late summer / fall gardening

Hi everyone! I'm a newbie to the site/forum. Found it this morning while researching some seeds given to us by fiance's brother. We put in a late spring/early summer garden and have had great success with our tomatoes and peppers. Our vining plants, however, are another story. Maybe we planted too late, not sure. We are religious about watering to try and beat the heat and lack of rain. Thankful for the wonderful wetting we got yesterday! We also use Miracle-Gro (or the Hi-Yield equivalent) foliar feeding once every 1-2 weeks and have finally gotten some Black Cow (0.5 - 0.5 - 0.5 composted cow manure) and spread around the plants. Ants ARE a problem in the garden area where we have the beans and vining plants planted. The tomato and pepper garden is in a different section of the yard but still have some ants, though not as many. We've tried Sevin dusting which worked until it rained. Since we have no fruit on the vining plants we've also sprayed diluted Malathion on the soil around the plants to try and get rid of the ants. This year they seem to be especially bad.

I have a couple of questions.

We live in Williston SC and want to know what might be stunting our squash and cukes, other than the oppresive heat! We get beautiful blooms which then shrivel up, brown, and fall off. The plant produces more blooms but they follow the same pattern. We're drooling for some squash! Any idea what we might need to do??

We're thinking of putting in some new seeds for a late summer garden. I know I've seen tomatoes growing rampantly in fields on my way to work. I know I saw them loaded with fruit up until late last October so I'm thinking we should have plenty of time if we start now. We also have some butterpeas, roma bush and, full of hope, more straightneck squash seeds. Does anyone have some hints for our late gardening?

I know this will probably make you laugh, but....any ideas on keeping the deer / rabbits outta the beans other than a sentry-guarded fence around the garden????

Howdy, rogersneesy...and a hearty WELCOME TO DG!

I'm not quite sure why you want to get rid of the ants so badly....are they fire ants or something? If not, ants actually help many areas of the garden (up to a point). If you are spraying Malathion in your garden you may be killing of many beneficial bugs and, more importantly, pollinators. Between that and the Sevin dust you may be depleting your pollinators (bees, wasps, etc). (If you like to use Sevin I'd suggest you use the liquid form, that way the honeybees won't carry it back to their hives and wipe out the whole colony as they would do if you put the dust out.)

Squash flowers/fruit often fizzle away due to either no pollination or incomplete pollination. (And remember, many squash flowers that come on early are mainly male and will die off naturally anyway.) Excessive heat (boy-howdy, haven't we all had that lately!) will also contribute to making pollen non-viable. But, if your plants are looking nice and healthy then just hang in there, they should keep on keeping on!

Will be watching this thread when I have more time.

Again, welcome to DG!
Hope to see you around the site!

Shoe.

Dear Roger: I don't know anything to keep out rabbits, but a suggestion I read in Organic Gardening magazine years ago seems to work with deer: place sections of fencing flat on the ground around your garden or around fruit trees. Evidently (?), deer don't like walking on the fencing. I've even used sections of lattice. Perhaps I've just been lucky, but we often see deer in the woods and so far they haven't raided our garden. I am looking forward to putting up a fence, however, as this solution makes walking and mowing around the garden area a lot more trouble!

rogersneesy- Do you have any cats or dogs? My little serial killer cat really helps keep the rabbit population down. I've heard of spreading used cat litter around the perimeter of your vegetable plot .

Roger, there's a product called Ropel that has worked wonders for me to keep the rabbits from chewing my plantings. Not toxic to the plants or the animals, just tastes hideous. So you wouldn't want to spray the fruit/veggies, just the foliage (lol). Don't remember where I ordered it, but when I googled for it I found lots of sources. Oh, and it's weatherproof; one application is said to last all year, I can attest that it lasts at least for months.

Roger, you say the plants are doing well in one area and not another. Since the plants you mention all do well in like conditions I suspect the soil in one area is deficient in something. Take a soil sample from each area and have them tested at your local Clemson Extension office. Then compare the results.

the fence on the ground will stop big animals, I've seen cow grates which are the same thing and it stops cows. They just don't like to walk on them.

Dogs and cats would keep the rabbits away or at least ruff them up a bit. If you don't want animals you can find stuff that smells like a dog or cats and that will probably keep them away. You could try dog hair.I've seen people put up a small electric fence too but to stop rabbits it would have to be low and to stop the deer it would have to be high so might not look to great. Small childern running around that wouldn't be a good idea either.

You seeing any fungus on your plants? This year seems to be a bad year for fungus attacks around here.

This message was edited Jul 27, 2006 4:17 PM

Thankfully, I've discovered that some of the deer repellents keep the rabbits away, too. I've used Deer-vik this year as well as Deer Fence. Neither product is affected by rain or watering. Now if I could stop the %%&*(@! voles...

Thanks everyone! Fleurs...I give up on the voles! I have what looks like a map spread over the backyard made out of little mounds over their tunnels! At least one has made the fatal mistake of tunneling into the dogs' fenced area. Now if they'd all follow that path!

As for the ants, the ground is just simply COVERED with them. No mounds, they're just crawling EVERYWHERE. They aren't fire ants but when I'm trying to walk through the garden to get to the plants, they are all over my feet and a couple of them bite!

The plants were puny looking before I started putting out the Sevin. They were beautiful in the pots they came in but didn't do anything after transplanting. They seem to have perked up some since we broke out the nice fresh brew of Miracle Gro - i.e. some new green leaf growth - but they are still not much bigger than they were when I brought them home from the garden center. One of the cukes has laid down and started sprawling but the others are still stick-straight up in the air.

We have two Dachshunds but they are kept in a fence away from the garden - we live fairly close to the road and it's a busy state highway so I can't let them run to guard the garden. Besides the mini doxie is probably smaller than some of the rabbits! If I put the garden INSIDE the fenced area, the dogs would have it in shreds...doxies do love to dig!

I'm close to the Extension office so I'll definitely take advantage of getting the soil tested. I'll try and get some pictures taken of my plants so you can see what I'm talking about. I've heard of Ropel and will look for it as well as the Deer-Vik and Deer Fence. I'll keep y'all posted.