photosynthesis and peak water loss. Beds dry fast and transplants sulk.
In the garden now · September
The insects and soil life out near Laramie, Wyoming in September. Most of them are on your side — learn the few that aren't before you reach for anything.

Apis mellifera
Golden-brown, banded, furry thorax, and pollen packed onto the hind legs in visible baskets.
What it does in the garden →
Bombus spp.
Big, round and very furry, in black with yellow, orange or white bands.
Writing your field guide — reading the forecast, the moon and the map…
Overhead · Laramie, Wyoming
The two clocks nothing on the ground can argue with: the length of the day, and the phase of the moon.
The sun
12h 29m of light
Sunrise
06:42
Solar noon
12:57
Sunset
19:12
A month from now the day will be 1h 21m shorter. Enough light for steady growth.
Right now · Laramie, Wyoming
Nothing here is a guess. Each of these is read from this week's forecast and this location's climate record, and each one is pushing the season one way or the other.
14 days
Average first fall frost is around Sep 28. Nothing you sow now will finish unless it beats that.
The hard edge of the growing season. Ice inside a leaf ruptures its cells — one night ends a tomato and sweetens a parsnip.
18.5 °C
Warm enough for beans, corn, squash, cucumber and transplanted tomato and pepper. Roots run hard at this temperature.
Seeds read soil temperature, not the calendar. Six centimetres down is where the decision gets made.
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Syrphidae
Wasp-striped but a true fly: two wings not four, huge eyes, and it hovers dead still in mid-air.
What it does in the garden →
Papilio spp.
Large, with tails on the hindwings; black-and-yellow tiger stripes, or black with blue and orange spots.
What it does in the garden →
Coccinellidae
The adult everyone knows; the larva is the useful one — a spiky, alligator-shaped grey-and-orange creature that looks like a pest.
What it does in the garden →
Chrysoperla spp.
Delicate pale green adult with lacy wings and gold eyes. Eggs sit singly on the ends of hair-thin stalks.
What it does in the garden →Photo: Annika Lindqvist · CC BY 4.0
Photographs are research-grade observations from iNaturalist, each credited to its photographer. Ranges and timing are typical, not guaranteed — 54 species are covered across Canada and the US.
The moon
Waxing Crescent
11% lit · waxing · day 3 of 29.5
Planting by the moon: New to first quarter: sow leafy crops and anything harvested for its leaves — lettuce, spinach, brassicas, herbs.
Fishing: good — feeding peaks in the days either side of new and full, and around moonrise and moonset.
Turn of the season
Fall equinox
Sep 22 · 7 days away
About 14 days to the average first frost (Sep 28).
Next moons
12h 29m
Losing about 3 minutes of daylight a day.
The one thing weather can't change. Plants count photoperiod to decide when to bolt, bulb, flower and go dormant.
44 GDD / 7 days
Slow accumulation — cool-season crops are happy, corn and melons are waiting.
Growing degree days: the running total of warmth above 10 °C. Crops and insects both run on this clock rather than on dates.
16.9 mm / 7 days
16.9 mm across 3 days — short of the ~25 mm a week most beds want. Top up the thirstiest rows.
Sets the pace for everything: germination, fungal fruiting, slug nights, and how a river runs for the next three days.
3 of 7 flying days
3 decent flying days coming. Bees work between about 13 °C and 38 °C, in wind under 30 km/h, and not in rain.
A third of what you eat needs an insect to have visited first. Bees fly on temperature and wind, not on your schedule.