23,948 Garden Web Discussions | Vegetable Gardening

Savor is a true Charentais. Johnny's carries it.

To me, a Galia is a bit more on the Dew side than the Loupe.

Thanks again, both of you. It's so aggravating that there aren't any farmers' markets around here that have melons (I don't believe I've ever seen a melon other than watermelon at either of our local markets) that I could buy to try.

what they all said... but to clarify.. simplify.. i hope ...

a plant in the wild has ONLY ONE goal ... to reproduce ... produce seed ... and if the fruit/veg itself rots where it lays.. all it is doing .. is composting the seed produced ... with me so far ..

a gardener... has no need for seed ... their goal is large pretty produce ... and that is not accomplished.. by letting them lay on the ground ... due to the potential of bugs and diseases mentioned above

easy peasy ... lol.. see what i did there ... its veg related.. lol ..

do NOT confuse industrial production as one above noted ... because ... again.. their goal is different ... near napoleon OH is the campbells soup factory that makes its famous tomato soup ... for lots of miles around... all you see is T fields... and in season.. giant semi dump trucks filled with Ts ... i often wonder how they arent all crushed by the time they get their.. from their own weight piled 8 or 10 foot high ... [probably because they are picked while still rather hard]

the point being.. they arent trying to produce a grocery store perfect T..

you can try going all nature in your process ... all the power to ya .... but i would suggest ... you plant say 3 plants.. stake one.. cage one.. and let one lie ...

i learned more by experimenting.. than i ever did from a book/WWW .. especially since we didnt have the WWW back them ....

good luck

ken

The idea is to keep the stems/vines and especially the fruit off the ground. Tomatoes will reach 6-feet in stem/vine length. Cherry tomatoes a lot more. If you didn't support them, they'd be crawling on the ground, even before tomatoes formed, and certainly afterwards. They might produce down there, but keeping fruit in the dirt from decaying would be hard, and you'd waste a load of growing space.

Of course, since the whole purpose of a plant, to that plant,
is to produce more plants, it's pretty sensible to have the fruit laying on the ground! That purpose isn't served by supporting the fruit. Since the purpose of the plant to us, is to harvest clean and flawless fruit, not so much the case, and plant support makes a lot of sense.

Wow. That is exciting to see all that fruit this early in zone 5. I am starting to get jalapenos, but my eggplants are just barely starting to set fruit.

What is your recommendation for an early and reliable tomato? I have lots of green ones, but nothing is starting to turn yet. I was hoping Earliana and Buckabee 50 would beat July 4th, but it isn't going to happen.

Here is a link that might be useful: My garden blog

This year Sweet 100 gave me some red ones already, like 6-7 of them from 2 bushes, not more. Last year I had first 4th of July ready by June 29, but this year they are not ready at all yet. I also like Jetsetter - it is not ready by July 4th, but by 15th usually you can start picking them. I am still researching tomatoes, because 4th of July is only sold by Burpee and too expensive, and Jetsetter sometimes gets sick - last year lost a plant in a very beginning of the season due to bacterial cancer. Had to remove the whole bush to save others. This spring was very late and cold, I usually transplant my tomatoes by May 9. This year it was May 25. May be this is why they are not ready yet.

If you have plants available, you may be able to get usable sweet potatoes by planting in July. They do slow down as the days shorten, so don't make a very large bet on them.

Corn, okra, tomato plants, sweet potatoes, winter squash, pumpkins, basil, pepper plants. Maybe you could find some on sale at the local garden center or big box stores. Please check first before buying for bugs and diseases.

Thanks, wlynnp. I've heard from several people that Jimmy Nardello is the best tasting sweet pepper, but isn't it kind of narrow for stuffing?

ha! yes! but for cooking in general and eating fresh they would be great.

Snip off the worst, try some fungicide, and try to water from underneath. My cucumbers had this last year, and for some crazy reason they didn't die until the end of the summer! I've seen pictures of some other gardeners' and mine never got that bad, it only affected the leaves. My plants were hideous, but they kept producing, which makes me think it may have been a different strain of downy mildew? I had a ton of huge cukes. This year I started spraying since the first pointed leaves appeared...there are a few spots, but I hope those are just bugs.

I'd say it's angular leaf spot. This isn't such bad news as downy mildew.

Maxim's advice will work with this disease, too. Copper fungicide is recommended.

Very pretty!!

Thanks, Loribee. :-)

Ohhh Nancy, I have to share my turkey story: A coworker of mine was selling his dark blue Mercedes. Had it detailed and polished to a mirror shine. Then because he didn't want it touched, he passed on the parking lot and parked it near open space surrounding our office.

Yep....you know where I'm going with this....the turkeys happened upon it, surrounded the car, saw "that rival gang of turkeys" in their reflection and pecked a turkey-high ring around the entire car. We all learned about it when he was on the phone explaining what happened to his insurance company. You've never seen so many people with tears rolling down their eyes, trying to stifle the laughter.

Another story. This week a friend who has half wild, fixed barn cats noticed a new critter hanging out with the kitties -- a half grown raccoon. It's living in the old barn with the cats and thinks it's one of them.

I heard someone on TV the other day state that squash vine borers stop laying eggs after the 4th of July. So if you can hang on for another two days . . .

Of course, this assumes the TV woman knows what she's talking about. Sometimes that's a stretch. ;-)

I hear ya. The weather person has as much chance of being wrong as right in our neck of the woods too. lol

Ok, well I do hope that is the case with the SVBM. We've had an unusually large number of birds in the yard. Robins seem to have nested nearby and I counted about 7 adolescents yesterday. Then a flock of starlings, and a pair of catbirds. They all seem to be very interested in the vegetable beds. Flying in and out of the beds with squash in them, so I am hoping they are finding bugs to eat.

I don't even have a feeder up, because I didn't want to attract squirrels. I do have a number of shrubs that fruit is developing on and I think they are here in anticipation of a feast. And I seem to remember reading that birds that are fruit eaters, also eat insects. So this has been an interesting development this year.

"We have no way of knowing where the OP resides as for some reason they never include that info in any of their posts despite requests to do so."

They never seem to reply to follow-up questions either.

Right you are Dave, as I said, every situation is different and it's up to the individual to determine what is right. In my case, I find it helpful, in others, it can be harmful. I don't prescribe to a one size fits all approach and never will.

Course, based on yours and Lori 's comments, the author of the question seems to not care one way or the other so, either way, oh well.

Should I thin them out? Maybe they are planted to thick and the flowers are not seen or sought out because they are hidden under so much foliage......?

And hand pollination....I guess swirling a qtip around in each flower would get the job done, no?

yes, so long as you do it in the male first. I use a small paint brush.

The yellowish plant was planted in Miracle Grow garden

There is your cause. MG Garden Soil says on the bag Not for Use in Containers. It compacts, drains poorly, and retains too much water leading to root suffocation and root rot and yellowing of the leaves. It is intended only for use mixed well into existing garden beds.

Scott's Potting soil isn't much better but it doesn't compact as quickly. Still you will likely have problems with that plant further down the line.

Container plants do best by far in soil-less potting mixes. Check all the discussions on the Container Gardening forum about the various recommended container mixes to use and the ones to avoid.

Both plants are small enough that they could still be transplanted to containers containing beneficial mixes if you wish.

Dave

I had hopped mixing the MG with peat moss and manure would have made the soil okay to use in a container. I am planning to transplant into a bed this weekend so hopefully the plant will improve after that point. I sprinkled with a nitrogen fertilizer earlier today.

Thanks for all the help.

Dave

Thanks for all of the replies!

I went out and checked and several looked like they had holes in the stems. So, I cut them open and found the yucky SVB worms. I made sure to kill the worm and then covered the stem where I opened it with dirt. Will the plant live through this?

I also checked my yellow squash and zucchini and found a few worms in those also. I hope everything does not get ruined. They have really been doing well!

Also, in the process of getting the worm out of one of the acorn squash plants, one of the smaller acorn squash fell off. It's about the size of a baseball and is not dark green yet. Will it ripen up now that it is off the vine, or should I toss it?

Thanks!

You can eat it.

"Dr. Mittleider's garden has been tested after 20 years of growing and still showed no signs of salt contamination, toxicities of the subsoil or salinity problems"

Tested by whom? A completely independent third party lab, not contracted by Dr. Mittleider?

I just came accross this method, and it seemed promising until I looked into it. Please correct me if I'm wrong but isn't this method just a run to waste with standard soil deep backup system? seems the method has yields similar to hydroponics systems, but uses more space.

They look a little burned from the soap but nothing too serious. If you have caterpillars, use BT.

The only bugs I ever see on my Kale are aphids. And while soap will kill them, it simply isn't necessary. Like flora suggested, sprays of water every few days is sufficient to keep populations at bay.

My guess, also, is that you sprayed with soap and left it on there during the heat and sun. Insecticidal soap is best used in the evening and rinsed off in the morning.

Kevin