Posted on 03/01/2013 12:32:22 PM PST 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. No matter what, you won’t be flamed and the only dumb question is the one that isn’t asked.
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I on the other hand am happy with any homegrown tomato. Big or little pink or red. Not really interested in other colors.
Hubby likes the big slicers like mortgage lifter, so that one slice covers the entire sandwich. I like those, but also the smaller ones that are just right for a salad with no leftovers or else several cherry tomatoes for salads and snacking.
Romas are great for the sauces.
The KC area got it worse than the ST Louis area too. We are south of St. Louis, so it wasn’t too bad here except for the night of ice.
That stuff is the worst for the commuters. Many people in our county commute to other cities, since there aren’t many jobs here.
The weather we are having lately makes me glad I am retired and no longer commuting. Our daughter had to stay overnight when Q storm hit, but at least her company paid for it.
Woo Hoo! This year I am finally 100% non hybrid non GMO seeds! All the greens planted and most of the others started indoors for another week or two.
Patience. If they are three years old they will not be much bigger than that. It’s about the 5th or 6th year in my experience when they begin to get to pencil size. You can harvest them and eat them after about three years but better to wait until year 5.
I’ve only had one good year growing carrots here. We are about 35 miles NW of Austin and I am lucky to have almost a foot of good soil for my garden.
I bring in leaf mulch almost every year and the black dirt is just too hard to let those grow very well, but our small garden is enough to keep us happy.
I love cherry tomatoes for salads or eating out of hand, but I rarely ever grow them. I grow what I'm going to use for most of the year. It's a homestead kind of mindset, I suppose. Survival crops first, everything else, dead last.
/johnny
Well I lost tomato seedlings this week. Not to cats. No. Lost them to anti-cats. *squeak*.
Had to move the seedlings from my lighting setup in the garage back inside where they’re getting way leggy. Hubby put out anti-anti-cat devices. Unfortunately I can’t trust the *real* anti-anti-cat devices in my garage or I’d just cut to the chase. And what a chase it would be!
Now we await the little demised squeaks. This, like spiders, is a hubby task. I change dirty diapers, he takes care of the really really icky stuff.
Sad thing is the felines know the temptations are out there. They can hear and probably smell them. They sit at the garage door and paw and howl.
Fortunately I hadn’t planted anything expensive like moruga scorpions or jolokias yet. I’m going to wait for proof of dead squeaks first.
Good job! I only plant heirloom non GMO. Hubby on the other hand is not a convert sigh. Although he does prefer heirloom, because you can save the seed and get consistent plant. He’s not convinced that GMO is a bad thing to eat.
But for the most part, I just order the seeds I want and there’s plenty left over for him. He still gets some hybrid stuff locally.
This was my first year to have any luck with carrots, and I didn’t plant very many. This year, I am thinking of planting them in a container to see if that works better for me.
Cherry tomatoes are a survival plant. They help me survive the winter, so I grow a couple, dig them up and bring them indoors for the winter. I don’t make sauces very often - I just freeze the tomatoes and use them as needed in chili or to make stewed tomatoes. Sometimes I do make a quick pizza sauce using a small package of frozen tomatoes.
I have no homegrown tomatoes left and am going into a downward spiral of with drawal that will only be resolved by the first bite of vine ripened homegrown tomato.LOL.
I hate those squeakers. I once purchased some decon, then decided to just make do with traps. Put the decon up on a top shelf at the back of the laudry cabinet.
Really thought I had caught them all with traps. A couple of months later there was one just walking really really slow down the hall, and I put a can over it. Hubby disposed of it.
This repeated several times. I had forgotten all about the D con. Later on, in the spring, I was doing some spring cleaning and came across the Dcon. Little buggers had eaten through the container and consumed all but a few granules.
Did you see the pics I posted at #145 on last weeks thread?
Yes. They were great. I thought I responded. Apologies. Thanks for sharing them.
My last horse had to be put down in 2009 due to a freak head injury that never would have healed ... he was 27 and looked/acted at least 10 years younger. His mom made it to 29. The last horse on the place (my niece’s) left summer before last for the Shenandoah Valley and 3 little kids who treat her like a princess. She’s knee deep in grass, doesn’t get ridden, and everybody feeds her carrots and apples .... an earthly form of horse heaven. She’s a sweetie so she deserves it. Anyway, for the first time in 40 years, no horses .... we can actually leave the gates open and nothing bad happens! My dad loves it - he can now drive his golf cart all over the place without having to get out to open/close gates. It’s a simple thing, not to have to deal with gates, but he mentions now and again how wonderful it is. The only way I’d have horses again would be if I won the lotto ... I’d have a broodmare farm combined with a bucking bull and alpaca farm. No stall cleaning - I’d hire help to do all the grunt work I did for years. I’d just walk around with a pocket full of carrots/apples, rub soft noses and pat sleek hides, play with the babies and enjoy. :-)
If you will go to post 145 on last week’s thread, you will see pictures of fanfan’s winter sown project.
It’s very interesting. A picture is worth a thousand words.
I did not want to have to face putting my horses down, and after I retired, I didn’t have the income to support them anyway.
I don’t miss getting out in the snow to give them hay and feed, but I do miss petting them and feeding them apples.
My advice on horses .... they are heart-breakers and money pits ... other than that, they’re wonderful.
Kind of funny why I started with carrots. A soccer mom used to bring full sized carrots to games as snacks. Daughter was used to eating baby carrots and wondered where those “big ones” came from, so I told her they grow in the garden.
She insisted I plant some the next year. I promised her I would, but I’d show her how to tell when they were ready to pull. After the carrots had top, I showed her how to run a finger around the top to see if they were ready. Imagine her surprise when the first one was about 10 inches long.
LOL. That is sooooo true.
That’s a smile for sure. We are taking our granddaughter to a local organic farm this summer just so that she can see the animals on the farm instead of the supermarket.
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