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CoffeeBeans

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Hah MrsMig, I haven't gotten anything other than a handful of cherry tomatoes, but I think that's a result of stealing.

Someone has caught on to the cucumber bounty. I haven't harvested one since the first week of July. The squash plants up front for the public were growing amazingly well, and then someone snapped off most of the leaves... I just don't understand.

Finally talked to the parents of the Ferry St. Girls about making sure the kids aren't unsupervised in the garden, but I'm really tempted to put up a camera and see who's really causing the damage.

After months of debate for a shed, the community center kid bought the shed, and then left it, in a box, empty, to be stolen from the garden. :cry: I just can't with these people...
 

SWest

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Aaaaaaand deer and squirrels have made off with every. Single. Tomato....

Deer: the other rodent. :rolleyes:

Hah MrsMig, I haven't gotten anything other than a handful of cherry tomatoes, but I think that's a result of stealing.

Someone has caught on to the cucumber bounty. I haven't harvested one since the first week of July. The squash plants up front for the public were growing amazingly well, and then someone snapped off most of the leaves... I just don't understand.

Finally talked to the parents of the Ferry St. Girls about making sure the kids aren't unsupervised in the garden, but I'm really tempted to put up a camera and see who's really causing the damage.

After months of debate for a shed, the community center kid bought the shed, and then left it, in a box, empty, to be stolen from the garden. :cry: I just can't with these people...

People: just plain weird most of the time. ;)

:Hug2:
 

blacbird

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:Hug2:


I think my potatoes have failed. *sigh* Though the sweet potato vines are going great-guns.

I don't know where you live, but if you are where you can successfully grow sweet potatoes, you might not be in a place where plain ol' potatoes will ever do well. Despite the American name similarity, the two are not closely related, and require very different growing conditions. Sweet potatoes are a long warm-season veg, which does well in the U.S. Southeast. The potato, native to the Andes, is a cool-weather plant that produces tubers related to a reduction in daylight hours.

I live in southern Alaska, where potatoes work magnificently. The plants thrive through most of the summer, flower, produce poisonous fruits that look like little tomatoes, then begin to look like they are dying off in late August (some variation depending on variety). Owing to this biological characteristic, it does virtually no good to put them in real early. They only start to produce tubers when the daylight conditions dictate. They actually are not dying. They have just transferred their botanical energy from producing leaves and fruit to producing tubers. And freshly-grown potatoes are truly wonderful.

But I could not possibly grow sweet potatoes up here. Thank God they're widely available in the grocery store, because I love 'em.

You might just be in a place where you won't have much luck with regular potatoes. Some things you just can't grow everywhere. I can't grow okra, or coconuts or pineapples or mangos, either.

But it is possible that something like a fungal disease is affecting them. That's the thing that caused the infamous Irish potato famine in the 19th century.

caw
 

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... I can't grow okra, or coconuts or pineapples or mangos, either.
...

caw

:roll:

Yeah, this is the first year my reg'lar potatoes have failed in like, 20 years.

I'm blaming the bugs. :D They've eaten things this year that I've never seen damaged ever (even my prickly lettuce and garlic mustard are chock-full-of-spots!). My guess is our bit of Polar Vortex this winter killed off any predatory species acclimated to the Northeast. (If I ever get back to being adequately employed, I'll look into ordering some at the beginning of the planting season.)

Wish I'd been hip to them earlier, 'cause the canola oil treatments have rescued my peas and swiss chard.
 

shakeysix

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Still out of my house. This is my 7th week of long distance gardening. The rainy weather helped but now it is REAL July--102* yesterday. The fifty mile round trip to water is a chore. So far I have been making it every other day--also helps to pop in on the contractors unannounced. There are young trees and perennials that need deep watering in this heat and wind. So far so good. The contractors have been enjoying my peppers and tomatoes--s6
 

harmonyisarine

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I've been taking a handful of wineberries for lunch every day this week!

:D

So jealous! I missed the bulk of the black/red raspberry season over here (though was in Washington in time for their raspberry/marionberry/blackberry/blueberry season, so...). I love wineberries, but I won't plant them because they are incredibly invasive and, last time I checked, hadn't made it across the Appalachians yet. I don't want to the be the reason they do. Instead I just eat all of them whenever I go to where they grow.
 

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lol
We're in the foothills of the Poconos, and people treat wineberry brambles mostly like weeds. Which is too bad, since they've quite a unique and delightful flavor. And bumblebees get a lot of value from the flowers.

I keep a tangle of wineberry on one side of the patio and wild black raspberry on the other to feed the bees. And they feed me right back.

:D
 

stormie

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Got the shock of my life yesterday evening. I was trying to get underneath the zuccini plant (which is absolutely huge now) to water it. Saw a large lump underneath on the ground. It was a four pound zuccini. I don't have time to photo it right now, but it's amazing.

Other than that, the tomatoes aren't ripening.
 

harmonyisarine

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And bumblebees get a lot of value from the flowers.

And now I want wineberry honey, but I'll never find it so long as the berries remain in the weed/invasive classification. Best I can do is hunt down some wildflower honey made in the time when the wineberries are blossoming.


In other garden news, my squashes all came down with powdery mildew while I was away. ;_; They were looking a little dusty and wilty when I watered them yesterday, and sure enough, there are spots today. The pickling cucumbers might not survive. The pumpkins were only barely touched and the zucchinis are no more than a third with a mild infestation. My dad was spraying the vineyard with fungicide today (we've got a really bad rot that takes out a good bit of the grapes even when we do spray), so he hit the squash and neighboring tomato plants on his way past. Here's hoping it worked.

In better news, peas! I had three pods today, and there are ton more ripening. I can't even save them long enough to do things with them, I just eat them as they come. I love fresh sweet peas.

And my tomatoes are also not ripening. There's a huge one that was big enough to ripen when I left two and a half weeks ago. It's still just green, but twice as big. What is this plant doing?
 

kaitie

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Has it been really hot? Tomatoes need a bit cooler temperatures to ripen. I had one summer it seemed like that sat unripe for a month before it cooled down enough, then everything turned red at once. Or you could just have a giant tomato!

My squash and zucchini plants up and died the other day. I think it's the heat. I did get two nice squash out of them, but the rest were all too immature, and they literally went from awesome and healthy to wilted and dead in about two days. I normally have problems with them weathering heat, so I think that's the problem.

I have a ton of yellow pear tomatoes growing, and several already are turning yellow, but they're tiny, the size of a grape tomato. I can't decide if I should pick them or see if they get bigger.
 

Hip-Hop-a-potamus

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I haven't been able to garden this year at ALL. Headed to Santa Barbara and the writers conference in June (with a side trip to L.A. for research), and since May my husband and I have been looking for a house.

FINALLY found one. We take possession on Aug 29th (so I've been packing, and will continue to do for the rest of the summer). A bit late in the season to start much (up here, anyway), but I'll be able to see a bit of the shade patterns for late summer early fall.

The older woman who was living there has a lovely garden in already (flowers, herbs AND vegetables!), mostly around the building perimeter, plus a huge, gorgeous deck for sitting and enjoying it.

During our long winter, there will be much painting and arranging going on inside. Come spring, I can't wait to turn a gorgeous garden into a PARADISE of even more luscious goodness! (SQUEE!!)

Here are some of the raw materials:


 
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stormie

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Has it been really hot? Tomatoes need a bit cooler temperatures to ripen. I had one summer it seemed like that sat unripe for a month before it cooled down enough, then everything turned red at once. Or you could just have a giant tomato!
Yet the weather here has been cool. We have sandy soil which is great for tomatoes. Yet they are growing. And growing. But stubbornly staying green on the vine.

My zucchini plants are producing abnormally large zucchini. So far the largest is four pounds, with others trying to catch up. I could use them as weapons.

My squash and zucchini plants up and died the other day. I think it's the heat. I did get two nice squash out of them, but the rest were all too immature, and they literally went from awesome and healthy to wilted and dead in about two days. I normally have problems with them weathering heat, so I think that's the problem.
 

Tepelus

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I have grape tomatoes turning and so far one Cherokee Purple ripening, but usually up here in Michigan the tomatoes don't start ripening until August.
 

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Another fantastically nice gentle rain for several hours late today. We continue to have the best garden season ever in the 23 years i've lived in southern Alaska.

Which brings up some failures and successes, not all entirely understood or explainable by me.

Failures: Broccoli, for some reason; not a clue. Spinach, which always seems to bolt to seed early, no matter what. Mustard, for God's sake; how can you not succeed growing mustard? Likewise arugula, which has all bolted rapidly, for unknown reasons.

Successes: Lettuce, five or six varieties, wonderful. Best of them all is Lollo rossa, an heirloom red frilly leaf lettuce I'd fecommend to everyone. Also very good small bright green container lettuces called Tom Thumb.

And numerous other unusual leafy salady things, which most people don't even know about: Mache, frilly endive, and a wondrous maroon red spinach substitute called orache. My standard spinach is also prone to bolt every year, but the orache grows more slowly and doesn't do that. Plus, it doesn't lose its color or get so slimy when cooked. I probably won't even try regular spinach next year, but plant a lot of orache.

And snap and snow peas, fabulous production this year.

Potatoes look good too, but you never know until time comes to dig 'em up in late August/early September.

A few other things seem to be going well, carrots, kale, etc. Didn't even try tomatoes up here this year. Too painful.

caw
 

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This year's mysteries are mysterious.

I'm going to try covering a small bed with plastic this fall...to see if I can keep some wild spinach and other misc. things alive along with the winter chickweed. And maybe a second round of sweet potatoes if they work out, since the leaves of the vine variety are a good substitute for all sorts of leafy vegetables. Might give me a few extra months of fresh veg anyway.

'Need to get on the engineering specifics of that evil plan...
 

shakeysix

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The weather is cool again. Unusual for here but no one is complaining. The contractors called last night--we will be moving back home this weekend. Everything is hanging on. One bed of tomatoes and peppers is flourishing, the other is a loss. The perennial bed is amazing--drifts of daisies, snaps, black eyed susans and chrysanthemums cover the weeds.

I bought the mums last year at a July closeout sale. Twenty cents a plant and since they were more dead than alive, I bought them all-- 18. Glad I did. All are thriving now--some almost two feet wide-- and beginning to bloom. They were advertised as mixed colors but so far, all are yellow. Just bought ten half dead columbines and daisies on July closeout- Hope to put them in this weekend. Fingers crossed that the columbines aren't yellow--s6
 

kaitie

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I went outside today to check on my eggplants, and they've grown massive in the past couple of days. I pulled off two that were almost two feet long (Asian, so long and thin). With my massive amount of tomatoes I've pulled off, I think I'm going to do an eggplant and squash spaghetti for dinner tomorrow or Friday. So exciting to be able to use things from the garden!

I was kind of hoping to pull enough tomatoes from the plants to do a giant vat of sauce (or freeze a bunch), but I'm not sure how well that's going to do. I saved them from the spider mites, but the plants are still looking pretty iffy, and they aren't putting out many tomatoes anymore. But I should get at least a couple of good meals out of them. :)
 

harmonyisarine

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~Makes a note to try planting orache next year~

The squashes are all definitely infected with powdery mildew, but I think we sprayed in time that the zucchini and pumpkins might actually survive. I'll have to keep an eye on them and re-spray if it looks like it starts to spread again, or to dose the new leaves. The pickling cucumbers should have been dead by now but aren't, so who knows, maybe they'll pull through as well.

Tomatoes are still mostly green, but we have one that's turning! I'm so excited. And the Brandywine Pinks are getting huge.

My green onions are nearing harvest. I'm so excited.
 

blacbird

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I'm going to try covering a small bed with plastic this fall

I'd recommend a big pile of organic compost. Dead leaves work well, but almost any kind of vegetative matter will suffice. Cover that wth plastic if you wish, but the bed will be happier having the organic material over it. The natual composting process provides some heat, as well as organic matter into the soil.

Rake it off in spring, and proceed forward.

caw
 

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Compost works well over the chickweed, but I'd like to keep some plants that grow Up...which will involve providing coverage from drying wind and snow/ice. So my plan is to basically engineer a mini greenhouse that will easily disassemble and store away.

I love fresh greens in the winter, but never have enough space/light indoors to keep them on the scale I'd like.
 

mrsmig

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Damn stinkin' deer.

That is all.