I'm going to try strawbale gardening!

Jnette, I was thinking the same thing. I popped in and took it over. I am so sorry, Toby. Come and join us!!!

Connie

Well Connie, you had a problem. We do try to solve those too. But, it is my fault. I have been around long enough to know better.

Jeanette

??? I thought it was better to use straw over hay. Guess I could try one next year to see what it will do.

Connie

Toby is probably eating home grown tomatoes laughing at this thread LOL!!!

No, not necessarily. As Suz says, there are more nutrients in hay.

Well, I'll be...do they break down about the same? In other words, the straw broke down naturally over time and will the hay do the same? Do you change up the fertilizer during the growing season?

If you are interested in hay you need to talk to Suz about it. I am not experienced with it. But, I will listen and pop in when I have questions. Jeanette

Okay, Suzan......bet she is in bed. Maybe she will read this tomorrow. When I get my first tomato, you will have to tell me how you clean and store them, Jnette. Very impressed with your seed :).

LOL, which seed/ tomato are you working on Connie? Why are you going to clean and store them?

Actually you gals got me to thinking... we too have had it very cool & rainy here... is there a point where we'd want to COVER our bales to keep them from getting TOO wet? I know, sounds crazy, but......

All of my poor plants still in their little pots are MISERABLE, they are so waterlogged. I am putting them in containers or the bales and not watering them for 2-3 days!! I am hoping that the dryer soil will leach out some of the water from the planting mix they were growing in and help get them back to a happy place. :) Then I will water in the Tomato Food and apply Osmocote.

But then again, it keeps raining EVERY DAY, so just when we start to make some progress on drying a little bit, ka-bam more rain! Nothing has died yet =) maybe I am just being an overly worried mother hen??


On a separate note, we are also doing some nearly-organic containers this year and will be using just Dr. Earth's Organic #5 fertilizer. Anyone have experience with the Dr. Earth fertilizer? I figured it's worth a shot. :)


:) K

" Sure would like to know how many green bean plants are in each of those bales. "

Connie, I can't speak for anyone but myself, but I just planted every 4 inches across the entire bale, in a little "trench" of compost. They did just fine, but this year my beans are stuck in the ground. Poor little beans, but my bales are full of tomatoes and peppers.
I have two tomato plants per bale, and I think it's too much. The first year I did three, then last year nothing grew, but I don;t remember how I planted. The plants this year are huge, and could all use more room. I've had to add additional support on either side of the bales. I got my first Marglobe yesterday (and promptly gave my "store tomatoes" to the chickens), so today I shall enter Tomato Nirvana. Just for a day, but more are on the way:)

Jnette, I need to save some tomato seed for next year. I am wanting to save the seed from the first tomatoes just in case they are my "only" tomatoes. You know my luck by now LOL!!

K, we are actually under flash flooding at this time. Our backyard has water literally sitting in it right now and we do have a small garden in besides the bales. Our bales are saturated also. It is time to fertilize again but we will have to wait a few more days on that. We are looking at more rain also.

Cat, thanks for the info on the beans. We also have two tomato plants per bale. Ours are puny but green and we are hoping it is due to timing LOL!!!! (Lost the first round) Maybe my dream will become reality and mine will grow like yours. Neighbors will ooohhh and aaaahhhh scratching their heads thinking they are tomatoes on steroids LOL!!!!! I would feed store tomatoes to the chickens also!!!! NO FLAVOR!!!!

Connie

garden, it doesn't show where you are, but you know how crazy everyone is reporting on their weather that you must might be surprised and go directly into a hot summer. No in between. If that happens and your plants aren't established in the bales then they might not make it.

If it were me, I would pack them in soil in the bales. Don't know about Dr. Earth.

Cat, this could be a freak year for you. I would not think 2 plants per bale would be too many. Can't imagine needing a whole bale per tomato.

So far, with all the rain we have had, my tomatoes look the best I have had at this point in growing. However, even with all the rain I had to water yesterday. They were dry. Don't think we realize what it is like down inside those bales. BUT, we are not near flooding like a lot of you are either.

Jeanette

Jeanette, you may be right. But, looking back at the2008 pictures, maybe 1 per bale will be my choice next year. Of course, that means I need 70+ bales....
We'll see how these do. If I can let them grow out away from the bales, they may be okay. I'm thinking that it may be like the summer squash, I'll have to practically crawl into the plants to get to the fruits *G*. I already missed a zucchini, and it's only the third one! That's one of the perils of squash in bales...they sink down into the interior, and I have a gap between my 3+3 bales where the asparagus is growing, and that must look very comfortable for growing.
Another of my Squash has turned out to be a vine. I didn't read the label....

catmad or anyone else,
Are there a squash type of plant that isn't a vine? If so what varities? and lastly... All 4 of my squash plants and one of my zucc's have been hit by the squash vine borers. I've been trying to cut them out but they are in there bad... I have harvested 4 zuccs so far from one plant but they are beating me up pretty good. Just wondering if they still hit a bush type plant over the vine type.

Thanks for looking and listening.
mike

Most of the summer squash types are bush. Unless your zucchini is Rampicante (tromboncino) or another summer/winter variety, they shouldn't vine. The patty pans are all bush, AFAIK, I have White Bush and Patisson Strie, all of which are growing properly as bushes. BIG bushes, but bushes :). My "surprise" vine was Kamo Kamo, which shouldn't have been a surprise, had I paid attention....

You can inject your vines with a Bt solution for the SVB, if you have it. I'll seeif i can fine directions for that...

Sorry- it's been a crazy week! OK- first I put about 3-4 green bean plants per bale (I'll have to go and count).

The hay breaks down MUCH faster than the straw- that's because the plants actually consume the hay! They offer so many nutrients, plus the way they retain moisture helps to break them down, too. By the end of the season, they're gone - POOF! I see this as a good thing. The plants grow SO MUCH bigger and more robust than the ones I planted in straw (the first year I tried this). I'd never go back. It's like the dirrerence between a home that comes with most of the food you'll ever need plus climate control, and one with nothing but the walls.

I posted some new photos on the General Discussion thread - everything (except the peas, which I put in too late and they hate this heat!) is thriving, but the squash and the tomatoes always like it best!

Thanks so much for answering back, Suzan :) Here is an updated version of the "mater" plants. We just fertilized Friday with MG. I can say they have grown. I hope they start filling out and the puniness goes away LOL! Neighbor "arrived" a little bit ago. We were supposed to trade a couple of habanero pepper plants for Purple Cherokee tomato plants that a lady gave his wife to give to us LOL!!! Confused yet? LOL Anyway, they kept the tomato plants :( He came over to check on our straw bales and to his surprise, there were some live plants in those bales. He said he was always told straw around tomato plants will always kill them off. He also said they planted over 50 different tomato plants (including ours) and he said he would be happy if half made it because his is not doing good at all this year. I just had to laugh. I am so glad these are growing the second time around! He left scratching his head LOL!!!

Hay sounds appealing to me Suzan. Hubby says we might run into a problem with those sticker weeds and junk in them. Will that matter? Do you buy yours from a farmer?

Here is an updated pic. Opinions please...gotta keep that neighbor confused hee, hee.

Connie

OK, Connie, we have got to do something to beef up those plants. They ARE growing. LOL What has your weather been like this year? You are the same zone as I am and my plants look much better than yours. Sorry. You asked for my opinion.

Does anyone know what will make those plants stronger? I know you don't want a higher nitrogen, n in the npk of things. My plants are growing and blooming etc. in our terribly cold year so far. 59 degrees high today. This is the way it has been all year. raining and cold. And yet this is the best my tomatoes have ever looked.

However, it had better warm up if I am ever going to get any flavor from any tomatoes they decide to have. Bees be warned!! If I see a bee. LOL

I always pollinate my own tomatoes. I stick my finger in each blossom. LOL, yup, I am crazy. BUT, I need the heat to ripen any tomato. After all, tomorrow is the first day of summer!!

Yep, I asked and I am getting the response I wanted. I knew my DG family would come to my rescue once again LOL!!! They do look puny. We took them off of fish emulsion and Friday they got their first dose of MG. The weather has turned HOT averaging mid to high 80s with a few 90s mixed in and lots of rain. We are watering the bales on the days it doesn't rain after will use the paddle boat to get to 'em. Steroids needed (wink) Got a little competition going on next door and I am going to do my best to keep him from telling me I told you so. Should I sneak some more potting soil down in the bales? We got some worm castings in a jug (grin)....SOMETHING! Singing to them is OUT although I could sneak over and sing to their garden. It would be dead in a day hee, hee.

Never heard of anyone pollinating tomatoes. Do they produce more tomatoes if you do?

Connie

LOL if you don't have bees- - - - - -

I would go ahead and use the MG every week. If it is pretty wet, use peroxide. If you have the room put the worm castings on. If you want to invest cheaply about $6, a bag of alfalfa pellets, make sure they have MOLASSES in them. soak some overnight and then use the water the next day on the tomatoes. Lets see if this helps.

Jeanette

OK Jeanette, I have to ask... why the peroxide? And why the alfalfa w/ molasses? What do those 2 things do to help tomatoes??

Last night I fertilized with MG Tomato Food + an equal amount of Epsom Salts dissolved in the water. My plants ALL grew overnight... my brussels sprouts, which are trying like hell to commit suicide, perked up! (Hah!)... my tomatoes and peppers have never looked better.

BUT, I had ONE tomato plant, a very well-established and gorgeous-looking Sweet Baby Girl, wilt and collapse. This happened in < 12 hrs time. Literally I woke up this morning and the plant was fatally limp. I am completely perplexed. It got the same fertilizer, the same amount of straight water, was in the same bale as another mater, has the same EVERYTHING, and yet it seems this single fertilizing killed it. But WHY??? I just don't understand. There were no signs of blight or any disease whatsoever; it was a beautiful thriving plant. *sigh*

I had an aphid infestation starting up on 1 pepper plant, which I have under temporary control with water and insecticidal soap.

I am also learning that I have to water my bales at least twice a day. (I have straw) If I only water 1x/day, they are so dry by mid-afternoon that 1/2 my plants are wilted! Crazy!! So I am thinking about setting up a soaker hose system & about what I can use to mulch the top of the bales to try to trap more of the moisture in.

The GREAT news is that I have mushrooms many mornings now! :-) They just started in the last week and this morning I had some HUGE ones (probably thanks to the MG). It is so exciting to see the bales finally "living," decomposing, supporting life, doing their thing. I honestly thought this was never going to happen.

Now if I can just figure out WTH is going on with those bipolar brussels sprouts, I'll be set!! hahahaha :-)

:) K

I'll look for those pellets. What would the ratio be for peroxide per gal of water? Thank ya, ma'am! :)

Connie

K, how much epsom salt did you add...1 TBSP per gal?

aspen -- yep. All the rest of the plants LOVED it. =)

I also did some reading and it sounds like brussels sprouts are very moisture-sensitive, and need higher nitrogen. I haven't been fertilizing a higher level of nitrogen specifically, so will be gently supplementing them. :)

:) K

Ok you 2, you don't say where you are so it is hard to know what your weather has been like etc.

First of all K, if the MG and ES worked for you, then good. Continue to use the MG weekly and ES 2 or 3 times during the season.

Peroxide. You will notice that Connie said her plants were all but drowning. Peroxide puts oxygen in the soil to the roots so they won't rot.

If you have a water problem then use the peroxide.

ES did not kill your plants Connie.

Alfalfa pellets: If you looked at Connie's plants you will see why she was calling them puny. We are trying to beef them up. Therefore the alfalfa pellets with molasses.

one glug of peroxide to a watering can of water. (maybe a 1/8 cup) a gallon or more of water.

K, the alfalfa tea would do that.

To both of you, take a container and put alfalfa pellets 1/4 full. fill it up with water. Warm water makes it work faster. Leave it overnight and then use the water to water your plants. Don't mix more than you will use (you can put this on your roses) because it really stinks if left over.

I am in the northeastern part of MO close to the Iowa line. Oh, Jnette...I know the epsom salt didn't kill my plants. It is great stuff!!!! I use 1 TBSP per gal of water and give it to my ferns monthly and they love it. I just thought I might be able to add it to the MG every week for an added boost. Maybe that is too much too often. Do you think it would be too early to spinkle about a 1/4 cup around each plant again like I did when I first planted? First plants were planted 1st part of May. Hubby has therapy Monday and I will see if he can find some of those pellets. I am in such a rural area it is hard to find anything around here.

Connie

No Connie, leave your plants alone except to try to find the pellets. I know how hard it is to get anything like that. I am rural too. Oh, by the way, go into "my info" at the top and go to preferences and put that in there would you please? Location. It is so much easier instead of trying to remember. I don't think it is alzheimers, lol, just too many of us.

Sorry Connie, I am just trying anything to get your plants healthier. The peroxide is important if they are pretty wet.

How is your husband doing? How often does he do therapy? I'm telling you, if I had a kid today I would encourage them to go into that. There are so many of those places, and they are so booked it is hard getting an appt. Those and pharmacists.

Okay, lets see it that will show Mo now. I have CRS LOL!!
No problem. I so appreciate you helping me!!! I hope he can find those tomorrow.

NO kidding on PT! Great money in that. Our daughter works for a hospital as a home health aide. They will help her further her education and that is what she is looking into doing. I told her to go for it!!!

He is looking at a total of 4 months for a full recovery and is still going to therapy 3 times a week. He will be starting on small weights tomorrow. Limited to 2 lb weight limit. I think by now they should be paying us some dividends LOL!!!

Thanks :)

Connie

To your daughter Connie, anything in the health field is where the money and jobs are going to be for quite a while.

No alfalfa pellets with molasses to be found. We did find the alfalfa pellets without molasses so we didn't buy any. Dog gone it!!! :(

Connie

I know, I can't find them either. I will keep looking.

Well, I found it but manufactured in California and distributed just in the SE states. AZ, UT, NV, and HI of all places.

50# might be expensive to ship.

Jnette, how far are you from this?

http://www.capitalpress.com/classifieds/results/?CategoryLink=LIVESTOCK-LIVESTOCK%20EQUIPMENT&ClassificationID=1010&operator=search

Um, how about just adding molasses to the plain pellets? If someone has a label for the "with" product could probably tell you approximately how much to add.

Thanks Connie. About 4 or 5 hundred miles. Not sure. But too far to go get them.

I suppose you could use a paint sprayer, but how would you do it so they didn't all stick together Cathy? Don't think I want them in my clothes dryer. LOL

I have used the plain ones before and they really stink. You have to use them up as you make them, like overnight, 'cause the longer they sit the worse they stink. Maybe that is Methane gas???

Not that the ones with molasses wouldn't stink. Not saying that. I have just heard that the molasses make them work better. My DH really gets on a roll whenever I just mention these things. Says they smell like dirty diapers. LOL I had a garbage can of them that had sat with the lid on all summer because he didn't want to empty it. Because of the smell.

Yeah...a little distance there LOL How ironic that I was searching for some in MO and that popped up for WA. Crazy! Still looking though :)

Connie

I think that Jnette is right and that the epsom salts really help to strengthen the tomato plants (as it does for rose bushes). My main stems are about the size around of my thumbs!
We're in the midst of another bloody heat wave here- 90s every day, and this is only the second day of summer! Good for the tomatoes; not so good for me. (Thank the Lord for A/C!)

Jnett.. Have been reading the conversation on the alfalfa pellets and molasses. How about you just add about a 1/8 cup to the soaking mix? I watched a u-tube video on making high quality manure tea and the one thing they did in the process (among aerating the whole thing in this big vat like contraption) was to add molasses to the mix to "feed" the good bacteria and make the whole solution of organic tea better. They were spraying this solution on lawns to get people away from the chem lawn type of fertilizing.) Soooo, I would think you could just add some to the soaking feed. I may give it a try. And it is hot... pushing 100 degrees here in Virginia.