23,594 Garden Web Discussions | Vegetable Gardening
Thanks, I hadn't thought of that. I kept thinking it had to be a seed thing, but my experience with seed germination was always a) it germinates and b) it doesn't germinate. I hadn't realized that a newly germinated seedling could be affected by the way the seed had been treated. Makes perfect sense, and now I've learned something new. It's almost as if the endosperm were affected and has not been nourishing the seedling properly.
Well, we'll see what happens. I'm guessing they will recover.
thank you so much. I am so glad that I found this site and joined. I am learning so much. It pretty much has to be container planting based on the rental property until next year. If anything it has been a great experince for my son and I researching and reading and watching the plants go from seed to plant. Thank you all.
It is always unfortunate when you are given bad news. If you really want to learn the most out of this and truely are limited to pots, then I say start new plants and keep the old ones going as long as they can. You can compare the difference between direct seeded and transplated squash/cucumbers. To have the best chance you want to get as large of pots as you can find, half whiskey barrel size is preferrable.
They're doing this to document climate change? I'm sitting here in Boston freezing my a$$ off - it just cracked 40 degrees at 1:00 PM. Weather Underground tells me the normal high is 59 degrees. All my early crops went in late, and are barely breaking the surface now.
I know why they waited so long - leaf out is late this year, so there was no hurry.
This is exactly what I did last year. IMO, by the time the beans grow up over the trellis and shade the potatoes, the potato vines are starting to decline and have done their job already. I was reluctant to dig the potatoes (Purple Haze) close to the bean roots, so I left them in the ground until I cut the bean vine down...maybe 6 weeks later. The potatoes were perfect. I'm doing the same thing this year. The potatoes are just breaking the surface now and I'll put in the beans in another 2-3 weeks.
Use a hand-held magnifying glass to check the undersides of leaves for spider mites. They make thousands of pin-prick holes.
Predatory mites are usually used as a control in greenhouses. Act quickly, or you could lose your crop.
Here is a link that might be useful: predatory mites
Thanks a lot for the response, i checked and looks like spider mites. I will try to get the predator mites from Koppert, but that is going to take a few days, please let me know if there is anything else which could be effective, searching the web, i found the below, please suggest if this could work to slow the spider mites down until i get the predator mites? If not, please suggest an alternative:
- Mix washing detergent (1 tbsp) and neem oil (30ml) in water (1L) and spray the same on the affected leaves.
thanks,
nivin
Yes, lemon thyme is more cold-hardy but they will both be fine.
My experience with the dead looking thyme branches is:
1) Sometimes they leaf out much later, so it's worthwhile to not cut them now, and
2) Sometimes they are broken at the base from animals lying on them. Thyme plants are a warm, dry, good-smelling nest :/. If they are broken, you can pull them out.
Oh, and:
3) Sometimes it''s not the cold or animals, but shade that kills parts of the thyme plant. If your sun angle is markedly different in winter, for example. Thyme do not like shade.
--
The oregano is just doing its normal thing -- it is a true perennial, which means it dies back to ground level in winter and resprouts from the roots. Go ahead and cut off the dead stuff; that part won't green up.
This year you can cut oregano to the ground in the fall and/or when it starts to flower, and dry or freeze it for winter cookery :).
How you doing MJ? Welcome!
Yes, I unfortunately lived in a apartment most my life, as soon is I got some land, you bet I packed it to it's gills with plants! I never liked cutting grass anyways! You are much wiser, slowly weening your way into it, that's probably the best way to go..
Your garden is huge! How are you going to take care of it all? No it's good your starting small.. It's still just as enjoyable..
Don't hesitate to ask questions.. We are more than happy to help.
Joe
Given the controversial nature of its philosophies the best source of info for you here will be the Companion Planting forum. I direct linked it for you below.
Dave
Here is a link that might be useful: Companion Planting
I have planted marigolds, basil, rosemary, lemon balm, chives and red salvia in the hugel with my tomatoes. Can't hurt, can it? The Ask.com site I went to was very informative about companion planting. I bought several petunia plants to plant in with my squash and pumpkin plants. They are supposed to deter squash vine borers. Stink bugs are supposed to be deterred by catnip, radishes, mints, marigolds and garlic. I will try anything natural. I will not use chemicals ever again. I had to spray them every week in a back pack sprayer at one nursery I worked at. I'm sure my COPD has been caused by mostly that.
"Kudzu bugs" are now moving into the South-East US...growing exponentially the past few years.
They look like regular brown "stink bugs" (and smell like them when crushed) with different shell coloring (white/beige with a lot of black dots/lines all over their shell making up a huge part of their coloration) and they are more rounded than pointy on the hind end.
They are absolutely plague-like on soy bean plantings...as well as other plantings. They are huge feeders.
Thanks to "wild" kudzu all over the place, it seems they're not going away any time soon.
This post was edited by nc-crn on Mon, Apr 22, 13 at 17:51
I remember seeing Kudzu vines when we drive on 95 through the Carolinas. We don't have that here. Mostly millions of acres of pine trees. Native and tree farms for harvesting for pine products. I was informed about that bug months ago in master gardening. I will keep my eyes open for it though. Thanks, digdirt for the bug links. I am familiar with assassin bugs, although I might have killed some of their instars thinking they were leaf footed bugs.
But then of course the weather changes year to year. I have planted cole crops in mid April - this year the snow keeps coming down, and the ground is still frozen. We just got another 2" last night ! I am hoping thats the last of it.
With your weather , everything you sowed should be just fine.
Re: the black plastic, is your concern that it will get too cold at night for the seeds to germinate? Be sure to check the temps under that plastic to see how hot it gets. Everything you planted actually prefers cool weather, so I don't know that you'll need to warm things up that much to get them going. Definitely make sure the plastic is off as soon as the seeds germinate - it sounds like an easy way to accidentally cook them. :)