24,795 Garden Web Discussions | Vegetable Gardening

Marianne and Sulani62,
Thank you! That sounds like a wonderful rule to go by Marianne (this is my first time growing eggplant but definitely won't be the last and that is a rule I won't forget :)
Sulani -- did you get a good harvest from yours? We've got 4 Pandoras and 4 Astrakom eggplants in the garden and the Astrakom's started off having 4 or 5 fruit on each plant at a time but production now seems to be falling off with them quite a lot (about one per plant). Guess it is a good thing that the Pandora's are just starting to fruit.

If you can hardly find the outside of your borderless raised beds because weeds have overtaken both the pathways and the beds. Or if while you are harvesting bush beans you find yourself spending less time picking beans and more time pulling weeds just to get to the plants.
Rodney


Agree with Wayne that baited traps are quite effective in eliminating mice in the garden. I just use the old fashioned, cheap wooden ones you set (with care ;) and bait with peanut butter. And yes a mouse can nibble 1/2 through a corn stalk over night.
Dave

Agree with the others. Trying to contain a butternut and its vines to a limited area is futile. It will go where it wants. I don't understand about the raised bed sitting on top of a rock bed but if that means the squash will be laying on rocks you will want to put a layer of straw mulch or something under them.
Dave

I've been using the following technique for butternuts for several years and it works great. I have a non raised but permanent bed garden and I can't handle an immense butternut wandering everywhere. Also, I visually inspect every single leaf throughout the growing season about twice a week for squash bug eggs. Here's what I do. When I can see that there is a good fruit set and the vines are getting to the 5 ft length, I cut off the growing tips of the vines, and any side vines that are starting. This keeps the plant in bounds and makes the leaf inspection not quite so daunting. I get great squash and have gotten as many as 18 butternuts from two vines growing in one hill.


"I believe that corn is an exception here, in that, for example, sweet corn and field corn cross pollinate and the effects are seen in the first generation. Of course, in that case, the fruit is the seed."
The same holds true for beans and peas. If cross pollination occurs, the pods will still grow true but when dried the seeds inside can be different than what was originally planted.
Rodney

I'm growing melons for the first time this year. Since space is limited, I chose smaller varieties, papaya dew and Minnesota midget cantaloupe, so I can trelles them. Everything I read says that any cross pollination will not be apparent in the fruit. But, some of the developing melons are football-shaped like a papaya dew with the end to end striping of the cantaloupe. Has anyone seen this before?


Devil's eyelashes? So very appropriate. The seeds/goatheads survive for millennia, waiting for enough moisture to germinate or for you to be stupid enough to till the soil and bring them up. Any time I see it, it gets pulled immediately, even if it is growing in a parking lot crack. It is a compulsion.
It turns out that we do have desert spoon, too. However, it and all of our cacti, agave, are on the natural parts of the property, where I do not weed (we are on acreage). They are no fun when we are collecting rocks. I think buffalo bur first made it into my garden with a load of wood chips from the transfer station. At first I was curious as it did look like watermelon leaves but once I saw those burs, I pulled it. Curiosity ended there.


It all depends what all varieties are around you of the same species. Summer squash and many winter squash are the species C. Pepo and they all cross. The diversity of culinary use in the species is too high to think a volunteer will be good for anything, unless you last year planted a very limited amount of varieties. Like if around you was just summer squash and some acorn/ dumpling types they may be good to eat as immature. But if you had pumpkins and gourds it wouldn't be worth bothering. C Pepo is not a good species to let freely cross.



That is not one plant that is 8 or 9 plants that were never thinned. Each stem is a separate plant. Sometimes they come that way from the store. It makes it look like a fuller healthy plant in those big containers, so they look more worthy of the price tag. That should have been thinned to 2 or 3 plants

I thought so (about the material) but I went to 2 local nurseries and neither had any and finally went to a Friedmans (like Home Depot) and this was what they showed me they had. I thought maybe since it mentioned it "blocks insects" that I was just wrong about the material. Oh well. At least I knew enough to be worried it would kill my plants with the greenhouse-like effect! I am a bit baffled that it was impossible to find given how often I've heard it mentioned here and other gardening pages. I have tulle I can use.
Do you really think it is too late to apply given that I have not yet had a run in with/seen these pests and these are in containers (not in ground) and the planting medium was fresh at time of direct seeding a month ago? I assume if they aren't in my containers yet then I wouldn't be trapping them inside with the cover, but only preventing them from finding my plantings to come. Does it not work this way? The websites I've read mentioned some of these pests become a problem in July so to prevent then, if you hadn't earlier. Or is my newbie pest logic off completely?


I put in six plants this spring, Toma Verde, that I grew from seed. I lost a few to cutworms, but had back up plants, so I was able to replace the lost ones. Now the smallest plant has full sized fruits. the largest plant, sprawling and covered with flowers is just starting to get little lanterns. they are definitely fun and interesting to grow. I try to give them a shake every day.

I prefer my jalapenos ripe red, and I grow a lot of them. I think the flavor is improved immensely over when they are still green - though I will harvest and eat all the green ones at the end of season just before frost. Plus, if you want to make anything like chipotle, it is best done with ripe jalapenos. The great flavor just hasn't developed in green ones, in my opinion.

Ripening on the plant is for sure a preference.. some peppers I like to pick fully ripe, others at the.. hmmm, juvenile stage? Not sure what that green fully sized but not turned to full ripe color is called.
And I for sure understand the "don't feel it in the kitchen" action. I professionally cook most of the week, and don't always feel up to doing canning at the end of the day, lol.
I've left peppers on the plant before.. what's the worst that can happen, the pepper gets extra ripe and turns color? So what. Every pepper from juvenile to full on ripe has it's own characteristics, and all of them are good IMO. Honestly, with some peppers, it's harder to wait till fully ripe, hehehe.
Something I really love is a product called "green bags". It's a produce bag that's meant to help extend shelf life of produce. And they really do work well. I've often picked a couple peppers at a time as they are good, or beans, or other produce... and kept the bag in the crisper drawer of the fridge for days till I either have enough of whatever, or the gumption to face the pickling.. and the first pick 3-5 days ago is just as good as todays pick.
For example, yesterday I picked eight wax and banana peppers- not really enough to bother pickling up. But I have another dozen or more peppers that are almost ready over the course of the next 5 days or so. Which would make a small batch of canning. So I tossed the peppers into a green bag, and into the crisper.. and those will hold till I get the rest picked for pickling.



Something to watch with Kandy Korn is the tip of the ear can poke out of the husk when it matures, making it very attractive to birds.
Whoa, thank you VERY much for that. I just checked on them and found they grow 8'+! I'll have to net over the bed I suppose.
Thanks for the heads up.