Marcella's Container Garden Report:
I decided to count some veggies so I, and you, would know how many of certain ones are out there (I really didn't know at this point):
24 tomato plants, two of the older ones, have blooms. There are 24 because I couldn't stand the throught of killing those little plants after they made their way from seeds to plants. There are no store bought tomatoes out there.
11 pepper plants, the only hot ones are hot banana peppers and mixed hot pepper plants (they came that way, a mix of hot pepper seeds - have no idea what each one is except it's hot). No sign of peppers. Grown from seed.
6 Tromboncino squash. Grown from seed.
10 cucumber plants and almost all have blooms. There is more than one type. Grown from seed.
7 tobacco plants that are in good shape. Grown from seed.
3 or 4 very small Lemon Balm growing. These seeds came from Sockmonkey. Grown from seed.
I'll tell you what - if you want a seed to grow and can't make it happen, send it to me - I can make seeds germinate. Now that isn't bragging, that's saying I can actually grow seed and most come up under the grow lamp in my house. I am amazed when a plant grows from a little seed.
30 Cilantro little plants. I'm so fine - grew them from seed.
I get a nice handful of strawberries every day. See, I can grow some food. Bought plants. There are small green blackberries growing on the three plants. Bought plants.
greeneyes, what is your formula for making a soapy mixture to use for little flying insects that get on plants? I see some weird flying iridescent little fly looking things but they are not regular flies - is that an aphid and does the soapy water put on plants drive them away? OK, I don't know jack about flying insects that want to murder plants - I just need to know the formula you use for that soapy mixture stuff.
Wife and I are removing the frost blankets and hoops from our raised beds. Bird netting now surrounds the rectangles, held up with 2 inch pvc pipe. We also added fence posts and wire for the tomatoes to grow up on. This looks a bit industrial but it will hold up to the wind we have from time to time.
We created a fourth raised bed for squash and melon. It's still covered.
Also let your soil dry out between watering. Another home remedy is to slice some potato slices and lay them on top of the soil for 4 days, you should see some teeny black which is the heads. Throw these away and do not compost.
The homemade spray may work, have never had issues with the gnats. Here's the recipe:
1 onion, and a garlic bulb peeled and crushed-put into a quart jar. Fill the jar up to about half an inch with really hot to boiling water. Add a tsp or more of cayenne pepper. Let it sit overnight up to 24 hours.
If you are going to apply with a fine spray mist, strain it with coffee filters. If you are going to kinda squirt it using a Dish washing liquid bottle, a colander or metal mesh strainer is fine.
After straining, mix a drop or 2 of dish-washing liquid and a drop or 2 of cooking oil or neem oil. Shake to mix and put into applicator container. Make sure and shake to combine each time before using. Keeps in the refrigerator for quite a while.