Garden 2006
The 2005 thread was in Quality Images, but there doesn't have to be an image to post to this thread. I just thought I would maybe keep a garden thread again and if anyone else has things growing, you post them along too.
Jacquelita and I bought the seeds for this year, the plan involves:
1. BASIL MARSEILLE
2. THYME ENGLISH
3. ORGANIC HERB - ITALIAN OREGANO
4. BROCCOLI PACKMAN HYBRID
5. BRUSSELS SPROUTS DIABLO HYBRID
6. CARROT POT O GOLD HYBRID
7. CARROT SCARLET NANTES
8. SPINACH MELODY HYBRID
9. SQUASH CREAMY IMPROVED II HYB.
10. TOMATO PLUM DANDY HYBRID
11. TOMATO BIG BEEF VFFNT
12. TOMATO GLORY
I think I could handle a third 8x3' bed. Let's see, one tomato and herbs, one broccoli and carrots and squash, one spinach and brussels sprouts.
No zucc on this order. The squash will be enough.
Thanks UT. I'll try to hold up my redneck garden end. But goodfriday is late this year. Most old folks around here never plant till then. I might cheat.
Good Friday? :eek: Up home we couldn't plant anything but peas before Memorial day.
right now.. I have seedling started for
red peppers
sweet basil
royal opal basil
fennel
dill weed
roma and grape tomatoes
shallots (well.. not seedlings obviously)
elephant garlic
living down here gives me access to about a 1/4 acre of prime georgia soil. although I don't have the time to work that much land.. the idea surely is tempting.
on a side note, my father who knows quite a bit about plants and gardening brought this little tid-bit to my attention.. apple trees don't breed true to species.. which has me wanting to plant a ton of apple trees just to see what I get. jhonny appleseed be damned!
I've got a few going... I winter sowed some Nigella and Convolvulus. It's my first time winter sowing, so we'll see what happens.
Downstairs I have some Imperial Star artichokes (one popped up today!!), and some Beaverlodge plum tomatoes (which all popped up in about three days and have grown 1/2" just today - freaky).
Tonight my son planted some misc. annual seeds.
I have all of my materials on order for the greenhouse I'm going to build in the back yard, but they won't make it until the next barge which is 2 weeks away. :( I hope I can get it done before we take off on our trip.
This is the first year that I will be able to garden since our house burned down, so I am probably going to be giving my soul to the local garden center. (but seeing that my soul is probably overdrawn, it won't do them much good).
You are all very ambitious, dedicated gardners. I am going with more lavender, sage, climbing rose (red one--my house is white with black shutters), pumpkins and new peonies in the back and maybe some new evergreen bushes (holly?) for front.
Perhaps some hardy daisy type thing for next to the driveway.
I imagine we'll have several bean and pea varieties, some carrots, maybe corn (although we lose so much corn to the raccoons it's hardly worth it). Green onions, red onions, tomatoes, some cilantro, cayenne or habanero peppers, and if i'm lucky, some okra. Growing okra in Colorado is pretty hilarious -- you get a knee-high plant, if you're lucky, with maybe 2 okras a week on it. Our cousins in MS get a kick out of that -- they send pics of okra plants that are 7 feet tall.
Gardening time is the only time I get jealous of all my southern relatives.
Blimey, didn't realise we had a horticultural section here as well!
The wife's the expert here - she has a penchant for growing cherry tomatoes in hanging baskets amongst other things (I think peppers are in there somewhere, but in normal pots as opposed to being suspended and hanging several feet above ground level) - the greenhouse is about due for its spring clean and seeding session I believe. Flower-wise it was geraniums mainly last year - not sure what's in store for 2006 -I'll try to get a rundown to add to those above...
The soil is poor in upstate NY. Still...getting my hands dirty is one thing I miss a lot. Three or four pots of tomatoes and such will have to suffice.
Extracting some info from SWMBO - hanging basket tomatoes are Tumbling Toms which will be repeated this year - excellent heavy croppers , very sweet. Waiting for the decision on the variety to be potted at ground level - last year's didn't have the flavour. Also learned that the pots need to be thoroughly cleaned and compost changed to prevent any return of last year's leaf blight. Looks like peppers in the green house - again waiting to learn which variety.
Sounds nice. I, however, have a black thumb. If it can't make a noise to tell me it needs food or water then I will forget it exists.
Just have to plug our community garden for seniors that won a 2005 greening award. Here is a bike basket delivery shot from last summer. Going to plan more for this year.
Meanwhile, an 8" wet march snowstorm just pinned some of my baby trees to the mat this morning. awful pretty though.
That's a hell of a basket. A load of zucchinis could blow out the tire.:lol:
Its true. Mostly beans, carrots, tomatos, peppers, and herbs. If we had the UT/Jax bumper of zuchs, it would require a trailer.
all the raw ingredients for homemade salsa are headed for our garden:
roma tomatoes
tomatillos (yes, together!)
bell peppers (green, red, yellow)
jalapenos (and other hot ones: cowhorns, anaheims, pimentos...)
garlic
onions
cilantro (aka coriander)
basil
limes (still have to come from the store)
I can't wait to fire up the ol' cuisinart! The 2 of us can go thru a 1/2 gal. container in a single standing.
jalapenos (and other hot ones: cowhorns, anaheims, pimentos...)
I can't wait to fire up the ol' cuisinart! The 2 of us can go thru a 1/2 gal. container in a single standing.
Are you standing because of the "hot ones", you had the day before? :lol:
yes, the one's that burn at both ends...
gosh, i miss my garden so much it hurts! this will be my 2nd year without one (i'm in a disgusting rental) and i think i feel more of a lack of identity because of it than i do because of my divorce! (geez, that would be a whole 'nother thread, huh). but anywhoo...my all-time faves are:
--old flame tomato, red with yellow/orange stripes and intense tomato flavor
--sungold cherry tomato, little orange beauties so sweet even my tomato-gagging son ate them right out of the garden
--silver and golden queen sweet corn, yes, i know -SO overdone- but just performed so well and tasted so good
--red oakleaf lettuce, i don't know if the taste was all that great, but i had such good luck with it
i think i've tried everything under the sun (other than okra, cuz...ucky).
this year i'll have to try things in pots again. does anybody have any recommendations for tasty tomatoes, beans, or other garden goodies? i sucked at that game last year.:headshake
I've had nothing but bad luck growing things in pots... other than houseplants and herbs.. but michigan bulb company has some good deals on strawberries/golden raspberries and blueberries that are made to grow in pots.. check the website out, they are a good company.. and the lifetime guarantee is toot-sweet
i've never ordered from them cuz a few years ago they were voted "absolute worst" in quality of plants and customer service along with springhill nursery on some gardening forum i stumbled onto. but...not everyone had a bad experience, just most people. the thing is, for the price, maybe what you get is what you should expect. like shopping at wally-world compared to saks. have you tried any of their fruits or veggies? i'd at least like tomatoes and green beans!:yum:
I have 23 maters. 8 better bush, 1 grape, 1 cherry sweet 100, some marion, celebirty and arkansas traveler.
3 cayenne, 3 habanero, 3 jalapeno. 3 black beauty eggplants, 3 ichidan.
12 cucumbers and 40 ft. of LA. purple pod beans.
No rain here in 2 weeks and none in forcast. Hello water and sewer bill.
This one tells me that server is busy, forget it. :smack:
Tomatoes in front, broccoli in back. It seems warm but the last frost danger is still two weeks away.
Our spring is late this year - this is the first weekend without a frost. Mrs CF is getting ready to pot sow her tomatoes only now. Our Star Magnolia is finally out in bloom - will try to get a photo when it reaches its peak. Still alot more to flower - Cherry blossom a long way off, Camelias just coming out along with Forsythia.
PS - you've no time for gardening, UT, what with all them rock bands to sort out and all....
The pics of the Star Magnolia - a little way to go, but not far off best as some of the existing blooms will disappear as others open, now - one picture from each side:
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Today's picture is certainly showing even more flowers (plus opportunity to try out the new camera!):
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CF - oh my gosh that is so beautiful!!! Do the flowers have any scent?
them is pirty pics, cylefrance....
But Im with warch: habeneros
(although I like the low maintance stuff: impatients, perry winkles, boston ferns, snap dragons, mexican heather, honeysuckle vines, wondering jews, mexican sage, dewberry vines, grapevines, weeds, sun flowers, xtra large elephant ears, popcorn trees, and some half dozen things i got at walmart, I forget their names... )
Know what you mean Tiddy, but Have to leave that to Mrs CF - she's the expert there (put herself through an RHS cours as well) - me, I'm more likely to finish them off if I get near plants. My gardening is limited to mowing the lawn, chopping up logs, any heavy pruning that's needed, and erecting any structures that Mrs CF wants - oh, and, of course, managing the bonfires!
AhhhHUMMMMMM Mr Cycle:
"erecting any structures that Mrs CF wants - oh, and, of course, managing the bonfires!"
Now where might those pics be, please?
You can trust me, I wouldn't be a posting those pics where the 989 guests might be observing the erectal of the day images.
Meant to post these last week - final shot of the star magnolia - about as good as it gets, now the leaves are taking over - and two pics of the camelias which are at their peak as well.
Hopefully in a couple of weeks or so the rhododendrons will be out - we had an amazing display last year and it looks as though there may be a repeat this year....
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Because I live across the road from the beach I only grow sand, gull feathers and chip wrappers here, but down at the allotment there is spinach, cabbage, new potatoes, toms of various sorts, courgettes, carrots, peppers, mint & parsley, sunflowers, and a little something to add interest to winter stews and summer kebabs.
we planted this Asperagus last year , bu next year we should be able to start cuttin some of it ,
<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/11268176@N00/146426119/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://static.flickr.com/49/146426119_8dae4b87e4_o.jpg" width="1280" height="960" alt="DSCF1293" /></a>
Oh and Oliver just had to be in the pic as well !!!
What oliver? What picture? :eyebrow:
The tomato seedlings that we started are all dead now. I had forgotten to harden them before transplanting. This is where you leave the indoor plants outdoors for a few hours at a time, so they get used to it, until they are fully ready to transplant.
So instead, we have now put in pre-started plantings, now we'll see how hardy these things are. It surprised me to see that Bonnie Plants uses the same hybrid tomato plant that the seed company offered.
Carrots are planted and little shoots are showing. We are going to have too many. On purpose.
UT what the HELL is up , I can't seem to post pics !!!
No more HTML my friend, it allows a few holes which the hackers have been able to bother us with. Try using the Go Advanced editor and use the image button to enter the http address.
Roger that !!!
Try #2
try #3
Asparagus is a very cool looking plant. I'm to shady to grow it, though.
I had to finally chop down my ailing birch tree clump this past weekend. Snif. It was in major dieback. I replaced it with a native pagoda dogwood sproutlet. Had to put it in a wire cage to discourage the herd of bunnies from chomping it.
Planted tomatos, Kale, cabages, and herbs. Oh, and lots of nasturtums.
I have a clematis that is about to pop, I will try and share a picture.
I think we just ducked a hard frost here last night. I got out early and sprinkled the plants just in case. We've got tomatoes and peppers growing and a bunch of salad stuff ready to sprout along with beans squash cukes and potatoes. Asparagus I need to check on, we've eaten some but our beds just don't appear that productive.
We haven't had enough warm weather, Griff. :headshake
all the raw ingredients for homemade salsa are headed for our garden:
roma tomatoes
tomatillos (yes, together!)
bell peppers (green, red, yellow)
jalapenos (and other hot ones: cowhorns, anaheims, pimentos...)
garlic
onions
cilantro (aka coriander)
basil
limes (still have to come from the store)
I can't wait to fire up the ol' cuisinart! The 2 of us can go thru a 1/2 gal. container in a single standing.
Poor neighbors.:yeldead:
I love those boston terriers, they crack me up.
I love those boston terriers, they crack me up.
Are you going to get some seeds? :redface:
you must be a boston terrier
We haven't had enough warm weather, Griff. :headshake
We had frost on the windshields but the 'maters still stand! Of course, the chickens were in the garden excavating so who knows what seeds are left.:mad:
Rhododendrons just about ready to give their best - will get an up-to-date photo tomorrow, but meantime here are two showing them first two weeks ago, and then last week:
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And a close up of the light pink ones that seem to be bloom early:
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I do, I do represent zone 4!
I need to get a camera rollin' 'cause its prime lovely time here: Peonies flopping their flouncy thangs; Japanese Iris starting, cranes bill, honeysuckles, mock orange, coral bells, yah!
It has been so beautiful here, not too too hot, just enough rain but not too much. the greens are loving it. Friday, and time to lounge in the Beer Garten!
I am going Saturday to work on the community veggie plot. We have baby pea spriglets a plenty, the herb patch is rockin, the salad greens are rocketing, and we'll will slam in some tomato freebie starts.
I love this time of year.
Possibly the last pics of the rhododendrons - I think they're at their peak now. Look good but were better last year - more abundant. Maybe 2007 will be better...
First pic taken at the weekend and second one taken today
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Carrots
Brussels Sprouts, which already have that sort of Brusselly Sprouty leaf to them.
Tomatoes, from Bonnie Plants plants. We have a ton of these vines in and I expect by fall we will be marketing Cellar Brand Spaghetti Sauce.
Rosemary, also Bonnie. We also have in basil, sage, oregano, thyme, spinach and beets.
Good, you can cater your reception. ;)
I've picked 7 maters so far. About 12 gals. purple beans. 7 gals. cucumbers and some hot pepper. A few eggplants. No rain in about 6 weeks.
Seven gallons of cukes? DAMN. My cukes just got in the ground a few days ago, only two true leaves. Today I lifted the row covers to have a peak and one entire row of pickling cukes was completely GONE. not a trace. the other row was just leaf skeletons. Oddly whoever didn't eat the cotyledons, just the true leaves.
I'm too stressed to care. I'm looking at next year.
Also a new bastard woodchuck has taken up residnece under my shed, He ate 2/3 of my parsnip plant that I am letting go to seed. Today the brazen rodent kept running out to eat things whenever I went to the other side of the house to get a tool. I walked up to him with the paslode framing nailer and from about five feet I fired a couple of 3 1/2 framing nails at him. Since the thing doesn't really have sights, per se, my aim was a bit high and the nail missed him.
That's my gardening story this year.
Things to try:
1. Cat fur. Stuff it into the woodchuck's hole. The one that the beast dug, not the female woodchuck's hole. That might be dangerous.
2.
This.Trap.
Rock up the entry/exit holes (for me it was a garage one year, a porch the second...)
Drive to Wisconsin.
Toss into ravine.
Repeat.
I have some noisy-ass crows that tempt me to rethink my position on gun ownership. They think my bird baths are their personal killing fields. Regularly I find them dunking bagels, or creating a lovely soup from some slaughterd baby bird. Ick. That's not the zen garden I envisioned. Blam!
In the home plot, I just put in some stumpy carrots, some fennel, some chard, detroit red beets, and I am trying some bush beans in a random back spot, to see if I get any quantity- it might be too shady.
I am trying some natural bug pest guard- cottonseed and rosemary oil. Hmmm.
Import natural predators. If Jack can tree a bear,...
So far, I'm most enamoured of Wolf's # 2 suggestion, it's the gearhead in me I suppose.
I am going to trap it with a have a heart trap and then I am going to relocate it as per my wife's desires. ([COLOR=White]relocate it somewhere off this mortal coil, or to woodchuck camp, or to the bottom of the creek[/COLOR])
I have also been carrying on a harrassment campign which includes firing the paslode through the spaces in the porch floorboards, (emotional satisfaction really) I'm hoping for the have a heart trap since I live surrounded by neighbors and the only high vantage point (for downward shooting) does not have a good sight line of the holes. If I could find a nice supressor for the .17 or .22 that would take care of my other concern about shooting in the village.
I have several of those 77s......a two liter supressor is cheap. ;)
a little research and it seems all the really good things are illegal.
I got rid of a woodchuck a couple of years ago by trapping it. Afterwards a friend told me that the best way to discourage them is to put used cat litter clumps at the entrance to their holes. I can send you lots of clumps if you need them!
My uncle uses that to get rid of trespassing bow hunters, works beautifully!
Thanks Katkeeper, we're plenty stocked w/ clumps.
:)
Sorry about the size of these huge garden images.
Or, enjoy. This is the new 8x5 bed and as you can see it's happenin'. From top, it's 4 brussels sprouts, 2 rosemary, 1 sage, carrot rows and at lower right is a jalapeno plant. Not visible are beets and a row of marigolds along the edge.
Pearl checks everything out and here you can see the tomato staking operation
The brussels sprouts are really impressive, in how fast they're growing.
The herbs are slow to start, but the spinach is taking off.
The first tomato. It's so early for this. We are going to have hundreds.
Chuck update:
Caught him /her after a tip from an informant pointed out cherry tomatoes as bait. CAught in less than ten minutes.
He didn't even realize he was in the trap.
SWMBO got all peta on me and insisted I release it. So I drove it to the part of the state froest where I saw a Barred owl last year. Not to mention the fox and coyotes...
Chuck update:
SWMBO got all peta on me and insisted I release it. So I drove it to the part of the state froest where I saw a Barred owl last year. Not to mention the fox and coyotes...
LMAO and slap my knee!! I love it!
cues Disney Lion King theme...
Garden enjoys all this rain. Carrots are about half done.
Large bed doing well. Lower half carrots, upper half brussels sprouts, in between are rosemary and sage and beets.
and jalapeno.
The other beds. the bare-looking one is mostly herbs and they are slow to take off. The spinach has taken yellow after all the rain. I fed it.
Beets. Not doing great, I think this is because I used a low grade of seed. Live and learn.
The worst problem is that the tomatoes have aphids. I have been using an organic approach to this problem so far: I pick them off by hand. This has kept it under control but I don't look forward to continuing the job all summer.
Beets prefer a poor soil, too much NPK and you won't get beets.
re aphids. Order a couple handfulls of ladybugs. Aphids are history. Totally organic. And it works.
UT. Aphids are the worst I've seen in years on maters. Think I sprayed so much hurt the maters. So dry the ants moved in an ate them. A few photos.
1 a photo of better bush.
next a shot of ? that has fell over the cage.
Then Cherry sweet 100, which must be over 6' tall and so thick it's hard to pick.
mmmm... yummy. What kind of peppers are you growing there?
Wonderful . I am a bit of an obsessive pepper person myself . I recently had the luck to come across a second-hand book called 'The Cuisines of Mexico' by Diana Kennedy , 1972 . Her chapter on 'chilies : fresh and dried' is a work of art . Well , the whole book is a work of art .
It's carrot harvest day. Foggy carrot harvest day
Some carrots are obscene.
Uhh doesent that need a NSFW ????
Ack! Big hail storm here on Monday. Beat the hell out of leafy things- cabbage, kale, chard. Hostas look like hell, too. Bush Beans a bit tattered, but I got the pods off the ground and they should be ok.
I have some big green tomatos, they got dinged/bruised, but are still on the vine. We'll see what happens.
I wish I had a camera. Minutes after the storm, the ground was completely covered with iceballs. snow in july, then back to high 90s.
Just had the whole guilt trip for not having a pretty garden wiped out. Four straight days of 113-115F temperatures took the whole thing out of my hands. Whoopee, gotta start all over again just when my hyperextension of the knees from the last planting phase was healing and I can walk again :thepain:
Oh no! Its become the garden disaster thread!
Those carrots are in mah bellah now, via an incredible beef stew that put five unneeded pounds onto my frame.
As far as disasters go, the enormous amount of soakage we've had has been great for some things, but hell on the spinach it seems, which simply won't grow right at this point no matter what. Everything else seems to like it.
Been a while. The heavy rains of May/June turned into hot dryness in the last six weeks. This set up two lots of ripening small tomatoes, and in the last three weeks we made two big batches of chunky maranara which simply could not be beat. The whole thing needs more watering/feeding right now but we can't even use the mates we have brought in. So far there have been about 40 plum tomatoes and 30 "slicers" of varying quality. And a few rotten ones to leave around the edges of the box so that the local rabbit eats those and not the whole ones on the vine.
Gardening is easy! Last year I threw the rotten toms into the wood pile. And this year, I found these three extremely large and healthy vines growing out of the wood pile. These are now staked and will produce probably 20 excellent fruits. I didn't do anything - I *found* them when they were three feet tall and in better shape than the "real" vines.
The brussels sprouts slowly continue.
Once the carrots were pulled, the butternut squash vine magically decided it was time to expand and take up the entire space where the carrots had been.
The results so far are two absolutely perfect, beautiful squash fruits. Can't wait until these are ready in the fall!
I *found* them when they were three feet tall and in better shape than the "real" vines.
Sounds to me like you are conducting a strain improvement program in your back yard. You should take some fruit from this plant and toss it into the woodpile again to see what happens next summer.
Good looking carrots there UT and I am so drooling over your Brussel sprouts. I love those things..:yum:
I am only growing flowers. This year they took along time to get strong because of the surrounding arbovite having a desease so my blooms are just getting big and lush. The miniature rose has so many buds on it and so does the snap dragon. I guess my pride dosn's show through in the photos too well.
My fushia are just comming up. I have a standard kind then one with little pink delicate flowers. The pot behind the snap dragons is an Azalea. It has a graphed red stem amoungst white. It is really sepectacular when it is feeling well. The pot behind the rose are wild flowers mostly poppys. We have mild falls so I expect these to be still blooming way into october.
damn, I thought this thread was going to be about Westminster :(
If this works well, 1st photo is of my pepper. About the only thing left alive around here. No flappin rain.
Next one is of what I picked today. May try something new this time. Let them have a go in blender before I bottle.
I'm mostly growing crab grass but our tomato crop is very heavy. Pete put up a lot of sauce Saturday.
Our "garden" is sad. We put a fence around it to keep the bunnies away, which makes weeding it a much harder chore. So we don't weed. Picture a few wilted tomato plants hidden in a clot of tall grass.
Next year, I'll really figure something out. Next year...
We're doing well with tomatoes, too. They are liking the new spot. greens are going well- kale, romaine, chard. Yesterday made a tasty improvised batch of penne with sausage, tomato, kale.
I am dumbstruck by how beautiful the red cabage is. Its like purple-grey silk. I'll do more next year. I am planning to renovate for more edible garden realestate. Eggplant, more beans are on the docket for 2007.
busterb, I keep comming back to this thread to see the beautiful pepper plant of yours. I didn't know you could grow one in a hanging pot. I'll try that one day.
glatt,To keep bunnies out maybe you could try raising your garden plot?
We cleared out the garden yesterday , this is the LAST of it ,
Responding as a cook and an artist, it looks like a great harvest!
Zip. My 1st year for the long eggplants. Thereee Greatttt. tony sound. :duh:
Zippyt, don't you live in like zone 85 or something? I thought you guys could grow bananas in February down there. Right now we have tons of Collards and swiss chard. Also a few Broccoli that may yet head out.
Any good Collard recipes from down south?
zone 85 or something? WTF ????
Responding as a cook and an artist, it looks like a great harvest!
All i did was till and help put down the plastic sheeting , Carol did ALL the rest , we have LOOOOOOTS of tomato sauce base in the freezer !!!!
long eggplants. Thereee Greatttt.
We have had MANY different eggPlant dishes this year
Any good Collard recipes from down south?
PORK FAT RULES !!!!!
After messing up my legs so early in the season, and then going through a plague of budworms, slugs, and temperatures of 116F, it's amazing to me that the plants on the back patio lived and made such a great recovery last month. Here's a photo taken with my birthday digital camera, came out pretty nice, didn't it? Are you sure you don't want me to post the other 600 shots of T'Pau, Queen of the Universe? :D
That looks Beautimus Tonchi !!!
zone 85 or something? WTF ????
http://mgonline.com/zonemap.html
OK maybe not 85, but yer up there.
Thanks, zippyt. Your results are beautifully edible though, the only edible plant I had which made it through the tribulations was chives. There is basil on the patio at the bottom right, but I confess that it was purchased the day I took the photo.
