Gardening, flowers and veggies: 2014

[Bpeep]

Yep lots of time to plant spinach.

[Queen K]

Great, I'll replant.

And isn't EVERYONE awake at 3:20 am? Every day?

[Bpeep]

I picked brocolli from the garden today.

[Lady tehMa]

I'm now eating cherry tomatoes :)

[Bpeep]

Too hot for my brocolli.
My corn sure enjoyed the heat tho. It grew 3 feet in a week.
It's cobbing nice now.
Peppers are loving the warmth too. Green peppers are coming along and I picked my first jalapeños yesterday.

[flamingfingers]

Which is more effective?

Epsom salts sprayed onto tomatoes for blossom end rot or applied as a drench to the soil? I see a few in big pots are showing signs - but the ones in the garden itself seem ok.

[Lady tehMa]

I just toss the crystals on the ground around them and water them in . . . I guess I'm a bit of a lazy gardener :p

Edit: This link popped up on Pinterest for me just now . . . good timing! It recommends specific doses and applications.

http://www.backyarddiva.ca/garden-tips-6/

[flamingfingers]

Great! Thanks.

[Queen K]

I'm eating low acid cherry tomatos now too. All our tomatos are green or turning colour now. Our peppers look like a write off I'm afraid to say. Kale is going great and so are cukes, we've eaten a few now. Zukes are a disaster however, under formed and I have no idea as to why one year I had great ones and never after that.

[JLives]

My butternut is huge, green and luscious but is not producing any fruit. Any ideas on how I can help it out?

[Lady tehMa]

My butternut is huge, green and luscious but is not producing any fruit. Any ideas on how I can help it out?

Do you hand pollinate, jennylives?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=srfRonXRO4c

[Bpeep]

I'm getting tired of eating zuchini and cukes. Lol. Cukes for breakfast.
Had my first green pepper of the season today.


Epsom is good to help with a magnesium deficiency but it can be overdone.
You'll rarely get a mag deficiency unless it's sandy fast draining soil.
Mag is effective to help plants utilize calcium.
Calcium deficiency is what causes blossom end rot on tomatoes and peppers.
Soil is rarely low on calcium, it's usually locked out because of cold soils, improper watering or wrong ph.
If you have BER on tomatoes a calcium foliar is super effective.
Spray the leaves liberally with it. Don't do it in the heat or sun.
I do it late evening. Doing so allows it time to be absorbed.
I use 2 or 3 drops of detergent per liter as a surfactant.
Once a week should be enough while the fruits setting unless you have BED problems then do it more often.

My corn is 10 feet high. I had to rope both patches in.
They are as high as the irrigation sprayer now.
I got it in a bit late. Looks like another week before any will be ready.
I have a little over 200 plants.
I'll never keep up. I'll have to blanch and freeze most of it.

I put in 6 indeterminate tomatoes. They are about 7 feet high and pretty laden.
I'll have 5 times what I need.
Don't forget to keep popping off the suckers on your indeterminates. I do mine every few days.

I grew my carrots in peat this year.
They are laser straight. Totally unrestricted growth.

I got two pickings so far off the 6 blueberries I planted this spring.
There's lots left to mature yet. The trees have doubled in size with new growth.

I planted 125 potato plants. Early, mid, and lates.
I've been getting earlies and mids for close to 2 months the size of softballs.

August is kinda one of those sadder summer months.
Things are maturing. The days are getting shorter.
Summers end starts poking it's nose out.

I can't wait till spring.

[Bpeep]

For you greenies with more zuchini flowers than you want zuchinis,
Pick them and coat them in a beer batter and deep fry them.
The oils make them heart stoppers but you can justify it in your mind because of the healthy flowers.
A bit of work but delicious.

[Bpeep]

One of the nice things about August is the mums are starting to bloom.

I planted a patch of 50 geraniums beside the stairs to the walkway. They are blooming like crazy.
They've been enjoying the heat more than my hostas have.

[Bpeep]

I finally had my first pickin of corn yesterday.
I ate 6 of em. Delish.