Weekly Gardening Thread
Posted on 07/23/2010 5:14:03 AM PDT by Red_Devil 232
Good morning gardeners. I hope all of you are doing well and your gardens are flourishing. I ran across a thread posted by FReeper Lorianne last night that I thought everyone might find interesting. It is about an enterprising 14-year-old young Lady from Michigan who is using her love for gardening and making a few dollars on the side. Link: A Michigan Teen Farms Her Backyard
Weekly Gardening Thread
I hope all of you will stop by.
This is typically a low volume ping list. Once a week for the thread and every once in a while for other FR threads posted that might be of interest.
If you would like to be added to or removed from the list please let me know by FreepMail or by posting to me.
Buried in tomatoes here. We picked about a bushel day before yesterday. I’ll be turning them into salsa and tomato sauce shortly. Lots of peppers, too. Okra is just starting to come on. Man, is it ever hot! Hopefully, a front that is approaching the SE USA will give us some relief in a day or two....
Yeah hot here too. I have been getting a few tomatoes and expect in a week I will be burried in them also. Okra, pepperplanta and eggplants all producing well.
Good morning, Red and all. I loved that story about the Michigan teen. I suspect she’s a clone of JustaDumbBlonde. I was irritated at the comment on the page from someone who said she’d be lucky to clear minimum wage for her efforts.
She’s FOURTEEN, FGS. How many fourteen year olds have a job at all, let alone pull down minimum wage? She’s learning a lot about business, grant applications, growing things, etc. I think she’s just wonderful. If I lived near to her, I’d abandon my own garden and sign up for her service.
I encourage everyone to click on Red’s link and read the whole story. The pictures are wonderful. Then, scroll down through the comments and click on the link to read her report. I just love this kid!
Read it and weep that most of us (or our kids) weren't so enterprising at 14. This young lady is adorable. I have a couple of grandsons that should meet her!
Peaches sure are good this year, and the pears are loaded. I noticed a few pears falling off and the stems are totally dried out.
Just checked the forecast — almost 3 inches of rain on the way today. We had 7 inches yesterday (Nobody should plan to swim in Lake Michigan today. I’m sure Milwaukee dumped lots of sewage yesterday.) As I’ve stated before, I live on top of a hill and water flows down. But, my poor garden is wet, wet, wet, despite the raised beds.
My neighbor invited us over for a lovely dinner last night. The main feature was a stroganoff made with left over seed potatoes that I had given her when I started mine. She planted them in buckets and dumped them this week after the foliage started to look bad. She cooked red and Yukon gold potatoes quartered (and some whole because they were small) in a sauce with filet mignon and pat-a-pan squash. THe salad was sliced cucumbers in a sourcream sauce seasoned with choppedchives, parsely, & dill grown in her garden. Mmmmm Mmmmm good! We ate this meat/potato/squash mixture poured over thinly sliced sour dough bread from a local bakery or fresh noodles.
She never grew food before until I gave her half of my seed potatoes.
I’m growing a variety of Anaheim chillies this year called “Carmen” I got from Johnny’s Seeds. I’ve never seen an Anaheim type chili put off this many fruits. I’ve been making and freezing chili relenos so I can have them for lunch later. I made 15 yesterday and I’ve still got a pile of peppers in the fridge. I need to pick again, too. Could be that I installed a drip irrigation system on my raised beds this year. Everything in the raised beds seems to be putting off bumper crops this year. The drip system seems to give everything just the right amount of water.
Good morning, all. Another week and no beans. My pole beans (KY Wonders & Blue Lakes) are flowering OK, but there are no beans. I haven’t noticed any insects out of the ordinary. The beans are planted along a fence that separates me and my neighbor, so the yard grass grows up to within a couple of inches of the plants, and the grass shows no problem. Just lots of flowers and no beans.
I tried side-dressing with a 10-10-10 garden fertilizer according to their directions.
Any suggestions would be appreciated.
I’ve got a dumb question to start off with —
I just got some homegrown organic peaches from one of my neighbors, (they were delicious) and I saved the pits....
I’d like to have a couple of peach trees of my own, but budget is too limited to invest in saplings, so would it be possible to start new trees from those pits?? If so, how would I go about it??
TIA
Could you post directions about your drip system after the harvesting slows down? Like maybe in the winter? I would like to know the materials you used. My garden is some distance from a source of water. Right now I am using one of those ratchet sprinklers on an automatic timer. I have a hose extension and hose bib out to the fence near the garden and a timer and another hose extended to the middle of my beds. I know that overhead water is not the best, but it haas kept everything growing. A drip system would be ideal. Of course, we get rain too — in buckets.
My ideal would be to be able to turn that water on and off remotely, but that is just a dream. Yesterday we had T storms and Tornado warnings and buckets of rain falling that sent me to my basement for shelter. Naturally, my sprinkler was watering the garden at the same time, and there was no way I could reach it to turn it off. LOL.
My rain guage only measures to 6 inches, but I’ll bet that it is full. I’ll have to go out and empty it to wait for the 3 inches expected today. I’ll turn off the water at the same time!
I don’t know if this will help or not, but I must say, I’m NO FAN of “balanced fertilizers” for crops.
Each of the three elements that make up fertilizer plays a role:
The first number indicates Nitrogen. Think green leaves, healthy growth.
The second number indicates Phosphorous. This controls flowering and FRUITING (your problem).
The third number indicates Potassium. This means overall plant health (think about the banana you need after a night on the town with the high school buds. LOL)
If I were having your problem, I would switch to a high phosphorous (middle number) fertilizer at once, before your season is over.
Just my two cents....
We’re in Orlando for the week and while here found some nice potted herbs on sale at a local market. We bought mint and oregano to bring back up with us. Now they are sitting on the deck of our hotel soaking up sun while we’re off to Universal Studios.
I’m no expert, but I imagine it depends on whether your neighbor’s trees were grafted. Sometimes they graft stock that produces delicious fruit onto sturdy root stock.
Your seed might grow a small tree that does not have a root stock that is hardy enough to survive.
Please add me to the list! :)
Can I ask a question or two while I’m here?
(zone 5, albany ny)
This year was the first time I’ve been able to plant
in ten years. New ground, virgin yard.... turned it several times, added loads of manure and compost and peat, degrubbed it. It seemed to be in good condition, light and fluffy, not clay, not sand, made nice ribbons.
I did not add any other kind of fertilizer, as I never did anywhere else and never had a problem.
Planted a little late, 2 weeks after Mother’s day. Bought plants at a local nursery. The usual suspects - tomotoes, peppers, eggplant, zuccini, summer squash, beans, cukes...
And ack! NOTHING has grown well!
Peppers of all varieties are stunted and do not even
flower.
Eggplant - see ‘peppers’.
Tomatoes are a mixed lot - some have nothing, the rest are small and stunted.
Beans have very little output.
Zuccini has tons of flowers but will not set one fruit.
Cukes are holding their own, harvesting one a day on average, but the vines are small and only spread about 3 feet.
The only thing really growing is yellow squash, which is sad because I HATE it, I thought I was planting a flat of pumpkins.
So.... does anyone think this might be just bad soil that should have been fertilized with one of those 3-2-5 (that’s a guess at the numbers) products?
There does’t seem to be any infestation.
Could the plants have been a bad lot like that?
Or maybe it’s just the Albany weather (new to me), which involves little sun, high humidity, and when you’re not melting in the dank swampiness of the place it’s a bit cool and cloudy overall.
As you can guess, after spending about $240 in this venture, it’s embarrassing and defeating to have such poor crops, and I would sure appreciate anything helpful anyone can suggest that might help next year.
Be blessed :)
I don’t have any beans yet either, despite planting 4 kinds. Maybe it’s too early.
I didn’t do a good enough job of explaining things,so I’d like to revise and extend my remarks. lol
There was a time when Miracle-Gro (for example) was a 15-30-15 fertilizer. And it was great for flowers and vegetables, which is how it got it’s reputation.
They have changed their formulation, reducing the phosphorous. Why? For the same reason everyone else did. Phosphorous mining is under attack from the enviro-nuts and thus, has become very expensive. But it is essential to the production for fruits and vegetables. In a decade or so, we might be here on FreeRepublic discussing the cost of food in a negative way, because of scarcity. The shortage of phosphorous due to environmental nuts will be the reason.
You will pay more for a high phosphorous fertilizer, but at least you will get a crop.
*PS...the clue for me was that your grass is just fine. Balanced fertilizers are designed for grass, although not marketed that way.
Hang on to my screenname. Let me know how you make out if you change fertilizers. I’m trying to help. :)
good luck!
My daughter lives in a suburb of Albany (Rexford). I know you had some bad weather late into the season. Late snows as I remember.
I’d buy a soil test kit at your local garden store and find out what is really in your soil and what it needs. I suspect that it is because it is just a new yard. Also contact your County Extension office and ask them.
Others here will have better advice, I’m sure.
That is VERY interesting information. And that may be why this year it has become difficult to find the ‘numbers’ on many fertilizer products in the store. They are hiding them in many cases.
The Miracle Gro that I am using this year (liquid) is some that is left over from a couple of years ago. But I’m going to have to replace it soon. I’ll watch carefully what’s in it.
Buy a soil thermometer. That will answer many of your questions.
Next season, turn your soil on that random weekend when it’s warm. Rake it out, so it’s level and ready to plant.
Go to Home Depot or somewhere and get a roll of black plastic. Roll it out and pin it down; it will warm up your soil. Don’t let the kids and pets run over it and squash it down.
When it’s time to plant, you’ll cut an X in place for each plant. At this point, you will either take a lawn fork and poke holes in ALL the plastic or make a commitment to water each X individually.
The symptoms you describe are of a soil cooler than the plants want. I dealt with this all my life, as a fellow gardener in the Great Lakes area.
I advocate soil thermometers as stocking stuffers for ALL gardeners. :)
And yes, you can still go ahead and run a couple sheets of black plastic in between rows to help.
Picked another five gallon bucket of tomatoes last night. Need to get to work putting them up. Then take another picking of blackberries for jelly. (Have 8 packages in the freezer)
What kind of pears do you have?
your front is gonna slow to a crawl with that tropical storm approaching the Keys...
Indeed.
You have to be a bit of a detective nowadays, with respect to fertilizer. Remember, they are trying to sell a product and keep it affordable.
Simply stated: If you are fertilizing to generate a fruit or vegetable, rather than a lawn, the middle number on the fertilizer MUST be higher (and preferably double) than the other two, in order to put you in a position of success.
Otherwise, it’s like trying to make a pot of sloppy joes without the meat, the spicy sauce, and the bun.
Here in Missouri it has been hot and wet. The garden has been doing well and the weeds better. Can I put black plastic down to control the weeds without cooking my cucumbers?
I sure hope we’re not going to read about some ham handed government entity smacking her down for selling food without a license or some such nonsense.
Yeah, I think it’s about to get really wet here early part of next week. At least it should be cooler. It’s pushing 100F today with humidity to match....
My neighbor was just telling me about a big blackberry patch she found not far from my house. I was thinking about going and picking some today. I know the seed ticks and chiggers are out in force, though....
Is there any way you can post a picture of your garden in full sun so we can do soil analysis? Spade up about 6’ of your dirt and get it close-up.
The MG I use is a 15-30-15 called Bloom Booster. Their tomato fert also has a higher P number I don’t have any to look up the number right now.
I think they are Bartlett. They usually start rippening in late July - mid August.
It was pushing 100 at Fall Creek Falls last week when we were there and it was so much “cooler” than what we were accustomed to here in FL. That and my wife’s allergies were greatly relieved compared to here...
Any news from up there about the new VW plant?
Do you have a soil thermometer? LOL
I’m just being funny. You should be able to put black plastic down to control the weeds without killing the cukes, as they love the heat, but you’re a little late.
If I were worried about weeds in mid/late July, I would be using another weed removal program: children who need an allowance.
heh
Next year, do the black plastic thing from the start. While it’s not pretty, it’s a lifesaver. When completing my Master Gardener training in Ohio, part of our last set of steps were touring commerical growers. You can imagine how shocked I was to see hundreds of feet of tomatoes, etc. grown just that way! I wish I’d had a camera with me.
I live in Central NY. It sounds like your growing conditions are much like ours and I’ve had a bumper crop.
Peppers and other really warm weather crops tend not to do well in this climate, however, my tomatoes, beans and zucchini are all doing well.
I did what you did for fertilizing it, manure and compost just to boost the soil and our soil is good (if a bit stony) like yours sounds like.
Did you plant in full sun?
I have some swiss chard in my garden and I have no idea what to do with it.
Do you eat the stems and/or leaves?
That’s very useful information. Thanks.
If you read her business plan, a lawyer friend of her parents helped her get registered and licensed.
Treat it like celery. Chard leaf is not poisonous like Rhubarb. Did you grow the multi-color variety?
Thanks for the support :)
Sad to know about the peppers, but it makes sense.
I did plant in full sun, except for the peas which had some shade, but all 12 died, anyway.
Sam’s club has a huge roll of landscape fabric for a not unreasonable price. I use that with straw thrown on top to mulch.
The thing I like about it is that it lasts longer than the plastic and the water can seep through the fabric.
FWIW, I found that any vegetables that I plant that don’t get as much full sun as possible, don’t do as well. Veggies like LOTS of sun.
Another question for anyone out there......
I bought rhubarb from a catalog company and the cutting they sent me did NOTHING. Or next to it. Three times it got a little green nub in the center as if it were going to start growing, then it scaled over and quit.
I prepared the soil according to directions and EVERYTHING else in my garden is going gangbusters.... except the rhubarb.
What does it take to get one of those roots to grow?
you bet. Hope it helps!
Yes. With lots of butter and salt.
When you cook it, get the biggest pot you can find and stuff it as full of swiss chard as you can. You don't need a lot of water though. It cooks down to NOTHING! Very funny to fill the pot and look in it when it's done and see a little pile of cooked swiss chard in the bottom.
That sounds like a good idea, but I don’t have the proper equipment. Thank you though for being willing to help! :)
added to
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Eggplant and pepper plants love the heat and lots of sun.
You might want to give all your plants a little feeding with a fertilizer like Miracle-Gro Bloom Booster it is a 15-30-15 fert. I give all my plants a hand feeding of this MG fert about every two weeks. I mix up 25 gals. at a time in five gallon buckets and each plant is getting a little more than two quarts at each feeding. It can't hurt to try.
Oh and I have already pulled my zuke plants they just were not producing like yours.
My peas did terrible this year. I didn’t get them out soon enough and the heat got them. They don’t like heat at all.
It usually doesn’t get much above 80F on the plateau at my house, but I’m on the opposite side of the valley from FCF. Occasionally we’ll see 90F up on the hill, but it’s fairly rare. Down in the valley at the farm, though, it was 97F yesterday with 78% humidity showing on the weather station. Thick. At least there was a slight breeze. Today and tomorrow are supposed to be hotter.
Get some MG Bloom Booster 15-30-15!
The head cheese at VW visited Chattanooga for the first time this week. Otherwise, no news. I did hear a while back that Audi was thinking of building a plant next door to VW, though.
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