Kittriana & David,- thanks, darlins. I went outside in a sun break just now and I'd say 60% of my plants are nibbled to bits. Tomatoes, beans, okra, eggplant - in 3 days they're gone. I love my monarch caterpillars, fortunately, they're in containers, but everything I have in the ground is halfway to gone.
And David, I hope you're feeling better. My friends and I like to call July 1 "Demi-New-Year" when we get to start it all over, it's just one way to get a reset. :)
Y'all be good, I'm going to go lose some karma by squashing all the bugs I see!
STARTING OUR SPRING VEGGIE GARDENS PART 6
First zucchini of the garden. Stir fried and eaten up!
That's the problem with some of the Organic pesticides by the time they work the plants are gone.
Nola it sounds like you might have army worms also? It is amazing how fast they can take plants down. Most of the plants you mentioned can come back from almost nothing.
Stephanie - the tomatoes may get bigger as the season progresses, but they look great anyway. Did you get the pepper plant in the ground?
David- be good.lol. The heat and humidity are terrible this year. I'm not use to the humidity please take care of yourself.
Definitely have the army worms, in all sizes. I'm a little impressed with how quickly they took everything down.
I haven't had anything to talk about lately- just a lot of work in the garden, but today I harvested these- they are so pretty! Peas are Sugar Lace- supposed to be stringless- tatse test will be tonite! Tomatoes are blooming but none are set yet. I'm having a terrible time to get decent Pole Beans going-
I got pole beans going but they were supposed to be bush beans. Your soil may be too cold still.
Jo, those look fantastic. Carrots and peas wow, I'm jealous.
Nola I would use something stronger but thats just me. When they do that much damage I want them dead, now!
If it were me, NOLA, I would try a quick dusting of Sevin. Not organic, but has proved to be one of the safer pesticides. I would hate for you to lose your garden because of a stupid worm infestation! I suggested the organic options since that's what you seemed to be interested in using.
It looks a fright , but it's growing plants ..
Here some of my extreme old fashioned trellis doings .. some of you were talking about trellising a while back .
Tomatoes on the big tall trellis,Kentucky wonder beans this year on my extreme sawhorse whatever or that they may be . background trellis will have cucumbers , And the concrete reinforcing wire cage with Lima beans climbing
1 the trellis
2 KW beans
3 more KW beans
4 KW bean vine imitating me ,, going over the top
5 lima beans Yes I have bean scrounging not as bad as it sounds, only it is to most ,, lol
It will be all green and hidden shortly though, and there is still and always mulching to do . worth it when it all crops well also though , Lots of goodies for the table come from there .. lol
Nice harvest, Jo!!
Gorgeous carrots! Which variety?
Cant resist... self rising flour is poison candy is also organic, but might also hurt butterfly cats. Onions not slowin down yet, Burpee carrots fightin to grow. chuckl
Linda, the carrots are Yaya- I love them-
The last of my winter garden. Putting in my okra seedlings today!
I edited one of my above posts after a bunch of researches . on the southern army worm. Nola? The moths eggs are tiny sparkly things on the undersides of the leaves- apparently they hatch fast too, so early morning inspections...
Several things after onions, but the nitrogen isnt as high as all that, flowers are one possibility, corn, another.
Here I sit looking my my new bean seeds. I have yellow bush beans, burgandy pole beans and black seeded pole beans. Have green french fillet beans also. Too many choices. Not enough room.
Chuckl. think of how many times you'll eat each one, and go for that one first. Then maybe add a few of the oothers...
Just can't make up my mind about it today. Will put off sowing seeds until another day.
My mind is towards a few heirloom bush beans for planting , not rare or unusual or anything , they just plain taste good from the garden.
I usually grow Blue Lake Pole Beans for years and years. The taste very good. But this year i wanted to try some different types that are new to me. Couldn't make up my mind while ordering seeds so ordered too many different varieties. Not I do have to choose before I can plant.
Ok, ladies,
Just had my annual mammo, and collected enough plastic "patient belongings" bags to get me through the next two years of seed- starting!
Hugs!
I don't have those, as they've been reported to actually CAUSE cancer. Have never had one.
I have to get one so i can have my hormones. They used imaging not xrays since I have had fibrous strings forever. Tech says there are no rules for who gets cancer- past the people who volunteered to try new drugs in medical ads and were given cancer deliberately. There is no bets on this.
This conversation just outran me ,, I was going to say I have Blue Lake pole and bush types ,, good beans but it has been a couple of years since I have grown them
The conversation all changed on me though .. always behind ... so it seems .
Finally realized I have 17 tomato plants .. GOO....OOD LOL
LOLOL! It's a girl gardener moment .
Nice to have a lot of tomato plants. I have 62 tomato plants and 14 pepper plants. 10 eggplants, 5 zucchini plants. Melons I am growing Sakata, Avara, Sugar Cube, Green Machine and mystery melons (no tag). Cucumbers growing Burpless, Straight Eight, Suo Long, Camilla and Armenian Cucumbers. Brocoli and Cauliflower. Peas I am growing Mammoth Melting Snow Peas, Super Sugar Snap, Norli and Sugar Lace II. For beans I have yard long beans and Tenderette Bush Beans. Plus the seeds I got which I am still trying to decide which ones to start and where I can fit them.
Well. Beans. Sunshine. Chuckl. I run out of room too for what all I want. Planning a new spot to care for this issue.
Windsor and speckled lima (horse food) Kentucky wonder amd climbing lima (green) And shell bean ..lemon ,spacemaster bush , and blonde is all I managed to get planted of cucumbers ,off and on straight eight I have grown for many years ,, good strong grower with a good taste , little tough at times ..
Giant cantelope and a couple of watermelons is about all .. Of course I could go for permanent plantings but then we (me) would be straying away
Last year was the first year we grew pole beans and we had so many problems with them! We went back to bush beans this year. This year, we're growing burgundy. In years past, we've grown Blue Lake bush and Contender bush beans. Both very good, but I really like the Blue Lake.
I feel a little bit guilty! I have two main garden areas that are about 80' x 30' and one small area that is about 20' x 20'. Some of you that have much smaller spaces are growing many more types of vegetables and more varieties of the types I am growing. All my rows are 30' except for the small area. I have:
3 types corn, total 20 rows (rows 30' long)
12 types tomatoes, 50 plants in total
2 types bean, 4 rows each black-eye pea and Burpee Bush Heavyweight II
1 type cucumber, 2 rows, Picklebush
1 type squash, 1 row (for now), Early Straight-neck
1 type sweet potato, 2 (20') rows, Vardaman
1 type pumpkin, 18 plants (25' x 30' patch), Sugar Pie
I've pulled the onion and garlic. I had 3 rows of onions, 1015Y yellow, Texas Early white, and Hybrid Southern Belle red. I had one short row of white, soft-neck garlic.
I still have space for some peppers (where the onions were), but I have to find a source for some decent peppers. All the peppers from Bonnie at the local big boxes all look diseased to me. Any suggestions from anyone in Central Texas?
I'm lucky to have as much as I have done. Most of it, other than the corn and tomatoes, was done on Saturday and finished today. I'll be resting for a couple of days... maybe making a batch of summer sausage. Brisket was on sale last week.
David R
Humm, I am surprised about the pole bean problems. I like pole beans much better than bush.
Yummm. Peppers. Most are already in ground in Texas. Big box stores, feed stores, even seeds would jump right now if planted. I do like to go over to peppergal.com and look at her varieties, but Fl is a bit far...
Armadillos, green stink bugs, huge leaf footed bugs, squash vine borer, leaf hoppers, grass hoppers, the list goes on. Summer must be here because all the usual pests have arrived in the garden. I did manage to get at least a few meals off the squash before the vine borer moved in. I pulled that plant and now am relying on the other plants to produce more squash. The melon vines are just getting ready to start running, the onions were in too much shade, the carrots are the best I have ever grown. The peppers are starting to come on faster than we can eat them, the tomatoes are the best looking crop ever, and for the first time growing sunflowers I am really loving it. I did plant four types of sunflowers and now I have only two types left thanks to the Armadillo that never ceases to return for a meal of earthworms every night.
Seedfork
great pictures, Your peppers and tomatoes look great !
You're way south of me, Seedfork, but I won't have bell peppers until August probably. I'm jealous... bell peppers are one thing we can just never keep around here.
I did it. Yesterday. Homemade tomato sauce. EIGHT HOURS on my feet!
I used 40 Roma and 10 HUGE beefsteak tomatoes I bought from one of our local Farmers Markets. I then added every heirloom tomato I had ripening at home (about another 10-12 large tomatoes).
Two large Vidalia onions, 5 huge ripe (red) bell peppers, about 8-10 cloves of garlic, FRESH handfuls of basil, thyme, rosemary, and oregano. Only thing I sprinkled was a bit of sage, cause I forgot to buy fresh. Salt, pepper, a bit of sugar to cut the “tang,” crushed red pepper flakes, a seeded ripe (red) jalapeno pepper…
I learned a lot…
I needed to DOUBLE the amount of seasoning I used!!! But, no matter, because when I thaw out the quart freezer bags to use, I will chop up additional fresh seasonings to add to the pureed sauce.
Remove the tomato seeds!!! Otherwise, you’ll get a “crunch” when you chew, but, more importantly, those crunchy seeds are a bit bitter – NOT good. But, my sauce simmered on the stove for 8 hours and cooked down enough that when I hit the sauce with my immersion blender, most of the seeds were broken up, so they’re now negligible.
NEXT TIME:
Just run ALL the veggies AND the cored tomatoes through the food processor. Will save approximately two hours worth of time chopping veggies. They’re gonna cook down anyways in the sauce…
It was worth it!
I had some over angel hair pasta with sausage for dinner. YUMMY!
Hugs!
P.S. I ended up with 3.5 quarts of very thick sauce…
WOW, that sounds so delicious! You are a determined and hard working lady! It does sound like it was worth it. I agree with the food processing part, given the time you spent on this project. The good thing: all is not eaten up in one meal- you have lots more for later! Let's see, chicken parmigiana, breaded eggplant and sauce, meatballs and spaghetti. I have two blooms on one tomato plant, so I have a ways to go before I can enjoy such deliciousness. Congratulations!
My corn is tasseling up; it's about 3' tall. I'm growing Fisher's Earliest for my first batch which gets 5-6' tall and is supposed to have some reddish foliage. No red just yet. It sprouted 4/21 and it's a 70 day corn.
I'm hoping for a nice thunderstorm today but if not I'm going to have to water the garden again.
Got the Sevin applied - the bugs will write epic poetry about this day. :)
A bit of trouble in tomato land! Found two maters with some kind of worm in them and 1 with blossom end rot. We'll treat for the worms this evening and I'll apply a fertilizer to help with the BER.
In other tomato news, this one Homestead tomato plant has TWENTY (20!!!) tomatoes on it! If they all make it to maturity and ripe status, that'll be a record for me. I don't think I've had 20 tomatoes all season from 6 plants much less ONE. Yes, I'm excited about that!
My burgundy beans are loaded with flower buds and should be flowering any day now. That means that beans are right around the corner!
