Posted on 01/24/2008 10:53:49 AM PST by Gabz
Howdy folks!!!
I originally planned to wait until tomorrow (Friday) to get this going, but it is such a damp, dreary, plain old yucky day here on Virginia's Eastern Shore I decided to do it now --dreaming of spring, so to speak!
One of the major topics that seemed to arise last week dealt with "zones" and how even people living in the same "zone" will have different growing conditions based upon location. Also because we are all so spread out the different zones do matter when it comes to planting times and plants.
GardenGirl and Diana in Wisconsin are among our resident experts, but I am sure they are not the only ones and so we would all like to hear from others both amateur and professional, food growers and flower gardeners, folks that deal with trees and shrubs, I hope you get the idea!
Exchanging ideas and getting help on garden problems weere among the reasons for starting this thread, and I would like to expand on that and ask you all to help me come up with ideas of specific topics we can delve into.
Let's have fun --- and wish for spring!!!!!!
The thread that started it all: Sowing The Seeds Of A Tasty Tomato Revival posted by T-Bird45.
Gerdening Ping!!!
To give you all an idea of what a dreary deprssing day it is around here — I let my 9 year old (no school today) change the channel on the “office” TV and we are “enjoying” Tom and Jerry..........and if you thik that’s bad, my husband was downstairs watching the Game Show Channel.......LOL
Oberon: If I get a piece of ginger root at the grocery store and plant it in my garden, A) will it grow, and B) is it suitable to grow in eastern NC?
JustaDumbBlonde: Ginger from the grocery store grows just great! I planted some many years ago and it spread like crazy. Looks similar to a bamboo plant ... kinda segmented with a stiff leaf. Good luck.
O: Did you ever harvest it to use in the kitchen?
JaDB: Yes, I did use the ginger root, alot. I like to make that ginger sauce that the hibachi steak houses always serve.
I lived in Houston when I grew the ginger, so the weather was not really cold most times. It was, however, planted just off the patio and was sheltered from wind, etc., but received a good deal of sunlight. I also kept the area mulched with cypress bark. You might do a Yahoo! search to find out just how deep to plant, etc. I just remember not planting it more than an inch or so and kept it watered. Within two years it spread from the one five-inch piece that I planted to a nice 3' x 3' patch of ginger.
After harvest, you can grate it and keep it in an airtight container in the fridge for quite awhile. If I were growing it today (which I will as soon as I find some), I would also dehydrate some to grind and/or powder. Crystallized ginger is a real delicacy and called for in a couple of cookie recipes that I have. Yum.
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Does anyone have nice easy ways to keep dogs from digging up beds? I planted some lovely bulbs last year and they were beautiful until the pups dug ‘em out. They really like digging holes.
“...and ask you all to help me come up with ideas of specific topics we can delve into.”
Seed Starting Techniques
Growing Herbs
Favorite Cutting Flowers
Composting
Homemade Remedies/Fertilizers
Weed Control
Critter Control
What to Eat - From Your Lawn!
Salad Gardens
Favorite Perennial Flowers
Gardening on the Cheap
Gardening for Wildlife
Fruit Trees, Nuts & Berries
Gardening for Profit
That’s just off the top of my noggin’, LOL!
I’d cover the ground with some chicken wire, maybe something with slightly bigger holes (I don’t know how big a plant your bulbs will produce), and cover the wire with a little mulch (covering is not necessary but looks better). I had one particular spot in the back yard that one of my dogs used to love to dig in and I covered that spot with a cow panel (fencing with approximately 5”x5” squares) that kept him from digging for awhile. The next season I was able to remove the piece of fence and he still thinks that he can’t dig there.
I have a question about composting. I am in East Central Miss. Zone 7b. We have had some of our coolest weather in the last week along with a nice 3in. snow fall (rare). After the snow finally melted I checked the compost piles and they have lost their central heat. Maybe I should have covered them up? They are moist in the interior. I am sure they will recover once we get some warmer weather in a week or two. My question - do I keep up the moisture content?
If you have a ping list, can you add me to it?
Grapes, muscadines, and viniculture.
I pulled out my “bible” and found the following:
Jerry Baker’s Dog-Be-Gone Tonic
2 cloves garlic
2 small onions
1 jalapeno pepper
1 tbsp cayenne powder
1 tbsp Tabasco
1 tbsp chili powder
1 tbsp dishwashing liquid
1 quart warm water
Finely chop garlic, onion, and jalapeno and combine with the rest of the ingredients. Let it “marinate” for 24 hours, then strain. Spinkle resulting liquid on any areas where dogs are a problem.
Yeah, right!!!!
Start writing, m'dear, next Friday is nearly here!
Hmm, other than the dishwashing liquid that sounds yummy... but it also sounds like it might work! Well, in four or five months when the atmosphere unfreezes I’ll have to give it a try.
HELP!!!
I have yet to start a compost pile and so can’t answer the question, but I bet Diana can!!!
Your wish is my command!!! LOL
Thanks!
4 or 5 MONTHS?????
As opposed to the Eastern Shore where everything grows, I can attest to the travails of gardening at 7500’ in New Mexico.
I’m going to write a book... “Plants Die, That’s What They Do.”
Chapter 1: The Indestructable Pocket Gopher
Chapter 2: Ground Squirrels and the Bulbs They Dig Up
Chapter 3: First Frost September 5th
Chapter 4: Last Frost June 11th
Chapter 5: No Rain for 6 Months
Chapter 6: Apple Crop Every 8 Years Whether You Want It or Not
Chapter 7: The Greenhouse Heater Always Fails When its -10
Chapter 8: CALICHE is it Soil or Rock?
Chapter 9: Bears in the Compost Bin
You get the drift.
My wife wants to plant a few fig trees this year any ideas or info will be great!
“My question - do I keep up the moisture content?”
Depends upon how quickly you want it to decompose. If warmer weather is coming (anything above 40 degrees and a good stir once in a while keeps compost piles breaking down) you can wet it down if you need to.
I have four bins (about 4’ tall, 4’ wide circles of pig wire) which I completely ignore, other than to throw “browns and greens” into them. Every year, we dump over the oldest bin, and use that, then that oldest bin becomes the youngest, etc.
Since they’re under yards of snow right now, they’ll have plenty-o-moisture to start up again when we get steadily back up to the 40’s (April, if we’re lucky.)
I can’t grow fig trees up here, so I don’t know a thing about them. Too cold for them in Zone 4. Sorry! Amazingly, though, I can grow peaches. “Reliance” is the variety. From Jung’s of course (where I work.)
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