The semester has ended

A little straw around these tomatoes and sweet peppers would have kept
the weeds down and moisture in the soil.  Only four or five tomatoes and
two peppers survived.

This is my experiment for finding a way to self water the plants.  The weight
of the water in the tube would cause the water to bubble out of the saturated
soil.  I don't want to saturate the soil anyway.  I think this piece of PVC will
be used next year to grow lettuce.  Mulch is the answer to keeping soil moist.

July 16- Small watermelon starting to form.

The semester is over and although Plant Biology was a pretty easy class, it took a lot of my time. The garden suffered.  On the bright side, I learned plenty about what makes plants grow and what they need to be healthy.It turns out, plants need only a few things to be healthy- food, water, protection.  Since the whole point of this blog was for us to read in the spring before we plant.
When I'm putting the snowblower away and starting to think about vegeatables- although we grow mostly fruit don't we?

It all starts with soil. The spot we use seems to have pretty good soil.  I will have to ask if they do anything for the soil before planting.  If I want more, I will have to add some composted manure in the spring before I plant.  We might want to consider planting in a different direction to follow the contour of the land and make better use of the natural drainage.
This year we got very little rain.  The location is pretty moist and the other people growing there didn't have too much problem but we sure dried up our plants.  They went into drought mode.  The stomata closed off and transpiration didn't happen very well so photosynthesis didn't make much food.  They seem to have rebounded and we may have a nice late harvest as long as the frost holds off.  So  how to prevent that next year?  My plan is to use mulch.  I think the best mulch is going to be straw, preferably something that has been used as animal bedding.  Rabbit poop is very high in nitrogen and bird poop is good too. Cow and horse poop will have more humus in it which isn't so bad either.

Ju;y 29-  Same watermelon getting bigger

Fourth of July

Yes, I messed with the sky.

The drought continues.  The rain pattern seems to be a long dry spell, a short drenching, long dry spell, short drenching.  My poor neglected garden was a mess, most of the peppers, eggplant and zucchini are gone.  I was able to find some eggplant and peppers.  They were marked way down, probably days away from being compost when I rescued them.  I don't know if my fate will be much better.  This time when I planted, I dug a small hole in the dirt and added a mixture of peat and composted manure.  I also left little walls around the seedlings, sort of a crude cereal bowl arrangement. I don't know what did the first plants in.  It could have been transplant shock, lack of water or a number of other things.  I have also considered that I got too close with the Preen. Those are all things to avoid next year.

The peas, beans and onions are growing strong, most of the things planted from seed are doing great.  I want to find a solution to the water problem.  I will think about that, I have a couple ideas.

I wish it would rain

We could use a little rain, I don't see any on the forecast until Thursday.  It's not all bad news.  We did get some rain, there were plenty of weeds growing among my vegetables.  Most of my peppers, eggplant and bok choy look like they are dead.  The tomatillos I planted the second time look better,  I gave them a few days to toughen up before I threw them in the dirt.  I might grab a few more plants to get in the ground this weekend.  Maybe I will read up on improving soil quality to give my new plants a chance to catch up.

Transplant shock

Garden still continues to grow.  We could use a little more rain but we're not too dry.  I have noticed that some transplanted plants are doing better than others.  If I were a better record keeper, I would have a way to tell where I bought which plant.  I have read that plants that come from a greenhouse and have never lived outdoors need to get eased into living outdoors.  It takes a few days to get accustomed to the wind and changes in climate.  I bought 4 tomatillo plants and half of them are awful wilty and sad.  I have read to give them plenty of water to build the roots.  I have four more plants that I'm keeping outside for a while before I take them to the garden, maybe try something new and see how it works.  I suspect that's what happened to some of the zucchini, they look pretty sad too.  I think the birds got the zucchini seeds we planted.  I replanted some of those today. I soaked the seeds in warm water for a day before we planted to try to lure them out of dormancy.

Cheer up zucchini

"About ten days before going outside, let your plant acclimatize to the great and dangerous outdoors by hardening it off. Since so far the plant has led a pampered life – warm, sheltered and moist it will have broader leaves than an outdoor plant to capture more light, and weaker stems from lack of exercise due to wind motion. Many plants take transplanting hard enough, zucchini being one of them, and transplant shock will set them back severely – they may not grow for a week or two, produce less fruit, and succumb to diseases and predators. To harden it off place the plant outside in a shady spot for a couple of hours, and repeat for two or three days, increasing its stay outside each day until it’s outdoors most of the day. Then place it under morning sun for a couple of hours and put it in shade for the afternoon. Repeat increasing time under the sun for three or so days until it’s spending most of day and evening outside. I know it seems like a pain, but it’s far better than having your plant keel over from shock and die."  from here

Peas and Beans

First the good news, peas and beans are growing.  I see a lot of ants around them but they still seem green and healthy so I'm going to consider the ants a friend of legumes.  The carrots are coming up, more sunflowers and cucumbers too.  Most of the tomato, pepper and eggplant look good, I have a wilty one here and there.  No sign of the dreaded beetles either.

On the downside, the zucchini isn't looking great.  I think the birds ate the seeds so I'm going to have to replant.  Some of the plants don't look too good either.  If I had pictures I could match it up with something on the Google machine.  Drat!  I'm going to have to remember to take more pictures.

The dirt looks dry on the surface but is nice and dark about a quarter inch down.  Anny watered anyway because it's fun to pour water on things.

Both welcome and unwelcome arrivals

Today when I went to the garden to hover over my crop, I found that the peas, some of the beans, carrots, a cucumber and sunflowers have started to poke up through the dirt.

Hello Mr. Bean

I also found that something has been feasting on the eggplants. Look at that picture below, there's an eggplant leaf on the ground.  Grrrr pesky something.  I think that something is a Colorado Potato Beetle.  I am going to go back and look closely at the rest of the plants and destroy any beetles and eggs I find.  I have heard that I can use this safely, but before I do anything hasty, I'm going to ask about in my plant biology class.  Yes, I'm going to be that guy.

OK- I asked. The recommended method for controlling the Colorado Potato Beetle is to squash them and scrape off the eggs.  Maybe spray with Bt.

Planting between the rainfall

It's been raining for the last couple days. Today we added a few more mounds for watermelons and squash.  The first ones were a bit close together.  The watermelons are down in the wettest part of the garden.  I've never seen standing water there but it's always wet. I also found a few tomatillo and sweet pepper plants at the farm market.  I'm planting the sweet peppers with the tomatoes. I have heard rumors about peppers cross pollenating so I'm being safe.

Planted!

May 27

Here is is, all planted or mostly planted to be more accurate.  The rain came hard yesterday morning and just like magic, the sun came out around 2:00. We went over and spent a couple hours planting. We still have room for tomatillos, more onions and some odds and ends.  I might throw a couple sweet pepper plants over by the tomatoes. We also have more zucchini than yellow squash.  I will drive over there later today and see if any of our plants got turned into a vermin feast.

Anny waiting to go home

A man, a plan, a canal

This is the first stage of our garden plan for this year.  We are going to put in a combination of plants and seeds in the hope we can extend the harvest, especially in the summer squash and zucchini.  Ironically, these are the two vegetables that are like gold at the start of the season, but after a couple weeks, nobody wants anything.  Last year we ate zucchini boats, patties, bread baked and fried, but I digress. This is the layout.

Plants- in no particular order

• Zucchini
• Yellow squash
• Cherry tomatoes
• Roma tomatoes
• Beefsteak tomatoes
• Jalapeño peppers
• Poblano peppers
• Anaheim peppers
• Some other pepper
• Sweet peppers
• Tomatillos

Seeds-in order of maturity

• Summer squash
• Cucumber
• Green beans
• Zucchini
• Snowbird peas
• Green beans
• Sugar snap peas
• Carrots
• Watermelons

We also have a couple types of onions, red, yellow, purple what have you.  I like strong red onions.  I think we may be able to do a second crop later in the year.

It's raining this morning, looks like a good soaker.  If it clears up this afternoon, we may go try to get started with the planting.  It's been pretty warm and dry for the past week or so, warm for this time of year.  Not much worry about frost but oh how quickly that can all change!

Purpose

Last year's garden

Squash, zucchini, beans and peppers!

Last year we had a garden for the first time in a long time.  Living in a subdivision and having dogs are two strikes against having a summer vegetable garden so for years, we settled for the farm market.  Last year a friend offered the use of his garden spot.  His brother in law has some property a few miles from my house that he tills up for a family garden.  It's located in a low lying field right next to a pond and stream.  During the dry months, he sets up a siphon hose from the pond to water the garden.  There is a rototiller available to use.  It's a nice deal and I feel fortunate to have this kind of opportunity.  Last summer was our first year and we ate like kings all season.  We gave lots of food away to family and friends.  We also learned a lot about growing veggies, cooking veggies,  not to mention canning and storing veggies.  We wasted a lot of food last year because we weren't prepared to store it for the winter. I have a better idea what to expect this year and we should cut down on the waste as well as continue the feast in the winter.

Eggplant

It's Memorial Day Weekend, the start of the garden season in the north. The threat of late frost still lingers but this plot doesn't seem to get much frost, maybe because it's on low ground.  We are ready to go.  Tina has been doodling up garden plans, I've picked up some plants and seeds.  I also started this blog, hoping to keep a record of our botanical adventure. Maybe next April, we can come back here, review this record and have an even better summer.  As a bonus, I'm taking a plant biology class this summer so that may also flatten the learning curve a bit.