Local advice for veggie growing please

I'm close to Philadelphia, growing veggies in containers for the first time ever and I'm not really sure how they are doing. Sometimes I think they look quite good - they're growing new leaves, feel strong and firm etc. but they don't seem to have got much bigger recently. Most of them are blossoming/ setting fruit. People posting photos seem to be from southern states where their plants have been growing longer so I'm not sure if mine are doing ok for this area or if I should be trying to help them along somehow.

I'm growing cherry tomatoes, roma tomatoes, bell peppers, cucumbers, carrots, lettuce, peas, spring onions - all container variety, all grown from seed. Can anyone describe how/ what their plants are doing just now or post some photos and let me see so I can gauge how mine are doing?

My peas (I think) have done quite well - I have eaten some! - although they are beginning to dry up, I think it's been too hot for them recently.

Thanks!

Hi gmun
Well, my plants are in the ground but my zone is not that different from yours I don't think.
My peas are also bearing but it will soon be too hot for them.
My tomatos have just started to bloom and are about two feet tall.
Cukes are about two feet, starting to climb the cage. Peppers are eight inches tall with a dozen leaves or so.Lettuce was planted too thick and with radishes so it is very spindly. and bolting anyway. The radishes bolted couple weeks ago with no chance to eat any roots.

Thanks, that is very helpful!

My tomatoes are only around a foot tall but they are in containers and are container varieties, so maybe this is normal...? I am trying to find some photos on google image. They have been blossoming for a couple of weeks now (the cherries, the romas are just starting) and I have some green ones growing but I think maybe I should have pinched off the first blossoms but I didn't know that then. My cucumbers are probably about the same as yours, maybe just under the 2ft and my peppers are a bit smaller but they are starting to bloom.

I think maybe I should be looking for something to feed them now, I used an organic potting mix that said it fed continuously for 2 months and they did seem to grow well initially, so maybe that would help. Can anyone recommend an organic feed?

Lots of people like Espoma products. That sounds like a good idea. I've read that fertilizer in bagged soil isn't always still all there by the time you use it.

hi gmun! I'm in MD I've got green peppers in pots and dh had to have two of those upside down tomato planters from Gardeners Supply lol! In any event, the peppers are doing pretty good, they've just finished blooming, so hope to see fruit soon. The tomatos one is blooming now, the other is/has bloomed and set fruit two tomatos thus far. Oh and I'm growing strawberries in a hanging basket and those are making loads of berries and keep blooming! I don't fertilize though, i mix my potting soil with compost from my compost bin and plant in that lol, I just never remember to put fertilizer in or on anything at all. I know a lot of times, my plants look stunted if they are getting the right water to sun mix! Have fun and good luck!

thank you! I went to a lovely local garden centre and the lady recommended Dr Earth fertilizer so I got one that does all veggies and applied it yesterday. My plants seemed to be doing really well at first, but over the last couple of weeks they don't seem to have grown so much and the tomatoes were flowering and then not setting fruit (there is already fruit growing though) so I was a bit worried because I really don't know what I'm doing!! Today my first cherry tomato is turning red though, so hopefully that is a sign of good things to come!!

That's great! Don't let a deer eat it...
What size pot is that in?

I think it's just about 8-10", I had extra tomatoes (couldn't kill the seedlings!) after I had planted the biggest ones into buckets. I managed to give some away and had a few extra so they've been planted up gradually as they outgrew their little pots and strangely they seem to be doing better than the ones in the large containers!! They are a patio/ container variety of tomatoes, not supposed to get very large anyway.

And the deer won't get it, it's on my deck and we have a makeshift barricade across the steps - actually because of a very brave and curious groundhog that left muddy footprints one night!

We are running very far behind. Last year I had cherry tomatoes on my patio in containers with some ornamental peppers. The Grandchildren ate them right off the vine like they were candy. This year we didn't get them planted. What I have in the Veggie Garden is going to town but the weeds are so bad you can barely find them. The spinach is stating to flower and my lettuce is huge. Peas didn't do well, the morning Doves ate a lot of the seeds so we reseeded and found them back in there scratching them up again. Sorry I can't be more help this year.

Thank you for your reply. My spinach was a disaster, started to flower before the leaves got any size so I gave up on it quickly, I think it was the early heat!

My fertilizer seems to have helped - my tomatoes are all setting more fruit again and I have a couple more cucumber flowers and things look like they are growing again.

Really nice to hear what other people are growing in the same area so thanks for all the replies :)

My spinach was horrible too. I am going to try for fall greens. I was very happy last year with how long the greens kept growing into winter.

Ric has the Veggie Garden almost completely weeded now. We found the beets and they have been stripped of leaves from a small GH. With all those weeds did he have to go for the Veggies? He also took out all the broccoli.

Most of my vegetables are doing great except for the lettuce and the radishes that bolted, and the peas were a disaster. My tomatoes (too many of them) are all blooming and some are starting to produce, my banana peppers have been producing for a month and I am starting to pick cucumbers and green beans. The aurigula reseeded itself in every bare spot available so it looks like we are going to be eating a lots of it. The eggplants are starting to produce also. On the other hand my raspberries are out of control and I have to get some tall fence post to secure them. The pleasures of gardening...and we should have potatoes at some points out of the potato bags (homemade out of the bird seed bags).

orcidfancy- sounds like s pretty pleasing production, I like the idea of elf sowing grens (arugula) I have had red mustard seedlings come up, very nice for fall growing.
My peas are fried of course. I'm going to try fall peas.
Green beans are showing poor pollination I think, the pods are not full. I've gotten a large handful but many opf those plants are fried too.
Tomatos, peppers, cukes, squash okra everbearing strwaberries coming along great,,just haven't harvested any yet.
Dug some potatos
First=year-bearing peach had lost evry fruit even before this heat wave, other wise it looks healthy.

gmun How are things going there?

Here is a picture of my vegetable garden, it is small . It is a triangle 20 feet long by 10 feet wide, 8 feet to the point is planted with all black currant and strawberries, this does not leave a lot of space for the vegetable.
here is a picture

Hi, things seem to be going pretty well now - thanks sally! I think the fertilizer definitely made a difference, they've been fed twice now and are looking pretty green and healthy, for the most part I think. We've also eaten some lettuce, cherry tomatoes, various herbs and have more growing and my bell pepper plants have cute baby peppers on them, my zucchini plant looks pretty strong (1 was a disaster, but 1 seems ok!), I have lots of roma tomatoes with one turning red now and some carrots doing well in a bucket (keep digging down a little to see how they are doing!).

My cucumbers aren't really doing well, they went yellow and the plant seemed to stop growing, all the climbing-vine-bits shrivelled up and died; I took off the yellow cucumbers and they started growing again, so they've been flowering again and are growing more leaves but I'm not really sure yet if they are going to be ok...

My strawberries are growing well with lots of greenery but very few flowers - does anyone know anything about that? Orchardfancy, you have strawberries - any advice to encourage blooming? I did have a nice red strawberry until a little rabbit ventured onto the deck and ate it last night!! Gate is back up tonight!

Here's my "bamboo veggie garden" today:

hey gmun, I like your bamboo garden fence.
Cukes- great if they seem to be rebounding. Its important to pick off any fruits that get too old, even if you don't plan to eat them. My cukes often get a virus, passed along by a beetle, that kills them anyway. new growth is a good sign!

Strawberries--do you know the cultivar? Regular spring strawberries would not be blooming now but growing leaves and runners. Everbearing should be blooming now., at least mine are, I just bought new Tristar plants this spring. (everbearing)

My long awaited zucchini has blossom end rot

Thanks sally!

Oh no! That might be what my zucchini has too... I was so excited about the first female flower (I even self-pollinated with a male one to make sure) and it has gone kind of yellow and beginning to shrivel up - does that sound like blossom end rot? Is there anything for that? Will it affect just odd flowers or the whole plant? I only have one zucchini plant that worked....

My strawberries are supposed to be everbearing, they are "Ozark Beauty". I have a small strawberry pot on my deck with other everbearers in it (can't remember type, bought those ones at HD) and they are blooming. I did buy the OBs a bit late as bare root plants, but they look pretty good and I've had a few odd flowers, was hoping they'd be doing more by now.

I have a baby cucumber growing now too, so optimistic about them now too! :)

I just did a brief google on the zucchini.
It could be blossom end rot, remedy is to add calcium to the soil. Lime has calcium. Mulch or water them and don't cultivate too close. Tomato rot sprays said NOT to work for squash re this one article.
It could be lack of bee pollination. You can watch for the flowers to open, pick a male and jam him onto a female. Well, rub the important parts together. Nuff said.

The pros tell us not to let strawberries bear too much the first year---but heck who can resist as long as the overall plant health seems vigorous? I just have other things higher on my list than picking off my strawberry flowers.

Thanks! I have another female squash flower appearing now, so I'll see what happens there and look into the calcium idea if it dies too.

Sadly there is no chance of my strawberries bearing too much! No flowers even to pick off at the moment (as if I actually would though.... !).

Just lost another zuke to the borers. I knew I would. I just can't spend time saving zucchini plants from borers. Possibly the stress of borers is killing my zucchini fruit too, I dunno. I have one big plant left, I buried the stem with extra dirt today because it does have some good roots coming out of the stem.
My dads borer idea was to stick pins through the stem and pin the borers in place so they couldn't move along and eat.

Sally, I've heard that you can slit the stem with a sharp knife and physically remove the borer.

My friend Theresa has been bringing zukes by... such a good friend! :-)

I know Jill, I know..."you" can also go hiking, or make valances for the bedroom, or read a book for fun...just more things "You" can do if "you" have the time. I had a piece of row cover on them at first and hoped it would hold off the borers.

Theresa is a peach! Speaking of peach, my baby peach tree in its first flowering year, has lost all of its fruits, weeks ago before the whole heat wave/ drought.

Well, I figured slitting the stem wasn't any more bother than trying to pin them into place!

I've tried row cover against borers without luck. Finally gave up, because like "you" I didn't have the time to fight them for every squash! What I don't get from Theresa, I can buy at the farmer's market. :-)

The drought may not have been a problem.. if your peach was so young, it might have just aborted those first fruits on its own. Our cherry trees dropped most of theirs this year, but now the trees themselves look a lot healthier than last summer. Maybe they know best?

I didn't mean to be cranky about my stupid borers.

I think you're right re the peach, and cherries.
Let me just curse myself by saying I have not yet seen a single cucumber beetle. (There, I know I will find one now!)
My winter squash is going to town, literally and figuratively. I expect plenty of fruit when the leaves start to die back. And if I can find them earlier-- I had seen one that looked like a green stripe thing that I could use young instead of the zucchini. Hubby did not see it but mowed it. Sigh.

My okra looks good! Oh, several fruits on a yellow elongated sweet pepper from you, Jill. Thanks!

yellow elongated... hmm, maybe you got one of the hybrid sweet banana types I started? I think you took a couple of my "mystery" seedlings where I hadn't marked every cell in the pack before splitting them up. LOL

Sorry about the hungry lawnmower.

Usually I have the tossed aside cellpack or pot rolling around the garden, with the name e'er handy!

I'm glad I'm not the only one who "labels" veggie plants by putting the empty (but labeled) pot next to them.. sometimes I weight it down with a rock... LOL

My method Exactly!!!!!! Great Minds...

Raising fruits and vegetables is hard work. This is our first year for a vegetable garden and John has been really disappointed with the squash borers too. He said his mother used to slit the stem open and remove the borer and then tape the stem back together and it lived and produced. Not sure we will do that or not. We have enjoyed both zucchini and yellow squash this summer and they are now done for the year. I was able to freeze several containers of each.

We grilled sliced zucchini on Friday evening and it was deluxe. yum yum I read a while back that Sally was already eating pretty many potatoes from her garden so I have had John bring in a few of ours. They have done really well and many are quite large. They too are great when cooked on the grill in foil and a few carrots sticks alongside. Uh oh, I am getting hungry just thinking about all of this.

Interesting reading. Looking forward to hearing more growing stories. Oh yeah, we had several cherry tomato volunteers from last year. He brought in a small sack full a bit ago. I am going to have to think of something to do with them. We certainly won't eat that many fresh. Any ideas?

Sally, speaking of peaches....I am hoping John will make a trip to the local orchard for me one day this week. I want to try my hand at a Peach Marmalade that my mother used to make and freeze. It sure tasted good on toast. Will let you know how that goes. Oh yeah....a bit of trivia. My dad had a small orchard the whole time I was growing up. He used to produce some award winning size beauties. Many were the size of softballs. Whenever I see what is being sold in the grocery stores I can't believe the diference in what I grew up on and what is passing for a peach these days. Always buy from the orchard if at all possible. He would roll over in his grave if he heard what a bushel of peaches costs today though.

Y'all take good care and have a great week.

Ruby

I'd like some cherry tomato ideas too.... counted mine the other day and I had 56 red or almost red and 103 green ones! Have been having lots on salads (& fresh lettuce, yum!) but would love to know what else to do with them.

Hi gmun. I haven't been around the forums for a while and am just now getting around to catching up with some things. Since I last wrote this on July 25, my hubby has brought home several more sacks of the little tomatoes. We even have loads of grape size tomatoes too. What I have been doing is using them the way I use extra regular size tomatoes. I have been chopping them and then blanching, (?) cooking for several minutes on a top burner and then putting in freezing containers. I plan to use them for soups and sauces this winter.

I re-read my message to Sally about the peaches and can report that I have also frozen a good amount of yummy peaches to have this winter too. I have sent John to the orchard twice to buy half bushels of culls. The first ones he brought home I made a yummy marmalade that can be frozen and the second batch I just sliced, sweetened and froze. The peaches, even the culls looked pretty good this year. Oh yeah, we made homemade peach ice cream one night too which was delicious.

Hope by now that you have found a way to preserve your extras gmun. I would love to hear what you have been doing with yours.

Ruby

My grape tomatoes have such tough skins. Part of it may be the heat / water stress. And they don't taste that good.
My okra has hardly bloomed, I blame heat and drought. With today's rain I can cross off drought! My gosh it has rained steady all night.

Hi, I haven't been on here much lately either... home made peach ice cream sounds delicious!!

We've had some family visiting from Scotland and I don't have any tomatoes left to preserve now!! They have been very popular! We also decided just to put them in a home made pasta sauces, and lots of salads and, of course, munched right out the bowl! I am glad that they haven't been wasted though! And plenty more green one on the plants just now... I may have to use your cooking/blanching idea yet...

I've been eating more than a dozen of the cherry tomatoes a day raw just by myself and I'm still way behind.

I have been cutting them in half and mixing them in cooked seafood and pasta dishes and will probably freeze some for winter soups. I'll cut them before freezing them.

Are tomatoes kind of exotic there? I guess its sort of cool for tomatos there.

Thought I would show you my lovely onions

That is truly a thing of beauty!

LOL Critter, You should have seen me trying to braid them. I have a smaller braid of white onions and DIL Deb did one to take home and make soup.

I think if I ever succeeded in making such a lovely onion braid, they would fossilize right there on my wall.. I wouldn't be able to bear to cut any off for soup! My SIL gave us a beautiful dried pepper wreath, once. The label on it said we were to snip the peppers off for cooking... didn't happen... had it on the wall until it fell apart. LOL