Yesterday evening, I strolled through the garden...
I picked a handful of Contender Green beans, some peppers, & carrots. Then, I went inside and pulled a bag of last season's broccoli & a bag of frozen baked plantains from the freezer.
Steamed the Broc & Beans, cut up the carrots and the pepper, heated up the plantains, and three BBQed ribs.
Life is good...
Spring Gardens 2015 Pt 2
Looks like some of my carrots are trying to bolt. A bummer for my red carrots, but i am actually happy about that with the variety i am trying called "Pusa Asita Black" that i got from Baker Creek. They gave out double batches to people that ordered them because the seed viability was less than expected, and they encourage us to try to save some seed for ourselves, so looks like just such an opportunity is on its way.
By the way, has anyone else had a lack of honey bees this year, so far i have seen absolutely ZERO....all i have noticed are wasps and carpenter bees, oh and of course sweat bees.
This message was edited May 19, 2015 1:11 PM
JMC1987,
Even the President is trying to save our bees.
we have a nice sized white clover patch beside our house, and the bees are usually going nuts for the flowers every year, so far not a singe bee, and the white clover is blooming full force, maybe a few will be lured in and then go tell all their pals about it, lol
Quote from jmc1987 :
By the way, has anyone else had a lack of honey bees this year, so far i have seen absolutely ZERO....all i have noticed are wasps and carpenter bees, oh and of course sweat bees.
Almost all vegetables home gardeners grow will be better pollinated by bumble and carpenter bees or tiny little squash bees. Honey bees are European, most of our standard veggie crops in need of pollination are American or African.
I would not stress over it for yourself. Large commercial orchard growers, on the other hand, sure do need those bee farms on the back of semi trailers. Fruit this year may get expensive since a lot of those roving bee farms have lost so many bees this year.
I wonder about seed farms, too. Turnips may not need honey bees, but turnip seed does.
I had a lady tell me at the garden center that she wanted flowers, but she didn't want bees. I told her, "Without bees, there are no flowers!".
hmm....sounds like she needs to do what my mom has been known to do....stick fake flowers in the ground outside, LOL! :D
Most (all?) of the "double" hybrid flowers are not visited by bees. They can't get to the nectar or it doesn't produce enough worth visiting.
All our bees are wet! LOL With all the rain we've had, I'm surprised anything is still flying. I have lots of bees because I have flowers near my garden.
right now the only flowers in my garden that are blooming are tickseed and a couple of calendula plants, everything else is not mature yet, seeing as the majority of them were started from seed
I checked my tomatoes yesterday, and looks like I have a pollination issue -- no pollination going on...
I do have a growing swarm of fat black bees near the eaves, and am wondering if they're setting up shop in my attic...well, they'll just have to stage war with the squirrels already up there...
Drat, darn, and sheesh...
The least they could do in return is pollinate the tomatoes...
I am starting to harvest onions. The one in the picture are TX Legend
Squashes, cucumbers a few blackberries ... the majority don't even make it to the kitchen ... and tomatoes (from left to right): Black Icicle, Nineveh (one large), Juliett and on top 2 Hartman's Yellow Gooseberry, 3 Grappoli d’Inverno, the red cherries are Sweet Million, 9 Black Mauri, 3 Amy’s Sugar Gem, 1 Chocolate Cherry, all the yellow cherries are Gold Nugget apart for 3 which are Sungold II, the purple/red cherries are Red Berries and the large red on the right are Glacier.
Happy gardening
First strawberry of the year, and the others arent too far behind.
Plucked a couple of my "Pusa Asita Black" carrots today, since a lot of them are starting to bolt, i found these two that hadnt quite bolted yet, a bit scrawny, but just wanted to sample what they were like, lol. im sure they will be a heck of a lot better as an autumn crop, but i started them in the spring intentionally trying to get them to bolt in our summer heat, so that i can get a batch of fresh seed.
Great job !
I just don't have the patience to grow carrots or maybe the soil.
I did try at different time of the year in my garden, but it seems that it took forever for a very small carrot ... but it was fun !
with the roots on these looking as good as they did, its telling me that the soil structure in my garden bed is definitely getting better, i have been having to grow varieties like "Little fingers", or any of the short and fat round varieties while my clay soil was being improved on.
Linda, just go out in the morning and shake your tomato plants to help pollination. It may be all the rain we've been getting is keeping the pollen from doing its thing.
GG I'm with Stephanie. Tomatoes, pepper, beans etc... plants are self pollinating. They are usually pollinated before the flowers open. No insects are neccasary but shaking the plants will help. With all the rain and humidity the pollen is liable to get clumpy.
Ok. Will do.
Mine arent setting fruit either, tho I have blooms and squash bugs moving back in. Shook mine too, then strung em up. One tiny chewed Momotaro still trying to get grown, muscadines are growing crazy and heavy
More berries and peas today. Also picked up another inch of rain.
We actually had about double the amount of berries, but hubby had already put half of them in the fridge.
Stephanie those look fantastic. I'm glad you are getting such a large harvest.
Steph,
Your berries are gorgeous!!
now things are really coming together, the cucumbers seem to be just barely crawling along, however, i gave everything a dose of spray on fertilizer today.
Will have to hurry and harvest / use the red lettuce soon, i can see a couple starting to stretch out from trying to start bolting.
Finally seeing my first peas!
The Cantaloupe is really picking up speed, and the watermelons have finally made their appearance.
The bell peppers are having trouble holding onto their flower buds it seems, but the Jimmy Nardello peppers have really started churning along.
Steph,
What kind of cantaloupes are you growing? I have seeds for Hale's Best cantaloupes. I'm hoping to sow seeds this weekend, behind the row of tomatoes.
I'm going to grow them vertically, just like the tomatoes on the baler twine.
I have grown Hale's Best in the past. They're good! The past couple of years I've grown Honey Rock. This year, we're growing Pike cantaloupes.
Thanks, Steph!
Any tips you could pass along about growing cantaloupes would be greatly appreciated.
You just have to watch them for mildew and be sure to keep water off the leaves. They can be prone to spider mites, so spray weekly with an insecticidal soap. Also, if you're not trellising them, and it's wet like it's been recently, you'll want to place something under them to keep them from rotting where they lay on the ground.
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I've used Standlee alfalfa pellets from Tractor Supply and recently discovered they now contain GMO alfalfa, so no longer and organic fertilizer. They say they added them in 2013, yet still promote them as a soil additive for organic gardening.