Posted on 07/22/2016 9:11:22 AM PDT by greeneyes
The Weekly Gardening Thread is a weekly gathering of folks that love soil, seeds and plants of all kinds. From complete newbies that are looking to start that first potted plant, to gardeners with some acreage, to Master Gardener level and beyond, we would love to hear from you. This thread is non-political, although you will find that most here are conservative folks.
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This year I further raised my tomato bed and limited it to 4' x 4'. It is raised to 32" by 4 layers of cinder blocks. I'm having the best luck I've had in a long time! My theory was to keep the tomato roots away from any walnut tree roots that grow under the garden.
Located in NC, thanks for the tip. The variety I tried was Giant Grey Stripe, and it failed to the point of the plants turning away from the sun.
Birds are stupid; if they can’t see it, it’s not there.
: )
Might not stop squirrel, though ...
You are welcome. I’ve never grown eggplant, but I have come to realize that mostly it is about your soil. Good healthy fertile soil, rotation, and replenishing the soil.
If you grow 60% of your crop for large amounts of biomass left to add back to the soil, it’s helpful. Cover Crops such as hairy vetch, clover, rye to use as green manure etc. then you can rebuild your soil for minimum costs.
Taking off for St. Louis now, will be gone the rest of the day. Catch you all tomorrow.
String beans doing very nicely; as is red lettuce, but that’s coming to an end. Looking for another variety to plant in August. Got my first pickle; eight more developing. Eggplants have tiny holes on leaves - found out they are flea beetles. Wife is gathering herbs. Tomatoes still green.
Okra is loving the heat here in Central Kentucky. Have to keep it watered, but that is part of it. Winter squash and pumpkins are also doing fine as long as I can keep the pump running in the creek to get water to them. Once the creek gets too low I will have to use county water and file for bankruptcy when the bill comes. LoL
Tomatoes have lots of blossoms and some little green ones, but so far with the exception of some yellow cherry that is it. I think the heat and drought have slowed them down.
It’s Friday...AGAIN? So soon? LOL!
I am drowning in zukes and cukes. Pole beans should start producing in earnest this next week, and I’ll be up to my butt in them, too.
Tomatoes are still all green, but we have plenty on the vine...where they will stay until the last minute!
Can’t WAIT for that first BLT, though...YUM!
We got 1.5” of heavy rain and wind last night. Of course! I watered the garden, Silly! Lots of wind, but no damage to anything, thank goodness.
Hi all, It’s like an oven here this week in west Michigan - low 90’s. Living south of the border style, up early, siesta in the afternoon. Getting tomatoes and lots of cukes. Pickling banana peppers this weekend and making more kosker refrigerator dill pickles. Just love making a meal out of our own produce. Tonight a greek salad with those costa rican sweet green/red pepper, onions, tomatoes and some fresh mozzarella and Italian dressing. Those peppers have a great flavor and the flesh is thicker than the bell pepper. Almost no seeds or membrane. PT on my new knee is going well and in a couple of weeks I expect to start kicking some serious garden @ss around here. Have a great weekend everyone.
I’m in rural SW VA and have transplanted flowers from the area (respecting personal property).
Trillium and wild geranium are two outstanding local flowers.
Need no care at all and just keep going.
Your extension office would surely have some suggestions.
How do you secure the bags? I’ll have to try something more sturdy due to the heavy daily rains, but I like the idea.
I’d be lucky if the birds left me 5% of their figs this year. Normally the leaves would be rusted and pretty well started falling off by this time of year, but this year no rust and I’m thinking I might get the second crop I’ve read that I should get but never have.
Big twisty ties work good; so does tape. If too much rain, mesh bags are another alternative :)
HHH weather with frequent electrical storms. We don’t need that much rain. Tomatoes plants are now forming tiny little green ones. There are three tomato plants with flowers; even the two which don’t get as much direct sun have flowers forming. That’s exciting! My mouth is starting to water. Thinking next year I’ll try cucumbers. Four o’clocks getting bigger and can hardly wait to see what colors the flowers have. Still have a goodly amount of arugula and use it to garnish my tomato, cucumber and red onion salad.
GREAT LOOKING Garlic Ellendra. I could never master the braiding
I’d gladly take some cucumbers from you, ours didn’t make it.
Cucumber slushies are the best thing on a sore throat, so I was hoping to peel and freeze a few for winter.
It’s been a good week - tomato sandwiches & lots of Ichiban eggplant big enough to eat. The zucchini plant is ‘done’ & removed from the garden & the crook neck squash plant looks like it is will be coming out of the garden in the next day or so.
The heat wave has moved in, starting yesterday - triple digit heat index with high humidity. Wednesday night, we had a nice T-storm with a 1/2” of rain & Thursday night we had another storm which dumped 3/4” of rain. It’s made quite the difference - grass greening up & the garden perked up. I want to be more scientific in watering the garden so to put down an inch of water over the whole bed, I found the calculation that would give me the gallons needed. For my 4 x 8’ raised bed it is 20 gallons & close to 25 for the 4 x 10’.
We had so much rain earlier in the growing season & I have plants like I’ve never had before - the ‘good water’ was the difference so for future gardens, adequate water is what I want to accomplish - 1” a week should be the minimum. Since we got rain Wed/Thur that totaled over an inch, I figure I’ll be watering probably by Tuesday because of the severe heat. In the meanwhile, the tomatoes may not be setting fruit, but what is on the vines is certainly ripening.
BTW, the Alton Brown “Kinda Sorta Sour” pickles have been marinating in the fridge for almost two weeks so I tried a couple. I really like them - definitely sour, almost the same experience as eating something ‘hot’ & spicy (except there is no ‘heat’ ingredient), and I love the faint garlic addition to the flavor spectrum. I am definitely making up a second quart, even if I have to buy some pickle cukes.
Picking tomatoes by the 5gal bucket now. Dehydrating them for tomato powder and cooking them down for sauce in the crockpot. Ditto sweet peppers. Dehydrating those for dices to throw in cooking rice and soups and pizza sauce/etc. Picked the first pumpkins a couple weeks ago (Montana Jack, not vine borer resistant but got a crop before the borers struck, planting those again in a few weeks for a fall crop). Fall peas coming up nicely and starting to pick apples and pears now. Probably dehydrate the apples and pears (in dices to add to oatmeal this winter) that don’t make it to the canner for pie filling or jam or some sort.
Starting some asparagus from seed today along with some mangels, peanuts (90d valencia ones) and sweet potatoes (90day ones).
Suckered a bunch of my tomatoes a week ago and will be transplanting those for a fall crop. We are especially enamored of the Super Sauce ones from Burpee along with Blue Beauty from Jungs and White Wonder (from either Jungs or Totally Tomato). The white ones, sliced, make really delicious pizza toppings with mariachi peppers and valencia onions with a couple pieces of bacon crumbled on top of all that.
This evening late we’ll be transplanting some blackberries, grapes, and moving my Persian lime tree to a larger (#25, presumably 25gal?) container we bought online somehwere to play musical containers and promote other stuff up the line.
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