Gardening 'blog

Our Tiny Little Minds ^ | December 4, 2006 | yours truly, et al

[SunkenCiv]

Eating the Environment: A Literary Kitchen Cornucopia
NYTimes Book Review | June 15, 2007 | William Grimes
Posted on 06/14/2007 8:50:11 PM EDT by Diana in Wisconsin
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1850443/posts

[SunkenCiv]

Watermelon Declared [Oklahoma] State Vegetable
kotv.com | Updated 4/18/2007 6:09 AM | staff writer
Posted on 04/18/2007 9:33:59 AM EDT by bedolido
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1819255/posts

[SunkenCiv]

Mysterious Kidney Disease Blamed On Bad Bread
New Scientist | 7-9-2007 | Roxanne Khamsi
Posted on 07/09/2007 5:33:52 PM EDT by blam
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/chat/1863211/posts

[SunkenCiv]

Tomato soup ‘boosts fertility’
The Times of India | 28 Jul 2007, 2039 hrs IST | PTI
Posted on 07/28/2007 12:01:06 PM EDT by CarrotAndStick
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1872935/posts

Help! I’m food confused
The Times | 7/22/2007 | Lucas Hollweg
Posted on 07/25/2007 3:35:02 AM EDT by bruinbirdman
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/chat/1871208/posts

Uganda’s ‘sex tree’ under threat
BBC News | 25 July 2007 | Joshua Mmali
Posted on 07/27/2007 10:01:56 AM EDT by Daffynition
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1872426/posts

[SunkenCiv]

[tubebender]

Found this old thread and your diary. I’m surprised there is not a regular gardening topic. I’ve gardened since I was 6 and I’m 74 now. I wonder how many tons of compost I have made and how many acres of soil I have spaded. Just today I spaded a 12 X 16 patch for the garlic that gets planted in Oct. I have cut it down to 7 different varieties.

I live and garden in Eureka Ca where it never snows and hardly freezes but rains for 5 winter months and the average summer temp is 65 by day and 58 nights.

[SunkenCiv]

Wow, a 12 X 16 garlic patch? That should keep the vampires miles away. ;’)

I share your wonder that there isn’t a regular gardening topic (apart from this one) since there are obviously gardeners here on FR. I think I posted my prototype for a Cooking and Gardening ping list logo / message somewhere up there. If you start a ping list, let me know. :’)

[SunkenCiv]

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/bloggers/1748035/posts?page=14#14

[Quix]

My heirloom tomatoes have started ripening

—BLACK PRINCE
—BLACK CHERRY
—AMISH GOLD
—AMY’S SUGAR SWEET
—MANDARIN CROSS
—HAWAIIAN CURRENTS—THE SIZE OF CURRENTS—VERY GOOD FLAVOR
—BULGARIAN TRIUMPHS
—BRANDYWINES HAVE YET TO RIPEN

a couple of vines developed some sort of leaf curl and essentially I cut them off at the ground. One was in a pot of only Miracle Grow soil . . . not sure where a disease could have come along—growing from seed.

Anyway—great tomatoes. Love the variety of flavors.

Also BERRIES GALORE strawberries are hard to beat.

I got a large PVC pipe and put it at about a 15% angle full of Miracle Grow soil and about every 8” or so a strawberry plant. I water them at the top with a big elbow 3-4 times a day. Probably should put an upright pipe part of a foot or two and water less. I drilled 3-4 holes in a cap on the bottom end of the large pipe for water to drain out. I recycle the nutrient rich water caught in one of my stoneware pottery pots.

My raspberries are doing well. But I think I’ll have to give up the raised bed to them alone next year and leave tomatoes out of it. I have one variety that is sending canes over 6 feet. I keep tying them up to the PVC framing . . . no hint of blooms. May whack the tips off. Getting to be a bit of a nusiance.

My blueberries seem to struggle in our alkalai soil without the sulpher and acid fertilizer. Didn’t realize it was so critical. Doing better now that I’ve wised up. The small seedling sorts of plants have not done much. The larger purchased at Lowes has put out some new shoots after adjusting with acid fertilizer. Had put some of Sterns sulpher to neutralize the alkalai but that evidently wasn’t enough.

Will be interesting to see how soon frost comes here in the four corners area.

thanks for this thread.

[Quix]

BTW, I have a dwarf bananna in a large southern glassed hallway at the college. No hint of a fruit branch yet. It’s near 6 feet or so. A different dwarf variety of the head of the art dept is about the same height and no fruit branch either. Any suggestions?

They are putting off shoots as is common, I guess.

My orange and tangerine dwarf plants have yet to flower after two years.

The gardenia has done well outdoors this summer.

And I have a vine similar to stephanotis but not that . . . very fragrant, though.

And a potted peppermint that I enjoy. Interesting flowers.

[Quix]

Where are you?

[SunkenCiv]

Banana problem is probably lack of humidity. That can be addressed through some sort of automatic misting contraption such as you see in the arboretums and such.

[Quix]

thanks.

They sure do soak up the water.

[djf]

So far, I have already saved seeds from:

Radish
Spinach
Red and green lettuce
Carrots
Cabbage
peas, both bush and pole
onions
celery
scads of seed potatoes

I had this year, for the first time, bunches of tomato plants starting from leftovers last year

I gathered a bunch of seeds from black raspberry plants yesterday, But I have never had much luck getting them to germinate. I know they need a cold phase, and kinda think they need to be soaked in acid a bit. (the acid in animals stomachs sometimes triggers the seeds to germinate)

I am still waiting for my squash and cucumbers. Things did not do well here this year because the ground never really warmed up sufficiently.

[tubebender]

Try Cherokee Purple next year. We buy them at the farmers market as it is too cool to grow T’maters in Eureka. Your leaf curl could be normal unless you have late blight. Blight is a disease that is air and soil borne and you do not want to put the plant in the compost pile.

My raspberries give me two crops a year. One on the tips of the new canes in the late fall and then I winter prune about 12 inches off the plant and it fruits next year while the new canes are coning up.

I use a lot of drip irrigation to put the water in the root zone and water is very expensive here...

[Quix]

Thanks.

Will keep Cherokee purple in mind—easier given that my great granddad was Cherokee.

Thanks for the input on the other issues.

The leaf curl didn’t seem to match anything I’d found on the net but what do I know. Just didn’t bear well and after got 4-5 feet or so just seemed to stagnate with all the leaves curled. Decided I wouldn’t risk it any longer and whacked em back. Didn’t put on compost pile.

New Mexico summers are usually good for tomatoes though I should have started my seeds 10 weeks earlier than I
did. My 84 year old step-dad is still partial to the EARLY-GIRL’S. LOL.

[SunkenCiv]

Pumped up at the fair: In Topsfield,
jumbo-sized pumpkins crush world records [1689 POUNDS!!!]
Salem News | Monday, October 1, 2007 | Cate Lecuyer
Posted on 10/01/2007 6:31:07 PM EDT by Momaw Nadon
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1905079/posts

[SunkenCiv]

thanks again for pinging me to:

Sowing The Seeds Of A Tasty Tomato Revival
CBS News | 1/14/08 | Staff
Posted on 01/14/2008 11:44:44 AM EST by T-Bird45
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1953465/posts

[Gabz]

BFL.........

[SunkenCiv]

The Cob Melon (the links above are all dead):