Garden Update

It's been a busy week, and my husband has been good about hogging the computer and camera because the semester is winding down for him.  I have definitely had some time to do some gardening though!  I'm sorry this will probably be a long post, and probably heavy on the pictures.

Gardening evidence

Thursday 4/28:
Transplanted all 20 tomatoes and 20 peppers, as well as three marigolds, and a basil plant. *I decided that whatever it was that was harming my tomatoes (which no one could seem to really get an idea about... best guess was edema) hadn't killed them yet, there was no wilting, and what was left looked as if it had "hardened over", I figured I'd bite the bullet and put them in the ground before I'd waited too long.

I also was able to bring over the transplants to Mandi to fill her second 4 by 8 bed.  It's nice to see things filling out in her bed. I go over there about once a week.  It's so much fun to see a weeks worth of growth at a time!

This was a three hour gardening evening.  It was a lot of work, but worthwhile.  I have the most ridiculous looking tomato stakes out there (culled lumber at Home Depot- 20 8 ft 1x2's cost me around $3.00) They'll work though, and since I still can't find myself a nursing job, saving money is a higher priority than things looking nice.

Part of the work included gathering up this year's potential Maple Forest-- I have two maple trees around my house, and another in the neighbors' yard, so everywhere gets loaded with those helicopter seeds. I don't feel I had as many to pick up as last year.  Maybe they're not all down yet. I'm hoping it's not that.


Saturday 4/30:
I stole Granny's idea with pots from Dollar Tree, drilled holes in them, and transplanted two zucchini, and two yellow squash.  I know 2.5 gallons is nowhere near the right size for squash, but I don't want to be feeding the neighbors with squash, and my broccoli is nowhere NEAR done, as I had hoped... (which is where I had planned to interplant my squash initially) so it's an experiment.  Who doesn't love a good experiment every now and then.  I know I'll be watering them at least twice a day once our June and July heat rolls around, but I wanted to give it a try. My squash was obliterated by the combination of squash bugs and squash vine borers last year, that I figure using containers may be an easier way to contain pests.

I wasn't planning on doing more than those four plants that day, and my husband was hoping to leave after I was finished to go to make a Home Depot trip, but he had to ask me if I was going to put the rest of the pots on the patio away now, since I'd planted in those four. I told him I had plans for them, and away those plans went.

I potted up cilantro, and garlic chives into one pot (the other one in the photo with the zucchini)

I put impatiens in another, and a cayenne pepper in another one. (I didn't have room for the cayenne pepper in my garden, and I read peppers do well in containers anyway)

That got the ball rolling, so that's when I planted some of the basil into the ground, some more cilantro went into the ground, as well as a few cucumber transplants.

(Edamame and bush beans were up today as well!)

Sunday 5/1:  All tomatoes and peppers (and any other plants I have grown for others) have been delivered, with the exception of my next-door neighbor, but she just got back from vacation, and didn't want to plant them just yet. I still have close to 20 extra tomatoes, and a few jalapenos left.  I think the neighbor next to them is going to at least be offered a few plants.  I am constantly getting requests for tomatoes, and they are putting "dibs" on my strawberries this year, so I think I'm going to let them grow some of their own! :)  (If I have runners from my strawberries that I can give them this year, I plan to do that as well!!) Fortunately, I should be in excess with my strawberries this year, the plants are just LOADED with blossoms and small berries already!

I have had some small harvests, and have been able to use some in meals, but I'll save those pictures for tomorrow.

I can hardly believe it is May already! We're going to have to start watching our turtles behavior in the evening.  It's about the time for egg laying, and I don't want to miss it and end up tossing eggs around in the compost pile when it gets turned! It was May 13th last year when Eleanor laid her clutch of eggs, and May 20 something the year before. We've got 4 females, who we KNOW have the opportunity to have had them fertilized this year, so we're going to be on the lookout! I am REALLY hoping for some little turtle babies this year!

Garden Update

I knew it'd get like this around this point in the year. Plants are growing, but not quickly enough for a harvest, and so I feel like I have nothing to write about.

I did pull all of my peas, so that I have space for my cucumbers. I'm hoping they survive the transplant. I read they don't like that, so we'll see. They were already flowering and I just had to finally get them in the ground.

My peas had yellowed half way up the vines, and I was no longer religious about picking them, so they were plumping too much for my taste. I picked what was on there, and yanked all of the vines out. I've got several gallon bags of snap peas ready for stir fry and other vegetable concoctions to come.

After I got all of the pea vines out, this poor scrawny tomato finally got some room to breathe. Look at how much it has had to reach to just get some sunlight! It's my only Striped Pasted tomato plant, so I hope it can recover!

I've yet to see any heads forming on my broccoli, even though the plants are massive at this point! I have no idea if it will still set with the heat, because I don't really know much about broccoli!

My lettuce is beginning to bolt, and we've barely eaten it. It's so pretty out there, that I just have a hard time bringing myself to harvest it! It's probably completely bitter by now anyway. It's still pretty though, and I'm okay with that.

Here are some of the tomatoes forming. I'm hoping these cherry tomatoes start changing colors this week, they are starting to have some give to them, and they look like they're almost there! The second picture is my most anticipated tomato right now. It's the biggest "normal" tomato I've got growing right now. It's from a Delicious plant (the plant the currently holds the title for the largest tomato, somewhere in the seven pound range). I just really want an open-faced tomato sandwich! Many of my heirloom tomatoes have LOADS of blossoms, but no fruit yet. Kind of disappointing. The tomato I'm looking forward to the most is my Pineapple tomato from Baker Creek Heirloom seeds, but that one has yet to set any fruit. Those plants are my healthiest looking as far as foliage goes, so I'm not sure what the deal is.

This is our newest addition to the turtle pack. I wasn't interested in adding to them, other than with potential babies from the turtles we already have. My husband saw this one almost get crushed, and when he pulled over to move it, he saw she already was missing a back leg, so he decided she'd probably fare better away from traffic. She's way smaller than the rest of the turtles we have, she's probably only two years old... about the size of the palm of my hand. We haven't come up with a name for her yet, hard to top Ilene (our other turtle with three legs).

Lastly, this is what the garden looked like today. I wish I had a photo splicer of some sort, so that I could connect these pictures. Probably the only downside to having a Mac. I used to use MS Paint to do that, but I don't have any software that I can do that with now.

Seedling Update

Thanks to Amy and Sunny for following my blog!

I've worked the past two nights (and my LAST two for a WHILE!) and while I've gotten to check on my garden, I haven't really had a chance to do much else. The weather has been phenomenal. It's supposed to drop tonight, with a high of 59 tomorrow, but back into the 70s by Saturday, and everyday for the next week after that!

My tomatoes are itching to get outside! My peppers are taking off, and will be potted up soon

(if I have ANY room left!) I've got to go buy some more potting soil to fill my newspaper pots because I ran out. I've planted my yellow squash, zucchini, spaghetti squash, cucumbers, watermelon, and cantaloupe all inside in

newspaper pots, and all but four or five of them have sprouted and the only ones that haven't are the yellow squash and one or two of the zucchini. I plan on planting a few extras straight in the garden when the time is right, but I figured if I could get a head start, it wouldn't hurt, especially since I won't even be coming close to using a whole seed packet! I'm especially excited about my Moon & Stars watermelon variety that I'm trying this year!

Here are a couple of side by sides from four days apart. (April 3-April 7)

I think I'm going to start hardening off my tomatoes next week. I'll finally have the time home to be carting them in and out, and the weather couldn't be nicer. I don't have 30 some milk gallons though, in the event of a frost, so I'll have to figure something out... I'm also going to have to figure out something to stake them with this year, I really want to do that when I plant them this time! I didn't do it right away last year, because I was unsure if my plants would even make it, they'd been purple and had shown no sign of growth for a while when I stuck them in the ground last year. Not staking tomatoes made for a REALLY messy garden. I spent several hours late in the season tying my vines up with one by twos just to try to get them off the ground, after we'd lost several to something that dug into the garden and was getting to them from the bottom.

I planted radishes on both ends of the garden, and though one side sprouted earlier than the other, it is significantly behind the other in terms of growth. I also can't figure out why I don't have any growth on my spinach or lettuce. Could it be the heat? Do I need to be feeding them with something? I was hoping that stuff would take off, and it just really hasn't.

Left Side

Right Side

Peas are still doing beautifully, as are the strawberries!

It was supposed to storm today, but that didn't really ever happen, so I'm going to go spend some time outside enjoying the new and refreshing green!

Things are getting greener! Happy Gardening to all!