Fed up with the garden

[masseyrider]

What a #^*@( f S--t show this year.
Got a few zucchini early in the week. Went out 2 days later half the plants collapsed and are done for.
Water melons and cantaloupe have been in for over a month and have hardly moved same with cukes.
The different squashes seem to have gotten powdery mildew.
Potatoes were looking good and now have an invasion of potato beetles.
Corn appears frozen at about a foot.
Tomatoes have gotten a blight and are dying from the bottom up. Same with the egg plant.
Beans? Don't even ask.
Only thing doing well are the sunflowers, over an acres worth. I like the flowers and the birds get into them. All sorts of yellow finches every year.
But the edibles are all doing poorly.
Haven't done anything differently.
I rotate the location of the garden plot every year. Never had a problem where it currently is.
Neighbors plots look good.
Looks like I'm going to be shopping at the local market this year.


But... what the H E double hockey sticks.

 

[CalG]

commiseration:

We have a few peach, plum, and apricot trees. A typical year is over 250 lbs of fruit.
This year... NOTHING!

We had fresh shell peas for supper last night though ;-)

 

[Thomas]

All the wife's $$$'s cuke tomato lettuce going like weed.

 

[scootr]

Buddy in KY said the same. Too dry early then too wet. Very little yield this year.

 

[masseyrider]

Buddy in KY said the same. Too dry early then too wet. Very little yield this year.

same. Didn't mention cherries. Every year the birds are a challenge. This year also had rain, rain and rain when they were ripening. What the birds didn't eat split and rotted.

 

[ericm979]

So far it's not looking like a good garden year for us. It's been colder than usual all spring and summer. Your weather's likely been different.

One problem we have had in the garden was using horse manure as fertilizer. Most horse manure now contains herbicides! It's from the horse's feed. In our case it was aged manure and it still had enough herbicide to stunt some plants but not others. The tomatoes took it particularly hard.

 

[masseyrider]

So far it's not looking like a good garden year for us. It's been colder than usual all spring and summer. Your weather's likely been different.

One problem we have had in the garden was using horse manure as fertilizer. Most horse manure now contains herbicides! It's from the horse's feed. In our case it was aged manure and it still had enough herbicide to stunt some plants but not others. The tomatoes took it particularly hard.

Imagine what it's doing for the horses.

 

[5030]

Buddy in KY said the same. Too dry early then too wet. Very little yield this year.

How the field corn here is going to play out. Planted, germinated and then a long dry spell so it rooted shallow. Once it matures and develops cobs (which will probably be on the small side), the weight of the cobs and stalks will cause it to fall over as the plants are shallow rooted and incapable of supporting them. the issue with that is of course, no combine can harvest the corn with the cobs laying on the ground.

Gonna be a bad year here for row croppers growing field corn and the beans and the wheat aren't much better. The wheat has very small heads and the beans are stunted.

Oh well, poop happens.

Least my hayfields are looking good. Fingers cross there.

 

[5030]

The issue with any garden is, they are all labor intensive no matter if the yield is good or not.

 

[GeneV]

I applaud people tending gardens, and I totally get the appeal...especially if you're farther out from grocery stores. We also had a garden for a few years. But then every trip to Costco, there's them organic fruits and veggies just right there waiting for purchase, every day of the week/month/year they're in season, and you could buy just enough w/o having to find family/friends to unload the excess onto, etc.

So we no longer have a garden, for us it's just redundant when the grocery store is a scenic 12 min drive away.

 

[5030]

One nice thing about where we live and farm is, this particular area in Michigan is loaded with truck farms so we have our choice of vegetables and fruits and we can actually go out in the fields and pick what we want to as we all are friends with the farmers around here.

I used to grow cabbage for making Kraut but quit doing that as well because If I require cabbage for making kraut, all I have to do is swing by the Dusseau's farm and get it and they usually will give us a full hamper of cabbage out of their refrigerated cooler. A full hamper is 100 pounds btw.

Makes no sense to have a garden and toil away on it when everything is available for the asking.

Strawberries are another big crop here. We can actually pick our own from those fields as well.

About the only thing we do grow is potatoes now. This is excellent potato ground and very few of the truck farmers around here grow them and the ones that do, grow chipping potatoes anyway.

 

[CalG]

same. Didn't mention cherries. Every year the birds are a challenge. This year also had rain, rain and rain when they were ripening. What the birds didn't eat split and rotted.

Speaking of cherries (sour).

We have two trees, Over the past 30 years, we have had maybe three good harvests. Mostly the birds get 'em the day before I should have picked.

This spring, a pair of Broad Wing hawks built a nest up high in one of our many maple trees.

I just finished my lunch of fresh cherry jam on toast. ;-)

 

[WVH1977]

My corn did well this year. Picked a wheel barrow full two days ago and there is more ready to go. Rain hit it just right this year. This year I planted it only about a foot apart. Did not even weed it. Also have good crop of cucumbers coming in. My green beans did not do as well just planted more of those to get up before fall. I only had one good picking on them. Like 5030 said, lots of work needed to care for a garden.

 

[masseyrider]

I grew up on a farm and my parents were old school. Partly their upbringing and partly they were survivors of ******'s concentration camps. They came to this country with maybe $20 between them.
Food and food security was a priority with them.
Even my father's last summer, he was riddled with cancer, he planted potatoes. He didn't say anything, just got a basket of seed potatoes got on the loader tractor and planted. It was too much for him to get off and on so he just tossed them off the side of the tractor into the little trough the disks make and backfilled them with the loader bucket. He didn't live long enough to have any, but he still had it in his mind that it had to be done.
How could I not make an attempt.
It is trying sometimes though.

 

[5030]

I have a furrower attachment for my rear tine tiller (Ardisam) than cuts a nice potato furrow. cut the furrow, rake in the spoil and call it good. One year I tried growing them in straw bales and that was a PITA.

 

[Jstpssng]

I have a furrower attachment for my rear tine tiller (Ardisam) than cuts a nice potato furrow. cut the furrow, rake in the spoil and call it good. One year I tried growing them in straw bales and that was a PITA.

I have one of those for my Troy built. Not only does it work well for potatoes but also for any seedlings you put in the ground. I like to drop my plants in, put a good dollop of soil/compost mix on the root ball and then cover them over with a rake. It sure beats bending over, although it doesn't allow for using a weedblocker.

 

[5030]

For seeds I used one of those Earthway wheeled seeders. gives uniform spacing and the one I have also has a fertilizer attachment for applying granulated top dressing. I should sell it, nice seeder.

 

[grsthegreat]

Wifes garden had a late start due to weather…
time will tell how it fares. As for cherries, we had a great crop this year. Gave bunch to neighbors. very little insect or bird damage this year for some reason. Last year they got the entire crop. Wife is freezing and caning them as i type. I just got thru pitting them this morning.

 

[Jstpssng]

For seeds I used one of those Earthway wheeled seeders. gives uniform spacing and the one I have also has a fertilizer attachment for applying granulated top dressing. I should sell it, nice seeder.

I have one of those also but never seem to use it. My soil is lumpy and has too many small rocks for it to work well.

 

[ultrarunner]

So far this year looking good.

After years of drought the series of almost weekly storms kicked everything into high gear… even the figs and citrus.