23,594 Garden Web Discussions | Vegetable Gardening

LOL Deeby. Your comment reminds me of the California cheese commercial (happy cows make better cheese) with the earthquake. Typical Californians making fun of our natural disasters.

Here is a link that might be useful: Happy Cows Earthquake Commerical

You were right, loribee2; I checked with my son (in Berkeley) and he says it's been about 10 years since anyone felt a bump or rattle.

Here's the 2014 list of hurricane names, though, just in case you want to follow them from your west coast perch, the way I follow earthquake tremors (online, on a weather site) from the east coast:
Arthur
Bertha
Cristobal
Dolly
Edouard
Fay
Gonzalo
Hanna
Isaias
Josephine
Kyle
Laura
Marco
Nana
Omar
Paulette
Rene
Sally
Teddy
Vicky
Wilfred

Carol (not a hurricane)

Zucchini are the only plants in my garden I don't fertilize after planting, mostly because I don't want to encourage even more zucchini, LOL

Once the fruits are setting I stay out of the vines, neither weeding nor feeding. I like buttercups, too, but they can run 15 feet or more. You can nip off the ends of the vines if they threaten to take over city hall.

I too have seen no females all season! been like 3-4 weeks and all male flowers every few days, until this past weekend when i saw ONE female starting to grow ( hopefully will flower soon). i really hope my zucchini plant doesnt produce only 1 fruit all summer lol

I've got the opposite - all females, haven't seen a male yet. Thinking of asking my neighbors if one of their plants can make a pollen donation ;-)

Mine are golf-ball sized at best. They emerged only in late May and early June, thanks to an extremely cold spring and a very late thaw. A full ground thaw occurred at my place only in late May and in some other people's farms it wasn't until June.

My ground was frozen too. This may be one good argument for bins, to get an earlier start than the frozen soil allows.

Egg plant seeds don't digest and act as laxative. If that's what you want, wait till it "give" feel otherwise pick when not.

As least for purple asian eggplants, if you wait until they're full sized, they'll be soft but have noticeable seeds. If you're going to broil them or stir fry them, I'm not quite sure why you'd want them to be soft. They'll soften up nicely just by being cooked.

Some type of Cucumis melo. Probably a cantaloupe.

Bloomin_Onion
Thanks for your help!
And yes it was like winning the seed lotto or alien growing.

Farmerdill, I didn't plant a cantaloupe but I'll take it!!
Thanks.

Some varieties are much worse than others about not knowing where to put their peppers.

Yes, I grow both Ace and Lipstick. The Lipstick never poses a problem, though admittedly, they are smaller sweet peppers and grow pointy (like lipstick) so I think they slide out from the "Y" as they grow.

The Ace, I've learned, definitely can't be trusted to grow unattended. Most likely because of their shape, they are constantly wedging themselves in the crux of branches.

My jug of Neptunes Harvest FE & Seaweed Liquid Ferilizer says:

Use 1/8 Cup (1 fl. Oz. or 2 Tablespoons) per gallon of water. Feed vegetables, flowers, trees and shrubs every 2-3 weeks. Apply until soil is saturated or as a foliar feed until leaves are wet, top & bottom. It is best to foliar feed early or late in the day.

So unless your mix is a lot stronger than Neptune's Harvest, I would double the dose. When I water with the mixture I do it until the soil is saturated around the plant. Depending on how wet the soil already is, that could mean a gallon or more per plant.

Yes, my bottle is the same. I just mis-remembered. Many thanks for all your advice! Luckily we've had a few days with no rain, so they've had a chance to dry out. I fertilized this morning. I'll report back with progress!

Stick your finger deep into the soil before watering. Moisture at root level is what counts, not the soil surface.

Dave

UPDATE:

Too much watering was definitely the problem. I watered the eggplants about 1-2 times a week or not even if it's been raining quite abit.

Now the fruits have been setting and growing nicely can't wait to harvest!

Thanks again Dave

Have you been fertilizing? They look relatively healthy, though they could benefit from some fish emulsion or miracle gro.

I do put fish emulsion down. I'll try to feed it more this week.

Thanks Dave, you're right! I really focused on "tell mommy first if you want to eat a tomato last year"... I still caught her a few times with the fruit of her choice half way gone, but she did ask otherwise. I just didn't want to risk the "one time" if there's poison on the crops. :) I'll go over it with her again and again this year, lord knows it's easy to forget just how much a child grows in both mind and body in just one year! The only difference between last year and this year for me is a few grey hairs and maybe a few extra dollars in the bank hahaha :p Thanks for your valuable advice!

Have no advice about stink bugs, but have one about 4 years old eating fruit without washing. Make it fun to her. Make a faucet available for her to use outside. Teach her how to properly wash her hands and the fruit. I am sure she will be washing it several times before she eats it - just because it is FUN to use the faucet). If you having problem with water running outside, you can use something like this.(see photo). in Russian it called "rukomoinik". Just make sure you change water in it 2 times a day when your daughter is outside and do not leave water in when she is not around. You can also wash it inside with some antibacterial wash before add fresh water in it.

I know, it is almost impossible to buy such thing in US, but you can actually make one from old pot with cover and and some metal stick.

Here is a link that might be useful: Read about