23,948 Garden Web Discussions | Vegetable Gardening
Now for the point of view of a painter. This is NOT a rare occurrence as all painters have to clean up somewhere somehow.
Firstly, there is nearly NO non-latex paint used any more. Secondly, there is nothing toxic in any non-industrial paint any more. Thirdly, nobody dumps buckets of perfectly good new paint.
Fourthly, what accommodations did you make so the painter could clean up after painting? If none, then the painter had to pick a spot. If the painter can't clean up, they you would have to pay for those ruined thirty dollar brushes and pans and rollers and so on. Clean-up takes water running through the thick paint residues until the tools are clean enough to be used again on the next job. You can't let that paint-y water run down the sidewalk or gutter or people would complain about THAT! Paint is designed to cover, so it looks like there's a lot when it's really just very very thin latex resins and pigments in lots of water.
So, what accommodations did you make so the painter could clean up after painting?
Well I can certainly buy oil based paint, which is very much a non-latex. But again, any toxicity evaporates away as the paint dries.
That being said, let's remember that the painter is getting paid to do a good job. If the painter needed a cleanup site, the painter really should have asked for one. That strikes me as a responsibility of the job that they're getting paid to do competently. Now, I can't assume that all painters would recognize a garden bed if they tripped over it. "Looks like dirt to me!" So it's not necessarily a matter of stupidity that they dumped it there. It is a matter of carelessness for not asking.
In response to a six year old comment on a very old thread, urine is actually quite sterile. What comes out the other end is not. That's the best thing to wrap your head around.
I find that putting urine on my compost pile raises the temperature noticeably. It really does seem to accelerate composting.
Urine sure won't do anything about the pH level of the bed, and wood ash is about the worst thing you can do about alkaline soil. My soil is alkaline, and I consider wood ash mildly toxic waste. (Though in very modest quantities, it is fine to put in a compost pile.) Per unit weight, wood ash is about half as effective in increasing alkalinity as lime.
emgardener - August 28, 2009, .....if you are still reading this thread just wanted to add that I use urine as a deer repellent and it seems to work well. I don't put it on or near my plants but just around the perimeter of the garden. Was wondering if you noticed that it keeps deer or other critters at bay too? Need to refresh after each rainfall.
I am relatively far north for eggplant, but we really enjoy them and so I am always on a search for productive ones for my area. Over the past many years I have tried Rosa Bianca, Hansel, Gretel, a couple of mini eggplants, and at least three large types, including Black Beauty. Hands down the most productive for me has been Orient Express. It produces early and in massive quantities every year I've grown it regardless of weather and my relatively short season. It's tender and delicious as well.
This is fun to read.:) Each time I plant something I say "(name of plant) please come grow in my garden." When I'm planting with my grandkids in the little plots I've made for them at their homes, we say it together and it's a fun little ritual (ages 2 and 3). Also, I express a lot of gratitude, maybe wordlessly, as the garden grows and looks amazing, and produces. I also seem to remember a few cheering sessions, like when something peeks up over the soil, as in "Yay! you look marvelous!"
Katie, I remember that study from ages ago. Would be interesting to google if anything has been replicated and researched in a way that would -- no pun intended -- hold water.
My mom visited Findhorn in the 80's, so it runs in the family.
Generally where are you Moonwillow? (zone and region or state) Last year I bought commercial slips, but this year I am just using sprouts from my current tubers. Last year was the first time I had planted sweet potatoes, and I didn't expect much since it was a relatively cool season. I planted them around Memorial Day or perhaps early June and harvested in early October, and was pleasantly surprised to get several pounds of potatoes from perhaps 5 or 6 vines. Each yielded 3 large to medium tubers, and two were a foot long and 4 inches wide, simply huge!
@NhBabs (4b-5aNH) Im in Ghana actually. no where near the States. so i dont have to worry about too cool a season even though its supposed to be the rainy season now. (thats the coolest its gonna get). They can get that large huh? thanks for letting me know.
thanks pitcom...guess i was worried for nothing!
@vgkg ouu....i shall do exactly that. can't wait for them to start giving sweet potatoes back. you make it sound simple that i have hope to cultivate a green thumb. such useful info ^-^
All i have to do know is look for a larger space in this house and ill keep you guys posted! :D
Heres an update. the rooted one's sprouts are ready i think to be planted. i think the one that didnt root well isnt growing any further. so i'll just take the sprouts ive gotten so far and plant them.
Just looking at it as it is now, it seems fine. They always start completely yellow until exposed to light above ground. Sometimes you get a yellow portion of the leaf that may or many not green up. Are you saying that yellow spot on the right-hand leaf was green and then turned yellow? If so I don't know what that's about, but if it's a yellow spot then never turned green then I'd say it's no worry.
Thanks for the info, I have a test kit and did the test many times and every time it indicated depleted levels of nitrogen (what is weird is I kept a small amount of the dry compost in a bag in my home when I got it and when I tested that it had a surplus of nitrogen? but the same compost in my garden always indicates depleted)
Also last year I got my compost from the same place and used it somewhere else in my garden and I had a Surplus of nitrogen according to the test and all my plants where dark green but this year there was more wood chips in the compost and i'm assuming that is why it is depleted of nitrogen.
If you are using one of the common home test kits then they are notoriously inaccurate, especially when it comes to N and pH readings. A common recommendation is to never make any big corrections based on their results. Far too often it only makes things even worse, not better. For a few dollars more you can contact your local county ag extension office and get a professional test done.
Dave
Vacations and healthy gardens are difficult to juggle without extensive "planning ahead". So for many, the vacation moves to non-gardening times of the year. That way you get the best of both.
Planning ahead allows you to incorporate auto watering set-ups into your gardening; either someone to cover for you or auto water timers attached to in-place drip tape or soaker hose or even sprinklers. Even the most inexpensive auto-timer can take care of all but huge garden plots for you and when the garden is heavily mulched and deep watered from the beginning of the season, one week of no attention is no problem when it comes to water. Pests and disease issues can still run wild when there is no attention but the plants won't lack water. :)
Dave
Several years ago I visited an enthusiastic gardener whose gardens had spilled over into raised beds directly on a paved surface (cannot recall whether it was macadam or concrete). I was stunned by how well these plants were doing, despite the fact that there couldn't have been 12" of soil in those beds on pavement. Perhaps due to the enthusiasm and diligence of the gardener. She was probably very attentive to fertilization and irrigation needs.
We know almost any kind of vegetable plant can be grown in a container, and I've even seen tomatoes successfully grown in bags of container mix with just an "X" cut in the bag to plant the tomato plant.
It's probably late, even in MA, for peas, though you could try pre-sprouting them inside to give them a head start. The shorter varieties of carrots should be fine, and any kind of lettuce or mixed greens. Tomatoes and peppers you'd be best off with seedlings if you can manage that. I think these plants' roots may need a little more space to spread out, since they cannot go down. The lower soil levels have more stable moisture and temperature levels, so you'll need to compensate by monitoring moisture of the growing medium and watering as needed ... as if you were growing in a container, which, essentially, you are.
Something beneath the bed to insulate, as mentioned by someone above, might be a good idea. If there is any way you can shade the concrete surrounding the bed to keep it cooler, that might help as well.
You might want to consider a succession of quick-maturing crops, and perhaps some herbs, many of which actually appreciate a warmer, leaner, drier soil. Beans, cucumber, melons, and Swiss chard all have rather shallow root systems, so might work well for you. Forest gardening and sustainable gardening make the most use of space by combining deep-rooted plants with shallow-rooted ones. Checking into either of these methods might give you some additional shallow-rooted plants you could try.
A good layer of mulch on top of your growing medium (which should be light and full of organic matter like compost) will help to stabilize temperature and moisture levels, as well as keep down weeds.
Our gardening efforts are always experiments, and that's how you should look at this; a learning experience. I hope yours is a good one! Good luck!
I dug a bag of ramps last week, in West Virginia, to bring to a friend who has been transplanted from WV to NC and hasn't had them for many years. He told me about how people also use them as a spring health tonic, sort of a detoxifier. To freeze them I've heard the best way is to clean them up, put them in a bag of water, and freeze the whole bag.
laceyvail, nice to know your ramps have taken off. I know people who have tried to transplant them but without success -- good to know it will work in the right conditions.
Wait, a sprinkler nozzle watering for an hour and the bed is dry in two days? Is that what you're saying? That just doesn't sound right. Especially in NE Pennsylvania, where the temps can be that extreme yet. Yes, the soil might be dry on the top few millimeters, but it's got to be moist below. Dry as in the soil isn't dark and moist? Or dry as in it isn't sopping wet? Parched beets? What does that mean? You mean the leaves are drooping? Beets have pretty deep roots, so it's practically inconceivable to me that they are hurting for lack of water after intensive watering two days before.
Don't worry unless it gets THIS silvery:
and then worry.
The first two photos are normal. Black Beauty zucchini has silvery spots on the leaves. The last photo shows insect damage, which could be spider mites. Get rid of that leaf and hose off other signs of spider mites or use neem/insecticidal soap.