How does your garden grow?

Larro Darro · Apr 30, 2017

CADplans said:
A guy had an ad stating he had apple tree rootings for sale,,
I asked him for 2 of each of the 7 kinds of trees that he said he had.

Well,, he got in a rush (taking his family to see a movie)
and he only brought me 9 trees.

The good thing is he only charged a little over $5 a tree,,,

A neighbor gave me some 2 gallon buckets,,,
and I used a Staples rebate to pay for the potting soil,,,
my daughter came over and helped me pot the trees this morning,

So,,, how long should I wait before I fertilize the trees??

and, what do I fertilize them with?
My SIL said the fall it the right time to plant them,,,
so we have all summer to figure out where to plant them,, and prep the planting sites.

Like CADplans said, I would go ahead and plant them. Easier to keep them alive when in the ground. Water once a week the first 4-5 months unless you get an inch of rain. I have peach trees that I need to get planted.

Larro Darro · Apr 30, 2017

Yesterday I replanted the skips on the Crimson Sweets. The dry weather has been tough on them. I need to side dress the melons I do have. I did get the Spaghetti squash laid by last week before it rained. They are looking better than anything else in the garden. Today I replanted the skips in the okra, and planted 4 more rows of Muncher cucumbers. The first planting of cukes was so poor I decided to just start over. Will do the same with Acorn squash tomorrow. A few came up, but not worth the effort to fight the weeds to replant in the same spot. I got the north half of the garden cut up, so I have plenty of space right now.

hghvolt · May 1, 2017

Made some sweet zucchini pickles yesterday. Going to try some dill tonight.

DFB · May 2, 2017

PEAS are up!

And I'm heading off to TSC now to get another 16ft cattle panel so I can do a second planting.

Wow down at work we planted red garlic late last Fall (I'm thinking like the first week of November maybe) I checked on it yesterday figuring I see maybe 2 or 3 inch shoots starting up but it was almost a foot tall already. Which is good because I was in charge of the planting I tilled the and laid down plastic with mi amigos and then they planted the cloves and covered the whole thing with straw.

That spot and the whole orchard in general is quite a bit warmer than where I am probably 1000 ft higher, plums have already flowered where as my trees are just leafing out,

Though I think he jumped the gun some Boss planted his gladiolus last weekend. I'm holding off slightly on mine though I'm itching to plant them too and did rototill the spot already. But last year I lost some, the ground was just wet and cold early like this. Been raining for 3 days too. So if something goes wrong with those at the business at least I'm not involved!

buckeyefarmer · May 2, 2017

Just tilled the garden.

robbyr · May 4, 2017

Here's mine. This pic is a week or two ago.

Crook neck squash, okra, purple hull peas, snap beans, tomatoes, jalapeños, and bell peppers.

MossRoad · May 4, 2017

Just planted seeds in starters Tuesday. Was supposed to do it Good Friday, but got delayed.

buckeyefarmer · May 4, 2017

Planted my garden tonight.
Tomatos, cantaloupe, peppers, cabbage, green beans, potatoes, corn. Downsized it a row.

lakngulf · May 6, 2017

I have a special source for growing soil for my garden containers.

I grew up on a cattle farm. My family does not raise cattle now but a farmer rents some of the land and has an angus herd. In the spots where he feeds hay during the winter, I pile up the soil during the spring. This creates an immediate rich compost pile. After a couple of years maturing, I load some on my trailer and bring to my garden. This is what fills the containers.

These guys help in the process:

The plants are doing well in this soil and some great growing conditions this year:

2ndhalf · May 6, 2017

Wow, that soil looks great.. no wonder those plants do too! All about the soil!

2ndhalf · May 6, 2017

I planted 4 blueberry bushes last weekend... about the only thing I can do in the dirt right now with all the rain we have had. I know you can't see them since I trimmed them back to just a small stem but they are in there.

I know it looks a little crude.. it is called using what you have. I built a rectangular box with no bottom to throw yard trimmings veggie scraps and compostable material and planted the blue berries around it. The galvanized only goes about 6 inches into the ground so the blueberry roots should be able to go under it.

I read that blueberry bushes do very well around compost piles and so that is the thinking behind it. I used the galvanized to make it harder for the critters to get into the compost heap.

I need it to stop raining as do all of our farmers... it is getting kind of serious right now with the rain and cold guys are going to start losing crops.

MossRoad · May 7, 2017

Supposed to freeze tonight and tomorrow night here....

buckeyefarmer · May 8, 2017

Tomatos and peppers got frosted last night, didn't think it got that cold.

MossRoad · May 8, 2017

Yar! It was chilly.

buckeyefarmer · May 8, 2017

My low showed 38 last night.

MossRoad · May 8, 2017

It dropped to 31 here. A bit colder away from town.

Gunny · May 9, 2017

I lost 54 tomato plants to the frost. I knew it was coming, but with all the rain we've had, there was no way to get into the field to cover them, I sunk down in the mud so far my boot pulled off trying to get unstuck. Shame, they were doing so well, most had already started blooming and the worst part is that they were from the expensive seeds from Burpees, not available on the open market yet.
I went into town yesterday and bought two dozen each Roma and Rutgers, maybe things will dry out enough to get these in the ground soon.

buckeyefarmer · May 9, 2017

We had 34° and light frost. Will be replanting I guess.

lakngulf · May 9, 2017

buckeyefarmer said:
We had 34° and light frost. Will be replanting I guess.

Yikes. We had some late cold spells just before Easter but have been ok for couple weeks now.

DFB · May 9, 2017

Geez too bad for all those losses to the weather this year for some of you

Still cold here only in high 40's and low 50's plus has been raining off and on for the better part of the last full week now too. Ground is soaked.

Started all my zucchini and yellow summer squash plants plus the cukes in 6 pk containers for later transplanting and just did some basil seeds too. Was decently warm amd humid in the little HF greenhouse. Last Sunday I did several 72 flats with beets and swiss chard and that's all come in just a couple of days even with the generally low temps.

So tried the Mexican grey squash Zappolo from Ferry Morse Seeds this year along with the Cousa squash I most always grow. But I got Barq a F1 hybrid from Harris Seed, Burpee didn't offer any this season but I other years I grew whatever they had.

And then there is yellow zuke Goldy, also an F1 hybrid, two green zuke another hybrid called Sure Thing from Burpee never grew it before and the one I like a lot the real dark green Black Beauty plus the Italian heirloom Costata Romanesco.

For yellow I got Multipik hybrid from Harris same as we use at the Greenhouse business and also Burpee Saffron

I'm supposed to save the Romanesco seeds for our little seed saving club at the library. I will need to keep them separate from the rest to do that.

With proper isolation one could save the Black Beauty, Zappolo, and the Saffron seed too those also being OP varities.

Ordered a new 3 ft mulch layer from Earthway Tools to use for the gardens at work. They are building it now. My old 2 ft wide Holland though still good has been hard to source the correct size rolls of plastic. I cut a 4 ft roll in half last year but not without major difficulty, There is no real easy way to do it seems as virtually any type powered blade fuses the edges of plastic together at the cut. Hand saw binds too much.

One of the places I talked to recommended using a chainsaw

I dunno about that!