23,821 Garden Web Discussions | Vegetable Gardening


The image sure looks like sun scald to me!
Suzi, I'll make a suggestion that can help you prove your neighbor wrong. 'Surround', a kaolin clay spray can be an enormous help in keeping borers, beetles, and sun/heat at bay.
It's used commercially, but is now available in sensible sizes for backyard growers. I've used it for years on my cucurbits, beans, and tomatoes without fail. It is approved for organic growers (and Certified Organic growers).


fadiver ... That's a UK expression, not an autocorrect issue - slang term for 'a very long time'.
Donkey's Years


Some potato pieces sprout about 8 shoots...too many skinny ones in a crowd for best results unless you like small potatoes. I suggest leaving 4 stalks per piece. I try to plant them a little deeper to start with and don't need to hill so high. They like cooler soil than here in central Indiana and high hilling dries out faster.

You are welcome. Good to know you won't be relying on these transplants to get your cucs! Good luck and stick around. There are some really knowledgeable gardeners on Gardenweb that have helped me a lot the last several years as my gardening went from a minor hobby to a MAJOR obsession.

I'll for sure be sticking around. I've been reading the forums for the last month or two and have found them very helpful so far. I look forward to being a more active part of the community now that I've officially started posting. Everyone here seems great.


This is one of the planters in a large vegetable garden on a private estate in So Cal. The client has major wildlife issues: deer, coyote, squirrel, rabbits, birds, gophers.... Lots of things were tried until the solution pictured above was put into place. Although it is a bit cumbersome- it works and is fairly invisible at a short distance.
The planters are constructed of dry stacked round stones. Beds are lined with 1" wire mesh for gopher prevention that wraps up sides of planters and bends out between the top courses of rock. Above ground critters are are successfully kept out with a metal stakes in edges of beds that have hooks welded onto the outer top edges. 1/2 inch heavy gage bird mesh: ( https://www.birdbgone.com/products/bird-netting/garden-netting-products.html ) hooks onto the stakes via Garden Netting Clips attached to net.. Not all beds have mesh over top- only crops where birds are a problem. Caretakers can easily unhook mesh to care for plants.

"Chemicals that are applied by label directions are safe"
So very VERY not true. DDT, Diazinon, all sorts of insecticides were taken off the market AFTER years of use. There is much we do not know about chemicals, some are safe when used correctly, some are not, some we won't realize the damage done for years to us and to our families.
I'm not by any means putting down the good that some chemicals can do. But to believe that they are all safe when used according to label directions is naive.

Living next to a cornfield is way different than having neighbors that use Roundup. On a farm, the herbicide is applied from above and will definitely drift onto your property. Especially because you want to grow organically, this location is not ideal. My husband and I are in the same boat. Looking for a place where we can keep bees and grow organically. Sad that we live in such a toxic world.


almost lost my plants last night, it was 39*F felt like freezing with the wind chill but they were covered with a plastic and wood greenhouse. Bright them in tonight, true temp without breeze is freezing. :S Tomatoes in my pots had one foot in the grave. They're doing much better now that they've warmed up inside.

Here you go, hundreds of pics of various bamboo trellis set-ups.

We do ours in more of a V shape rather than the typical ^ shape (I'll try to post a pic tomorrow). That way you don't have to crawl in the teepee with all the spiders (of course, if you have kids I'm sure they would love that!). They just hang down the outer sides of the bed for the picking. It also leaves room on the outer edges of the bed to plant something noninvasive. I usually do some extra basil. Nancy


Gardeners in colder climates can start seeds indoors and if you choose short-season varieties you can increase your chances of getting some production. What variety did you order? Days to maturity range from 70 to 90, even 120 days so by planting say Blacktail Mountain or Gold Midget (70 days) you can improve your odds substantially.
Dave

Adding gypsum is the remedy for soil with excess sodium.
The gardener can determine if his/her soil has excess sodium by sending a sample of the soil to a professional lab. If excess sodium is present, the lab will tell you how much gypsum to add.
If you have the gypsum already, and the package is open, you can go ahead and add it. Fortunately, it won't damage anything if sodium levels are ok.



I started with bamboo but ended up getting 6' coated steel stakes then tied them up as well. The boxes are 18" tall but buried 6" and I dug another 2' down. I filled them with a garden mix soil I had trucked in. 7 - 4x12' boxes and used 20 yards of soil. I do need to mulch though. It also seems like the big beef are prone to splitting more than the pink cadillacs.
With regard to tomato pruning, I believe that there are some situations that make pruning healthy for the plant. Here in HZ10, life is rough in the summer. When my cherry tomato vines get eight feet long and longer, they have to suck water up a LONG way. The fruit way up at the top is seriously water-stressed. I have found that topping the vines encourages branches lower down on the vine that are closer to the soil. Now, that being said, once the lower vines are very mature, they aren't as likely to sprout new branches, but the new branches at least don't pop out way up at the top.
Not clear that this would be relevant to non-vining full-sized tomatoes. I've never pruned those.