Tomatoes....
Fall/Winter plants coming along
Tomatoes are really going slow but they are getting there....
Cauliflower box....
The orange demon guarding the Cauliflower....
Regular container Broccoli...
Aphids sure do like Cole crops....
One side of the deck...
The other side...
Gosh Ray, how often do you have to water those monsters....or maybe I should say, when do you get a break from filling those EBs? LOL!
Carol
Yeah, no kidding Carol! Their water demands are a big pain in the butt. They just keep drinking and drinking. I stopped watering everyday, now I do it every other day and it takes anywhere from a hour to 2 hours. Watering at night when I get home is really an adventure :)
Ray put em on an automatic drip timer. I have a 6 cycle timer. Really easy. Just turn on the hose to the drip lines and let them water for you.
I wish that were possible, oh how I wish. The deck is on the 2nd story and no outdoor faucet up there. I also would need at least a few hundred feet of tubing. The nearest faucet downstairs is a pretty good distance as well. Even if I did all that, I wonder if the water pressure in the tubing would be powerful enough to climb up to the 2nd story?
Ray, please, what are your day and night temperatures? I'd LOVE to grow Brussels Sprouts! But I have about a nine degree cooler night than day.
And have you tasted the leaves? Could they possibly be eaten, like how I eat Broccoli leaves? All that green!
You must be getting some good exercise carrying water upstairs!
Hi Mola, our day time temps are running between 65-70 and around 40 at night. We just had our first rain since last year, they seemed to really like it.
Oh, you definitely can eat the leaves just like Broccoli. Never tried the bigger leaves but the smaller ones I've munched on from time to time. Perfect for rolling up fish with.
Yeah, it's good exercise but after a long day at work it becomes kinda tiresome. It does however give me the time to inspect them more often for bugs and disease. If they were on a timer, I would probably neglect them more.
You should try Brussels Sprouts. If Broccoli is doing well for you give them a try.
I just ordered some seed!
The instructions on the catalogue's page said to take off the leaves from the bottom of the plant upward as the sprouts form.
This is one veggie that I've never grown. Funny, I disliked them most of my life, but one day about ten years ago, I simply wanted to eat some, and started enjoying Brussels sprouts immensely since then. Like a light clicked on.
What kind did you order?
I've been snapping off the bottom leaves for about a week now. Time to put their energy into the sprouts. My only question about Brussels Sprouts is.....Do I twist them off individually and hope more come back later? Or do I wait until the whole stalk gets loaded and chop it down? Seems like most do the latter. If I could get a 2nd round to harvest I would much rather do the former.
Didn't everybody hate them when they were younger? I know I did. It wasn't until my late 20's that I really started enjoying them. I grew a few last year in containers just because they looked fun to grow. I got a few dozen small sprouts that were tasty. This year, I'm up to about 16 plants and they 3-4 times bigger and healthier than they were last year. They sure are water hogs!
Hmm, lessee, I ordered from somebody that I've never heard of, Home Harvest. Very cheap seed .95 or 1.19 for seed packets, Ferry Morse seed.
Catskill variety of B Sprouts.
I was looking for Barbados Hybrid Broccoli, supposed to take warm temps better. We'll see! As well as what how the seed germinates and service from this company.
Never ordered from them either. But Garden Watchdog has 18 positives, 5 negatives and 1 neutral. So you should be good to go with them. Ferry Morse seeds are reliable from the ones that I have tried. Never grown it but from what I've read, Catskill looks like a good choice.
My Broccoli heads need to be harvested soon.....
Well, it's being eaten tonight :) I couldn't wait so I cut one of the heads off this morning.
First broccoli of the year....
All 16 broccoli plants are Green Comet this year. I grew Packman last year and I'm already seeing better growth from the Green Comets.
EDIT: Oops, I lied. I forgot I also have 6 Green Goliath in regular containers. 22 Broccoli plants.
This message was edited Dec 4, 2009 11:47 AM
Just got back from Boca Bob's and TPlants area a few days ago to delight in picking some broccoli and leaf lettuce, wow, has everything taken off big time, and it's getting cold here now brrrr.
joy
Babe, those are gorgeous brocs. What did you plant yesterday?
I'm looking for Elephant Garlic! Remember the few we saw in Carlsbad?
:)
Planted more carrots, onions, garlic and radishes. Those elephant garlic looked great. Still don't know why we didn't grab a few.
For $5 I'd STILL be growing that same garlic!
Yikes! $5 garlic from a store?
Well, I don't know what Broccoli prices are but the heads keep on growin'...
2 more forming....have about 12 more making heads.
Ray: I picked some nice looking heads off my broccoli; I cut the heads off with shears, problem is, they are not growing back is this normal?? did I do something wrong when cutting off the broccoli heads?
joy
Mola, I didn't know California was such a large producer of Broccoli. Did some looking and I guess it supplies most of the U.S. and surrounding areas. Learn something new every day.
Joy, once you cut the head off it won't form another one. Some types however will have some small side shoots you can harvest.
Picked this bad boy this morning...
Broccoli soup time...
Broccoli and Peas....
Cauliflower starting to form...
babe, greenfield (CA) is the broccoli capital of the world. it's 1 hour 26 minutes/91.60 miles north of san luis obispo =).
your photos never disappoint.
See, looks like I'm the only one that did not know that. Looking at the numbers of pounds of Broccoli grown in Cali is hard to even grasp.... 18,900,000 Cwt in 2007.
Ray: I feel like I've been robbed, only got one head per plant thus far.
joy