Oh, WG, a girl after my own heart. North Carolina....aaahhhh, that is where I lived for so long as a child and where my grandparent's farm was. In a little town called Fremont. Just outside of Goldsboro. I have much family that still lives there. We go there and leave our cares behind. It is like Mayberry to us. Since we moved away from there it has been a tradition in our family, when we reach Wayne County, to roll down the windows, stick our head out and breathe in the air. We say, "Mmmmmm, this is God's country." I swear, the air does smell sweeter.
Years later, I lived in Greenville (that is where my first child was born) and then in Charlotte. All parts of NC are wonderful.
My favourite thing...pottering in the garden. I lifted my onions last week so there is a big bare patch. I turned my compost bin (no small task, digging it out and moving it elsewhere - a compost turner sounds a very good idea!), tossed some of the compost on the bare patch. Forked it in this evening., and the place where the bin had been.
There was this floppy looking potato top so I pulled at it and found to my surprise that there were a load of decent sized white potatoes under it. I lifted that and another potato. Both of these are self-setters from chits, well just peelings, in what was obviously poorly composted stuff from last year.
I sowed some salad vegs where the compost bin had been; if they do anything so much the better - my salad crops this year are practically non-existent.
I have given away lots of my courgettes, which had turned into small marrows. People have taken them away to make chutney and - soup!
So tonight I ate all home-grown:
some delicious potatoes, tasting sweetly of the earth they were in half an hour before
some mangetout peas, tasting sweet
one onion, with a crisp super-oniony flavour, sauteed in a little olive oil together with:
one courgette, quite large but not quite a marrow, crisp and pleasant, lightly sauteed
followed by a little plum nectar from when I boiled up those tiny plums last week (I froze the main plum mix to make a crumble later; but there was a little juice left).
Twinky, as soon as I cross the pond I will be there for left overs!!! Yum, Yum, Yummy. That is my kind of eating, girl. There is a satisfaction, that I can't find the words to describe, from eating what you have grown.
Work, tend, amend and cultivate the soil. Select the right plantings and seed. Save seed and care for it. Plant at just the right time. And then wait... Watch it grow and produce. Spend hours taking care of the plants, the fruit, worrying about the lack of rain or too much, analyzing and correcting any problem that could affect production, etc., etc., etc.
Then the pay off.....eating, canning and preserving the fruits of your labor. When it is winter and everything is in gardening limbo, sitting down to dinner and those beans are on the table or you open the Mason jar of tomatoes for that sauce...makes one proud and thankful. It is the charge that keeps you going for the next season.
As we say here in the deep south...I'm fixin to plant some greens. Took soil samples to my local university extension service to have it analyzed.
Thought the speckled butterbeans were done for and then had more rain. The amount of rain we have had this time of year is quite unusual. I go out to the garden to pull them up and cart them off to the compost bin. Low and behold, there are new flowers...and lots of them. This weekend I am going to lavish the plants and soil with compost tea.
More unusual is the wind that has continued to blow. Never ever in my southern life, which has always been except for one year, have I known a wind to breeze during dog days or the days after.
I saw on a garden show this morning that spraying compost tea on squash leaves (amongst the gazillion other benefits of compost tea) helps prevents powdery mildew.
Watered Garden do you have composted compost? If you do then you have to brew it.
Down home method:
Compost...not stuff composting but true black gold compost
5 gallon bucket and some sort of lid
1 leg from a pair of panty hose
fish tank pump
water...if water from the spigot and city water let sit for 24 hours before using
Fill bucket a few inches from top with water.
Put pump in water and turn on to make sure water level is not so high it bubbles over and out. Adjust water level if necessary. Let water bubble about 3 or 4 inches from top. DO NOT touch pump unless you unplug it first!!!!
Fill stocking with about 6 inches of compost leaving enough room at top stocking to hang over side of bucket.
Water, pump and stocking is in bucket. Put on the lid, turn on the pump and let brew for 24 hours.
Unplug pump, remove lid, remove pump, and stocking. You now have compost tea. Spread the compost from the stocking in the garden.
I have one of those pump sprayers that I fill with the tea. Saturate the leaves and soil.
you can get an inexpensive fish tank bubbler/pump for about $10..
IT is the part that puts air into your fish tank.
Happily planted zinnias in all my pots... (this protects them from the gophers) they are beautiful.
Tomorrow is cactus day. I have been rounding up all my clay pots and am going to fill them with as many different varieties of cactus as I can. We are just too dry to grow any other plants in them
We get high winds most days during the summer so they dry out too fast even if you water them everyday.
Thanks for the compost recipe. I will have to try this.. my compost is almost done.
you can do the same thing with worm castings if you have a worm farm. IT is supposed to help protect against bug invasions.. (The worm casting tea)
I have also heard that a spraying of diluted coffee works good for this too.
When I moved into my current house in 1993, my neighbor gave me a little climbing vine called Sweet Autumn Clematis. (It blooms in late August through September hence the "Autumn" part of the name.) I planted it next to a trellis on the west side of my carport/garage. It grows about 3 inches a day, so every summer it fills the trellis and every fall I cut it down to the ground. It has zillions of tiny white blooms and smells fantastic in the evening breeze. When the blooms are spent, they leave behind millions of tiny seeds in a filigree/lace-like mass.
Here is a photo of one like it. (This is not at my house.)
It's always been one of my favorite plants---------until this summer.
This summer, it showed up everywhere in my yard, overran my forsythias and climbed to the top of my neighbor's 25 foot tall tree. It looks like a massive snow cap hanging there. I hate like heck to get rid of it 'cause it is such a cool plant. I guess everything is a trade off when it comes to gardening.
When we lived in North Carolina, there was this vine growing in front of the garage (which was separate from the house, out back of it) and I was not really happy with it until it bloomed and proved itself to be a sweet autumn clematis. Since then, we've had one at every house we owned, and this spring I plant to get one for this one! Their scent is incredible, equaled in my mind only by Confederate jasmine, which of course doesn't grow up here in Yankee-land.
Oh, yeh, I forgot to mention about the compost tea...Leafy's post reminded me....use it within 24 hours. After that, all the oxygen pumped into it will be gone. Something about the oxygen in it activates all that goodly/beneficial stuff.
Oh, Leafy, a flower lover after my own heart. Zinnias are my favorite. They are so showy and beautiful. Gee golly, they survive any and everything.
Mrs. Crowe lives across the street from us. About 8 years ago she survived a brain anuresym (sp?). It was quite miraculous. The boy was quite distraught. He said I can't imagine life without Mrs. Crowe. When she came home we cut zinnias from my garden and the boy took them to her. It has been his tradition since then to cut and take zinnias to her a couple of times during the summer.
Waysider, your worries are over. I will be right over to collect a bag full of those seeds!!! I have the larger flower Clematis (don't remember the name) around the mailbox. It doesn't cast seed, because I have never had babies spring up. But, I have rooted it tens of time over to share with folks.
Eeewwee, Watered Garden, Confederate Jasmine, mercy sakes!!! The aroma is intoxicating. I love this plant because it blooms in the spring and then again in the fall. I have it right outside my living room window on a trellis. It is on the same bloom cycle as the honeysuckle. The honeysuckle is a real pest because it can be so invasive. Its aroma and show is its redeeming factor. I keep it on a fence near the vegetable garden because it attracts the bees. Cut it and bring it into the house....mhmhmh.
When we lived in Charleston, it was wonderful to go for an evening stroll in our neighborhood (or South of Broad for that matter) and smell the jasmine blooming. When we bought our last house in Charleston, we planted one, and doggone if that wasn't the one and only cold winter we had down there, and it killed the darn thing! I was heartbroken. Then Hurricane Hugo came along that fall and killed nearly everything else! We did have some very strange flowers, possibly from Florida or a Caribbean island, spring up in the yard after that, though.
I was so glad to be alive and have tales to tell, I really didn't mind too much. But I missed the roses Hugo clobbered.
When I was a kid, we used to follow the scent of honeysuckle in the air until we found it growing wild on a fence row. Then we would pull out the thing-a-ma-bob in the center of the flower. At the very end is a tiny drop of nectar which we would sip. Each flower has one tiny drop. Like nature's candy. Probably wouldn't seem like much compared to the giant size snicker bars that are sold today. Pleasures were much simpler to come by way back then.
When I was a kid, we used to follow the scent of honeysuckle in the air until we found it growing wild on a fence row. Then we would pull out the thing-a-ma-bob in the center of the flower. At the very end is a tiny drop of nectar which we would sip. Each flower has one tiny drop. Like nature's candy. Probably wouldn't seem like much compared to the giant size snicker bars that are sold today. Pleasures were much simpler to come by way back then.
Honeysuckle always reminds me of the first couple of years we were married. It grew all along the side roads in Athens, and when we were out for a run (yes I did still run back then!) or a walk at night, its scent hung heavy in the air. I still get nostalgic remembering that - not the run/walk but the warm summer air and the scent of honeysuckle.
Yum....the nectar of the honeysuckle. Gosh, I remember that sweet simple child delight. We thought we had discovered something. I will never forget when I showed my children to do that. Very good for allergies eating the stamen and anther. Of course, you have to fight the bees for it. Those boogers will literally gang up and defend what is rightfully their territory.
I was in the veggie garden today looking at the butterbean flowers. The bees were determined to let me know the garden belonged to them. Literally, they chased me away. I said, o. k., excuse me, I just want to look. I will get out of the way and let you do your thing. Really, I know better than to walk in the garden when the flowers are in bloom. That could reduce the development of the beans. I was just so proud to still have them producing this late in the season. The bees were more proud. They won. They always will.
Anybody who has ever lived in the Carolinas surely remembers kudzu. It is a large leaved vine imported from China by some fellow who thought it would make excellent cattle fodder. Kudzu can grow a foot or so overnight and will simply drape itself over any inanimate object, abandoned house, fence row, dead tree, rusted out car, whatever. It is one of the scariest things I've ever seen, kind of like a science fiction visitor from outer space. Of course it grows out in the boonies for now, but who knows, somebody it may well swallow downtown Raleigh!
Watered Garden, I was watching on a program the other day about crews employed in Georgia and especially near Atlanta. Their only job is to keep the kudzu at bay. This stuff is immune to even the most lethal brush killer. It is the roots that are so hardy. Unbelievably invasive. I wonder if Chinese cows eat this stuff.
Goats do not eat kudzu. So, if goats do not eat it that is a huge clue!!!! But I have heard of some hill folks cooking and eating it. Even know of some folks that use the vines to make beautiful baskets.
Have I mentioned my potatoes?? I was so disappointed with my tomatoes, this was my third attempt to grow them here :( but when I harvested potatoes in one section of my raised bed I almost forgot about them. My gosh, I bet I had at least 20 POUNDS hidden under the soil. It almost made up for my tomatoes loss. I just recently harvest my 4 bins where I had more potato plants. I think I pulled out 10 to 15 lbs from each bin. Potatoes grow well here! I put in some lettuces and green onion in the place where my potatoes were for fall.
Twinky, yes, it is so cool to eat what you grow. I finally have my first courgette growing. Almost tempted to put an electrical fence around it to keep the slugs away :) I heard my mother-in-law telling someone that my first words from coming in from out in the garden is either "dam slugs" or "dam rain", so I guess I complain a lot about both :) I did something wrong with my onions, they are still so little.
My carrots did ok, the parsnips will be wonderful on the Christmas dinner table! My leeks are looking fine and tall. They have done well all three years I've been here and my garlic looks good. I believe what has done the best in my garden, what has produced the most and what I've harvested the most from are my sweet peas, both annuals and perennials. Everyone in the neighborhood has had some of my sweetpeas! My mother-in-law has started taking them as little gifts when she goes out with friends. They are starting to slow down now and the stems are a little shorter, but their aroma is just as sweet. They have been flowering since May.
GC, exactly what problems were you having with your tomatoes? I probably just forgot or looked in the wrong place. Did you have the soil tested? Did you get some loathsome disease on them?
WG, I'm guessing that it was mildew caused by too much rain or some type of blight. There were beautiful tomatoes on all the vines, all small yet and lots of them. First the stems then the leaves started to turn black, the fruit was fine. Eventually the fruit got spotty. I picked some of the larger clean fruit hoping to save it and put it on the window sill indoors. By the time they were ripe they were hard and discolored. So I bagged everything up.
Recommended Posts
Top Posters In This Topic
62
82
94
90
Popular Days
Mar 29
9
Jun 12
9
Jul 4
8
May 25
7
Top Posters In This Topic
Watered Garden 62 posts
gc 82 posts
kimberly 94 posts
leafytwiglet 90 posts
Popular Days
Mar 29 2009
9 posts
Jun 12 2009
9 posts
Jul 4 2009
8 posts
May 25 2009
7 posts
Popular Posts
kimberly
gc, black eyed peas are for luck and collard greens are for dollars. I plant enough collard greens the end of August to last us all winter long. Oh, honey everybody, I have maters and more maters.
kimberly
Bramble, so sorry about your garden. Our weather has been crazy too. This time of year we are accustomed to the feeling of a hot wet towel wrapped around the face when we are outside. But it has
kimberly
When referring to the herb garden I meant the annuals. I broke down and watered/fertilized the dill and basil. I am hoping for a comeback. The perinnial's (sp?)are forging on. Nothing seems to f
Posted Images
kimberly
Oh, WG, a girl after my own heart. North Carolina....aaahhhh, that is where I lived for so long as a child and where my grandparent's farm was. In a little town called Fremont. Just outside of Goldsboro. I have much family that still lives there. We go there and leave our cares behind. It is like Mayberry to us. Since we moved away from there it has been a tradition in our family, when we reach Wayne County, to roll down the windows, stick our head out and breathe in the air. We say, "Mmmmmm, this is God's country." I swear, the air does smell sweeter.
Years later, I lived in Greenville (that is where my first child was born) and then in Charlotte. All parts of NC are wonderful.
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Watered Garden
Mayberry was based on Mt. Air, NC, where Andy Griffith grew up. Remember when they talked about going over to Mt. Airey?
WG
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Twinky
My favourite thing...pottering in the garden. I lifted my onions last week so there is a big bare patch. I turned my compost bin (no small task, digging it out and moving it elsewhere - a compost turner sounds a very good idea!), tossed some of the compost on the bare patch. Forked it in this evening., and the place where the bin had been.
There was this floppy looking potato top so I pulled at it and found to my surprise that there were a load of decent sized white potatoes under it. I lifted that and another potato. Both of these are self-setters from chits, well just peelings, in what was obviously poorly composted stuff from last year.
I sowed some salad vegs where the compost bin had been; if they do anything so much the better - my salad crops this year are practically non-existent.
I have given away lots of my courgettes, which had turned into small marrows. People have taken them away to make chutney and - soup!
So tonight I ate all home-grown:
some delicious potatoes, tasting sweetly of the earth they were in half an hour before
some mangetout peas, tasting sweet
one onion, with a crisp super-oniony flavour, sauteed in a little olive oil together with:
one courgette, quite large but not quite a marrow, crisp and pleasant, lightly sauteed
followed by a little plum nectar from when I boiled up those tiny plums last week (I froze the main plum mix to make a crumble later; but there was a little juice left).
Mmmmmmmm........
Link to comment
Share on other sites
kimberly
Twinky, as soon as I cross the pond I will be there for left overs!!! Yum, Yum, Yummy. That is my kind of eating, girl. There is a satisfaction, that I can't find the words to describe, from eating what you have grown.
Work, tend, amend and cultivate the soil. Select the right plantings and seed. Save seed and care for it. Plant at just the right time. And then wait... Watch it grow and produce. Spend hours taking care of the plants, the fruit, worrying about the lack of rain or too much, analyzing and correcting any problem that could affect production, etc., etc., etc.
Then the pay off.....eating, canning and preserving the fruits of your labor. When it is winter and everything is in gardening limbo, sitting down to dinner and those beans are on the table or you open the Mason jar of tomatoes for that sauce...makes one proud and thankful. It is the charge that keeps you going for the next season.
As we say here in the deep south...I'm fixin to plant some greens. Took soil samples to my local university extension service to have it analyzed.
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Watered Garden
MORE tomato sauce to can. This time I'm doing it for tomato soup and it's not going to have a bunch of "stuff" in it.
Corn, squash and beans are done; so are cucumbers. Got some lettuce coming on. Time to consider September plantings of kale etc.
Lots of frozen stuff, too.
We grew a green bean called Tenderette this year, first time. Awesome!
WEG
Link to comment
Share on other sites
kimberly
Thought the speckled butterbeans were done for and then had more rain. The amount of rain we have had this time of year is quite unusual. I go out to the garden to pull them up and cart them off to the compost bin. Low and behold, there are new flowers...and lots of them. This weekend I am going to lavish the plants and soil with compost tea.
More unusual is the wind that has continued to blow. Never ever in my southern life, which has always been except for one year, have I known a wind to breeze during dog days or the days after.
I saw on a garden show this morning that spraying compost tea on squash leaves (amongst the gazillion other benefits of compost tea) helps prevents powdery mildew.
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Watered Garden
Compost tea????? What is it and how do I make some? Powdery mildew is epidemic in my neck of the garden this time of year.
WG
Link to comment
Share on other sites
kimberly
Watered Garden do you have composted compost? If you do then you have to brew it.
Down home method:
Compost...not stuff composting but true black gold compost
5 gallon bucket and some sort of lid
1 leg from a pair of panty hose
fish tank pump
water...if water from the spigot and city water let sit for 24 hours before using
Fill bucket a few inches from top with water.
Put pump in water and turn on to make sure water level is not so high it bubbles over and out. Adjust water level if necessary. Let water bubble about 3 or 4 inches from top. DO NOT touch pump unless you unplug it first!!!!
Fill stocking with about 6 inches of compost leaving enough room at top stocking to hang over side of bucket.
Water, pump and stocking is in bucket. Put on the lid, turn on the pump and let brew for 24 hours.
Unplug pump, remove lid, remove pump, and stocking. You now have compost tea. Spread the compost from the stocking in the garden.
I have one of those pump sprayers that I fill with the tea. Saturate the leaves and soil.
Happy gardening, lovies.
Link to comment
Share on other sites
leafytwiglet
you can get an inexpensive fish tank bubbler/pump for about $10..
IT is the part that puts air into your fish tank.
Happily planted zinnias in all my pots... (this protects them from the gophers) they are beautiful.
Tomorrow is cactus day. I have been rounding up all my clay pots and am going to fill them with as many different varieties of cactus as I can. We are just too dry to grow any other plants in them
We get high winds most days during the summer so they dry out too fast even if you water them everyday.
Thanks for the compost recipe. I will have to try this.. my compost is almost done.
you can do the same thing with worm castings if you have a worm farm. IT is supposed to help protect against bug invasions.. (The worm casting tea)
I have also heard that a spraying of diluted coffee works good for this too.
Anyone here tried it?
Link to comment
Share on other sites
waysider
When I moved into my current house in 1993, my neighbor gave me a little climbing vine called Sweet Autumn Clematis. (It blooms in late August through September hence the "Autumn" part of the name.) I planted it next to a trellis on the west side of my carport/garage. It grows about 3 inches a day, so every summer it fills the trellis and every fall I cut it down to the ground. It has zillions of tiny white blooms and smells fantastic in the evening breeze. When the blooms are spent, they leave behind millions of tiny seeds in a filigree/lace-like mass.
Here is a photo of one like it. (This is not at my house.)
It's always been one of my favorite plants---------until this summer.
This summer, it showed up everywhere in my yard, overran my forsythias and climbed to the top of my neighbor's 25 foot tall tree. It looks like a massive snow cap hanging there. I hate like heck to get rid of it 'cause it is such a cool plant. I guess everything is a trade off when it comes to gardening.
Edited by waysiderLink to comment
Share on other sites
Watered Garden
One of my favorites, too!
When we lived in North Carolina, there was this vine growing in front of the garage (which was separate from the house, out back of it) and I was not really happy with it until it bloomed and proved itself to be a sweet autumn clematis. Since then, we've had one at every house we owned, and this spring I plant to get one for this one! Their scent is incredible, equaled in my mind only by Confederate jasmine, which of course doesn't grow up here in Yankee-land.
WG
Link to comment
Share on other sites
waysider
The way this one is spreading, it's likely to show up at your house all by itself!
LOL
Link to comment
Share on other sites
kimberly
Oh, yeh, I forgot to mention about the compost tea...Leafy's post reminded me....use it within 24 hours. After that, all the oxygen pumped into it will be gone. Something about the oxygen in it activates all that goodly/beneficial stuff.
Oh, Leafy, a flower lover after my own heart. Zinnias are my favorite. They are so showy and beautiful. Gee golly, they survive any and everything.
Mrs. Crowe lives across the street from us. About 8 years ago she survived a brain anuresym (sp?). It was quite miraculous. The boy was quite distraught. He said I can't imagine life without Mrs. Crowe. When she came home we cut zinnias from my garden and the boy took them to her. It has been his tradition since then to cut and take zinnias to her a couple of times during the summer.
Waysider, your worries are over. I will be right over to collect a bag full of those seeds!!! I have the larger flower Clematis (don't remember the name) around the mailbox. It doesn't cast seed, because I have never had babies spring up. But, I have rooted it tens of time over to share with folks.
Eeewwee, Watered Garden, Confederate Jasmine, mercy sakes!!! The aroma is intoxicating. I love this plant because it blooms in the spring and then again in the fall. I have it right outside my living room window on a trellis. It is on the same bloom cycle as the honeysuckle. The honeysuckle is a real pest because it can be so invasive. Its aroma and show is its redeeming factor. I keep it on a fence near the vegetable garden because it attracts the bees. Cut it and bring it into the house....mhmhmh.
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Watered Garden
When we lived in Charleston, it was wonderful to go for an evening stroll in our neighborhood (or South of Broad for that matter) and smell the jasmine blooming. When we bought our last house in Charleston, we planted one, and doggone if that wasn't the one and only cold winter we had down there, and it killed the darn thing! I was heartbroken. Then Hurricane Hugo came along that fall and killed nearly everything else! We did have some very strange flowers, possibly from Florida or a Caribbean island, spring up in the yard after that, though.
I was so glad to be alive and have tales to tell, I really didn't mind too much. But I missed the roses Hugo clobbered.
WG
Link to comment
Share on other sites
waysider
When I was a kid, we used to follow the scent of honeysuckle in the air until we found it growing wild on a fence row. Then we would pull out the thing-a-ma-bob in the center of the flower. At the very end is a tiny drop of nectar which we would sip. Each flower has one tiny drop. Like nature's candy. Probably wouldn't seem like much compared to the giant size snicker bars that are sold today. Pleasures were much simpler to come by way back then.
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Watered Garden
Honeysuckle always reminds me of the first couple of years we were married. It grew all along the side roads in Athens, and when we were out for a run (yes I did still run back then!) or a walk at night, its scent hung heavy in the air. I still get nostalgic remembering that - not the run/walk but the warm summer air and the scent of honeysuckle.
WG
Link to comment
Share on other sites
kimberly
Yum....the nectar of the honeysuckle. Gosh, I remember that sweet simple child delight. We thought we had discovered something. I will never forget when I showed my children to do that. Very good for allergies eating the stamen and anther. Of course, you have to fight the bees for it. Those boogers will literally gang up and defend what is rightfully their territory.
I was in the veggie garden today looking at the butterbean flowers. The bees were determined to let me know the garden belonged to them. Literally, they chased me away. I said, o. k., excuse me, I just want to look. I will get out of the way and let you do your thing. Really, I know better than to walk in the garden when the flowers are in bloom. That could reduce the development of the beans. I was just so proud to still have them producing this late in the season. The bees were more proud. They won. They always will.
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Watered Garden
Anybody who has ever lived in the Carolinas surely remembers kudzu. It is a large leaved vine imported from China by some fellow who thought it would make excellent cattle fodder. Kudzu can grow a foot or so overnight and will simply drape itself over any inanimate object, abandoned house, fence row, dead tree, rusted out car, whatever. It is one of the scariest things I've ever seen, kind of like a science fiction visitor from outer space. Of course it grows out in the boonies for now, but who knows, somebody it may well swallow downtown Raleigh!
WG
Link to comment
Share on other sites
kimberly
Watered Garden, I was watching on a program the other day about crews employed in Georgia and especially near Atlanta. Their only job is to keep the kudzu at bay. This stuff is immune to even the most lethal brush killer. It is the roots that are so hardy. Unbelievably invasive. I wonder if Chinese cows eat this stuff.
Goats do not eat kudzu. So, if goats do not eat it that is a huge clue!!!! But I have heard of some hill folks cooking and eating it. Even know of some folks that use the vines to make beautiful baskets.
Link to comment
Share on other sites
gc
Have I mentioned my potatoes?? I was so disappointed with my tomatoes, this was my third attempt to grow them here :( but when I harvested potatoes in one section of my raised bed I almost forgot about them. My gosh, I bet I had at least 20 POUNDS hidden under the soil. It almost made up for my tomatoes loss. I just recently harvest my 4 bins where I had more potato plants. I think I pulled out 10 to 15 lbs from each bin. Potatoes grow well here! I put in some lettuces and green onion in the place where my potatoes were for fall.
Twinky, yes, it is so cool to eat what you grow. I finally have my first courgette growing. Almost tempted to put an electrical fence around it to keep the slugs away :) I heard my mother-in-law telling someone that my first words from coming in from out in the garden is either "dam slugs" or "dam rain", so I guess I complain a lot about both :) I did something wrong with my onions, they are still so little.
My carrots did ok, the parsnips will be wonderful on the Christmas dinner table! My leeks are looking fine and tall. They have done well all three years I've been here and my garlic looks good. I believe what has done the best in my garden, what has produced the most and what I've harvested the most from are my sweet peas, both annuals and perennials. Everyone in the neighborhood has had some of my sweetpeas! My mother-in-law has started taking them as little gifts when she goes out with friends. They are starting to slow down now and the stems are a little shorter, but their aroma is just as sweet. They have been flowering since May.
gc :)
Link to comment
Share on other sites
gc
That clematis is beautiful Waysider!
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Watered Garden
GC, exactly what problems were you having with your tomatoes? I probably just forgot or looked in the wrong place. Did you have the soil tested? Did you get some loathsome disease on them?
WG
Link to comment
Share on other sites
gc
WG, I'm guessing that it was mildew caused by too much rain or some type of blight. There were beautiful tomatoes on all the vines, all small yet and lots of them. First the stems then the leaves started to turn black, the fruit was fine. Eventually the fruit got spotty. I picked some of the larger clean fruit hoping to save it and put it on the window sill indoors. By the time they were ripe they were hard and discolored. So I bagged everything up.
gc
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Watered Garden
Is that that disease the talking heads mentioned that was similar to potato blight?
I'm sorry for your loss.
Perhaps plant in a different location next spring, would be my only suggestion.
WG
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.