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I'm so paranoid about that. My wife has a habit of just using any old spray bottle for bleach. I've taken to brightly labeling each new spray bottle for a specific chemical. e.g., this bottle will only ever be used for neem oil.
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Jan 8, 2019 15:43
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Harry Potter on Ice posted:Hot! What kinds? Seed mat heater? What kind of light? Chile Japones, Guajillo, Thai, and Sweet Banana! No seedling mat, and no extra light beyond the fluorescent overhead lights. I shake them around a bit every day to help them support their own weight. If you want to be a pepper growing monster, go to your local Hispanic grocery and stock up on small packages of dried chiles. They are usually very cheap and I've grown many good pepper plants from their seeds. They probably won't have the crazy exotic kinds that a seed catalog would, but if you're trying to cover your chili bases it's a good way to do that.
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Jan 8, 2019 23:01
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Seed Catalogs are burning a hole on my coffee table. What should I try and grow this year? - Mid-Atlantic US - Everything will either be grown in homemade SIPs or some medium/large Grow Bags I plan on picking up - Local tree conditions mean I'll have a little "Full Sun" but mostly "Partial Sun" -- anything that is particularly "Shade" tolerant would be a boon, though I know that's a rarity - Advice on timing (planting in Late Winter/Early Spring, Late Spring/Early Summer, Late Summer/Early Fall) welcome. Last year my early plantings went in late, and my fall plantings never went in at all. Past results: I started with some greens in late spring, but I think they went in a bit late, and I never quite got my rhythm for when to harvest them. They ended up getting hit by bugs and then withering in the heat. I started some Brussels in the late spring, but while it grew a ton it didn't grow any actual sprouts until late fall, at which point it was devoured by white flies. Clearly I did this all wrong. Last year we did some tomatoes -- one bog-standard Bonnie Patio Cherry and two heirlooms (a Mr. Stripey and some weird black siberian thing). The cherry tomatoes did fairly well, the Mr. Stripey was OK but didn't yield many fruit, and the indigo tomatoes never really got good (they were kind of watery and flavorless and took forever to ripen). I think not having quite enough sunlight impacted them, as well as the record (as in wettest year in recorded history) rainfall leading to a lot of losses due to splitting. I'm probably going to move from SIPs to Grow-Bags with an automatic drip system for them, as I'm hoping that will provide more consistent moisture (as well as provide larger per-plant real-estate for supports). I'll probably be less ambitious and do two less adventurous tomatoes and just tend to them much more closely. Variety recommendations welcome. We did two peppers -- a Shishito and an orange "snacking pepper". Both were awesome and thrived in the SIPs, and I think the decision was to do one more. Might just do Shishitos and Snack Peppers again, but any additional suggestions welcome. We did two cucumbers -- a "Burpless" variety and then one advertised as "container" cukes. Both turned out great -- I might do another container cuke and then some unique variety (persian?) but I'm not sure. I'm curious about eggplants. How hard? Container friendly? Good varieties? Anything else that would be fun/interesting and do well in containers?
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Jan 10, 2019 16:48
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I'm thinking about using more grow bags too. I'm not really excited about having to buy all the soil for them though when I already have this nice semi-raised bed, but I think it might prevent some of the disease issues I had last year. Eggplants are not difficult. In my experience they're pretty similar to tomatoes, but their growth habit is more like a pepper. Makes sense given the close relation.
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Jan 10, 2019 17:19
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I also had an eggplant question, I put them on trellises on my garden plans but they don't actually grow like that, do they? Do you just stake them like tomatoes/peppers?
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Jan 10, 2019 17:35
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Yeah, stakes or cages are good. They have a pretty sturdy structure.
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Jan 10, 2019 17:43
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Yeah, eggplants are very similar to tomatoes. I grow mine on trellises. You have to train them but otherwise they take to them fine.
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Jan 10, 2019 17:45
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I tried an eggplant starter last season that didn't really do anything after I repotted it. I don't know what went wrong there.
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Jan 10, 2019 18:07
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A Pack of Kobolds posted:I tried an eggplant starter last season that didn't really do anything after I repotted it. I don't know what went wrong there. Rootbound?
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Jan 10, 2019 18:30
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Crakkerjakk posted:Yeah, eggplants are very similar to tomatoes. I grow mine on trellises. You have to train them but otherwise they take to them fine. Huh. I did not know that. So far they've always stayed upright for me but maybe that's the square foot spacing at work helping them support each other.
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Jan 10, 2019 19:31
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Hexigrammus posted:Huh. I did not know that. So far they've always stayed upright for me but maybe that's the square foot spacing at work helping them support each other. I mean, they have enough internal structure to stand on their own, but if you train them up a trellis they'll take to it happily and it helps with the heavier fruiting ones.
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Jan 10, 2019 19:57
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Hexigrammus posted:Huh. I did not know that. So far they've always stayed upright for me but maybe that's the square foot spacing at work helping them support each other. That's why I was comparing the growth habit to peppers earlier. They're not nearly as sprawling as tomatoes, though they're more closely related to them than peppers.
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Jan 10, 2019 20:10
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Hubis posted:Seed Catalogs are burning a hole on my coffee table. What should I try and grow this year? Greens will tend to melt in heat. Plant them in shady areas, it helps a bit. Get a variety, start them early, and look for stuff that says heat tolerant or slow to bolt. Don't be shy snipping off some leaves for salads. They'll grow back, and if you kill one plant you'll learn not to trim off that much next time and they grow pretty quick anyways. Not sure what went wrong with your Brussels, but they do take a while. Cherry tomatoes tend to be easier than bigger ones, as they don't have to sit on the plant as long to ripen. I would normally put tomatoes in SIPs, but it won't hurt anything to try some in grow bags. Stick them in the sunniest part of your yard. Do a pickling cuke! Fridge pickles all season. Sweet potatoes? You can eat the leaves, and just sprout the ones from the store. Strawberries? They do well in containers. Snap peas. Super tasty. One zucchini and one yellow squash plant. Only one of each. That will be enough for you and however many people you have in your house. Trellis it. Pinch off every other squash blossom, and remember the flowers are edible!! Bush beans? Growing weird varieties of beans you could never find at the store is a bunch of fun, and beans are simple and pretty foolproof. Southern Exposure Seed Exchange has a lot of varieties that do well in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeast, if you're Virginia-ish or southerly. Crakkerjakk fucked around with this message at 22:16 on Jan 10, 2019 |
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Jan 10, 2019 22:06
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There's a couple varieties of bush blueberries that would probably do well in a shady spot, though you probably wouldn't want to stick them in the bags. And they need higher acid soil, which is easy to create in a container. Actually, depending on where exactly you are Paw Paw trees are an understory fruit tree that prefers shade to full sun and make delicious fruit that you can't find at the store. Crakkerjakk fucked around with this message at 22:26 on Jan 10, 2019 |
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Jan 10, 2019 22:20
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Crakkerjakk posted:I mean, they have enough internal structure to stand on their own, but if you train them up a trellis they'll take to it happily and it helps with the heavier fruiting ones. That's probably what it is - most of mine are small-fruited varieties that you pick at tennis ball size or slightly larger. We don't very often grow the big black aubergine types. The Taiwanese Ping Tung eggplants will get quite large but we pick them small so we don't get inundated in them. I'll have to try a bit of support if we grow one of the giant varieties again. Speaking of seed catalogs, if you're in Canada and want to try some weird stuff including cold-tolerant sweetpotatoes Mapple Farm in New Brunswick just sent out their 2019 brochure. Sounds like this might be their last year for sweets but they're still shipping seeds around North America. All open pollinated if you're into seed saving. I'm definitely going to keep growing their "Mystery Keeper" tomato. We cleaned up our tomato patch in late September and brought all the green tomatoes in to ripen on the basement windowsills. Mystery Keeper and related varieties ripen slowly from the inside out over several months. It takes a bit of experience to figure out when the inside is ripe while the outside is still pale. The taste is better than anything from the stores at this time of year. This was lunch today: 
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Jan 11, 2019 00:37
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Carrot pictures I promised from last page. These were planted in the late spring, so they're about seven months old now? I think our coldest night so far this year was about 20°F, and despite some frost damage on some of the older leaves the greenery is thriving. There's plenty of new growth on all of them. I'm not sure if the greens will last until spring, I'm sure we'll get down into the single digits at some point, but I may let a couple of them go all winter just to see how they do. There are about three rows of mature carrots left in the bed, we've been picking from these rows all summer. I'd guess maybe 15-20 carrots in total remain. To the left of these rows there are another six rows we planted in the early fall, and we have another couple of rows we planted in the late fall in another bed, but only five of them germinated.  Washed. These are the Purple Haze variety (seeds from Johnny's). I'd say the longest was about 7 inches or so.  Just look at this friggin cross section.  Their final form, simply roasted with olive oil and a crack of black pepper. The split carrot was definitely the best – we roasted it cut side down and it carmelized wonderfully. It looks burned, but that's just how the deep purple color looks when cooked. I read somewhere that root veggies almost always taste better when they've gone through a couple of frosts, and boy is that right. These were nice and sweet with a deep, powerful carroty flavor. Absolutely nothing like the carrots you get in the grocery store. 
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Jan 11, 2019 03:33
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I'm having good luck so far in our weird winter growing season here in Dubai. It's January and highs are in the 70s and 80s, lows in the 60s. The weather will probably stay this way until March, and by the time late April has arrived it will be highs in the 100s and lows in the high 80s/low 90s. I would spread them out more that corner of the balcony gets an extra two hours of sun, so I think the benefits of being in that corner outweigh the crowding. It turns out the time to start tomatoes is probably September or October. Two of these were purchased as starter plants in late November of an undetermined tomato variety. The rest were started from seeds in December, and while my wife and I were traveling around Christmas they really took off. Almost all are starting to show flowers now.  First sign of a tomato! And our very leggy cilantro.  1) should I trim these back and then out the stalks? 2) Should I do anything about how they flop over? Is it worth it to try to train them upwards? I also put seeds into starter pots earlier this week from our favorite grocery store peppers- some small spicy variety from Thailand. Fingers crossed they sprout soon and can get some good growing in before temperatures get too hot. I think I'll try to start them earlier next season. Maybe get seeds going in September. We've got a second balcony that gets an hour or so of sun and then shade all day. Any suggestions on what might do well in planters/pots over there?
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Jan 11, 2019 18:09
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Anything mostly shade I always go for greens. They're spendy at most stores and are one of the higher risks for bacterial contamination (in the US, no idea if the same for Dubai). Do other people in Dubai garden at all? Is that a thing there? Interesting that the growing season is winter, makes sense. My wife is from Arizona and that's how it is there as well.
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Jan 11, 2019 18:34
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I have planted 64 cloves of garlic in 8 different spots in my garden. Hopefully it's not too late and I still get something. Now I'm twitchy about it. Planted them this sunday, managed not to go check the beds to see if they sprouted last night. Really reinforces I need to buckle down and at least sketch out a plan for what goes where this spring over the weekend.
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Jan 16, 2019 15:40
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I had been intending to put some onions in the ground, but I guess with temperatures looking like this for the next week or so, they'd do nothing at best, or freeze at worst?
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Jan 19, 2019 11:04
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Angrymog posted:I had been intending to put some onions in the ground, but I guess with temperatures looking like this for the next week or so, they'd do nothing at best, or freeze at worst? Celcius or Fahrenheit? If Celcius, no problem. I don't worry about my winter onions until -7 or so. Throw a light mulch over them if you want to be absolutely sure. They won't do anything yet but they'll be ready to bust out when temperatures are right.
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Jan 19, 2019 19:12
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Hexigrammus posted:Celcius or Fahrenheit? If Celcius, no problem. I don't worry about my winter onions until -7 or so. Throw a light mulch over them if you want to be absolutely sure. They won't do anything yet but they'll be ready to bust out when temperatures are right. C. I'm SE England.
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Jan 19, 2019 19:40
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What do people do in terms of reusing potting mixes for container gardens? I have no problem growing things in my main garden/bed but when it comes to containers I still haven't nailed down the perfect formula and this year I really want to get it right. Last year for the most part I mixed the old potting soil with a fresh batch and a bit of compost. My plan this year when it comes time is to just dump all of the soil from my containers into a bin and mix 40% or so compost and organic matter into it. I haven't really had any problems with specific diseases or anything so not too worried about passing anything like that along. Is that about right? It seems silly because I feel most people have little problem growing in containers while growing in actual soil creates issues but I have the exact opposite problem.
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Jan 23, 2019 14:51
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Your plan sounds fine to me. I'd personally just top dress with compost and mulch (preferably at the end of the growing season, letting it sit over the winter) to avoid disturbing any beneficial soil bacteria/fungus, and also out of laziness so I don't have to move all the container soil around.
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Jan 24, 2019 13:48
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Crakkerjakk posted:Your plan sounds fine to me. I'd personally just top dress with compost and mulch (preferably at the end of the growing season, letting it sit over the winter) to avoid disturbing any beneficial soil bacteria/fungus, and also out of laziness so I don't have to move all the container soil around. This. I just throw my own compost on top, then leaves on top of that. Then I mix it all together in spring when I'm ready to do the planting. If it looks light on compost I'll add more when it's getting mixed in. I also like how the mulched leaves keep the mix lighter while they decompose. Only a few more weeks and I'll start some peppers. I want them to be larger when it's time to put outdoors this year, especially the longer growing plants. So that means I need to modify my starting plans. Should be fun!
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Jan 24, 2019 15:40
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I compost old potting soil. The heat gets rid of anything bad.
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Jan 24, 2019 18:54
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I do the same. The only thing I don't compost is obviously diseased plants, though theoretically if you're hot composting you'll kill most harmful pathogens.
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Jan 24, 2019 21:38
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Hey guys, I was just thinking about starting snap peas at my apartment. Zone 7. I have a ground floor unit, access to DIRT, and gardening is quite popular, lots of people have containers or little plowed patches for gardening in front of their terraces. I'm thinking of just tilling up a strip of soil up front and building a little frame trellis the snap peas. Oorrr. I can be lazy. I have a box hedge in front of the terrace. Will the peas just trellis on that? I'm also planning some container gardening. Just some greens and herbs, a few cherry and plum tomatoes come summer. I may guerrilla garden an abandoned patch by the creek with some raspberries. Thornless, don't worry, i'm not a monster. It's already covered with vines back there. Facebook still thinks i'm still back in zone 8/9 and it's throwing up hella START SPRING PLANTING NOWNOWNOW ads, lol. Suspect Bucket fucked around with this message at 23:32 on Jan 25, 2019 |
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Jan 25, 2019 23:26
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Thank you for input regarding soil in containers. I'll probably just keep doing basically what I've been doing but up the amount of compost I'm adding. This will be the year for proper growth out of all of these drat containers.
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Jan 26, 2019 16:18
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I would not guerilla garden with raspberries. They can be horribly invasive and should be grown in a controlled environment.
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Jan 26, 2019 16:49
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Last year was my first year gardening. Because of my very tiny, narrow bit of yard that gets closest to full sun.. I decided to go with container gardening. I used https://www.houzz.com/discussions/1375349/container-soils-water-movement-and-retention-xviii as a guide when creating my 5:1:1 soil. I had to sift pine bark mulch bags from Lowes down to size, which was fairly time consuming. I used the fabric grow bags which air pruned. I also had an automated drip irrigation setup because of how well draining the soil is. San Marz tom, Pink Brandywine tom, Peach Sugar Rush and Banana peppers were what I grew. I was very happy with the results. San Marz were 10+ ft up the trellis, way to many Sugar rush peppers etc etc.
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Jan 26, 2019 18:43
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Fitzy Fitz posted:I would not guerilla garden with raspberries. They can be horribly invasive and should be grown in a controlled environment. Well if I can't commit various war crimes with my gardening what the hell is the point
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Jan 27, 2019 04:28
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I could use some advice on grow lights. I have a mini green house that is 28" wide with four shelves. I'd like to get 4 grow lights that I could hang from each shelf to start seedlings in my basement and I'm shooting for two trays per shelf. I tried to use LED strip lights last year but the seedlings came out leggy so I don't think that they were powerful enough. Any recommendations? I just bought one of these but I'm worried that it's not actually going to be large or powerful enough to support two trays.
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Jan 27, 2019 05:04
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How close are the lights to the seedlings? I usually start the lights closer and move them away as the plants get taller.
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Jan 27, 2019 16:07
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The strip lights were taped to the shelf above so probably about 12-15" away from the tray. This new light can be raised or lowered as needed, so I can certainly start the seeds with the light closer to the trays, but I'm still a little worried that the light won't cover enough space. Is there any way to figure out which lights will be powerful enough without trial and error?
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Jan 27, 2019 17:56
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Mikey Purp posted:I could use some advice on grow lights. I have a mini green house that is 28" wide with four shelves. I'd like to get 4 grow lights that I could hang from each shelf to start seedlings in my basement and I'm shooting for two trays per shelf. I tried to use LED strip lights last year but the seedlings came out leggy so I don't think that they were powerful enough. Any recommendations? I have lights like that I used to help extend my peppers and overwinter them. It will depend entirely on how you put the trays under the lights, but they should be able to do two trays side by side when close enough to start. I don't know how tall your shelves are, but for 28" it should be a decent amount of light when close. Either way, strips or the squares, you'll need to start them close to the sprouts and then move them up as they grow taller to keep them from getting leggy.
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Jan 27, 2019 18:08
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I'm a dummy with 0 experience but those type of lights look so cheap... do they really work??
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Jan 27, 2019 18:17
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this video demonstrates the value of getting the light close to the plant https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ULIIiRb_cSg
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Jan 27, 2019 18:29
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If you haven't already, you can surround the setup with foil to keep the light from escaping. It's a cheap way to get more mileage out of your light if you don't want to buy another lamp.
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Jan 27, 2019 18:45
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Harry Potter on Ice posted:I'm a dummy with 0 experience but those type of lights look so cheap... do they really work?? They're super cheap. They kept my Carolina Reaper and Carribean Reds producing for two extra months in my colder than ideal basement. They don't produce any reasonable heat, so I'll be using a heat lamp/pads for starting seeds. The pepper plants kept their leaves for the whole time until I pulled them off, but three of the plants look like they're still plenty green and alive.
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Jan 27, 2019 21:04
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