Watermellon and Tomato question

Hello!

I planted three hills of Sugar baby starts five weeks ago. They have put on no new growth and the first leaves have turned yellow. Not the true ones just the ones that come out when pushing out of the ground. (Does that make sense?) I amended the soil and made sure that they have had ample water. Last week I even sprinkled some Osmicote around them hoping that would give them a jump.

Out of my twelve tomato plants, my Sungold has done nothing as well. Not one new leaf in five weeks. All of the other plants are doing great. Should I go to the local nursery and replant the Sungold?

The Sugar baby and Sungold are in different parts of the garden, and everything around them are fine.

Thank you!!!

Sugar Baby watermelon usually does start slow and as long as the first true leaves are o.k. they should be all right. Has it been warm there? Watermelons like heat. Don't know about the Sungold, I've never raised it.

Let us know how you make out.

For comparison, here's a picture of my Sugar Baby melons. They've been in the ground for about 3 weeks.

Yours look nicer than mine. They are half that size. The temp is 104 today so we have the heat. My husband thinks it's the soil. It is our first growing season in this house. I will add more to the soil and check with the neighbors and see how their gardens are doing..

I went to several nurseries to look for Sungold but they are all gone. So I bought a Sweet 100 and then for the other spot an Arkansas Traveler. I know its not a cherry tomato but I have not tried that one.

Thank you for the reply and I will post if things change with them.

Flower --- Go to Lowes, if you have one in your area or try your local nursery for a meter that measures fertilization, moisture and PH. It costs about thirteen dollars and will answer your question. Also available at Home Depot.

Flower, Try some agricultural epsom salt. Don't sprinkle right on the plant stalks, but around the soil a few inches away from them, mix in the soil, then water. You should be able to find some at a garden store or place that sells ag supplies. Try on a few plants before you do it all.

This works on melons and cantaloupes.....I'm not sure about tomatoes.

This message was edited Jun 6, 2007 10:51 AM

Misty --- I've read something about the merits of epsom salts in the garden. Can you elaborate? I would appreciate it...

IF you sprinkle epsom salt around your plants and rake in, your melons and cantaloupes will be sweet, juicy, and grow larger. (you can use store bought, but it is not as high in magnesium as the agricultural variety). It's even better if before you plant your plants, you put it in your soil as you would fertilizer, etc. Remember not to touch your plants with it though, as it could burn your plants like fertilizer does.

I would suspect that there are a lot of things that it would work well on, but my experience (so far) is just with melons. And you have to make sure your ph is okay with melons too.

For instance, we don't grow the melons on our farm because our soil, no matter how hard we try is not good to grow melons on. The melons are grown by a friend about 7 miles from us and he has riverbottom soil.

Hope this helps,
Kathy
Edited to say, Ralph just told me that our friend runs the epsom through his drip irrigation. He also recommends that you look at another product: Azomite. You can find it Peak Minerals in Branson, MO. It has excellent trace nutrient analysis and most all gardens in this country are trace mineral deficient. They have a website it is either www.peakminerals.com or just google Azomite. This is an all natural product (volcanic dust) and we use it on our fields with good results :)

This message was edited Jun 6, 2007 10:25 PM

I have sweet 100 and it is WAY bigger and farther along than all my other tomatoes and always is.
I use harvested rain water mixed with fish emulsion for fertilizer 2x per month, and when I plant the maters dig in some dry fish fertilizer and bone or blood meal. They grow like weeds.

GGG