23,948 Garden Web Discussions | Vegetable Gardening

With eggplants, it is more about sheen and less about size. You should harvest them before the sheen begins to fade. Early-season eggplants often fade before they reach full-size, and the eggplant in this photo is an example of that (unless my eyes are playing tricks on me). So, pick it now. However, you will find that when the plants get bigger and healthier, the eggplants will grow larger than this before they fade. A normal Rosa Bianca should be the size of a large man's fist.

You can always play it safe and pick them early. No harm in that.

Thanks all for the feedback. Slimy okra the dullness on the first one and the size was throwing me off thanks for explaining! Just had my first seasons harvest of my first vegetable grown from seed; rosabianca!!! So happy! I was gonna have them for dinner but I ended up sauteing one in garlic and oil cause I couldnt wait to try.... best flavor ever!!!

I just picked one of these!! It was yellow on the top, but had a slightly streaked green place that I did not see until I cut it. It tasted great, but could have gone a week or so longer.

I have 4 vines, but only have fruit on one stem of one plant. Hopefully more will come along.....

Nancy

I've learned to measure it, when it gets 7-8" long it's ready

sorry about the duplicate posting.

This post was edited by nugrdnnut on Sun, Jul 14, 13 at 10:13

I'd cut it off as close to the bottom as possible, pull off the bottom leaves then try rooting it in another pot just to see what kind of tomatoes it might produce.

The markings are the leaves dying around their veins.

I've seen the same thing often when my backup plants spend too long in their pots, unneeded. It means it's time to throw them out.

Whatever the reason for the failing plants, you have too many and they are indeed too crowded. If I were in your position, I would throw out the two bad plants, sterilize the soil (or better yet,use it somewhere else or throw it out), then use the container (be sure to wash it out with PineSol or someother disinfectant cleaner) to transplant one of the good plants.

Whatever the variety you have, you do not need 4 zucchini plants. I have two plants of an unknown bush variety planted out in the ground and I am feeding the neighborhood.

Last year I had another variety that vined more and the four plants just overtook anything in their way so I isolated the zucchini in another part of the yard this year. This years two plants are producing enough for 4 families plus a weekly drop an my mom's exercise group.

Jean is probably right, but you also need to rule out spider mites by looking at the leaf undersides with a magnifying glass.

That's what I was afraid of, with it being such a bad year for aphids. I'll do a check for mites. One time I'll probably ever hope to see some spider mites, LOL.

Here's another pic. My good camera is on the fritz so I used an ipod touch.

Another pic

Maybe you got some diesel or hydraulic fluid from the compost or the road grader. A soil test won't pick that up.

If the compost was tainted with persistent herbicides particularly aminopyralid or clopyralid, tomatoes, peppers beans and peas will show abnormalities but most other veggies will grow okay.

Thanks Dave! I took your advice and pulled up one of my plants and I'm sure glad I did! I had 5 full size potatoes there which completely surprised me (we planted the seed potatoes only 9 weeks ago). I think I will re-plant one of the potatoes as a seed potato to hopefully get another crop in the fall.

Makes me want to go check mine. I have been waiting for flowers, but I havent seen any.

Congrats on your first spuds!

Yes, Squash Vine Borer. Mine fell victim this year too. I have panted a second crop to see what will happen with a later season planting.

Gotta get those buggers at the egg stage, if possible. Very tiny single brown eggs usually laid on the lower part of the stem. Not to be confused with the squash bug eggs which are an orange cluster usually on the back side of the leaves. Both should be removed by hand when discovered.

The link below I an interesting read.

Here is a link that might be useful: Squash Vine Borer Control

Thanks all for the replies. I slit the plants at the base and started looking for the bugs... to my surprise it was not one or two ... there were families of them 4 or 5. Finally felt the plant would not survive the operation. So pulled all of them out. Infact all of them had SVB damage. - what a lesson learnt - I lost all my zucc plants.

I will be more careful from here and try to protect my winter squash plants now.

Thanks again.
Regards
G

I had all female blooms first too...not to worry.

Dan - Hmmm. . . and my seeds are from Johnny's, and they sell to a lot of large scale farms. I wonder?

Well, it has made for some nice visiting -- one of my neighbors today asked me if I'd gotten enough male flowers, so I think that means I can go back to him when the ones I got today are past. And it's working -- we ate the first Zephyr squash tonight, and Costata Romanesco coming tomorrow!

I'm planning on doing that Dave, thanks!

My second favorite cause of whole plant collapse this summer is having a mole tunnel right through the roots... You mentioned gophers in the spring? Maybe pull up that plant and see if you need to shore up your gopher defenses.

Hmm, I thought bees pollinate females to make the fruit.

Yes, but they do it by carrying pollen from the male flowers to the females.

None of those will kill it, but they will help control it. You have to be very regular with your spraying for the remainder of the season. I prefer the milk method myself. Yes, you should remove the heavily affected leaves. I save my Neem for bugs because I'm mean that way >:)

I am also on Long Island and when the heat and humidity hit I got powdery mildew on all my squashes. Tried cutting off the leaves but that did not do it. I sprayed with Neem three times. Once, them two days later again and two days after that again. That stopped it. Make sure you do both sides of the leaves (top and bottom) and the stems also. Plus do both the new clean leaves and the ones already with the mildew. Now I just spray weekly to control/stop the mildew.