Gardening

[Growit1]

Delbert - I know you had your tomatoes in a lot earlier than most of us. Are you getting any ripe ones yet? I have one Cherokee Purple that was the first to set but it's only about tennis ball size and is a long way off from turning. All the low 50's at night probably aren't helping much.

[Delbert]

Have some tomatoes on but small.  Needs warmer weather.   I don't need it but they do.

[Delbert]

I noticed in the journal that I keep that we are sure behind last year.  I had picked during the week of June 3rd to June 10th blackberries,white peaches, picked squash and green beans.

[Bullwinkle]

      Wondering what the rest of you do as to feeding, and how often. I've been using Miraclegro and it says 7-10 days apart. some things are thriving, others not so much.

[Growit1]

I've a lot of manure etc. worked into the soil so the only thing I've used this year is fish emulsion. I've used Miracle-Gro in the past and too many times I've found it's giving too much nitrogen for the plants. Lots of foliage and little or no fruit. In some of the reading I've done a lot of people suggest using the Miracle-Gro bloom booster for flowers on tomatoes instead of the others. Has less nitrogen in it and more phosphate.

[Wilma]

Yesterday, on another thread, I said that I would post a picture of the Black Velvet petunia that I bought the other day.  Here it is.

[Delbert]

I put a tablespoon of  miracle grow and that much epsom salt several inches below the roots when I plant the tomato and hardly every use any after that.   They still get 5 or 6 feet tall.   Just make sure you get the two things away from the roots when starting off or they might burn.  I have some tomatoes called Fourth of July that normally turn before the 4th.   Last year I had some by now but will be closer to the fourth this year.   They are a smaller tomato.  Finally got some sweet potato plants at Dillons in Winfield.   Finally have my garden all planted.  Getting my pond watering system ready to go.   Have a pump that increases the water pressure that flows from the pond.   I can run a sprinker with it.    I don't use it on the tomatoes.   I have them in containers that I have the bottom out ,   I have the container about half buried.    When it gets dry I run the hose in the container.   

[Wilma]

Delbert, I like that idea of container tomatoes.  I hadn't thought of cutting out the bottom of the containers and setting them in the ground.

I don't plant tomatoes because I can't eat them and because my husband always went overboard when he bought plants.  Every year I swore I wasn't going to do any canning, then every year we would overflow with toms and I couldn't just throw them away.  I could have been happy with two plants.  He wasn't happy without two dozen plants.

[Growit1]

Delbert - Have you ever tried starting your own sweet potato slips? I did it this year mostly just to see if I could. Considering I don't have any sunny windowsills (actually no windowsills) it went fairly well. I only put seven slips out - space is limited and since I've never grown sweet potatoes before I thought I'd see how well they do for me before I go wild with them. STILL no tomatoes turning red but lots and lots of green ones. Have had a touch of early blight this year which I usually don't have. Rather surprised by it considering nothing has ever been grown in that spot before. Had to give up and spray the potatoes - little grasshoppers were eating them faster than they could grow.

[Delbert]

Picking green beans.   Not my favorite job but guess I could have skipped planting them.   Some warm weather garden growing days.    A guy gave me 6 climbing spinach seeds.   About gave up on it.   Finnally one has started climbing up the fence and the other is behind in growth.   He said the more leaves you pick the more it grows.   Fun to grow something new