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coyo7e posted:Any other suggestions? I don't peel my tomatoes when I make soup from them and use an immersion blender to make it very smooth. I've never tried with all cherry tomatoes though. It's nice to have frozen portions of tomato soup to pull out over winter. I've made "sun-dried" cherry tomatoes in the oven and they're pretty awesome. Here's one article on it, including a link to a tip for cutting them in half faster: http://www.dishinanddishes.com/how-to-make-homemade-sun-dried-oven-dried-tomatoes/
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Sep 2, 2014 19:10
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dangittj posted:Anybody have any experience with hydroponic gardening? I'm debating running an indoor hydroponic garden over the winter. Kind of wandering what are some good plants for hydroponic besides lettuce. I can answer any questions you have. Lettuce and herbs are certainly the easiest to grow and with the right setup grow very fast to produce very healthy plants - from cotyledons to full head of lettuce in 30 days or so. Other leafy green things like bok choy, kale, etc. can be done, you can also do fruiting vegetables like tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers but it is more involved/complex.
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Sep 2, 2014 20:44
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Shifty Pony posted:Seriously this is good advice. Kiwi are like a tasty fruit producing kudzu. My parents' vines have destroyed their trellis (made of 6" posts) at least four times now. It's hanging off of my porch railings, 4x4 and 2x4 construction. The only problem I've had after 6 years is it getting between my gutters & house, some diligent trimming solves that. Two years ago I hacked/pulled it away from the house to paint the railings and the put it back up without issue. Perhaps the climate is harsh enough here to keep it from going crazy.
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Sep 3, 2014 15:29
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coyo7e posted:If you've got a gas stove or grill, it's really easy to roast them and that makes them soft and less spicy, as well as adding a nice smokey flavor - once they're scorched a little, you can scrape off the skins with any knife or even maybe a spoon with a good edge. At that point you've got the pepper equivalent of sun-dried tomatoes, and you can use them, freeze some, and then just toss them into whatever you happen to be cooking. Thanks for the ideas man, I've used a some in a few chicken dishes already. I was thinking of using the rest in a relish or something. I'm going to use 'em all quick because I heard storing them in a fridge can effect their spiciness and I'd probably just make them rot if I tried to air dry them. I totally forgot about the ornamental numex I had, and when I checked it some of the peppers are all wrinkly and very soft, I'm not sure if they are just very ripe or starting to rot or what. rear end grade pic included. 
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Sep 3, 2014 20:42
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if they're hot.
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coyo7e posted:loving cherry tomatoes. Most of the tomatoes the ex-roommate planted are cherry tomatoes, so I have 4 different cherry tomato plants (all but one are huge and sprawling) and currently like 10 lbs of ripe tiny tomatoes in the fridge (at this point I don't care I just don't want fruit flies all over the house, gently caress flavor) that are obnoxious to blanche and peel, all need to be individually rinsed of pollen/dirt/etc, and no loving clue what to do with them all - gonna try throwing a bunch into the cuisinart and cooking them into paste or something, I guess. I've always just cut them in half and sprinkled with olive oil then broil them until they collapse. Saute some shrimp or other seafood and serve with some chopped up basil over pasta. Nice light flavors. You can also just oven roast them whole with a little salt and oil until they burst and proceed to make pasta sauce, just need an immersion blender to keep it smooth if that's your preference. Keep in mind they're sweeter than paste varietals. I have approximately 14 cherry tomato plants in my back yard that I did not plant. It's an awesome bonus round for the garden this year.
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Sep 4, 2014 04:47
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Will a regular blender (even a decent one) not get the skins but a immersion blender will? Or does a regular blender just take longer? Not having to peel tomato skins would make my thoughts of doing a home made sauce much easier. Just debating if I'd have to spend money or not on the immersion blender.
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Sep 4, 2014 05:09
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If you boil them for a few minutes the skins should peel off easy.
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Sep 4, 2014 05:26
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Yeah I just don't want to peel cherry tomatoes. But I may not even grow cherrys next year, I think I'll takeover the tomato growing from my wife and just grow for saucing since we don't eat them much raw.
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Sep 4, 2014 05:36
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Totally TWISTED posted:Will a regular blender (even a decent one) not get the skins but a immersion blender will? Or does a regular blender just take longer? Not having to peel tomato skins would make my thoughts of doing a home made sauce much easier. Just debating if I'd have to spend money or not on the immersion blender. Do you have a food mill (old school crank kind)? That's what I use for canning tomatoes, and if I miss any skin before they go in it tends to not make it through the mill. Might work for blanched/lightly crushed cherry tomatoes that haven't been peeled.......worth a shot if you have one. Edit: I just HAD to repost this from the reddit gardening sub. Somebody on there figured out who's been eating their tomatoes: 
Motronic fucked around with this message at 13:26 on Sep 4, 2014 |
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Sep 4, 2014 12:42
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Unless they're in Africa that's somebody's escaped pet. Looks like a sulcata tortoise, they can get to 200 pounds at adulthood. They're also cute as hell, look at the attitude on that face. "Gawwwwd guys I just wanted a snack what is this bullshit."
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Sep 4, 2014 14:37
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Just read this yesterday: How to peel tomatoes fast
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Sep 4, 2014 16:34
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I guess the reason I hate cherry tomatoes is that I'm lazy. I don't like picking dozens and dozens of fruit of any kind, every day. Reminds me of picking flats of raspberries for $1/flat as a kid. Feel the same way about picking blueberries and the like as well - I'd rather be doing something else, and I don't like pies or jam or jelly that much so when I get a sweet tooth I'd rather buy a gallon bag of berries from a local organic farm, and keep them in the freezer to eat straight.  Kilersquirrel posted:Unless they're in Africa that's somebody's escaped pet. Looks like a sulcata tortoise, they can get to 200 pounds at adulthood.  Then my aunt passed away and they gave the tortoises to my parents. We kept them for many years but eventually they caught colds and died due to the damp here in Oregon, I suspect. I don't think that's a sulcata though, they have more striking colors on their shell than that guy. coyo7e fucked around with this message at 18:24 on Sep 4, 2014 |
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Sep 4, 2014 18:20
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Eh, it might be an American species of desert tortoise, but it's too domed on top to be a G. agassizii, maybe a Sonoran then if I'm wrong in the first place. Sulcatas don't really keep those bright colors if they have a natural burrow though, the dirt dulls everything up and it gets less colorful as the scute abrades and the animal gets older. Those flares on the outer scute ring look longer than the pictures I've seen of the Gopherus torts and the legs look a little too jagged in that photo. It is a little bit blurry though. I wouldn't be surprised if they were in SoCal and it was a feral sulcata though; everybody turns them loose once they start getting big and they do extremely well in the climate there, it's just like home. Cuteness comments stand though, if I found a tort raiding my garden I don't think I'd have the heart to shoo it off. I think I'd just plant more of whatever it was eating instead.
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Sep 4, 2014 18:36
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I wasn't sure if I should post this in this thread or the general plants thread. What kind of chemical run-off do you get from wheatgrass roots? I've got a solar-powered water bubbler that I'm using in a tupperware container to encourage the cats to drink more water (for their general health). I also want to grow some wheatgrass so they can nibble on it, and I was considering doing it hydroponically. Would it be feasible to have a big round shallow container with some floating medium in one corner for the wheatgrass, a bubbler in the centre, and the rest just open water for the cats to drink? It's only grass but I want to make sure there's not going to be anything dodgy going on in the water if I grow stuff in it at the same time as using it to water the cats. I also need to find something to weigh the bubbler down because it keeps tipping over and shooting water onto the balcony floor for about 30 seconds before I can jump up and reposition it.
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Sep 6, 2014 10:47
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Chemical runoff? None if you don't use chemicals, but then you'd grow some weak rear end grass. I'm no expert, but I don't think it would be a good idea for any living creature (besides plants of course) to consume hydroponic solution on a regular basis, with their dissolved nutrients and chemicals. E: Or any other agricultural chemical, hydroponic or not. TheToxicEuphoria fucked around with this message at 12:53 on Sep 6, 2014 |
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Sep 6, 2014 12:49
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Oh no, no hydroponic chemicals. I'm just talking about clean water. I had a look a few weeks ago and I found a bunch of videos that suggested that a number of grass seeds (wheatgrass etc) can grow to a reasonable size from just the stored nutrients in the seed, water, sunlight, and air. I don't need them to grow to such a huge height, they're just for the cats to nibble on. I just wanted to check that there wouldn't be anything in the roots that might make the water impure for the cats. For example I've heard about some type of (soil-based) plant having bacteria growing around the roots that return nitrogen to the soil.
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Sep 6, 2014 13:18
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Sulla-Marius 88 posted:Oh no, no hydroponic chemicals. I'm just talking about clean water. I had a look a few weeks ago and I found a bunch of videos that suggested that a number of grass seeds (wheatgrass etc) can grow to a reasonable size from just the stored nutrients in the seed, water, sunlight, and air. I don't need them to grow to such a huge height, they're just for the cats to nibble on. I just wanted to check that there wouldn't be anything in the roots that might make the water impure for the cats. For example I've heard about some type of (soil-based) plant having bacteria growing around the roots that return nitrogen to the soil. It sounds like you mean exudates, the stuff plants give off through their roots. I've never gone too deeply into researching them. Different plants give off different chemicals that allegedly inhibit other plants from competing with them and attract stuff that is beneficial for them. Anecdotally, have you see "lucky bamboo" growing in just water? After a week or so the water takes on a slight tinge and it's recommended to replace the water with fresh water. That's at least partly the exudates going into the water. The nitrogren-fixing bacteria are part of a larger group of mycorrhizae and there are all kinds of them. The ones that fix nitrogen usually only do it with plants in the pea family. I see cats drink horrible, disgusting scummy water from puddles outside all the time with no ill effects. I don't think it would be an issue as long as you're changing the water routinely, which you should be doing even without the wheat grass growing in it.
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Sep 6, 2014 17:31
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Rogue posted:I can answer any questions you have. Lettuce and herbs are certainly the easiest to grow and with the right setup grow very fast to produce very healthy plants - from cotyledons to full head of lettuce in 30 days or so. Just saw this now... Leafy things make sense, there are a ton of guides on doing lettuce for beginners. I honestly would like to try cauliflower, just because it is difficult to grow here (too much temperature variation, not a long enough cool season), and because my wife and I both like it a lot.
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Sep 11, 2014 17:23
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Pulled my off-season potato onions---started them late due to a cold Spring. Common wisdom is to harvest them when it gets hot in Summer, but they were too loving tiny then. They're still small, but the greens had mostly already died off and a couple of the small ones were wanting to sprout and gently caress that. Here's a little one (guy in the lower right resprouting, rest of the greens from the past season): The bigger individual bulbs are only golfball-sized (potato onions are small, but they'll get up to around 7 cm (two or three inches). On the small side, but I got an average of about 10, 12 bulbs harvested for every one I put in the ground. And holy gently caress do they smell good.
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Sep 12, 2014 05:37
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Thanks to a fairly mild summer here in Central Texas my tomato plants have somehow survived... for a certain value of survived. The vines are spindly with few active growth points. There are few or no flowers. The tomatoes that are on the Cherokee are merely "meh" (although the very few that came from the krim recently were still excellent).   I've cleared out the brown stuff a few times recently but more comes back just as fast. I kind of would like to have the space open for a fall/winter crop as it is the least shady spot in the garden (hence why they got cooked). Time to throw in the towel for them? Any suggestions on what to put in? First frost here is early December so I have ~80 days. My bell pepper plants didn't produce much because the heat kept making the flowers drop. Insead the plants put all their energy into greenery so now I have some crazy bell pepper plants. 
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Sep 13, 2014 13:22
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Is edamame supposed to be furry? I kind of wrote my plant off because they didn't seem terribly big and were hairy, but I randomly busted one open when I was picking tomatoes today, and it seemed just peachy. I'll eat them either way at this point obviously but wasn't sure if it was normal.
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Sep 15, 2014 06:37
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Yes edamame is always furry. Even the stuff I get in restaurants. I would harvest ASAP they have a very short window before they get starchy.
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Sep 15, 2014 15:20
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I had a pumpkin come up in my back yard nowhere near my garden. Looks like a different variety than my usual plants. I let it grow and have been watching with anticipation as one of the pumpkins started early and grew all season. Big thing, probably 2.5 feet in diameter (that's huge for me). Vine died off, so I went to pick it up. Found out some critter chewed into the back and it's half rotted.  Since it grew so well, maybe I can salvage some seeds for next year.
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Sep 15, 2014 20:16
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So I'm wanting to try to grow hard red winter wheat this fall and have already acquired 2 pounds for use in a plot about 400 square feet (20x20.) The plot held my mixed vegetable garden until about midsummer, then I kind of abandoned it to the weeds. Any tips or recommendations? I've never grown a cereal before. The plot has been disked under 2 days ago. Zone 7b (Northern Alabama), for reference.
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Sep 16, 2014 06:30
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Anyone ever try to plant any hybridized seeds? I planted lemon cucumbers and straight eights next to each other and got a few green spheres and one orange lemon shaped cucumber. I saved the seeds from the orange cucumber.
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Sep 16, 2014 16:41
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ashez2ashes posted:Anyone ever try to plant any hybridized seeds? I planted lemon cucumbers and straight eights next to each other and got a few green spheres and one orange lemon shaped cucumber. I saved the seeds from the orange cucumber. I mean if you have two cultivars of cuke planted next to each other cross pollination may well have occurred. Both of the cultivars you mention are the same species (Cucumis sativus) so that's certainly plausible. But the fruit won't be visibly different as a result of cross pollination. Some plants produce more or less robustly depending on pollen source and pollination frequency, but you're not going to get genetically/morphologically different cucumbers in the first season.
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Sep 16, 2014 22:44
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I didn't take a very good photo of the cuke that was growing on the straight eight plant that looked orange/yellow: This is the one that really seemed weird that was growing on the lemon cucumber plant:  I planted straight eights, lemon cucumbers, and suyo longs in the same bed. The nub at the top kinda looks like a suyo long? ashez2ashes fucked around with this message at 15:11 on Sep 17, 2014 |
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Sep 17, 2014 14:59
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ashez2ashes posted:I didn't take a very good photo of the cuke that was growing on the straight eight plant that looked orange/yellow: ashez2ashes posted:This is the one that really seemed weird that was growing on the lemon cucumber plant: Are the plants also producing normal fruit? Could just be an environmental problem of some kind---soil, disease, watering, or whatever.
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Sep 17, 2014 21:16
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SubG posted:hosed up looking cukes like that are almost always due to poor pollination. I've never seen a lemon cuke produce anything with spines like that. But you should be able to see that on the existing female flowers on the plant before they even open, much less before they're pollinated. The growing season is pretty much over in Southern Ohio now, and I've started to clean up and winterize, but when the plant was producing it made a lot of normal healthy lemon cucumbers. I'm sure my soil could be improved (I'm working on that as I winterize) but my lemon cucumbers were quite healthy.
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Sep 17, 2014 21:44
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ashez2ashes posted:The growing season is pretty much over in Southern Ohio now, and I've started to clean up and winterize, but when the plant was producing it made a lot of normal healthy lemon cucumbers. I'm sure my soil could be improved (I'm working on that as I winterize) but my lemon cucumbers were quite healthy.
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Sep 17, 2014 21:49
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Hey all, I had noticed over the last few days some of my basil had been eaten. I've got both genovese basil and cinnamon basil and both were gnawed upon, in some cases to a large degree (both are above a foot tall). Cilantro seedlings/4 inch tomato plants/pepper plants were untouched. The last three nights I've gone out with a flashlight and seen only American cockroaches/Palmetto cockroaches (I live in south florida and I can't be sure of the identification). So today I get home and the tips of a bunch of my basil has turned black, from what I'm assuming is stress. So I really bust my rear end looking and finally find a slug hidden in a crevasse nearby. Cue one dead slug. So my question is, can I be fairly sure that plant stress from the slug caused the basil to begin turning black at the tips? No other plants are affected, and it's a small raised bed. Slightly more than 10sqft. Thanks
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Sep 19, 2014 03:20
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Anyone have any hot fruit tree pruning resources? I have two plum trees that are insane. I literally have strangers at my door every other day wanting to go into my back yard to pick them (no, you can't bring your ladder into my back yard to pick plums.) But they're crazy big, and are starting to become an issue.
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Sep 20, 2014 02:57
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 Picked the rest of my starter chillies yesterday. Holy hell I actually managed to grow something edible!  A few had been bored into by caterpillars or something, but mostly all good. Thanks for all the tips over the last few months guys! Still got the rest of the ones I grew from seeds to go yet, and a buncha new recipes to try.
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Sep 20, 2014 19:56
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OlyMike posted:Anyone have any hot fruit tree pruning resources? I have two plum trees that are insane. I literally have strangers at my door every other day wanting to go into my back yard to pick them (no, you can't bring your ladder into my back yard to pick plums.) But they're crazy big, and are starting to become an issue. I'm not in the UK, nor do I grow plums, but I do use this sight as a resource.  Also, GordonComstock, I'm not sure what that's about, but some of my basil patch does that sometimes as well. I always thought it behaved just like the botyritis blight I fight off my peony hedge. It has never gotten worse than a mild annoyance for me; I just pull that plant, discard in a lawn bag, and move on. 
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Sep 21, 2014 01:28
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First real effort at growing this year netted a lot of ups and downs. For what it's worth everything was container-grown. Patio Tomatoes - Did great, although it was a little hard to contain without a cage/trellis. Yielded a lot of tomatoes and survived some deer damage and occasional bouts of powdery mildew. San Marzano Tomatoes - Took forever to ripen but just as they were turning orange-yellow, days from ready to pick, a deer gobbled down every last fruit. Just now starting to get some ripe fruits here and there but definitely less than I was hoping thanks to the deer. Also seems to have some sort of leaf spot now so what I do have may not ripen before the plant dies off, though I'm doing everything I can to keep it alive. Black Beauty Zucchini - Grew foliage and flowered like crazy, although half the time I went to check there wasn't a female flower to fertilize. The bees took care of them for me, luckily. I got one decent sized zucchini out of it and then when the second one was just starting out the whole plant seemed to be overtaken by something and died. I suspect something bug-related rather than disease but I wasn't able to find anything. Cajun Belle Peppers - My absolute favorite. Despite being in a relatively small pot, this sucker shot out quite a few peppers right from the start, and the peppers were freaking delicious. Definitely growing multiples next year. Santa Fe Grande Peppers - Also did very well. Not quite as productive as the Cajun but still a good amount. Peppers were a nice medium spicy. Will probably trade up for something else next year to keep the variety going. Poblano Peppers - I only got like 2 or 3 out of this plant despite it being quite healthy and fertilized/watered the same as the other pepper plants. After the first couple it just never really set any flowers. Tabasco Peppers - This thing took FOREVER to fruit, but now the thing is covered in tiny little peppers that are pretty goddamn hot (I made the mistake of trying one raw right off the plant). A caterpillar recently demolished about half of the plant but luckily it was the half that had less (and less ripe) fruit. Silver Queen Corn - I don't know much about growing corn, but I know you generally have to row plant to get cross-fertilization so I wasn't expecting much. I had one Bonnie starter with a couple stalks in a not-very-big planter but it grew to about 6 foot and did all the things corn seems to usually do, including fruit! The ears are taking a long rear end time to grow though so I don't know if I'll get much of anything but we'll see. Mostly I was growing it just to grow it and for having decorative corn stalks for the fall so it was a pleasant surprise. All in all, a fun growing season and a lot of learning. I had big plans for a raised bed next year (4x8 or 4x12) but since I also work at a garden center and would be setting this sucker up during my busy season AND also have a baby on the way, I decided to hold off for another year and just expand my selection of container-grown stuff next year.
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Sep 21, 2014 02:59
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AlistairCookie posted:I'm not in the UK, nor do I grow plums, but I do use this sight as a resource. Sonova....Spring pruning, I was so ready to do this in the fall. Ah well, here's to hoping I remember to do it come April.
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Sep 21, 2014 17:43
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/\/\ Keep a notebook. Or a [something] file on your computer. Or on your phone. I'm a Luddite, so I keep an actual notebook for stuff like this. Otherwise I would never remember what I'm supposed to be pruning when (in the fall, in the spring, after blooming, etc...) Speaking of pruning, I'm headed out to do a number on a rose of sharon in the easement that has been allowed to get 8-9feet tall. This year, I've decided it's mine, and I'm pruning with extreme prejudice...
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Sep 21, 2014 18:51
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OlyMike posted:Sonova....Spring pruning, I was so ready to do this in the fall. Ah well, here's to hoping I remember to do it come April. I think it's never a bad time to prune dead, diseased or damaged wood. Most of the plums I've seen tend to develop lots of dead twiggy wood. IMO, after the harvest is a great time to prune those out since the leaves are still on the tree making it easier to tell which wood is dead.
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Sep 21, 2014 20:00
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Okay these things? Screw these things forever. They pretend that you can just plant them as-is, and the roots will figure out how to tunnel through. Well, bullshit. I spent last night emptying old plants out of my hanging 5-gallon-bucket garden, and inspecting the root balls to see what there was to see. Well NONE of my tomato plants managed to grow THROUGH the coconut hair pots. They ALL had to squeeze ALL of their roots through the tiny crack between the lip of the coconut pot and the bottom of the 5-gallon-bucket. Staying alive for the first few days must've been hell for them. No loving wonder they were so drat sensitive this season. I'm never using them again without (at least) drilling holes or tearing swaths off or something. Dilettante. posted:
These look great!
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Sep 22, 2014 19:15
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AlistairCookie posted:Also, GordonComstock, I'm not sure what that's about, but some of my basil patch does that sometimes as well. I always thought it behaved just like the botyritis blight I fight off my peony hedge. It has never gotten worse than a mild annoyance for me; I just pull that plant, discard in a lawn bag, and move on. Thanks for the comment. I went a few days not noticing any new damage until today. I grabbed a bug I'd seen my whole life in south florida but never bothered about. They're called bagworms. And they seem to be the root of my problems
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Sep 23, 2014 01:55
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