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Gardening: 2012 Season


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My garden is finally coming into its own. This is part of the take from just this week (less what we had eaten before this afternoon :smile: )

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Pickling cucumbers, variety of squash, tomatoes, and the first eggplant--a baby variety called Fairy Tale. A few beans off of some of the more precocious vines but not enough to do anything with. The main bean crop will begin in earnest next week I think.

Most of what I've had so far are the tiny cherry or grape tomatoes, but the big boys are on the way:

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Black Krim, getting as much hangtime as I can spare. Knock on wood, the birds have left things alone up to now.

Andy Arrington

Journeyman Drinksmith

Twitter--@LoneStarBarman

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wow... your set up is amazing! I am trying to do a little apt gardening too. I have not had luck with tomatoes in teh past. I have done best with leafy greens that I can tear off a few for salads.

I have a thai lime tree that is just a few years old, it never gives limes, but the leaves are the thing and they are plentiful. I also have scallions , lemongrass, and my most hard producing... pea sprouts! in a shallow pot, just dried peas from the super market, they make about a salad a week.

I need to figure out the tomatoe. IN the past they have flowered repeatedly and not set fruit. I had a hot pepper that did the same thing.

Your set up is super impessive1

Thanks.... When your tomato plant flowers, how do you pollinate it? Most, if not all, tomato plants do not self pollinate - they rely on the wind, bees, etc to do it. So, indoors (greenhouse or apartment) you have to do it manually. The easiest way to do this is with a electric toothbrush. It vibrates at the right frequency to shake the pollen out - it's actually similar in frequency to bees wings! Just hold the toothbrush under the truss with flowers on it and press lightly. You should see pollen dust fall out of the flowers. Best to do I the morning, or late evening. I'm not sure if the same is true for peppers. Some hot peppers are notoriously difficult to set fruit indoors. Keep me posted as to your results!

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Here's yesterday's haul; it's the last I'll see out of that garden since I'm moving. I'll try to take as many of the plants with me as I can, but the ají pepper bush is too large to move ( :sad: )

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Elizabeth Campbell, baking 10,000 feet up at 1° South latitude.

My eG Food Blog (2011)My eG Foodblog (2012)

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wow... your set up is amazing! I am trying to do a little apt gardening too. I have not had luck with tomatoes in teh past. I have done best with leafy greens that I can tear off a few for salads.

I have a thai lime tree that is just a few years old, it never gives limes, but the leaves are the thing and they are plentiful. I also have scallions , lemongrass, and my most hard producing... pea sprouts! in a shallow pot, just dried peas from the super market, they make about a salad a week.

I need to figure out the tomatoe. IN the past they have flowered repeatedly and not set fruit. I had a hot pepper that did the same thing.

Your set up is super impessive1

Thanks.... When your tomato plant flowers, how do you pollinate it? Most, if not all, tomato plants do not self pollinate - they rely on the wind, bees, etc to do it. So, indoors (greenhouse or apartment) you have to do it manually. The easiest way to do this is with a electric toothbrush. It vibrates at the right frequency to shake the pollen out - it's actually similar in frequency to bees wings! Just hold the toothbrush under the truss with flowers on it and press lightly. You should see pollen dust fall out of the flowers. Best to do I the morning, or late evening. I'm not sure if the same is true for peppers. Some hot peppers are notoriously difficult to set fruit indoors. Keep me posted as to your results!

I had not thought of it needing pollination! I will try that out. I will be getting some plants in the next few weeks. I have an electric tooth brush even! thank you!!! I will let you know.

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Scottyboy, your artichokes look terrific. I planted one in late January/early February and it has grown some but I wouldn't quite say it is thriving. I didn't expect it to necessarily make chokes this soon but I'd appreciate any tips you might have, or even just what to expect out of it. I put a 6-8" tall plant in the ground and now have something that is about 2-3" across but the outside leaves tend to yellow and eventually fall off, which sort of negates new growth.

Andy Arrington

Journeyman Drinksmith

Twitter--@LoneStarBarman

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North Texas, yeah (Zone 7). It gets some morning shade and has a tree about 12 feet to the south of it, so it's not in total sun. It always seemed to have growth spurts after rainy cold fronts...I just can't seem to nail down whether it does most of its growing during the warm or cool months--seems to depend on where you live.

Like so many interesting plants, it may just be too damned hot for it here. Ah well.

Andy Arrington

Journeyman Drinksmith

Twitter--@LoneStarBarman

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  • 1 month later...

Well, it only took me three years, but I've finally managed to coax a decent yield out of my tomato plants here in Oklahoma:

Tomatoes.jpg

Those are Porter's Pride, it's a variety out of Porter, Texas, designed to set fruit even when it's very hot out. That, coupled with exceptionally fantastic weather since January, resulted in my first useable tomato harvest here. About time!

Chris Hennes
Director of Operations
chennes@egullet.org

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Congrats on the 'maters Chris! I have been picking zucchini, hot peppers and cucumbers from my little kiddie pools along with lots of herbs, A good number of the zuke flowers were fried along with the flower heads of oregano. A neighbor has a thriving vegetable plot and invited me to pick any green beans that come through the fence. It is chain link and she poked some of the tendrils through. They are tender and the essence of green bean. My tomatoes are still green but I have high hopes. We get "June gloom" here which has trailed into July so the sun does not come out till mid day.

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heidih

slim and tender, i would slice those like French beans and steam them, pods and all.

Martial.2,500 Years ago:

If pale beans bubble for you in a red earthenware pot, you can often decline the dinners of sumptuous hosts.

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So here's a couple shots of the garden now...

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This is a shot of the same 3 basil plants as before, growing out of a 1" rockwool cube - it's become a hedge!!! The leaves range from 3-5" long and are super fragrant. (BTW, please excuse the mess!)

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L-R: Rosemary, tarragon (cloned from another plant, not from seed), and bok choi

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Pretty soon, I'll have limes!

Edited by KennethT (log)
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Thanks.... Not yet, but stay tuned.... I don't want to start anything fast growing right now as I have a vacation coming up and won't be around to take care of it. Hydro is a bit different than growing in soil as changes in pH and nutrient concentration and reservoir levels can happen very quickly with quickly growing plants. And since I haven't had time to automate a lot of it yet, the new stuff will have to wait. But, since I'll be headed to Singapore, I think I might be able to find some really interesting seeds that might be hard to come by here. Holy basil is surely on the list.... No worries!

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Lovely homegrown produce all around. I'm on my way out to snap some pixs - I'm that inspired.

Elizabeth, how does the high altitude affect your garden? Is there any "winter" at the equator?

Peter Gamble aka "Peter the eater"

I just made a cornish game hen with chestnut stuffing. . .

Would you believe a pigeon stuffed with spam? . . .

Would you believe a rat filled with cough drops?

Moe Sizlack

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I'm back.

Kenneth, your place must smell exquisite.

My greenhouse is a steel frame car port with 6mil poly, gabled with 2x3's. Inside it's mostly tomatoes, herbs and peppers. The bright red specimen is a Bhut Joloka aka the Ghost Pepper of Bangladesh. Outside there are chives, radishes, beans, garlic, potatoes, etc. Also a Howard Dill varietal pumpkin with, hopefully, the genes and environment to become very big. Hundreds of pounds big, maybe.

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Peter Gamble aka "Peter the eater"

I just made a cornish game hen with chestnut stuffing. . .

Would you believe a pigeon stuffed with spam? . . .

Would you believe a rat filled with cough drops?

Moe Sizlack

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So, in anticipation of impending travel, I cut down my basil and Thai basil and donated them to friend. My friend usually buys a few bunches of basil at a time, purées, then keeps in the freezer. My3 basil plants yielded 8-9 CUPS of basil purée!!! I think he'll be set through the winter....

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got a couple tomatoes real close,the genovese basil is a bit slow due to the high temps,the garlic was a dud,,but thelarge leaf sage is really doing good and tastes fantastic...the squash and cukes are a month or so away but look great,and the savery was really great....(dont think that is the correct spelling)

Bud

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Well, it only took me three years, but I've finally managed to coax a decent yield out of my tomato plants here in Oklahoma:

Tomatoes.jpg

Those are Porter's Pride, it's a variety out of Porter, Texas, designed to set fruit even when it's very hot out. That, coupled with exceptionally fantastic weather since January, resulted in my first useable tomato harvest here. About time!

Lovely!

I didn't know about porter's pride, I am going to have to check those out. I grew mine, but the heat really got to them. They are hanging in there, but it has been too hot for them to set fruit. Same with the peppers, but the herb garden always holds up for some reason.

"I eat fat back, because bacon is too lean"

-overheard from a 105 year old man

"The only time to eat diet food is while waiting for the steak to cook" - Julia Child

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I don't have any garden pics. I'm not as diligent as I should be so they wouldn't be much to look at anyway. It's small... tomatoes, potatoes, peas, carrots, beets and a few herbs. The growing season is so short and unpredictable here most years that I don't let myself get too carried away with the amount I plant. Everything is doing pretty well so far other than the carrots are moving slow and something seems to be selectively eating my mint.

Edited by Tri2Cook (log)

It's kinda like wrestling a gorilla... you don't stop when you're tired, you stop when the gorilla is tired.

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  • 2 weeks later...

first tomato of the season here in Colorado,,,it was great...hope all the others are gonna be as good, and the squash and cukes have set fruit and are lookiing good,got a while for the herbsto start looking ready to dry and put in the spice rack...

Bud in the mile high city

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My tomatillos are not thriving this year. Last year they did. But it's early times yet. We've had tons of rain...and then days and days without rain. Right now we are without rain and I am diligently watering my small patch (container gardening) and waiting and hoping.

Darienne

 

learn, learn, learn...

 

We live in hope. 

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I have a question. What could be happening to my apple trees?

Right behind the house are two apple trees, a Mac and a Northern Spy. Last year they had more apples than I have seen in 17 years of living on the farm. Apples up the wazoo and farther even. We ate them, cooked them, made litres and litres of apple juice. Froze apple sauce. Left hundreds on the ground. We are finally running out of last year's apples.

This year? NO APPLES. Well, maybe one or two.

What is going on? (I might add that we had almost no lilacs this year either and the farm is covered with lilac trees. It's usually property line to property line in lilacs.)

Darienne

 

learn, learn, learn...

 

We live in hope. 

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