23,948 Garden Web Discussions | Vegetable Gardening
jnj, I have clay soil, so probably retains moisture well, but I've read that seeds and seedlings need constantly moist soil. I know a less frequent deep watering encourages stronger root growth, but I thought that was once they're well-established. I watered Friday afternoon and am out of town until Tuesday evening, so I have a friend watering either this evening and tomorrow evening, or just once tomorrow afternoon. Supposed to get some rain Tuesday morning. Sounds like you think they'd be fine without water from Friday til Tuesday.
Thanks again for the input vgkg. The info I got says the plots are rented 3/15 through 10/31 and that all plots will "be cleared of any and all debris/material by October 31st." It also says parks & rec is responsible for tilling at beginning & end of the growing season. Yeah, so that along with delaying the opening a couple weeks and not having water available due to a water line break, and then the 15x15 plots actually being more like 13.5x14, it's not a perfect situation, but my options are limited living in a townhouse.
Regarding carrots, I was planning have a total of nine 3' rows stagger-planted over a period of about 2 months, and then replant the rows throughout the summer as I harvest them. I guess I'll stick with that plan and just harvest all remaining on 10/31 Regardless of size. I'll also try to give my other fall crops a bit more time to mature by 10/31.
Your beds look good. You might consider growing bush beans if you plant them within the next couple of weeks. They do well in your area. You could plant purple hull peas in May. They are one of the few plants that tolerate the hot Texas summer. If is probably too late to plant potatoes. The hot weather will be here in less than 60 days.
Just remember that in Texas we really have 2 short growing seasons, spring and fall. Many people plant tomatoes in very early spring and plant another crop of transplants in July for a fall crop of tomatoes.
Bell peppers are a challenge but sweet banana peppers and hot peppers are easier to grow. Bell peppers tend to make early in summer and then just sit there until the fall when they will put on another crop.
Square foot gardening tends to put plants too close together for Texas gardens. As you may know tomatoes can get over 8 feet when put in cages. In raised beds you do plant things closer together but if you are not careful you can have a grown up "jungle" Plants need to have air circulation with the humidity that we have.
I decided to grow Kennebec this year, they are known as a good all around reliable variety. I planted them today, in a similar climate to yours (also 6b). (Potato Garden where I bought them recommends planting no earlier than 2 weeks before last frost date... the foliage can be killed by frost.) I grew potatoes last year, and they are not a particularly difficult crop to grow, relatively speaking.
I would advise against that unless your night temps will remain over 50. Basil is a heat lover, and lower temps than 50 will lead to stunting that it may not bounce back from. And for me, basil germinates in three to five days.
For me, I'm a zone behind you and for the most part basil doesn't go in until the end of May. I do some earlier, but in an Earthbox that is in a small, enclosed (6') townhome backyard next to the brick. It creates enough microclimate for the basil to thrive, and can be brought inside if we get a cold snap.
I wouldn't. Even in my zone I don't plant peppers out until mid-May as they prefer much warmer soil temps than tomatoes. It is far too easy to end up with stunted growth, lower yields, and BER - a common results often discussed on the Peppers forum.
Even then I always check the actual soil temps before transplanting them and make sure it is at least 65 degrees. Sometimes that means waiting and transplanting them into larger containers indoors to tide them over.
Dave
If you're going to try now, I would use black plastic to make sure the soil temp stays up, and consider water walls to make mini greenhouses for them. If not, I would just put in larger pots. I don't plant my peppers until May, even with water walls.
I'd contact them and ask why. The only reason I can think of is compost can have adequate water retention issues to get the crowns established or that you don't feed just transplanted crowns until they show signs of growth and that would only explain it if they are assuming the compost is nutrient rich - which it isn't.
But given all the time (no it isn't soil, compost becomes humus not soil) since you made the bed, personally I wouldn't worry about planting them in it. I also would not count on only compost to provide enough nutrients for them once they do show growth.
Dave
I emailed Nourse and they said 2 things:
- If not fully composted, there could be some viable seeds that could sprout and compete with the asparagus. So keep it well weeded.
- Unfinished compost could burn the roots. I could try planting pansies to test this if I wanted.
After we dumped the soil + compost last summer, we had a large crop of volunteer canteloupe, from the seeds in the compost. This is definitely more of a cold compost than a hot compost, and there was a lot of older "soil" (don't know the exact composition of the raised beds that we transplanted and mixed with the compost). And it looks and feels pretty done: no remnants of the origins except a few nut hulls and the odd eggshell.
Given the above, plus the fact that I've got the crowns and need to get them in the ground, I went ahead and planted them. When I dug the trenches, I mixed in some of the native clay soil with the topping, so hopefully that will help. I'll be vigilant with the weeds and hopefully will start to see some ferns in a few weeks.
Oh, I see you can get still buy both of those evergreen bell pepper varieties, if they're not secretly out of stock.
And now for something completely different...the crunch dance.
Water and ammonia is fine for hosta but other plants might burn (brunnera comes to mind) so be careful. When I do hand pick them into soapy water they end up in the compost heap as do Japanese Beetles.
tj
Ammonia never bothered any of the vegetable plants I sprayed. Don't forget ammonia is diluted with water or added to water until the slugs fall off the plant is what I recommend. I start with 1 part ammonia to 4 parts water.
Ammonia dissipates pretty quickly so there is no plant damage.
The very best thing about using ammonia in a spray bottle is "you don't have to touch the slimy things".
The 2nd best thing is you often get slugs you didn't even see. They are noticeable cuz they squirm as soon as the ammonia hits them.
The hardest part is you have to do this at night but you get to see other things that affect (live-in) your garden this way.
Keep in mind that 5-1-1 is an outdoor container mix primarily. And most of the advice on fertilizing is also for outdoor plants as Container Gardening, by its nature, is an outdoor gardening method, not indoor. For example, container grown tomato plants growing outside are often fed a 1/4 to 1/2 strength well diluted fertilizer every 10 days to 2 weeks but we are usually talking about containers bigger than 5 gallons too.
Make a note to yourself next year to not start your plants quite so early, 6-8 weeks tops before plant out date. :)
Dave
I basically have a lot of sugar snap peas over a period of about three weeks, beginning to end. Again, the endergy f th eplant is all going in to making peas, not making vines. It would be interesting to know if the temperature causes fruiting to "turn on" in sugar snap peas. Certainly if I had planted, say, in February, I'd have much smaller plants possibly starting to bear right now.
Well the only thing lost is a few zucchini seeds. Go for it if you want IMHO, if it doesn't work out plant some more. I found zucchini to be very cold tolerant for tender frost sensitive veggies. The more sensitive nightshade transplants are another story.
Thanks for the great advice everyone. Just as an update for anyone who might come across this, here's what happened so far:
A couple days after the frost incident I stuck a couple squash seeds in the ground next to the poor frost damaged one. The new seeds sprouted, but before true leaves emerged the original plant had put on a bunch of new growth and I decided to pull out the seedlings. Next to the transplanted squash was another squash seedling that also took damage, it now has true leaves so I think we are on the way with that one. The four tomatoes all ended up with a small amount of damage, but appear to have recovered, and are now flowering. The bush beans are another story...about half of them came back, but the other half are still struggling. I planted another batch of bush beans (succession planting every two weeks) and those are doing well, but a good deal of the frost bit ones have no leaves and are just sad stems. I don't think they are going to make it and I am debating pulling them out or some spinach to make room for the next set of beans this weekend.
Either way, I've learned a lot from this experience, and I'm definitely going to try to be patient next year with my frost date?
Very few suppliers apparently and most are in Europe and UK. Unless you can find them available in a grocery store and plant those you'll most likely have to order them online from overseas and pay the high shipping costs. Ronnigers Potato Garden has several other blue/purple varieties but this late many of them are already sold out.
http://www.potatogarden.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=CTGY&Store_Code=PG&Category_Code=NSP
Your ideas sound great. With such a big yard like yours, I could never limit myself just to that area you have, so kudos to you for not turning the entire place into a garden.
I would wonder if during this renovation, you might add in some kind of watering system? I currently don't see any thing about an automated system so I thought maybe you are doing it manually.
While I do like the layout can you just border the perimeter with a 2ft bed all around? I think that will save some building materials.
I don't think you need to make the bed 3ft wide for the zucchini. The plant can bush outside the bed but be planted within a 2ft bed, me thinks.
I prefer to compost on the ground right next to my plants as the roots will extend outside of the beds in search of nutrients. But I just compost in one pile
Is that gravel you are using as mulch? The beds don't look that old in these pics.
Mexibelle(?) perhaps? A hybrid that looks like a common red bell pepper but develops ''hot'' when left on the bush.
I dunno but that's pretty neat!