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Errant Gin Monks posted:Ripped out the last of my tomatoes. Had a huge infestation of leaf legged stink bugs that killed my last crop. Stupid bugs. We've no bugs on our cherries and romas. Unfortunately they all refuse to ripen.
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Aug 14, 2013 17:55
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Fog Tripper posted:We've no bugs on our cherries and romas. Unfortunately they all refuse to ripen. My cherries are doing alright, the romas... one is getting ripe. Now, we are going to have 4 straight days of sun in the next week, so, that should help.
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Aug 14, 2013 19:05
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SpannerX posted:My cherries are doing alright, the romas... one is getting ripe. Now, we are going to have 4 straight days of sun in the next week, so, that should help. Same thing here. My Sweet 100s and Beam's Yellow Pear have been producing like crazy. I've never had so many tomatoes. I have 2 plants of each, and we pick a huge bowlful every day. Generally the kids eat them all, but lately we've gotten a backlog, so I need to figure out something else to do with them. Very, very happy with the Beam's Yellow Pear, I will grow those again next year. Sweet 100 is always a winner too. But my Big Boys and Amish Paste... I've gotten 1 ripe tomato from each, and one had a bad case of blossom end rot. I only have a handful on the vine, but they are taking their sweet time to ripen. I had high hopes for the Amish Paste, to make some sauces for the freezer, but at this rate I don't think it's gonna happen. Everything else in the garden this year was lovely, except snap peas. Just a weird year all around. I think I'm going to put in a bunch of overwinter garlic, just to make myself feel better. 
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Aug 14, 2013 19:59
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If you cut the little tomatoes in half and drizzle them with olive oil you can broil them and make an amazing pasta sauce with them. That's what we've been doing, using various seafood proteins to change it up.
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Aug 15, 2013 00:59
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I've made the garden cost spreadsheet without the formulas. If someone could help put the formulas and finishing touches on it, that would be great. Feel free to copy it for your own home garden tracking! https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0ApQ8-ODTuAPMdDJScVdwekJITG1lbG91RmtXdjJGQ2c&usp=sharing e: Each place that has a $ should be auto filled out by a formula. On the "Cost $/oz" line, you would put in how much per oz it would cost if bought at the grocery store. Left it blank because it will vary by your location. It would also be interesting if the expenses would be separated into each category, so you could see how much you spend on seeds, or plant starts each year, but wasn't sure how to format that. Fozzy The Bear fucked around with this message at 01:47 on Aug 15, 2013 |
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Aug 15, 2013 01:37
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Fozzy The Bear posted:I've made the garden cost spreadsheet without the formulas. If someone could help put the formulas and finishing touches on it, that would be great. I should have gotten to this by now, sorry! I will slap some formulas in there at least edit: Do you maybe want the seasonal expenses broken down per season? And the expenses at the top totaled and broken down per season as well? tangy yet delightful fucked around with this message at 01:53 on Aug 15, 2013 |
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Aug 15, 2013 01:46
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Totally TWISTED posted:I should have gotten to this by now, sorry! I will slap some formulas in there at least Thanks! 
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Aug 15, 2013 01:50
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Fozzy The Bear posted:Thanks! I think you replied before I edited my previous post. edit: Do you maybe want the seasonal expenses broken down per season? And the expenses at the top totaled and broken down per season as well? Anyone else have any suggestions for the spreadsheet? I'll see if I think up any other ideas for it myself too.
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Aug 15, 2013 02:01
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Totally TWISTED posted:Do you maybe want the seasonal expenses broken down per season? And the expenses at the top totaled and broken down per season as well? I think it might be better to be yearly expenses and monthly produce, instead of seasonal. Sometimes crops end at different seasons. Monthly would be good to track, so you can look back to last year to find when your tomatoes (or whichever fruit) start producing. I greatly appreciate the formulas!
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Aug 17, 2013 04:24
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 Golden watermelon, corn, zukes, cantaloupe, cherry roma beefsteak and brandywine tomato, cukes, and some tiny bell peppers Garden thoughts this year: - I don't like planting in rows. I feel like I spend half my time walking around them, and a lot of space is just used to walk. Next year I'm going to try one main path with just a few branching off to the sides, kinda like a leaf's veins. Should make it easier to irrigate, too. - I really really enjoyed: Charentais Cantaloupe, the best melon I've ever had. 2 plants produced ~30 fruits. Mexican Sunflowers, the pollinators went insane for these, and they're stunningly beautiful. Harlequin Marigolds, Same as the sunflowers. healthy beautiful plants and the bees loved them Atomic Red Carrots, great flavor although they lose crispness quickly The sudduth's brandywines, beefsteaks, and cherry tomatoes. The romas are just ok. My cucumbers, which went insane and produced more than I thought possible. My one marketmore plant produced well over 100 fruits, my 2 lemon cuke plants produced 250+ - I did okay with: My broccoli. It's loving delicious but the harvest to plant size ratio is lovely. Giant plants and only 3 or 4 meals worth of broccoli. My golden watermelon. I think it's ok but nobody else likes it. Not very sweet compared to red watermelons. My cayenne and bell peppers. Ton of em but none are getting ripe, and the bells are tiny. Garlic. What I was able to harvest was small, and most of it died under contractor's boots. I intend to plant around 100 plants in a few months here when I make some space. - I did not do well with: My squash plants. I planted them in a part of the plot with poor soil, and they got powdery mildew. They struggled badly. My corn plants. A couple ears were ok but most were very starchy and unpleasant to eat. They also take up a shitload of space. My green beans. They were very tiny and died quickly. What they did produce was great but not at all as much as I'd expect. May just be where I planted them
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Aug 17, 2013 19:10
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The fall planting season s upon me, with the cleared areas we planted two types of carrots, spinach, new Zealand spinach and broccoli. Tomorrow I need to weed and turn where the tomatoes were and plant something else.
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Aug 17, 2013 23:34
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I haven't read all of this really awesome thread so I apologize if this has been answered, but I have a question about growing bell peppers. We have 4 red bell pepper plants and they all have HUGE peppers on them. Absolutely enormous. Bigger than ones you get at the store. Seriously these peppers are mutants. But they've been this size and been on the vine for like 3 weeks and they're still green! I'm just wondering how much longer it will be before they turn red. The tag on the plants specifically said "Red Bell Peppers" and has a picture of peppers on it that are red. So... how much longer do I have to wait because I loooovve red peppers and I'm so sad whenever I go out there to look and they're still green 
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Aug 18, 2013 23:34
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razz posted:I haven't read all of this really awesome thread so I apologize if this has been answered, but I have a question about growing bell peppers. All common bell peppers are green/yellow/red.....it just depends on when you pick them. Most varieties will take a good month to go from fully grown green to red. (this is why red peppers cost more)
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Aug 18, 2013 23:51
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Yeah, I've got tons of peppers that are on the plant and aren't even close to ready yet, besides the Jalapeños. Hell, my habs are super small still
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Aug 19, 2013 01:17
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Aw, guess I'll have to keep on waiting then We've had a lot of rain here (like flood-level rains consistently for a month almost) so I think all the water has really been good for our garden. Not that we don't water it but you know, the rain has been nice. We've got 8 Jalapeno plants... stupid I know but me and my husband bought 4 and didn't realize that his dad had already bought 4 so... now we have way too many! I picked 3 the other day that had sneakily turned red on me. It happens seemingly overnight because I check all the plants at least once a day. We also have a cayenne pepper plant and it has gone crazy. The plant itself isn't huge but when you look at it closely there are literally HUNDREDS of peppers on it. The plant is ALL PEPPERS. It's really pretty when they turn red though. Only problem is, we're not sure what to do with cayenne peppers really, haha! I think we'll dehydrate them and grind them up, or just string them up as a decorative thing. Of course we've been cooking with them as well.
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Aug 19, 2013 01:43
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razz posted:We also have a cayenne pepper plant and it has gone crazy. The plant itself isn't huge but when you look at it closely there are literally HUNDREDS of peppers on it. The plant is ALL PEPPERS. It's really pretty when they turn red though. Only problem is, we're not sure what to do with cayenne peppers really, haha! I think we'll dehydrate them and grind them up, or just string them up as a decorative thing. Of course we've been cooking with them as well. I like to string 'em up and dry 'em out and then throw one or two in the pot when I make chai. I also put a few in each jar if I'm making pickled banana pepper rings. Of course you can't use hundreds like that but I'm sure you can think of other things to do with them. Hot sauce?
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Aug 19, 2013 01:58
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Ooooh good idea! My husband is addicted to hot sauce. I just found some cayenne pepper hot sauce recipes that look really good and easy to make. The cayenne plant was bought more as a novelty so I'm happy you suggested hot sauce because we really had no idea what to do with them .I'll try and remember to get a picture when more of them turn red. Right now just a couple are turning red every day or so. I picked one red one today and one yesterday. And there are maybe 3 on there that are half red. They're really pretty, they turn red starting at the tip so before they turn totally red, there's a cool gradient from green to red along the length of the pepper.
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Aug 19, 2013 02:17
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razz posted:Aw, guess I'll have to keep on waiting then We dry ours in the oven and then grind them to a powder and make our own cayenne for the spice cabinet that way. We let our jalapenos turn red and last weekend made a whole batch of jalapeno-blackberry preserve. Was good on crackers with cream cheese. Was also great glazing a pork roast I made last week. Next, we are going to do just pepper jelly. Our pepper plants are heavy producers too.
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Aug 19, 2013 13:33
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I once asked a Hispanic classmate of mine if he had any good recipes involving whole fresh cayenne peppers. He responded "oh yea those are great. Put about 3 dozen of them, one whole onion, and a piece of pork in a slow cooker. To serve, put about 6 of the chiles on a plate with some pork, more if you like it spicy" I like spicy food and all but 
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Aug 19, 2013 14:19
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It's because cayennes are the tastiest peppers, period. I would eat them like grapes if I could get them fresh easily. If you've got enough crop, try salt-fermenting a pint or so of ground fresh cayennes, it gives the sauce a very unique flavor. Make sure you keep the brine level above them though, I lost a batch to mold from laziness and allowing the brine to drop down. They tend to grab gas bubbles real well so weighing the mass down with something heavy on a piece of food grade plastic with holes is a good idea. If you've never naturally pickled anything in a salt brine, some naturally-fermented sauerkraut and its brine added in will stack the deck nicely and put things on easy mode. Don't use table salt, sea salt or kosher salt only - it only takes a heaping teaspoon or so per pint of ground peppers.
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Aug 19, 2013 14:36
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My wife made some amazing popsicles with our cayennes. She blended avocado, lime juice, lime zest, honey, and cayennes and froze them in popsicle molds. For storing hot peppers, we just ground them into a mash and froze them. You may want to freeze them in ice cube trays or some sort of pre-measured size so you don't have to chip off chunks. That worked out really well for us and the peppers maintained a good amount of flavor. As for pepper growing, it's absolutely worth waiting for them to turn red whether it's bell peppers or hot peppers unless you have too many to handle at once. Last year, we overlooked some jalapenos that looked like they were done for the season. They ended up growing and finishing off as red jalapenos before I noticed them. Red jalapenos are 10 times better than green ones because they're hot and sweet at the same time.
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Aug 19, 2013 16:26
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We have a bunch of basil, oregano and mint. I don't know when or how to harvest it (should I be picking leaves off regularly to stimulate growth, or something?) Should I dry it in the oven then grind it?
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Aug 19, 2013 18:54
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/\/\ Pinch what you need from them at any time and use fresh as much as possible. If they are flowering, pinch the flowers off so they keep making leaves (except for the mint. It doesn't matter how you treat the mint. That poo poo is a weed that won't stop growing even if you want it to. You are never getting rid of it.  )Don't dry them in an oven--even mild heat will destroy the flavor. Oregano dries pretty well, but I like freezing my fresh herbs to use later. You can lightly chop them and stuff them in ice cube trays topped off with a little water or chicken stock. Then you can pop out as many cubes as you want later and put them straight into whatever you're cooking.
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Aug 19, 2013 19:50
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So I was looking at my tomatillos this weekend and noticed that some of the fruit "skins" or whatever were turning dry and yellow and I was upset that they were dying, so I went to remove one. But it felt suspiciously heavy and about to split its seams.. Oh. I have three enormous golden tomatillo plants!
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Aug 19, 2013 20:07
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redreader posted:We have a bunch of basil, oregano and mint. No, you are supposed to place fresh basil leaves onto slices of fresh tomatoes and buffalo mozzarella, drizzled with good olive oil, kosher salt and fresh cracked pepper. The oregano can be jammed into sauce as-is. I may try to dry some this fall, but cannot recall the last time I used any dried. Mint? People actually grow mint on purpose? I have a large pot outside with oregano and rosemary. I'll be jamming the boxwood basil and lemon thyme in another to keep growing over the winter. The big-leaf basils (we've a green and a purple) I'll probably do pesto with. Fog Tripper fucked around with this message at 01:47 on Aug 20, 2013 |
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Aug 20, 2013 01:28
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What the gently caress, everyone always complains about mint but it is the one thing I can never keep alive  What's wrong with meeee.
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Aug 20, 2013 04:36
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Hummingbirds posted:What the gently caress, everyone always complains about mint but it is the one thing I can never keep alive I can't keep catnip alive in a container, for some reason. And that's in the mint family, so don't feel too bad. Apples must be getting near ready, the dog has started eating them all. The jerk won't even come when I call because he'll be laying down chewing on apples. No treats for him till after September.
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Aug 20, 2013 04:56
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Hummingbirds posted:What the gently caress, everyone always complains about mint but it is the one thing I can never keep alive Don't worry, I have trouble with mint too. Anubis posted:Apples must be getting near ready, the dog has started eating them all. The jerk won't even come when I call because he'll be laying down chewing on apples. No treats for him till after September. It looks like I've got 3 golden delicious trees in the orchard and they've been dropping a lot of fruit over the last few weeks. Seeds were only half brown last weekend so they should be ripe this weekend, assuming there are any left on the tree. Here's one of my happier trees:  I dug up some of my earlier planted potatoes over the weekend too, about 30 pounds. It was only about half of what I planted in that spot.  I also have the 4 potato towers and these more traditional rows:  That was from about a week ago before the final hilling. They are bigger now and blooming. I had just about given up on my true potato seeds since I started them too late to plant out, and so I had turned off the light and stopped watering them. Last night I noticed there were little round tubers about the size of peas on some of them so I potted them up and put the light back on. It seems like you can easily grow seed tubers from true potato seed indoors under artificial light.
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Aug 20, 2013 16:40
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It's my first year with my allotment and potatoes were literally the only thing I planted that wasn't utterly destroyed by slugs. How will I know when I should harvest them?
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Aug 20, 2013 16:46
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Fatkraken posted:It's my first year with my allotment and potatoes were literally the only thing I planted that wasn't utterly destroyed by slugs. How will I know when I should harvest them? I'm far from an expert on potatoes and I've had a really hard time finding authoritative info on growing them. I think you can harvest them at any point after they form tubers. Early if you want them small or later if you want them bigger. At some point they will bloom (although my first year with purple viking this never happened) and one source said that's when the tubers start to form. Another said that's when you should stop watering them. You can also just leave them in the ground until the foliage dies back. This year I watered them inconsistently until it looked like they were dying back and then waited to harvest until I had time.
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Aug 20, 2013 17:09
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Fatkraken posted:It's my first year with my allotment and potatoes were literally the only thing I planted that wasn't utterly destroyed by slugs. How will I know when I should harvest them? I am not a potato expert either, but I pulled mine about 17 weeks after I put them in. They were a "main" potato. The tops had about half died back, and looked like poo poo. I dug around a plant to test, and got a good sized potato. I figured they were ready to go. You want to not water (can't help rain) a week or two before harvest so the skins can kind of dry out underground and aren't so fragile. Look at what type of potato you planted--is it "early", "main", or "late"? Early are ready in about 80 days, give or take, main in 100 days, and late in 110+ days. But those are just ballparks. If your plants are dying back on their own, and it's reasonably close (within a couple weeks) of when they're "supposed" to be ready, then stop watering and harvest them. Also, Cpt. Wacky, that apple tree!  I want mine to grow and be healthy and make apples so goddamn badly! Hopefully I've knocked back the cedar apple rust and now that I know I need to apply the fungicide starting first thing in the spring (every other week until the blossoms set is what my local botanical garden plant doctor said), maybe they'll blossom and give me an apple or two next year.
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Aug 20, 2013 20:57
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AlistairCookie posted:I am not a potato expert either, but I pulled mine about 17 weeks after I put them in. They were a "main" potato. The tops had about half died back, and looked like poo poo. I dug around a plant to test, and got a good sized potato. I figured they were ready to go. You want to not water (can't help rain) a week or two before harvest so the skins can kind of dry out underground and aren't so fragile. Look at what type of potato you planted--is it "early", "main", or "late"? Early are ready in about 80 days, give or take, main in 100 days, and late in 110+ days. But those are just ballparks. If your plants are dying back on their own, and it's reasonably close (within a couple weeks) of when they're "supposed" to be ready, then stop watering and harvest them. I planted after the garden centre stopped selling seed potatoes, so they're "bought in a bag from the supermarket" potatoes that I planted in, uh, the past. Next year I'm keeping a notebook...
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Aug 20, 2013 20:59
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AlistairCookie posted:Also, Cpt. Wacky, that apple tree! Thanks, but I can't take too much credit. I'm just taking over this neglected orchard as of last Winter. Someone else planted it about 40 years ago. I probably should have thinned the fruit on that tree but I'm still learning and I had my hands full dealing with all the pruned branches from about 50 old, overgrown trees. You probably know this already but you shouldn't let new trees set fruit for the first 2-3 years. They need to put energy into growing the branches and roots first. If they set fruit too soon then they don't grow as big and well as they should be later.
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Aug 20, 2013 22:06
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Cpt.Wacky posted:
Hmmm. Does this count for grape vines as well?
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Aug 21, 2013 00:25
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redreader posted:We have a bunch of basil, oregano and mint. With basil, you should regularly clip off the new growth. The place to do it is right after a junction, where two sets of baby leaves are starting to grow. The plant will redirect energy into those baby leaves and cause the stem to branch, leading to a fuller, bushier plant. Basil loves to be trimmed, don't be shy!  With oregano, if you trim off the last inch of each "runner", it'll start branching at the cut point. Likewise, oregano loves to be trimmed. Edit holy poo poo I should refresh the page before replying. :facepalm:
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Aug 21, 2013 01:29
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Fog Tripper posted:Hmmm. Does this count for grape vines as well? I don't really know anything about growing grapes but some quick searching makes them look just as complicated, if not more, than apples.
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Aug 21, 2013 16:51
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I stick to easy stuff, like peppers:  
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Aug 21, 2013 22:57
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Fog Tripper posted:Hmmm. Does this count for grape vines as well? I don't know about establishing the vines, but grape vines usually get pruned every year after they lose their leaves. My mother used to grow a couple varieties, and she hacked back everything but the strongest vines. Every year they came back and grew like crazy. Right now I have one sad grapevine in my yard that was planted by previous owners. It hadn't been tended to in several years, but seems to be doing better now. I pruned everything but the central vine over the winter, and now it's taking over the trellis it lives on. Didn't produce much fruit this year, but what I did get was pretty good. As a bonus, the grape vines you prune are good for making wreaths and baskets and things. Crafters go nuts for grapevine wreaths. Mom used to make them every year, and sold some of them at craft fairs. The branches I pruned were too woody and brittle to make any last year, but maybe this year will be good. Meanwhile, I have a couple wreaths I made from overgrown wisteria vines.
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Aug 21, 2013 23:44
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A couple of my potato plants have berries. How/when do I harvest them to get true potato seed?
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Aug 21, 2013 23:54
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Fatkraken posted:A couple of my potato plants have berries. How/when do I harvest them to get true potato seed? Lucky you, although they may be sterile seeds. None of mine set any fruit this year. They were all from commercial seed potatoes. These are my notes gleaned from watching a few videos of Tom Wagner of New World Crops.
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Aug 22, 2013 01:02
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