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I picked some baby zucchini off my plants. They still had the blossom on the end and when I touched the blossom a huge swarm of ants fell out of every one of them. They don't seem to have done any damage to the fruit or flower or even the plants, so what the hell are they doing hiding in the blossom?
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Jul 1, 2010 20:58
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Yo, imma blob posted:I picked some baby zucchini off my plants. They still had the blossom on the end and when I touched the blossom a huge swarm of ants fell out of every one of them. They don't seem to have done any damage to the fruit or flower or even the plants, so what the hell are they doing hiding in the blossom? Ugh, I have this problem with my pumpkin plants. They're these little tiny reddish brown ants that won't eat the borax bait I put out to kill them, either, no matter if it's made with peanut butter/molasses/honey whatever 
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Jul 1, 2010 21:41
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Yo, imma blob posted:I picked some baby zucchini off my plants. They still had the blossom on the end and when I touched the blossom a huge swarm of ants fell out of every one of them. They don't seem to have done any damage to the fruit or flower or even the plants, so what the hell are they doing hiding in the blossom? Sounds like the ants are going after the nectar. Sounds like it's not causing any problems, you can leave them be I haven't noticed ants but bees, especially the native tiny mason bees, are loving our squash flowers
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Jul 1, 2010 23:42
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I am performing an experiment.. well, a series of them. I came across 3 seed packets that allegedly expired in 2005. I have attempted to germinate them. So far, the catnip has germinated just fine, and I am still waiting on the anaheim and serrano peppers since they have a longer germination anyways. Also, last night I started trying to see if I could get the habaneros and mystery chilies(I bought a plant that went crazy and just put out tons and tons of chilies, but i never did find out what they were) that I grew a couple years ago to germinate from seeds that I had in the fridge for ages. It's kind of fun to play around and see if anything happens.
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Jul 2, 2010 00:24
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Odd behavior this year from my garden. My tomato plants aren't even as high as the cages and are already started to flower. My pepper plants aren't even a foot tall and are already started as well, a few small peppers started as well. I think my soil might be too hard, I planted in the raid and I have a feeling it screwed me.
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Jul 2, 2010 02:06
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Can anyone point me to a guide for growing peppers and herbs indoors? I'm moving into a roomier town home and electricity is included, so it seems like a good time to start growing. Can indoor growing be started anytime of the year?
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Jul 2, 2010 04:45
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MarshallX posted:Odd behavior this year from my garden. My tomato plants aren't even as high as the cages and are already started to flower. My pepper plants aren't even a foot tall and are already started as well, a few small peppers started as well. Have you changed the levels of nutrients in the garden? Higher nitrogen levels, if I'm not mistaken, would lead the plants to focus more on setting fruit than getting taller. I keep a pretty high amount of nitrogen in my garden and my tomatoes rarely get taller than about 5' but are weighed down with tomatoes.
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Jul 2, 2010 05:03
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mischief posted:Have you changed the levels of nutrients in the garden? Higher nitrogen levels, if I'm not mistaken, would lead the plants to focus more on setting fruit than getting taller. I keep a pretty high amount of nitrogen in my garden and my tomatoes rarely get taller than about 5' but are weighed down with tomatoes. 5 FEET? Hah. Mine aren't even 2!
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Jul 2, 2010 12:43
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MarshallX posted:5 FEET? Hah. Mine aren't even 2! That's what I was thinking too, hah. I have ~8 tomato plants of different varieties at the moment, and I think of those 8, none is taller than 3 feet at most, most are ~2 feet, and 6 or so of those are blossoming. I have a very, very short jalapeno (a foot, maybe) and it's already blossomed and I have 4 recognizable jalapenos growing on it. I don't know either.
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Jul 2, 2010 15:32
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mischief posted:Have you changed the levels of nutrients in the garden? Higher nitrogen levels, if I'm not mistaken, would lead the plants to focus more on setting fruit than getting taller. I keep a pretty high amount of nitrogen in my garden and my tomatoes rarely get taller than about 5' but are weighed down with tomatoes. Yes, nitrogen levels are good for the above-ground part of the plant. Phosphorus is good for the roots, and potassium for overall plant health. Fertilizers have the NPK rating on their packaging; a good mnemonic for remembering what does what is up (nitrogen/leaves and stems), down (phosphorus/roots) and all around (potassium/overall).
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Jul 2, 2010 15:59
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I need help identifying this weed growing all over my property and strangling my Cactus. It is a shallow plant that doesn't grow upwards at all. It is easily uprooted and the the leaves are pitiful but its most striking feature is its Red Purplish stems and vines. It doesn't take root at all you can dig it out by using a rake but it will have doubled the next day. It spreads like a virus and its spongy like and alien. I don't know what it is.
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Jul 3, 2010 00:58
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The same stuff takes over my yard in the spring, but dies off in the summer. I think it's called purslane.
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Jul 3, 2010 03:18
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Reading the previous description my mind made these leaps to this out of worldly plant and speculating what it was. Oh, its just purslane. That stuff is edible and actually quite tasty. In the north we get it only in the very hottest part of the summer when everything else is withered.
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Jul 3, 2010 03:25
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I guess I've misjudged it. I always admired it for its determination in spreading across my entire yard one year. Maybe I'll cultivate it as I've seen it nowhere else but my yard. It actually is quite pretty. The speed at which it spread is the freaky part.
JihadforChrist fucked around with this message at 21:04 on Jul 3, 2010 |
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Jul 3, 2010 20:59
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FINALLY. I moved my family down to central California after living in Washington for seven years, and we had to leave our wonderful 1/4 acre garden behind. It's been over half a year since I've been able to get into a new house (we were living with my in-laws while our house was being built), and my wife and I finally got some plants for our back yard...   Seedless "Flame" grapes. I have confirmed that they are delicious. I plan to have four of these vines planted at the four corners of my garden to serve as an edible wall. Yum.   Lemon (top) and lime (bottom). My wife goes through a lot of citrus in her cooking, so we may end up having to buy another one of each of these. Visible in this picture is a PVC pipe sticking out of the ground. The dirt around here is pure clay, so it's difficult for the water to penetrate deep, which is no good for trees. I took a piece of PVC pipe, drilled some holes into the bottom of it, capped it, and have an irrigation valve running inside of it to water the dirt at and below the roots. Cheap, easy.  Raspberry. You probably never need to buy more than a single stalk. They tend to spread.  Sad little basil plant. We go through quite a bit of basil, so I may need to start a patch from seed instead of spending lots of money on adult plants. That's all we've got so far. It's a little late to start from seed around here, where it's 95+ degrees all summer long... but I might try some indoor herbs and see if I can get some traction that way. I'm still trying to get used to the growing seasons around here... it's very different compared to western Washington. Also, it rains in Washington. Not so much in the central valley of California. Irrigation systems are a must, and this is the first time I've worked with one. The whole thing about drip lines and running small 1/4" lines to mini-sprinkler heads and all that... fun! I went to an irrigation shop today and they have all kinds of neat irrigation components to play with. Fun fun fun. jovial_cynic fucked around with this message at 21:53 on Jul 3, 2010 |
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Jul 3, 2010 21:46
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Going to the home garden store tomorrow to buy two pots an a bag of potting soil. I live in northern California anything I should know? I want to grow something edible and thorny like blackberries which I know grow here but since I'm insane I was thinking maybe attempting at pointsettas or is this too much?
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Jul 3, 2010 22:51
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This is so bizarre. All of my tomato plants are still only 1 foot off the ground after heavy watering all weekend due to some crazy canadian heat. Some of them already have tomatoes 1 inch in diameter. Is there anything wrong with this? I know what the issue is, we planted in the rain so the soil was like mud. Once the water dried up it's basically rock hard soil around all my plants and their root growth has been stunted, causing them not to be able to grow up anymore. I'm just surprised they are still growing fruit. 100% my fault for trying to rush to get my plants out in the middle of a rain storm. MarshallX fucked around with this message at 15:43 on Jul 5, 2010 |
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Jul 5, 2010 15:37
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I'm posting this in this thread since the other thread I asked in nobody responded! My husband and I are interested in getting into backyard farming as a hobby. We already keep decent (but not large) vegetable garden, some fruit bushes/trees and some chickens. We have an area of land in our backyard (25' x 35') that we can dig up/fill with a large vegetable garden. I'm looking for some good books about going about keeping a larger area of gardens, maybe more info on better more efficient ways for having fruit trees/bushes, and other stuff like that. A good guide to crop rotation would be great too! (like...at the start of the season, plant this plant...when its done plant this plant etc etc) ..and espeically a planting guide for when certain seeds can be started. I'm not a fan of square foot gardening. I've tried it for a few years, and it just doesn't work nearly as good as it claims. The vegetables totally seem to crowd themselves out. Ultimately in 3 - 5 years we'd like to move to a place a little farther out in the country and have more land. We're not looking at it as one day becoming farmers. Its a hobby for both of us. I've also been looking into aquaponics. I'd LOVE to have a large set up someday (when we have more space). I think in the next couple months I might do a little indoor set up. If there's any good books out there about it, I'd be interested in that too!
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Jul 5, 2010 21:28
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jovial_cynic posted:
Are those dwarf citrus trees? If not, one of each is plenty. Might want to wait until you go through one harvest with these, so you can see how many you get at once. I doubt your wife will be able to use all of them, if you get a bumper crop. They all come to fruit at once, and sometimes there's more lemons than you could give away for free.
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Jul 5, 2010 22:04
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Madama Butterfly posted:Are those dwarf citrus trees? If not, one of each is plenty. Might want to wait until you go through one harvest with these, so you can see how many you get at once. In fact, they are dwarf varieties. How many will they produce at maturity? I've been looking through some growers on eBay who offer banana and pineapple plants. Anybody have any luck with growing those?
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Jul 5, 2010 22:26
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MarshallX posted:This is so bizarre. Are you sure they're vine varieties of tomato and not bush ones? There's nothing wrong with having a compact plant if you're getting tomatoes off it. jovial_cynic posted:Raspberry. You probably never need to buy more than a single stalk. They tend to spread. Truer words about raspberries have never been spoken. When we moved into this house 15 years ago, there were 2 rows of raspberry canes planted in the ground. For some reason, around 2003, my mum went crazy and destroyed all of them, hacking them down. Then she did her usual thing of forgetting about the garden for 7 years and right about now it's impossible to tell where the raspberries end and the brambles begin. Oh and Jovial, IIRC pineapples are super slow growing- they can produce as little as a single fruit in a year. They're also spikey and an all round bitch of a plant. You can grow a pineapple plant from the top of a pineapple for free as a cutting if you want to have one; my aunt did this in her greenhouse. California sunshine is probably great for sweetening up pineapples.
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Jul 5, 2010 22:38
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Alterian posted:I'm posting this in this thread since the other thread I asked in nobody responded! My husband and I are interested in getting into backyard farming as a hobby. We already keep decent (but not large) vegetable garden, some fruit bushes/trees and some chickens. I've read only the first one, but the other 2 look interesting and might be what you are after. Four Season Harvest The Backyard Homestead Backyard Market Gardening
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Jul 5, 2010 22:41
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jovial_cynic posted:In fact, they are dwarf varieties. How many will they produce at maturity? Buy a whole pineapple at the grocery store (with the leaves and such). When you cut it to eat, cut the top of the pineapple off about 1 1/2 to 2 inches from the top, and plant that, leaves and all, in some nice dirt. A whole new plant will grow from that. Lemons: dwarf varieties should be ok....you won't be overwhelmed with too many lemons come harvest-time. If the one dwarf isn't enough, you could always plant another in a year. Or you could try a fruit cocktail tree. http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/load/citrus/msg0718343125446.html I'm going to try one of those after I have the remains of my orange tree removed. drat freaky frost! 
Madama Butterfly fucked around with this message at 23:29 on Jul 5, 2010 |
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Jul 5, 2010 23:26
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madlilnerd posted:Are you sure they're vine varieties of tomato and not bush ones? There's nothing wrong with having a compact plant if you're getting tomatoes off it. They are just so small, I know there is definitely something wrong, just hoping we can get SOMETHING from the garden this year. I won't make the mistake of planting in the pouring rain next year.
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Jul 6, 2010 00:58
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Madama Butterfly posted:
I saw my first fruit cocktai/fruit salad tree this weekend and have decided i MUST have one for my backyard. First, however, I have to cut down the useless ornamental tree in that corner first. So, it'll probably be a month before I get to it :/
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Jul 6, 2010 01:11
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I just had to dig up my pepper plant and move it because my zucchini literally quadrupled in size during the heat wave last week. I also picked a bunch of green beans, blackberries, and a few cherry tomatoes. I am one happy camper!
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Jul 6, 2010 21:10
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Emasculatrix posted:I just had to dig up my pepper plant and move it because my zucchini literally quadrupled in size during the heat wave last week. I also picked a bunch of green beans, blackberries, and a few cherry tomatoes. I am one happy camper! Your zucchini isn't done, it's going to take over everything then turn on your house! RUN, RUN FOR YOUR LIFE! So it stormed like mad for about 10 minutes on Monday and one of my neighbor's trees had a major limb come off and land in my new strawberries. Looks like a couple will be squashed but in good news he's removing the entire tree which will open up a ton of early morning sunlight to my garden! 
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Jul 6, 2010 21:57
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dwoloz posted:Sounds like the ants are going after the nectar. Sounds like it's not causing any problems, you can leave them be ding ding, they'll actually fertilize those blossoms for you as well. I've ALWAYS had ants in my cukes, zuchs, and squash and it's never caused any issues...they just like getting the goods inside of them, and don't harm the veggies/fruit at all in my experience.
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Jul 7, 2010 03:25
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ho mercy posted:Something strange has developed in one of my cauliflower plants. It was doing decently, then overnight the leaves began to purple slightly, and inside the leaves near the stem there was some very odd crystalisation that almost look like someone put extremely tiny rocks/crystals in it. Any idea what this would be? I assume it's some sort of fungus but I'd like to know what specifically. When cauliflower gets too much sun, some of them will develop coloration. Many people that grow it rubberband the big leaves around the developing heads to protect it from the sun. It's perfectly fine to eat, though I don't know what the crystals are.
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Jul 7, 2010 03:30
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My basil was finally starting to grow well, and last night something ate it. All of it.  Just some stalks left, no leaves.Something -smells like cat- also dug up my chives and pissed on them, but I replanted them (cat piss wont defeat me) and they are surprisingly still growing. No, nature, gently caress you! The zucchini is taking over. Augh!
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Jul 7, 2010 18:08
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My zuccini is trying to take over, but I am just hacking back the leaves that are going where I don't want them like over my basil. Also, I spent about 30 minutes picking little green worms off my broccoli and cabbage. I'd looked for the bastards before but could never find them - it took the full light of the sun for me to be able to see the little jerks and squish them (and the eggs). I need to chase down and kill the white moths I see flying around the yard...
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Jul 7, 2010 21:44
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Zeta Taskforce posted:I've read only the first one, but the other 2 look interesting and might be what you are after. I got The Backyard Homestead and its pretty much what I was looking for. Thanks! We're now planning our fall garden. Does anyone have any tips for growing beets? It seems like the only vegetable that we've had issues with.
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Jul 7, 2010 23:14
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Alterian posted:I got The Backyard Homestead and its pretty much what I was looking for. Thanks! If you figure it out then let me know. We planted beets, radishes and turnips in the spring, and the beets just never did much. They sprouted fine and putout some decent greens, but the root development was just non-existent. I pulled one as a sort of sacrificial lamb to see what they were like, and there was hardly any swelling at all where the root bulb should have been. The radishes and more especially the turnips went nuts, but the beets just failed to thrive.
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Jul 7, 2010 23:26
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Tomato problems I'm growing Early Girl, Green Zebra, Black Plum, Sweet 100 and SunSugar and they are nearly ALL exhibiting cases of extreme lengthwise upward leaf curl as well as leaf petioles growing upwards at an extreme angle. The plants are still producing fruit but growth is very slow. I'm growing in mostly compost with some sandy loam and plants are spaced a bit more than 1ft apart. They are watered 2-3 times a week depending on the heat. Soil is not mulched (yet) so the soil warms up quite a bit. It would suck if this was just one or two plants....but its basically everything in my beds Pictures   
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Jul 8, 2010 21:26
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I'd really love to get into gardening, but I'm a bit overwhelmed. I bought a couple of seed packets just to start out with since I'm completely new at this and didn't want to buy too much if I failed terribly. The instructions say to start indoors, in 'seed starting formula' and to keep moist. Do I really need to buy a different type of soil than regular potting soil to grow these, which is what it sounds like? And how can one tell the difference between moist and too wet? Shouldn't the kinds of plants that you can buy be able to grow in a normal sort of environment without babying? Wild plants seem to do a pretty good job for themselves, after all, and if there were any changes to the type you can buy in stores it wouldn't be to make them less hardy, right? I'm also looking for more generalized tips on actually managing to make edible things grow nicely when living somewhere that's cold for a lot of the year (Alberta). The seeds I bought for my 'Let's learn about growing from seeds' experiment are flowers, but I'd really love to grow some edible things next year. It just sounds so complicated to me, so I'd really like some advice. Will all of my plants really die if I think that the frost and cold weather is done with and plant something, then it decides to snow one last time in May, for example? I'm sorry for filling this post with so many questions, but getting a bit of advice from people who really seem to know what they're doing would be nice.
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Jul 9, 2010 19:24
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Akaadji posted:I'd really love to get into gardening, but I'm a bit overwhelmed. I bought a couple of seed packets just to start out with since I'm completely new at this and didn't want to buy too much if I failed terribly. Kind of a lot to unpack there, but to try, they do sell special seed starting medium and you should use that instead of potting soil. It is more absorbent and holds water better than regular potting soil. Never use garden soil to start seeds indoors. But the point of doing it is to give plants a head start, especially in short growing seasons like yours. You might not have a lot of success with things that NEED to be started indoors. You still have a few options. You can go for stuff that matures quickly, like bush beans or lettuce, maybe zucchini. Depending on your first frost, unless it is freakishly early, you should still have enough time for that, and you can cover stuff up if there is a freakishly early frost. Or you can try to plant stuff that tolerates frost like kale, greens in general, spinach, radishes. As far as babying plants, you kinda have to. Our cultivated crops have been bred over the millennia to do many things, provide lots of calories and nutrients, and all that is great. But they will never be able to compete with their wild ancestors. Also, few of them are native to the Canadian prairie, which means they will not be as adapted as the species that are.
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Jul 9, 2010 21:08
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Zeta Taskforce posted:Kind of a lot to unpack there, but to try, they do sell special seed starting medium and you should use that instead of potting soil. It is more absorbent and holds water better than regular potting soil. Never use garden soil to start seeds indoors. But the point of doing it is to give plants a head start, especially in short growing seasons like yours. You might not have a lot of success with things that NEED to be started indoors. Oh, so that's the difference...thank you, that makes sense. I suppose that seeds would need to have lots of water in the soil to want to grow. And really? If it has to be started indoors then it's not a good idea for me to try growing it? That's helpful to know. What about if I wanted to grow, say, lavender inside? Or other edible plants/flowers? That would take away the worry of frost, and I could put them out to enjoy the sunlight whenever it was actually nice out, right? When I was little we had a big garden full of kohlrabi, carrots, beans and potatoes...but then, my grandmother was a really good gardener. Maybe I should stick with herbs and edible flowers for now? Okay, that sounds extremely obvious when it's put that way. I'm not sure how it eluded me, given that I know perfectly well that wild varieties of plants tend to have much smaller yields than the domesticated varieties, but thank you very much for all of the helpful information. I guess I shall be going out to buy some seed-starting soil soon, then.
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Jul 9, 2010 21:32
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Akaadji posted:I'm also looking for more generalized tips on actually managing to make edible things grow nicely when living somewhere that's cold for a lot of the year (Alberta). When I was out shopping for seeds early this spring, I came across a tomato variety called "sub-arctic plenty", which is supposedly ideal for the Canadian prairie. They're supposed to produce early enough that they'll manage to ripen even in a shorter growing season. My plants (in Ontario, but still) are doing really well and have golf ball sized tomatoes on them, which is slightly ahead of any of my other varieties. In general, when picking things that will be relatively easy to grow, think of traditional foods for your area. Chances are, they're somewhat native. In Canada, choose the sorts of things that store well over the winter -- either by freezing or in a root cellar type of environment. These are typically things that grow well without a lot of heat: potatoes, onions, beets, radishes, beans, carrots, squashes, peas. Lettuce, spinach and other greens are also good options, even though they don't keep. Don't try to grow hot peppers right away, because they're not even close to native and like hot weather. You may be able to succeed with non-native species, but they'll be more difficult and are best left until after you have a bit of experience under your belt. All that being said, it's rather late in the growing season to be starting a whole lot from seed, so you may want to pick up a couple of nursery plants to get yourself going this year.
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Jul 10, 2010 04:03
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dwoloz posted:They are watered 2-3 times a week depending on the heat. Dunno how hot it is where you live normally, but looks like they need more water to me. Summer just arrived in the northwest to the tune of 90 degrees all week, so I've been watering at least once a night, with some supplementing in the morning. Caveat: I'm still pretty amateur at this growing food thing and have never attempted tomatoes before.
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Jul 10, 2010 04:14
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anitsirK posted:When I was out shopping for seeds early this spring, I came across a tomato variety called "sub-arctic plenty", which is supposedly ideal for the Canadian prairie. They're supposed to produce early enough that they'll manage to ripen even in a shorter growing season. My plants (in Ontario, but still) are doing really well and have golf ball sized tomatoes on them, which is slightly ahead of any of my other varieties. I'd absolutely love to try growing squash sometime, maybe I will attempt that next year. Thank you for all of your suggestions. I figured that would be the case. Maybe I'll pick up some little plants and simply practice care-taking this year so that everything I plant next year won't die. Would it be possible to also grow something like flowers from seeds inside just to learn what it's like, or are most things sold in seed form plants that absolutely must be living in a garden outside?
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Jul 10, 2010 04:18
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