Male flower striped of petals- notice the long stem and the pollen laden anther.
Posted on 06/04/2010 5:00:06 AM PDT by Red_Devil 232
Good morning gardeners! Wow June is here already. I hope all of your gardens are flourishing. Can you believe that last year at this time there were freeze and frost warnings for the North, Northeast and some of the higher elevations? This year the freeze warnings seem to be contained within a certain household in Tennessee. I just had to say that, couldn’t help myself!
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I’m surprised about Burpee’s. I’m not surprised about Johnny’s, since I’ve always heard good things about them. It seems that Johnny’s is very highly regarded.
Heh. :)
I had some amazing basil pesto this weekend at a restaurant in Knoxville TN.
I have a whole row of basil in my garden and I intend to duplicate that pesto!
I planted seeds, just regular sweet basil. I hope I have the right one!
I'm so disgusted with the plant selection of all the surrounding stores that carry nothing but Bonnie's Plants that I could spit. Besides being way overpriced and little selection beyond the basic hybrids, I'll be d@ng if I'm gonna spend $3 per plant for eggplant. I use to could find eggplant in 6 packs, but I've looked everywhere this Spring with no luck. Bonnie's Plants have essentially become a monopoly in my area as a vegetable plant source. Grrr!
I am by no means a pumpkin expert, but I’ll try to help with the experience I have. How long has the plant been flowering and do you have both male and female blooms? We grew 4 acres of them last year and I remember that we had male blooms for quite some time before the females started appearing. The males are on long, upright stems that you can look at and tell that they won’t support a pumpkin. The females will be much closer to the vine, at the crotch of leaves, IIRC.
Best of luck! I spent several months last year trying to get the bean ring I ordered out of them - I finally did get my money back when I filed a complaint with the Better Business Bureau. I'll never buy anything from them again and their catalogs go right in the trash. I now check the Garden Watchdog before mailordering anything. Here's the link:
http://davesgarden.com/products/gwd/
How long has the plant been flowering and do you have both male and female blooms?The plant has been flowering for at least 1.5 months now (yes, I planted too early, I think). The vine, if elongated and straightened, would be about 15 to 20 feet long. I don't know about male vs. female blooms (they all look the same to me) but will go home and get out my magnifying glass and examine the crotches.
Hey, that sounds just plain wrong!
The actual blossoms do look the same - it’s the flower stems that look different. The female stems have itty-bitty pumpkins already.
What do you guys do with volunteers?
I have a bunch of squash and tomatoes that popped up in some soil/compost I moved to the middle of the lawn(because I’m too weak to turn it by hand/till and too cheap to hire someone or rent equipment)so I could grow a little bit of corn and beans and I ran out of space.
‘Garden Watchdog’...HIGHLY recommended!!! Thanks for providing the link for everyone. I used to order from Park’s, but new owners came along; and in the tank they went.
Bored? You've DEPRESSED me. It's raining here, and I need to go to the store. Perhaps a garden center, or two. However, my husband has given me such a long list of stuff for the plant (as in manufacturing) that I won't have room in the car for anything else. Besides, who wants to load muddy sacks of mulch into their nice, clean car?
BA, we want PICTURES.
The good news here is that (although) my roses have had NO CARE this year because I've been preoccupied with this veggie garden, they are GORGEOUS. Unbelievably gorgeous. This is their 3rd year in. They got no winter covering, no spring pruning, no mulch, no weeding, no spraying, no anti deer application (I still have the cannisters in their package waiting to be put out) just toal neglect. The roses are huge and in full bloom. I've never seen anything like it. They are 3 yrs old this year.
$3 seems to be the standard price (or worse) nowadays; even for on-line plants...that is an OUTRAGE for standard GMO hybrid junk. I DID pay $3 for some HEIRLOOM hot pepper plants I couldn’t find seed for a couple of years ago...just saved a bunch of seed; planted them the next year; sold a few. Money back, plenty of plants. Win-win.
I just read through the comments on Park’s - they went into bankruptcy in April, so I googled that and found that nobody’s getting credit card refunds now. I did like the little Park-starts and biodomes, but maybe I can pack regular seed-starting stuff into the styrofoam when I run out of theirs.
EXACTLY what you have to do...the minute that blossom opens; either you or a bee needs to get in there; as the 'window of opportunity' shuts within 24 hours. No pollination; no pumpkin. Transfer male goodies to female goodies; you'll have PLENTY of pumpkins. I do it first thing in the morning when the blossoms open...
Male flower striped of petals- notice the long stem and the pollen laden anther.
I hope you like cucumbers, those things are PROLIFIC! I only planted 4 plants last year, wound up with almost 40 jars of dill pickles, plenty to put in salsa, and wound up giving a bunch away. It was amazing!
Our weather has been so cold and rainy here in the NW hardly ANYTHING is growing in my garden. The soil has not warmed up, and all the corn I planted decided to stay in the ground. Going to replant this weekend as it seems to finally have warmed enough, even tho it’s still pretty soggy! I guess last year was a fluke, and this year we’re getting the typical Washington weather, where summer doesn’t start until the 5th of July! I’m jealous of everyone else with their tomatoes! Dangit!
At least my beets are doing well, and my new strawberry patch is lookin good, along with the spinach I planted in with it (supposed to be a good companion plant for strawberries, according to my books).
Happy gardening!
Might be in that area soon...share, please?
I’ve got those penciled in for a fall garden down here. I woulda/shoulda/coulda planted them in very early spring but I didn’t think about it in time.
*sigh*
The next sound you hear will be Mr Bender ending it all by leaping off the tailgate of his pickup! Along about Wednesday evening I start looking forward the new Friday thread and the banter that goes with it and then the very first posts are about harvesting this and picking that and waist high over there and I look out the window at mud and weeds. This has been the wettest late spring that I can remember in my 56 years of living and gardening on the shores of Humboldt Bay. We had 3X normal May rain and we are already double our total June average in the first 4 days. It’s even worse between Eureka and the Ore border and into Southern Oregon.
The potatoes, corn, raspberries and blueberries are doing great. We are cutting lettuce and replanted the radishes, dug 2 types of garlic and have 6 types left to dig. I raked the mulch off of half of them before the rain drove me into the house but I fear the wrappers will rot and shorten the storage life of them. The slugs are in paradise in my wife’s flower beds she got planted...
I’ve tried to start my own heirloom eggplant a couple of times this Spring, but with no success. Could be the seed age and viability, but I tend to think it’s just something I’m not doing right. I’ve never tried to raise eggplant from seed before, but I do for basically everything else with little problem.
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