23,948 Garden Web Discussions | Vegetable Gardening
Yeah they are turning yellow because they are left on the vine way too long. They are long past the picking stage. If you don't remove them the plant will shut down any further production. Looks like you planted one of the pickling varieties and they don't get long and narrow like slicing varieties do.
Dave
Also, you do not need to root them in a pot first. Why not just root them directly into your garden and skip that step? That's the way most folks do it unless it is still too cold outside. I would assume by the time your slips are 6 inches in length it will be the right temp. Probably around 6/1 right?
You can put heavy duty black plastic sheets in the walkways and gravel or rocks on top. You can also cover the beds with black plastic sheets and heat kill all the grass, but it'll take at least 2 weeks. In autumn you can dig your beds and turn the big chunks of soil upside down. The freezing temperatures will kill the exposed roots and loosen the soil. And there is always an option to dig and manually remove all the roots, and to be very vigilant about removing all the growth and roots whenever you see it.
use those in-ground landscape dividers. By being at least a few inches deep, it helps (but not totally stops) the spread of those roots. Also, your walkways can be different material than just soil topped with something. For example, those crushed granite walk ways are pretty good and not letting things grow, or at least, not letting them spread so fast that you can't control it.
Most people just want to kill weeds but there are times you want to kill grass, too, such as on patios and walkways. There are those kinds of products if you're not averse to using them. It won't kill all of them all the time but you just need to get it to a manageable level where manual weeding can be used.
As for the long-term, you do have to keep doing this for many years, continually refusing to let the grass get a foot hold. My parents' garden area is in total regular top soil - no raised bed or walkways. It only dawned on me last year that I see no grass growth there at all. It is all veggies and bare soil (where they walk).
Check the soil temperature. If you have raised bed it could be just fine for planting - like 50F. If so - you can plant it, but keep handy buckets, tabs, big jars - anything you can cover them with for the night, if temperature predicted to drop. If you have lager glass jars, you can even cover them during the day, if day is not warm enough. Just remember, if you keep them under glass for few days, when you take the cover off, shade them for day or two, otherwise UV will burn them. Or you can take them in and out until it is warmer.
What I meant when I said maybe it was a "northern thing" was, well, maybe soil temps are low enough there that seeds wouldn't sprout? That's never an issue down here. But then transplanting plants into that same soil wouldn't be that smart either. I am equally struck by the fact that someone would be selling such plants well before they belong in the ground. Yes, they'll probably survive, but in terms of level-of-effort, buying a pack of seeds would be a lot easier, and the cost per plant would be far lower.
If you've been unsuccessful with planting bean seeds, you may need to take a hard look at what you've been doing. You plant them and "nothing happens"? Aack. Perhaps you planted them far too early? If conditions are decent, and soil as well, bean seedlings are almost indestructable and, as Dave says, you could practically grow them on concrete. Beans carry enough nutrient in their large seeds to make big, strong seedlings.
I can't see the raster (butt) at all, certainly not well enough to count the hairs on it.
See these diagrams - How to ID grubs of Japanese beetles & more by pattern on raster
Agree. Mint is far too aggressive for growing in anything but its own pot - unless you want it to take over the entire 2x8 foot bed. If not a pot then plant it somewhere that you won't mind when it takes it all over.
Too much for sage+thyme+rosemary? Not at all. A bed that size could easily hold many more herb plants unless you are wanting to plant tons of each.
The other issue here is that mint likes much different conditions than the other three. It like more moist, while the other three require very well drained soil. Give it it's own pot--it just doesn't play well with others.
Now, the remaining bed would be ok for the other three. You can try a hardy Arp rosemary that might survive your winter, otherwise you may have to consider it an annual. (Suzy we can just be jealous of the size your rosey can get when it is a perennial). The other two can get large, but 2' square is reasonable for them if you deliberately keep them spreading too far in a couple years when they get that size. Could even keep the thyme smaller and also look at adding some chives, winter savory, tarragon, or sorrel for perennial herbs.
It looks like sun and/or wind damage to me. Depending on where you purchased them, you never know if the plants have been properly hardened off. Action however should be the same as Giving suggested. Remove and discard damaged leaves. If you get more damage on a sunny day, erect some type of shade or move pots to protect them from the hottest time of day until plants adapt.
Thank you, after reading giving comment I quickly ran outside and cut off the damaged leaves. I fear it is sunburned as well. I bought them from Home Depot (Bonnie plants).i will move them tomorrow to a part shade area during the hot times. It shouldn't be very hot tomorrow with temps going up to only 74. I checked my tomato plants as well and they are not as burned but I can see that they were a little scorched as well.
in my prior post I should have said that they died before they reached the size in your photo. They didn't get any bigger than they are in my photo before slowly dying. A local greenhouse owner thinks it is damping off (based on my description of problem) but appears to be a leaf problem rather than stem problem to me. Has anyone seen damping off look like this?
<it there any point in trying to give it a boost and get some spears this season>
Sure. Do you normally not feed it in the spring before emergence? I strongly recommend it. A good 2-3" layer of manured compost well-watered in works great. But I wouldn't use Triple Phosphate. Way too heavy Phos IMO unless you know for a fact that your soil is extremely low in P, which would be unusual.
If you don't want to or can't use the manured compost then go with something more balanced and with some N. The N is far more likely to be low in early spring's cool soil than P is. I'd use a heavy feeding of fish emulsion, worm tea, or some strong compost tea rather than the Super Phos.
Do you have any indications of the organic matter content of the soil or of how good the soil micro-herd is?
Dave
I have a soil test, but it is a few years old and had no glaring deficiencies. I did a side dressing of the Garden Tone as well as compost manure (fall and spring on the compost), but I was concerned that maybe it was not enough and there must be some deficiency to still be getting thin spears this many years in.
I've got fish emulsion as well, so I will just start pampering the bed and see if that helps, thanks!
Hard to say, but I can offer some tips. (My answer would be to certainly build some of the beds now to spread out the labor and have an earlier start.)
I use a sunlight calculator (mine was made by Luster Leaf)--it really helps to grapple with areas that get shade from tree/house shadows, etc.
Many people will swear that smothering them is enough, but with really vigorous weeds, I dig them and put down cardboard before filling raised beds. It's just too risky to me to do all that work and have weeds in a raised bed!
good luck, and congrats--it's so great to be able to garden your own land!
Not in my opinion. It is about to flower so if you post again then we can help further. Or you could repost on the Name That Plant Forum where someone might recognise it. (Not saying that people on here won't but NTP is dedicated to identification.) Name That Plant
Im in zone 7b central Arkansas.
I only want to grow them for fun.
I definitely will not be digging a big hole in my backyard for it.
I already planted them yesterday, so we will see how they do.
Also, many plants dont really have a problem growing in clay soil
That makes more sense now. So, just continue to let them grow and then harvest when?
My guess in Iowa will be mid-late July. There's signs by the growth dying back, then you can carefully lift one clove to make sure the wrappers are developed enough. Don't pull by the greens--fork up.