Zones 8-9 Spr/Sum 2011 Veggie Gardening is UNDERWAY Part III

Zones 8-9 Spr/Summer 2011 Veggie Gardening PART III continues! Post your growing goals, challenges and progress toward your 2011 Spring/Summer Veggie garden(s) here! We'll start a new thread at the end of this season for posting pics of our Veggie garden bounty!

We came from here!
Part II Spr/Sum http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/1152863/
Part I Spr/Sum http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/11147789

HELPFUL LINKS:

SEED STARTER SUPPLIES
http://www.novoselenterprises.com/Default.asp

DD95172's PVC SEED STARTER TRAY
http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/1067922/

Kelly's ZONE 9A WATERING SCHEDULE
http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/p.php?pid=7919560

Jim41's ZONE 8A PVC DRIP IRRIGATION WATERING SYSTEM
http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/p.php?pid=7920004

Qinx's Raised Bed - INTERLOCKING DESIGN/w Pre-Installed Hoop Pins
http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/1117901/

GARDENER'S SUPPLY KITCHEN GARDEN PLANNER - DESIGN TEMPLATE
http://www.gardeners.com/on/demandware.store/Sites-Gardeners...

Calalily's Method for GERMINATING COLE CROP SEEDS IN THE FRIDGE
http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/p.php?
http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/p.php?pid=8116028

Gardadore's Recipe for deterring WHITE CABBAGE MOTHS
http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/p.php?pid=8104087

WINTER SOWING DISCUSSION LINKS FROM THE BEGINNING http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/1072154/


Godspeed & Good Harvest! ^^_^^

Linda

Zones 8-9a Spr/Sum 2011 discussion continues here...

Thank you for starting a new thread, Linda!!

Welcome, Steph!

Yesterday, I planted out two Sioux and two Momotoro tomato plants. So far I have the following growing:
(3) Black Krim (2 aren't making it so well. Will replace on the weekend...)
(2) Bull's Heart
(1) Pruden's Purple
(1) Cher Purple
(2) Sioux
(2) Momotoro
(5) Emerald Giant Bell Peppers
(2) Fooled You Jalapenos
(4) Earthboxes of Yellow Granex onions

I'm hoping to direct sow the eggplant and okra seeds in the eBuckets this weekend.

Have to sift more pine bark for the planting mix...

Need Have GONNA build a sifter...

Wow Linda what a great list, Last year I planted the Bulls heart and it was my favorite tomato, very meaty and hardly any seeds, the plant looks a little droopy but I have heard that it is common with the heart shaped tomatoes. By the way the fooled you jalapenos, are they spicy at all? My DH kind of got at me for planting jalapeños this year, unfortunately I can't handle the heat anymore and the older I get the worst it gets.

Thanks, C!
I've never grown the "Fooled You" jalapenos before. I'll let you know.

lol We've only managed to plant four tomatoes, but I did make a sifter box...

Ok, Birdy, yah gotta post a pic of the sifter!

I grew Fooled You Jalapenos last year and liked them- strong Jalapeno taste, But no heat at all. I'm wimpy, but I want a bit of heat.

Tapla, in addition to all his soil info and help, has built some awesome sifters. I've made several, but don't have the capability to make any joints except butted ones using screws and that usually leaves little gaps that catch soil (or whatever I'm sifting) but at least they serve the purpose!

I took the front guard of an old stand fan and been using this for screening the grass out of my soil, works well. It is made of expanded metal and has about 1/4" football shaped holes and the corners help trap the small roots. It is shaped like a flat bowl with short sides that keep the soil in.

I think a box fan with the fan and back off would make a good one with larger holes, but haven't tried that yet. The holes maybe too big for some applications.

dmtom, I use any number of old "findings" to sift thru -- colanders (plastic and metal), old fry baskets, some kinda of bait bucket (crickets?) from Wally World that has 1/8" openings that's great for the really small siftings I sometimes want to do. All these work well for the smaller sifts, but my large (16" sq) are more useful for the larger amounts of things to sift. Oh, and tea strainers -- if it's got holes I'll use it!

Ya'll are totally ingenious! My kind'a "save a $" folks. Glad to know yah!

We have a sifter made out of hardware cloth. It works great to keep the bigger things from the compost pile out. However, some of the grubs go through the holes. :/ I'll take a pic later on today and post it for you.

We've also used the sifter part of the sifting cat liter box before! LOL

This message was edited Mar 17, 2011 9:01 AM

LOL!

Here's what I have planted right now:

onions -- 2 beds (white and purple) -- planted closely so I can pick some green onions along the way. (About 120 or so in all, I think). They are looking great.
potatoes -- two traditional hills, 3 dog-food bags, 1 large planter (4 or 5 potatoes in each spot, for total of around 30, half Home Depot white, half Home Depot red)
garlic -- 2 pots, planted awhile ago, maybe 20 total
tomatoes -- 6 planted so far - Beefsteak, Cherokee Purple, Choc Cherry, Jelly Bean, Rutgers, Giant Belgium
broccoli -- 4 Packman
kohrabi -- 2
cauliflower -- 1, looks terrible
Swiss chard -- I usually plant a lot and they all die. This time I planted a lot and 3 of them are still alive. Trying to learn from this -- but what?
lettuce -- heaps, scattered here and there, a few in concrete blocks, others under the broccoli
strawberries -- 3 in hanging baskets, another 10 in grocery flat lined with weed block and filled with planting mix
cucumber -- 1 planted in concrete block, 1 in a pot next to our patio lattice.
acorn squash -- 2 hills, 4 plants each hill. If just one survives, I'll be happy.
pepper -- 1 in concrete block, 1 in planter
green beans -- 1 10-foot row.
Still to plant -- more tomatoes, peppers, watermelon, cantaloupe, cucumber,

On the perennial side:
grape -- has been growing for 2 years, not making much progress. I'm going to work on optimizing soil pH etc., for this
thornless blackberry -- in a huge pot, but not particularly happy. It didn't like the freeze, has lost leaves, hope I can get it back to healthy.
service berry -- growing in a pot, making buds but not really taking off. This is the 2nd year.
basil -- growing gangbusters, 5 plants in concrete blocks
rosemary -- rooting some now
oregano -- divided a plant into 3, all 3 are doing well, also have a zillion seedlings coming on.
dill -- got a foot high and it turned browny-purple and died. Trying again.

Go Lise!

Go Lise! Go Lise! Go Lise! ^^_^^

Did I tell ya'll I've changed my planting mix to Tapla's 5:1:1 mix for containers? I've modified it to 3:1:1 for my eBuckets and self-watering containers that need more peat for wicking the reservoir water.

The plants seem to be loving it. Go over to the High Yield Gardening forum under High Yield Gardening in Raised beds for his recipe for the raised bed mix. What I truly love about it is it really is saving me $$$!

Thanks for the cheering! :-D

So far, so good. I give credit to DG friends, who keep me enthused and do their best to keep me out of trouble.

Gymgirl, yep, I've been following the discussion -- learning as I go. Thanks! Keep us posted on how the mix does for you. I'm expecting great things!

Yesterday, DH put up wire fencing for me - 25 feet of it along our side fence. We haven't figured out whether there will eventually be a raised bed or just what. For now, I've dug out the grass beneath it and have thrown down some compost, etc. I've hilled up 3 spots so far and planted 2 cukes and an unidentified something or other (think it's zucchini or acorn squash). I also have watermelon and cantaloupe starts staring at me, with pumpkin not far behind, and tomatoes, all needing homes -- I got a little carried away starting seeds, I think! But 25 more feet of garden space should help.

And meanwhile, I'm looking for a vining flower now to put in between the hills along the fence. Hubby deserves some nice flowers for all his work and patience. So I guess I'll cruise over to a flower forum or Texas gardening forum (which seems to deal mostly in flowers) and see what suggestions would be good.

This is our new garden area that we started excavating the day after Christmas. We've planted out 9 tomatoes with cages wrapped in shrink wrap, hopefully to protect the plants from the horrific hot wind we've had for days and days. I'm not sure either the tomatoes or the gardeners will survive it !! Have about 9 more tomatoes to go.

Planted a few miniature bell peppers and zuchinni squash about 10 days ago. Way too early but they are holding on. Squash got sunburned and looks the worst.

Learned a lot of things this year in my first attempt at starting things from seed. (I've always just bought plants before.) No. 1: I planted seed indoors the 6th of February and I will NEVER, EVER plant seed before the 1st of March again. I used Roots Organics soil, as recommended by another DG member and, wow, things sprout and grow so fast, it cuts the time in half. My plants were ready to go outside three weeks ago and have potted them up three times and they finally outgrew my lightstand and could not spend much time on my porch because of the wind. So they are about a foot taller than I would like and not in what I consider very good shape because it was impossible to harden them off properly. We buried them deep, and hope it helps. But I do love the Roots Organics stuff.

Re: Sifter - Here's a photo of the kind my DH makes. Uses 1/4-inch hardware cloth stapled to the back side of this frame. Also has a 1/2-inch hardware cloth one for sifting really rough compost. The frame is 1x2, I believe. High enough to prevent compost from rolling off the screen.

He screws the wood frame together. Makes it a size that fits across my little trailer that I pull behind our riding mower, which is a good work height. Also fits across my Rubbermade garden cart.

The thing with the red handle is some kind of tool bricklayers use, I believe. Got it at HD. Use that to move the compost around and crush llama manure.

This message was edited Mar 21, 2011 7:14 PM

That looks nifty, Dogs_N_Petunias -- (nifty sifty!).

Mine looks like DNP's, but we don't use the little red tool. A piece of 2x4 would work to help sift it, too. We prop our sifter on top of the wheelbarrow.

I'm doing the makeshift version -- I have the plastic front of an old box fan as my sifter, so my grid is larger than hardware cloth and the holes are rectangular (maybe 3/8" x 1") but not too bad, and after the discussion about adding pine mulch and other pieces to one's garden bed for aeration purposes, I'm not too bothered by the larger size.

My composting is done in two trash bins. I set a bucket down in one half-full bin, so it's not too far from the top. I lay the plastic grid over the top, and scoop compost from the other bin onto it -- spread it around with a gloved hand and hope most of the good stuff falls in the bucket -- then push it all off again. Works pretty well, but some of the plastic grid pieces are cracking with use. I can't push too hard, but it should last another year anyway.

Well, duh! I posted this on the part 2 thread.

Got some bamboo (free for pickup!!) and will be planting my pole beans this coming week!! So excited!! We also got some compost to turn into the veggie bed as well as apply to our flower beds.

This is just some of the bamboo canes we got. I have access to as much as I want through my former boss. His mom has a big patch of bamboo in her backyard. We just have to go haul it!

Jealous...not sure what I am going to do for my pole beans yet but I am sure it will entail a little more $$$.

I have some concrete wire mesh (?) but it is only 5' tall. Unless I can figure out a way to stand it up.

John, just cut an extension for the tops of your 5' cages, and affix it with zip ties. I've been reading trellis posts, and a 3' extension seems 2 B standard.

Would someone please explain to this ole' farm girl why you want beans to climb so high you have to have a ladder to pick them? LOL. I remember it was back-breaking to lean over and pick bush beans but a trellis 8 feet high ???

Texans do things in a big way -- always have!

Weekend update pics.

These are tomatoes planted in 10-gallon containers of Tapla's 5:1:1: container mix. (My formula is modified to 3:1:1)

They seem to have burst forth overnight!

Planted out last weekend....

Should I be concerned about what's going on with this bell pepper leaf? I've seen this before, just can't remember what it is and how to handle it.

Thanks!

I did a quick look on google, Gymgirl, and couldn't find any photos that looked like yours. Any mottled ones I found also looked much worse in other ways -- puckered and usually crispy and just plain bad-looking. But I did find one hort site that said some pepper leaves are naturally mottled. So...maybe there's nothing wrong? Here's to hoping!

Thanks, LiseP!

Okay, I have lift-off. My first marble-sized tomato and the cutest little cuke -- never grew a cuke before, I'm excited!!

Here's my tomato. Sorry the pic is out-of-focus. I found a second one today, on the same branch. This is a Beefsteak, by the way. Weird, because I somehow thought that the Beefsteak would be the last to set, not the first.

ooooooooooooooo, that cuke is too cute!

Lise, I am sooo envious- you're doing great! It will be some time before planting cukes here- We are fighting high winds today, but warm temps.

LiseP, when did you start your cucumbers?
I have just transplanted mine a week ago outside.
I HAD to start them indoor otherrwise the pill bugs will eat the little seedlings.
I am monitoring my small cucumber plants every day ... I have some pill bugs chewing on the leaves ... I keep sprinkling DE around the plants ... I keep my finger crossed

Ha, for once I have decent notes:

Variety: Poinsett 76
started from seed: 2/13 (I had them either indoors or in my frugal outdoor nursery -- aka shelving unit with a shower liner over it)
transplanted: 3/16 (from a seed-starter tray to a Solo cup)
final transplant: 3/22

I put a blob of petroleum jelly at the base of the plant. I read that that can help deter vine-boring critters. Later, I thought that that was probably not the best thing to do from an environmental standpoint, but oh, well.

I also sprinkle Sluggo Plus around the hills.