Weekly Gardening Thread
Posted on 08/13/2010 7:15:48 AM PDT by Red_Devil 232
Good morning gardeners. Typical August weather has set in here in East Central Mississippi with days in the mid 90’s and nights in the mid 70’s. I have pears and a few figs maturing and being picked. My garden is still producing but just a little slower in this heat. This is typical for me.
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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.
Heat wave here. In another stretch of mid 90’s.
I am harvesting gobs of sweet peppers and the summer squash is starting to get close to picking.
I'm starting seedlings on the 18th according to the best moon days for August for the next garden.
Best of luck, Poobear.
I am sorely disappointed as T.B. told me he was going to post some hot, topless veggie photos and the thread is benign so far.
On a serious note we were blessed with our 1st ever vine-ripened tomato in 10 years of trying, here in Central Oregon last week. Portable container planting, unless you have a green house, is a must have to avoid the frosts this area has during the summer.
Here in LA I have harvested 3 tomatoes and 4 zucchini this month. We are supposed to have SUN this weekend. Here’s hoping. The tomatoes are big, beautiful, fat, and GREEN. Promises of things to come, when summer arrives.
We are kind of jealous of you who are reaping bountiful harvests, but it is lovely to have 78 degree days in August. August!!
I only have two okra plants and I am picking about 6-8 pods every two days. Geees the plants - they are huge! The production is fine for me as my wife will not eat them so I have been cooking up a batch when I feel like some fried okra and freezing the rest.
That sounds about right. I planted a 25 ft. row of them at the recommended spacing. Half of that would have been plenty.
I’m planting more plum tomatoes. Those really produce and the plants are pretty heat resistant.
Planting some fall garden this week. Rain has moderated and the high temps have dried things out to normal. Lots and lots of work to do building up my soil this fall, 4 ft of rain since April has taken it’s toll.
Mr. Bender is still napping:) He will chime in after he has had a cup of coffee and then a couple of sips of tea and a few cookies.
Good morning, gardening friends.
I dug up our patch of potatoes the other day and it was great fun for the kids. We didn’t get as much as we would like but shared our bounty with our one neighbor who thought the garden was cool and ignored the other neighbor who thought it was “ugly”. Needless to say, we are now addicted! We plan on a bigger patch next year.
Have you seen the pictures of JustaDumbBlonde's stand of okra? She says she has had to use her truck to pull them up in the past.
My potatoes did not do well at all. To hot down here I guess.
I HAVE SOME GREAT NEWS TO REPORT! The sun came out of the fog yesterday about noon and relieved my depression greatly. This is the first sun we have seen on shores of Humboldt Bay in 4 or 5 weeks and I know the corn appreciated it as much as we did. The fog is back this morning but should burn off by noon again. Click on Eureka Ca on this site to see the coastline blanket... Fog
We have been pruning the two year old canes out of the Raspberry patch and hoping to get a late crop of berries on this years canes. Weeds have adapted to grow without sunshine and weeding never stops. I am going to spray a tank of Round-up on the English Ivy creeping up the hill toward the yard. My tub of late carrots is showing some sprouts like Frogs hair growth...
I cooked a big pot of mashed potatoes one night. The next night I boiled them and added parsley. (butter with both, of course). It is just amazing how differently tasting fresh dug potatoes are vs. store bought. The skin on the potatoes are also thin.
I think we didn’t plant them deep enough but still got around 25 pounds. I am laughing because the kids want to dig up the ENTIRE backyard and plant potatoes next year. Funny how this gardening thing is catchy!!!!
Well, I’ve got two large boxes of pears on the dining room table. The wife took some to her parents yesterday, but we still have a bunch for us.
HAPPY FRIDAY TO YOU ALL
we have had 2-3 weeks of hellfire hot and humid. heat index in the 105-115 range. no rain. went from hard rains every day or so to dry as a bone. the hard rain ruined my green bean crop. i got 20 quarts canned but it should have been more. the tomatos are going great. the corn and cabbage were clobbered by worms. still need to start digging potatos. the onions are still good but i need to get them out of the ground. the hot banana peppers are still setting fruit and the cucumber is dying back. i’m about ready to put the garden to bed for the winter. all in all not my best veggie year but still learned a few things. the flowers however have been amazingly gorgeous this year. and the butterflies have covered every single blooming plant all summer. i think my mom is in charge of that. she loved flowers and butterflies. we lost her in december but i think she is encouraging the butterflies. those silly critters don’t usually land on me but they have this year. i have been assaulted by butterfly several times. have a good weekend everyone!
This is a photo of my okra this year, but it was taken a few weeks ago. I am now picking okra way over my head and I have to pull the plants over to cut the top pods.
If fog is depressing you probably shouldn’t look at this:
http://www.weather.com/outlook/travel/businesstraveler/tenday/97701
Yep, that looks familiar. Darn things are way over my head too. Hadn’t thought about how I’m going to pull these guys out of the ground. Ought to be fun in the September dog days of summer.
Nice picture!
Does anyone know what I can do about this white powdery stuff killing off my squash. I got 3 squash, then the leave started getting this white stuff on them and started dying off.
I’m still getting blossoms, but as soon as the squash itself starts to form, both the squash and the blossom turn brown and die. Plant seems to by dying from the bottom up.
Now, I’m just picking the blossoms and frying them up since they aren’t forming into squash.
Worse, it seems to have moved to my cucumbers in a different bed 20 or so feet away.
At least my grape tomatoes, white eggplant and green beans are doing good.
110 heat index is buring every thing up....Did finish another batch of pasta sauce this AM.
Have some pepper that need picking and we shelled out the soup beans this week. Dad has just two more treatment for cancer....We are so blest.
Probably should mention I’m in Southern Connecticut.
And Diana, your refrigerator pickle recipe is AMAZING!! Thank you for sharing!!
Sounds like Podwery Mildew on the leaves. It is a fungus and there are fungicides that will take care of it.
Thanks, Any brand recommendations. (I’m assuming the local Agway would carry this ?)
Yes, I am very new to all this :-)
I use just a teaspoon of pure Neam oil mixed in a quart of water in a trigger sprayer with a drop or two of dish soap. Apply in the morning.
I forgot you might want to remove a few of your zuke’s leaves to open the plant up to air circulation.
Those are beautiful! Are they green when ripe?
Add them to breakfast, too! Over easy eggs, sauteed tomatoes, beans, and ham or bangers, and wonderful thick bread - picked up the habit in England ... mm..mm..mmm :)
I have tomato envy.
Thanks. Yes, they’re green with a pink center and very soft. We have one more tree that has black/purple fruit but is not ripe yet.
I don’t know the variety of the fig that is ripening for me but it looks like a brown turkey would. A FReeper sent me a bare root plant a few years ago, she did not know what it was.
Happy weekend, Patriotic Farmers! It’s such a nice thing to come here and take a break from the news.
In my backyard, the squash and beans and cukes are so over, the tomatoes are dieing but have some greenies still hanging on, and the eggplant are growing 2 lovely specimens.
For my first garden in 10 years it was a learning experience. I need more calcium, black plastic, and maybe row covers.
For any of you on Facebook, I found a page yesterday called
“Back to Basics - Hope for the Best Prepare for the Worst” -it may belong to one you.
Anyway - interesting posts on the page, and the photos are full of wonderful ideas - I think you can still look even if you’re not logged in -
I can’t wait for spring!
I have lots of green tomatoes in my containers and topsy turvies, and about 6 blush colored tomatoes, that will be ripe soon. My onion stalks turned brown, so I pulled them out. They did not get very big, so I'll put them in a different spot next year.
Corn was my best producer in my raised garden(it's my favorite anyway). I pulled up the stalks this week and replanted RomaII green beans. We got 2 thundershowers this week, but with the heat, they may not germinate very well.
I have 2 crimson sweet watermelons on my vine in the same raised bed. They should be ready in about a week and 1/2.
The 2cnd (mid summer) raised bed is coming along nicely. Watermelon and cuke vines doing well. Iroquois melon has nice blooms. Tomatoes, marigolds, and basil all well on the way. Country gentleman corn about 5 foot high.
Hubby's garden continues to produce overwhelming amounts of cucumbers. It has also gone from producing just barely enough tomatoes to eat, to producing more tomatoes than we can eat.
I can't keep up with the cukes and tomatoes at this point, so I am giving the tomatoes top priority. I am also just freezing them, since it is quicker, and doesn't heat up the house.
Cantaloupe production has slowed, but we are still getting just about the right amount for daily eating. My favorite this year has been the Minnesota Midget. Hubby thinks the Calcium Chloride foliar spray has saved some of his watermelons from BER, but we have yet to get a ripe one.
He picked about a quart of green beans yesterday, the first in several weeks. Claims he is going to plant more beans, but that should have been done by August 5 according to my planting guide for zone 5, although with the heat, they might not have germinated.
We plant to plant more green beans and corn next year, and less cukes. It's been a great gardening experience. Have a great weekend. God Bless.
We are finally getting some hot weather here in the Puget Sound area - which hopefully will ripen the numerous green tomatoes in our garden. The green beans are really producing now and our three grapevines are looking good. Compost is king!
Yeah. Mine is named Garden Girl fig after FReeper gardengirl.
I likewise have harvested new potatoes for the first time in my life, first time I have planted potatoes, never imagined they tasted so good!
Have actually got flowers that put out berries, hope to use them as true potato seeds for my next planting.
Watermelons ready to harvest.
Have become the tomato man around my neighborhood, everyone I know is getting some.
Tomatoes are great in scrambled eggs. I learned that recipe from the Armenians in my home town.
Please add me to your ping list.
Took next week off to critter-proof what little area I have to garden. Little buggers only got about 10% this season, but unfortunately that would be one or two bites from just about every single fruit or vegetable.
I hope that opossum I trapped night before last knows just how lucky he is that I let him go (several miles away).
Glad you liked the pickles! I’m just getting ready to load the heavy cook-pot up with paste tomatoes. Chop, chop, chop, LOL!
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Do you have an idea what kind of critters?
Car urine? You own a Yugo?
Did the fog burn off today?
You should post some pictures, if you can.
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