Square foot garden problem

Moving from Ohio to Georgia this year I was excited about the prospect of becoming a full fledged country girl with a garden. I followed the Mel's Mix to a T, or at least thought I had...but nothing produced except the soybean. Nothing! No zucchini, no yellow squash, no cantelope, no watermelon, no carrots, no onions, a few lima beans, a few pods of purple hull peas. The okra put out a few pods a week. I got maybe 6 cherry tomatoes and no regular tomatoes. The green peppers are just starting to produce...I have 3 small ones. Hurray! It is October now and the garden was planted in late April. I have a feeling that I had too much manure and compost since the plants were all green and leafy but I didn't get ANY produce. I have put in some greens now...turnip, kale, broccoli, mustard and collards in hopes that the nitrogen has gone down. (I live in a small town in south GA and can't find a soil kit to check.) Does the problem sound like too much nitrogen? Is there anyway to bring the level down for my winter plantings?

How much Sun do the plants get and how did you fertilize them?

Hi MadTy, Welcome to Georgia. What county are you in? I am over near Savannah.

Look in your phone book in the listings under your county's name and find the number for the County Agent. Call his office and tell whoever answers that you want to have your soil tested. They'll tell you what to do. In my case, I drove over and picked up a couple of tiny paper bags which I then took home and followed directions for filling them with soil. I returned them to the County Agent's office and they were mailed off to the University of Georgia. In a few weeks, I received the results in the mail. Of course, there is a fee.

There could be numerous things that went wrong, the soil test is the first thing to help you mend or alter your soil for good growing conditions, next is sunlight as mentioned, next is watering, feeding, weeding, depth of seeds at planting, temp at planting and how hot the soil is in daytime, wish I had half these problems as they are with patience and time, are easy to fix as your skills improve.
Please don't be disheartened as Gardening is a good healthy past time, is rewarding, you meet up with so many people who like you, want to grow there own food / flowers etc, gardening can become expensive IF you allow it to be, there are so many make do and mend things you can use to keep costs down but most of all, dont turn it into a chore, it should be either a hobby or a pleasure.
Read as much as you can, go to local library for books and keep asking questions here as you are not alone in wondering where we went wrong, especially when starting out.
Have fun and good luck. WeeNel.

Welcome to the South! Too much nitrogen could be part of your problem, and planting too late could be part of the problem as well. Here in North Florida, it is best to plant most vegetables in the spring garden between early March and Easter. Squash do not like hot weather, and when the temperatures rise, they begin to go downhill. Peas and beans do not need a lot of fertilizer, so having nice, healthy plants, with few beans or peas on them is a sign of too much fertilizer. They can be planted later in the spring. I planted mine in late June, and just finished harvesting a couple of weeks ago. Peas and beans do not mind the heat, and are relatively drought hardy. If your nitrogen level is too high, do not worry about it for your fall garden. Greens love the nitrogen, and should do very well. Also, do not plant your carrots and onions in the spring. Plant them now, as they like the cool weather. Follow Milesdt’s advice, and get your soil tested. Here in Florida, the County Extension Office will do a free test for pH, but for more comprehensive testing, they will send it off to the University of Florida. And while you are in touch with your County Extension Office, ask them for information about when to plant in your area. You will find that they have a wealth of information regarding gardening, etc. Hope your fall garden does well.
PS You might want to update your profile to indicate the town where you live, as well as your plant hardiness zone. That would be a help in giving more specific replies for your area.

Thanks for the input. I was pretty discouraged. I will get find the county agent and get the soil tested professionally. I am glad to hear that greens like nitrogen...just in case that was the prob. I took the advice of planting onions and carrots now. I used the left over seeds from spring so hopefully that was the thing to do. Oh, the garden gets plenty of morning and afternoon sun until about 5:00 pm. We are in south, south Georgia, really just right above Tallahassee, FL.

Check out this website for dates to plant. It was created for North Florida (Zones 8b and 9a), but since you live in extreme South Georgia, it should work for you. Also, when using this chart as a reference, you will get better results when planting as early in the season as practically possible. For instance, plant your Spring garden between mid-March and Easter, and your Fall garden between mid-September and Thanksgiving or Christmas.

http://nassau.ifas.ufl.edu/horticulture/landmatters/neflvegplantguide.doc

Don’t get discouraged. Gardening is a learning experience. The more you do it, the better you will be at it. I think you will really enjoy planting a Fall garden. The weather is nice, and with adequate rainfall, your greens and all should do just fine.



This message was edited Oct 5, 2011 12:30 PM

Just a suggestion, I'm not sure what kind of seed's your using, Organic, Heirloom, or Burpee, but it takes a few year's to amend the soil enough, to get Good Soil for Growing.

MrPappyG - It has taken five years to build my Carolina Red Clay dirt to well-drained fluffy soil. Every year vegetable yields have been greater than the year before.

HoneybeeNC,
Did you ever put any of the pine bark fines in your beds? I remember over on one 'a the threads, you were giving a list of amendments, and I think I remember you go mostly with coir, yes?

Just wondering what you finally went with in your raised beds.

Gymgirl - I throw in whatever is available. I've never purchased pine bark fines, but some of the bags of leaves I pick up have small twigs in them. They make a wonderful addition to the paths between the raised beds.

Yes, I do use as much coir as I can afford to purchase, and prefer it to peat.

This past season I added: coir, finely mulched leaves, compost and castings from our own garden earthworms - bless them!

I've made arrangements with my son-in-law to borrow his truck one morning a week to collect fall leaves, and our neighbor has already dropped off several bags of grass clippings mixed with pine needles.

Leaves are Like Gold, while most people shun them, I even take my neighbor's, Shred them, and put them in the Compost Garden.
Honeybee that's a lot of Work, This year to keep the Carrot's from splitting and getting the bend's, I've taken very Fine Sand and amended a test garden I put in this year, but it was so wet this year, it's hard to tell if anything worked. In New Jersey, we have a lot of Clay, not like the Red Clay, you get in the South, but it is Still hard to make any Root Vegetable to grow properly.
Gymgirl, I was under the Impression that Pine Needles, Pine Cone's, were not good for a Compost Pile,If you Have any Information about this let me know Please?
MadTyMom, I hope your Southern Garden's are doing well, and you keep up the Fight.

MrPappyG,
The only thing I've really heard about the pine needles/cones, is that they take a long time to break down in a compost pile...

I've got an update for you on those late transplants.

As an addendum (which I'll probably post there, later), I have totally destroyed half the flat of Snowball Cauliflowers and most of those Late Flat Dutch Cabbages with the AFRICAN VIOLET-SIZED LEAVES!!! by leaving them out in the rainstorm, then attempting to pot them back up. I should've separated them into individual growing cups a long time ago.

Any seedlings that I have lost this season has been through my own fault -- every one of my seedlings was perfectly healthy. I didn't do what I was supposed to do. Chalk the losses up to "GROWER ERROR..."

Linda (where's our "crying" smiley...)

I understood that pine needles acidify the soil. That's fine if your soil is alkaline, but in my area, the soil is already acidic.

Gymgirl - don't beat yourself up. We've all killed a plant or two (or many!) through grower error.

One thing I like about our back porch is that I can place seedlings in certain spots and have them be in sunlight or shade, but still be out of the rain.

Of course, with rain, often there comes wind - which blows the seedlings off the porch! I then use a few choice words, and start over. This I call "Mother Nature's Error" - LOL