This years pumpkin crop was a flop this year. We got one 25 to 30 pounder and the rest are small and only 8 total from 3 hills 6 plants…
I'll trade you your squirrel for this overgrown rodent…
Between the nursing a cold and rainy weather, the outdoor activities were severely curtailed this week. The indoor garden is doing well.
Lemon tree has several more lemons ripening, and is loaded with blossums which make the air fragrant with their pleasant smell. Peppers are continuing to ripen and putting out new blooms.
My basil continues to amaze me. I have a pot that I started back in 2010. I have harvested it and cut it back every year. A couple of weeks ago, I got carried away and cut it back so severely, I thought it might be done for. It is loaded with little green buds all along the stems which are now as big around as my fingers.
My farmer's Almanac for November says: After digging dahlia tubers store them in a protected place in dry soil. Winterize irrigation systems. Mulch roses and protect winter veggie crops. Work bonemeal into soil before planting bulbs for spring blooms. Prune deciduous shrubs. Waste not- use regular compost or worm compost for kitchen scraps.
Hope all is well with you and yours. Have a great weekend. God Bless.
Pinging the List.
Thanks for the Ping. I’ve been baking all week, and my garden doesn’t seem to have suffered from the benign neglect.
Picked tomatoes this week. My lemon boy, and Tycoon tomato plants are loaded. Have a few peppers, and the pak choi, I transplanted from under the growlight is huge compared to that I direct seeded.
Haven't learnt much since last communique. Did learn one thing, though -- all the organic remedies in the world (and I've used, to date, 23 different ones) do NOT deter the determined leaf-cutter ant.
The only way that works (on empirical evidence) is a neurotoxin, typically an organophosphate. The crop: sweet peppers, aka pimentones here in Panama. After having EVERY plant in a 30-plant plot denuded of leaves between 60 and 95 percent (the little bastids leave JUST enough leafstock so the plant doesn't die), I treated the ground immediately around half the plants with a local product called Hormitox (hormiga is the word for 'ant' in Spanish).
To date -- and this was approx 3 weeks ago -- all plants so treated are developing new leaves by the bushel. No flowers yet, but I imagine that the plants must recover from stress before flowering (no seasons here, remember, except 'wet' and 'dry'). As to the others, I've kept treating them with regular doses of spice and garlic tea, and packing their stems w/coffee grounds. No improvement.
This is fairly definitive evidence, where I come from (oh, that's right...Missouri).
As ol' MJ said: you can't always get what you want. In this case purely organic ant repellent. But, sometimes, you just might find...you get what you need. In this case, ant-free pimentones.
After 6 weeks of growing dill seedlings in plastic cups, I've started transplanting them into the garden. Some are quite impressive, 10-12 inches high. Theoretically, it's a little early, still the rainy season (and, it has stormed for the past 3 days in the afternoon). Middle of November is theoretically better to transplant, BUT, good news, the four already transplanted are evidently too big to be crushed by the rain (yay!).
Happy gardening, young lady!
Herbacious plants can be safely pruned by removing about 1/3 of the foliage .
If you were to prune 50% of the foliage or more , the plant goes through "shock" , and is 'set back' a bit .
Wherever you prune close to a leave or stem , it will double the leaf or stem production .
Once my sweet basil goes into flowering and into seed production, it is extremely difficult to prevent it continueing.
We had some nights in the 30’s the end of last week/weekend & that killed the tomatoes and pepper plants ... marigolds around the garden, too. Sunday, I got out and cleaned the garden ... figured I’d be putting it ‘to bed’ for the winter. It was a very sad time, cleaning it all up and I just couldn’t stand it, SO ... even though I know it’s way, way too late for planting ‘cold weather’ crops, I did it anyway. Seeds were very hard to find, but I found some Chinese Kale, Collards and Beets. The seeds are in the ground and we’ve had some warm days. I mostly want fresh greens so if they come up enough for that, I’ll be a happy camper. I have some seeds left on the kale/collards so I can plant a very early spring crop, too.
My little garden (about 6 x 6) has woven wire around 3 sides and I think I can make a little ‘greenhouse’ with some tarp ... instead of a ‘long tunnel’, I’ll have a little square one. This little garden is the first one I’ve ever had that didn’t get out of control with weeds. We’ve been cleaning out a pole barn on the property and it looks like I’ll have enough lumber to make a couple more raised beds for next year .... I really didn’t have enough room for everything I wanted to plant .... already thinking about next spring & looking forward to those fresh veggies!
This years pumpkin crop was a flop this year. We got one 25 to 30 pounder and the rest are small and only 8 total from 3 hills 6 plants…
I'll trade you your squirrel for this overgrown rodent…
I checked my garden on Thursday and found some little caterpillars had eaten the leaves of two broccoli plants. One plant had about a dozen and the other had six. I may get to pick the first ripe oranges this weekend.
Picked the last of my zinnias this week. Mums and pansies having a blast with this changeable weather.
Runner beans are supposed to have an edible taproot, sort of like a white carrot. Mine look more like little octopuses (octopi?), I pulled some and left the rest in the ground, and piled the straw from the potato patch there. If I can keep those roots from freezing, runner beans are perennial.
Earlier this week I cooked some of my tomatoes up as soup. One of my coworkers is always raving about the tomato-basil bisque served at this one restaurant. They charge $25 a quart for it! I wanted to see if I could make it, the recipes I found look a lot like spaghetti sauce with cream added, so I made a batch of my spaghetti sauce but didn't cook it down like I usually do, and added a cup of cream at the end. Must have been good, because when I took it to the office potluck it was gone in a flash. That one coworker never even got a chance to taste it! Oh, well, I've got lots more tomatoes ripening on the table.
Depending on the weather I hope to get out to the land tomorrow. Even if i can't I at least want to get to the garden store, I need to start collecting landscaping fabric.