Posted on 09/16/2011 5:18:08 AM PDT by Red_Devil 232
Good morning gardeners. It has been another beautiful week here in East Central Mississippi we have had moderate daytime temperatures with cool nights. Perfect weather to get out and do some garden and yard clean up. My Fig trees have finished producing and it is time to winterize them with a thick layer of straw. All my of the pears have been picked and either canned or eaten. My vegetable garden is basically through producing except for a few Jalapenos that are still hanging on and still producing large peppers. My Beer brewing experiment is still progressing nicely with 6 gallons of a Canadian Blonde still aging in bottles and I have a six-gallon batch of Irish Stout fermenting and almost ready for bottling.
If you are a gardener or you are just starting out and are in need of advice or just encouragement please feel free to join in and enjoy the friendly discussion. Our Freeper community is full of gardeners, each with varying interests and skill levels from Master Gardener to novice.
I hope all your gardens are flourishing.
Sorry for the slow reply, thanks for the tips.
Those look beautiful! Bet they are tender!
Here is the last cucumber vine. It's still chugging along and producing 2-3 cukes per week.
And the crazy papaya plant in the greenhouse:
It never seems to get to the point of producing fruit. It's been there for the past 4 years, freezes back in the winter, and returns in mid-summer.
Love your hoophouse!
They don’t make it into the house as they are getting eaten fresh off the stalk...
I just thought of something to share that I learned this summer, quite by accident, about plantings that repel 4 legged pests.
Some of you may remember my efforts to plant a pot of something pretty out by my new swing in an area that I can not protect from deer, rabbits, woodchucks, etc. I had a very large, terra cotta pot that looks like it has been tipped over with the plants spilling out. I filled it with more than 2 1/2 cu. feet of potting mix — 1 1/2 large bags. So, you can visualize the size.
The folks at my local garden center were not much help, but I came home with 2 4 in. pots of sweet potato vine and 3 gazanias and planted them in a nice arrangement. The gazanias became a rabbit salad bar immediately and lasted about 3 days. The sweet potato vines are still going strong. Despite no care and no water, they have quintupled in size and are spilling all over the place. They look really pretty too. Next year I’ll plant a combination of the yellow-green vines and the “black” ones.
My point is that the deer and the rabbits won’t touch the sweet potato vines. They would make a nice edgeing around a garden full of plants (like lettuce) that you want to “save” from the rabbits. I have not seen sweet potatoes on any list of deer and rabbit resistent plants, but my guys shun them.
Even though sweet potatoes are not a plant that is grown, normally, in Wisconsin, I’ll bet that I have some potatoes growing underneath because I’ve experienced that outcome before.
Just thought I’d add that suggestion to the usual daffodils and marigolds.
And mine’s a big dog. (80lbs) It doesn’t seem to bother him. He started with my cherry tomatoes a few years ago, but now he’s progressed to the big red ones that I pitch out into the pasture when they are too ripe to pick, or when they have ugly spots on them. I’m really pitching them for the deer to find, but I’m trying to be careful not to let him outside when I have a bunch laying there. He’ll sneak out into the dark to eat them, and I don’t want him to eat too many.
MY eyes roll back into my head when I get a sour grapefruit!
South FL UPDATE: Plants are going great, Got 6-6-6 down 2 days ago and now it’s raining hard, Everything is up but the squash and the peas.... 95 days till watermellon.. I really miss my sweet watermellon from the spring garden.. I gave away 30 of them.. I guess watermellon wine is the only way to save them that long. The ones I get at the store are not even close.. I am also growing a bunch of orential cabbage this season.. My son want’s me to make and can him some kimchi... (rotten cabbage)..... Take care...
Odd. I’ve watched rabbits eat the leaves off a sweet potato. Maybe there are just other plants they like better, and they only eat sweet potato if the others aren’t available?
I watched them from the back window for a week. The rabbits were all over this pot of plants, but when I went out to check, only the gazanias were gone. And they were GONE. I had 2 orange gazanias and 1 white one. At first they were only eating the orange ones, but they finished up with the white one and then abandoned the pot. The weet potatoes are beautiful and have flourished.
My friend, whom I was visiting tonight, says that the deer stripped her sweet potato plants. She had them layered with chrysanthemums in a tiered fountain (non working). The deer left the mums alone and ate the sweet potatoes.
Go figure!
Something likes to munch on sweet potato leaves in my yard. Possible culprits include deer and groundhogs.
Experts say I should not go in the garden while it’s wet as it spreads desease... Darn, I can go out and weed today! BHAHAAAHHAHA!
I got some stuff made out of wolf pee last season, Seem to have done a good job along with leaving my dog out most of the time... He loves to chase the deer.. I have a 6’ fence around the garden and around the ranch and the deer can clear it by 4 feet without even trying! Also the dog has been helping by peeing on the fence posts!
Found a recipe for eggplant cake for you: http://www.cooks.com/rec/view/0,1916,155178-250194,00.html
My fence is only 6 feet, but the garden is a square foot affair. They don’t jump in (I think) because they are not sure where they are going to land. There are 4 raised “boxed” beds, 4 raised perimeter beds, some Tupperware storage boxes, 2 trellises, assorted tomato supports, 2 chairs, and a large, tripod sprinkler in there. I think they avoid the clutter in fear of getting tangled.
Day Three of having our hardwood floors refinished...
The floor refinisher showed up at 8AM and after a mild sanding of the sealer he applied the first coat of the finish and was gone by noon saying he would be back on Friday to put down the final coat. He told us to stay off the floors until Sunday afternoon so I called the movers to hold our furniture until Tuesday which gives our grandson and his friend a free weekend to camp and hunt deer then they will come by Monday evening to reinstall the bookcase. (we hope)
Now for the real stress... We have been noticing moisture on the crawl space vents and discovered we had a hot water line leaking under the kitchen area and a boat was required to traverse the area. The Plumber was able to send a man out at 2 and he had it repaired in less then 2 hours and we can flush the toilets again.
The BIGGEST SETBACK came when we had to terminate our planned shredding of the corn stalks and marigolds because a bearing failed in our trusted machine and repairs will take a month or more.
NOW I AM HERE TO TELL Y’ALL THAT THERE IS NOTHING MORE IMPORTANT IN OUR LIVES THAN SHREDDING GARDEN DEBRIS TO MAKE THIS WINTERS COMPOST AND THERE ARE NO RENTALS AVAILABLE!!!
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