The garden is in!

It is as hot and humid as late July outside! I worked out in the garden for about an hour and a half this morning and I finally had to come in. I can't take the heat! But the good news is all of my plants are in. I still need to plant the bush bean and pole bean seeds and I plan to toss a few pumpkin seeds on the compost pile and see if anything comes up. But the transplants are in. All total I spent exactly $50 on plants this year. I don't remember exactly what I spent on seeds, but I think it was in the neighborhood of $6 or so. I still need to buy supplies to make a cucumber trellis as well as bean and tomato supports, but expenses so far have been relatively low (thankfully!).

In the top picture today you can see how my two broccoli plants have grown since I put them in. Also, the nasturtiums I planted between the broccoli are up and growing. Behind the broccoli are the two cucumber plants I bought this weekend. I went back to the variety I tried two summers ago: Burpless Hybrid. They were long and skinny and the taste was the best I've ever tasted in a cucumber. I think my trellis-building will have to wait until after graduation next weekend. Oh, and also in this picture you can see the snow peas flowering and climbing up their trellis. The chives are still in bloom although I think the flowers are on their way out.


Take a look here at my root crops. The beets are really growing. And the green onions and carrots are starting to make a respectable showing.


Here are my hot peppers tucked in behind the flowering sage. I have planted one banana pepper, one poblano, two jalepeno, and four serrano. Also toward the back is a rosemary plant that I tucked into the only available spare place in the garden.


So here is the garden today. Jeff mowed the lawn this morning so I had him pile the grass clippings in the back. Once they cool off and start decomposing, I'll spread them around my plants (tomatoes first!) as mulch. Other things I've added to the garden today that I haven't mentioned yet are Beauregard sweet potatoes (twice as many as last year), two Italian oregano plants, two curly parsley plants, two butternut squash plants, and four Big Bertha sweet bell pepper plants.

Today's weather:
High temp 86 F
Low temp 65 F
Sunny with 10% humidity (which feel like a lot more than that if you ask me!)

A Race Against Time

Jeff has been nursing the pumpkin patch along for the last several weeks. Starting in mid-July, we have been undergoing an all-out attack on the pumpkins which included squash bugs, squash vine borers, powdery mildew, and scorching hot sun. The fact that anything is still alive out there is, in itself, a miracle. But it is barely holding on. Here is what my pumpkin patch looks like this morning.As you can see, the pumpkins are turning orange. The tiny Jack-Be-Littles (not pictured) are doing great and look fine. There are 3 Sugar Pie pumpkins and two are mostly orange and one is only starting to change. This particular photograph shows our two jack-o-lantern pumpkins in the early stages of changing to orange. I have to say that the amount of work and space that goes into growing pumpkins sure doesn't seem to be commensurate with what you have to show for it. I would rather not grow them next year but instead use the space for something that wouldn't have me pulling my hair out so much. But Jeff wants pumpkins. I finally compromised and said I will do one pumpkin plant next year and that is it.

Today is August 18. Do you think this pumpkin will survive and make it until Halloween?

Today's local weather:
High temp: 84 F
Low temp: 61 F
Sunny

Part Two: Surgery

If Saturday night was a murderous rampage, Sunday night was surgery night. I'll get into that in a minute. But now for something completely different:You never know what you'll find when collecting things from your garden for your dinner salad.

Now onto the surgery...I spent my evening in the pumpkin patch. I went out armed with knife and a bottle of organic mildew cure for the powdery mildew. I decided to cut out the worst leaves/vines, to douse what was left with mildew cure, and hopefully revive these sick plants. I started hacking away at sick leaves and throwing them into a pile outside the garden. I discovered that most of the sick leaves had both powdery mildew AND the frass that indicates squash vine borer. My theory is that the squash vine borers drilled into the vines making them more susceptible to diseases like powdery mildew. When I was finished hacking away, I had packed a 30 gallon trash bag with leaves and vines. The pumpkin patch is probably half as dense as it was before. With the worst of the plants gone, I went around and covered everything that was left with the mildew cure. My hopes were lifted by new green (healthy) looking growth that I discovered when I peeled away the bad.

One thing about clearing away all those large leaves - it is easy to see that there are lots of weeds that have moved in. In fact, I realize they may have been contributing to the problem. So this morning before the heat sets in for the day, I am outside pulling weeds from the pumpkin patch. I've already done one section and am taking a coffee break to update the blog before I go back out again. I was excited to have to share my area with the bees who were buzzing around because there are several new blossoms opened this morning! What a terrific sign! I hope I've been able to nurse the plants back to health.

Today's local weather:
High temp: 91 F
Low temp: 73 F
Lots of sun and hot

My murderous rampage

I went on a murderous rampage tonight although I fear it may be too late. We decided to pull out the big guns. Now, we've tried to stay organic as much as possible and have had generally good luck. But this squash vine borer thing has gotten out of control. We went to the organic supply store to buy beneficial nematodes to attack the pesky grubs, but we found out that the store didn't have any in stock. They'd have to order it for us. We felt that time was of the essence so we looked for other alternatives. We ended up getting a product called Rotenone. It is an organic pesticide. However, some organic gardeners dispute its use because it is still considered moderately hazardous. It is considered "organic" because it is made from naturally occurring substances.

Compared to "nonorganic" pesticides, it is still less harmful over all and the damage being inflicted in our garden is bad enough that we felt we need to go this route. I waited until this evening after all the bees (i.e. pollinators) had left the garden before I began stalking my prey. I had made up a gallon of solution using 4 tsp. of the rotenone to 1 gallon of water. With spray bottle in one gloved hand and a knife in the other, I headed toward my squash. My second zucchini has been hanging on for dear life for two days now so I doused it good. My spaghetti squash is looking worse and worse every day. It is yellow and wilted and some leaves are starting to turn brown. It may be too late for the zucchini and spaghetti squash, but I'm doing what I can. I also went through the pumpkin patch and sprayed all of the vines that I could. All three plant crops had evidence of the borers (the golden frass at the site of entry). I'll see in the morning if I notice any difference.

In other news, I planted some of my fall crops today. I direct seeded everything in a vacant area of the garden. I re-planted the broccoli and cauliflower (since what I planted two weeks ago never came up). I also planted mustard and collard greens and several spinach plants. I'm going to plant more lettuce too, but I'm holding off on that since the Indiana Extension Service says to wait until August 15 for fall plantings of lettuce.

Today we went to visit the place where we had a plot in a community garden when we were first married. We were walking up and down the aisles between the plots and critiquing what we saw. We were amused at the fact that we both have learned so much since that time we tried to garden years ago. It made me feel better about my own garden. Most of these gardens were not well-tended. They were overgrown, ripe veggies hung on the vine as food for the pests that were moving in, and everything needed to be watered. Despite the problems we've had lately, I think our garden is in pretty good shape and we are doing a lot of things right. This was exactly the pick-me-up I needed today.

End of July Garden Update

So technically I'm a day late, but it is time for the monthly garden review.

First of all, I finally have a new blog header picture! I've been waiting for that particular bunch of cherry tomatoes to ripen for weeks solely for the photo op. I've had them pegged for my blog header for a while and today they were finally picture-worthy in my opinion.

I have to admit, the end of this month finds me in kind of a sad gardening mood. I realize now that the early part of the summer was easy on us. July has been much more difficult. Challenges that passed us by early on have started to hit us hard the last couple of weeks of the month.

Here's a plant-by-plant update:

* July started with bitter lettuces being dug up and added to compost. Their former bed sat empty for most of the month of July. For fall crops, I direct sowed some broccoli and cauliflower in that spot and so far I've only seen one broccoli seedling.
* Carrots are still in the garden and we've harvested a few, but generally I've decided I planted them too close together and didn't thin them out enough. They haven't had adequate room to grow to a useful size.
* The green onions have been slow to grow, but the ones I've pulled up to use in salads have been good. Next year I want to plant a bigger crop of these. We go through green onions faster than what this crop has allowed.
* My two zucchini plants provided us with lots and lots of zucchini. Most of it has been shredded and frozen. A week ago one plant succumbed to the squash vine borer and I fear that today the same thing is happening to the remaining plant. I think zucchini is done for this year.
* My potatoes didn't make it this year. I planted both Red Norland and Irish Cobblers. They started out impressively enough. But I didn't have a lot of soil to mound on them properly. What really did them in, though, is the amount of rain we had this May and June. It rained and rained and rained and area rivers and ponds flooded. Many people lost their homes so I guess I'm lucky that I only lost my potatoes. The tops turned yellow and died off way early and when I dug them up, the potatoes I found were rotten. I'd heard that potatoes were "really easy" to grow, but I don't think I'll try them again next year.
* My sweet potato plant looks healthy as ever. It has been vining out all over the place and will probably take over the area previously occupied by its next door neighbor: the zucchini. Still no idea how it is doing underground, but if the foliage is any clue, it's doing well.
* My yellow onions started to fall over which I took as a sign to harvest. I pulled about every other one up and was really disappointed with how small they were. I expected bigger. Maybe I planted them too closely together. I left the other half of onions in the ground to see if they'll grow anymore and the other ones are drying on my back patio before I store them.
* The bush beans did really well. We had two fairly large harvests and they tasted great. I plan to do pole beans next year. I might plant more bush beans too to provide us a harvest before the pole beans are ready.
* The pumpkins have become a thorn in my side, so to speak. The main reason I'm growing them is because of my husband thinking it would be neat to have our own pumpkin to carve at Halloween. Meanwhile, the pumpkins have provided me more worries than the rest of the garden combined. They are huge and are growing into the neighboring beds. There is no longer a walkway between the pumpkins and the tomatoes and bell peppers. Plus, I am tormented by an infestation of squash bugs and squash vine borers. I have to go out and kill bugs and tear off leaves with eggs every day. And now my pumpkins are covered with a nasty case of powdery mildew.The good news is that I seem to have several pumpkins set (3 different kinds) and if the plants hold out, we should have a decent harvest.
* We have three watermelons growing on the vine and the first one looks almost ready.
* We have had 8 muskmelons growing on the vines and so far I have picked two. The first one turned out to be not quite ripe yet. The second one, however, is delicious and juicy.
* I have been overwhelmed by the cucumbers my two little plants have produced so far. I have put up 10 pints of dill pickles and 8 pints of bread and butter pickles and I have a big collection of cucumbers in my fridge that I think I'm going to do as dill spears sometime this weekend. Not only are they plentiful, but they taste really good too. My mom says she's never tasted a better cucumber. At the nursery they were just labeled as "burpless cucumbers".
* We have been harvesting green bell peppers once every couple of days for use in salads or as a seasoning. I have ten bell pepper plants and one has already produced all of its peppers and I pulled it for the compost bin. The other plants are still full of small but growing peppers.
* My spaghetti squash plants have been making me proud. I have 9 spaghetti squash in various stages of development. I think the first one is about done.However, my leaves are turning yellow and the plants don't look good. I don't know if the problem is squash vine borer, powdery mildew, or just lack of a good watering, but I worry that the plants won't last long enough for the squash to ripen.
* The tomatoes are doing well (knock on wood). I have been bringing in a bowl of ripe tomatoes every morning. Most of them are cherry tomatoes, but some of the bigger ones have started turning. Last night we sliced and ate our first Cherokee Purple with dinner and it was delicious!

I suppose I should consider myself lucky and remember all the positive things that have come out of the garden so far. It has been a pretty good garden, especially when you consider this is my first real garden. And nothing is perfect. There will always be problems. I guess the trick is to stay one step ahead of the bad guys and never let them get the upper hand.

Today's local weather:
High temp: 90 F
Low temp: 66 F
Partly cloudy with thunderstorms this evening.

Come Out, Come Out, Wherever You Are

We made a discovery this morning when Jeff was watering the garden. Having the water raining down onto the plants made the squash bugs come out. He stood there watering while I was on the watch for the bugs. Whenever I'd see one, I'd squash it (pun intended). I must have killed at least 5 or 6 just this morning. We've killed 2-3 a day for the past several days. I've also made at least two trips a day out to check the leaves of the pumpkins, spaghetti squash, and zucchini. I've torn off several corners of leaves with clusters of squash bug eggs on them. I drown them in the bucket of water with dish soap. I'm doing my best to keep those critters from gaining control in my garden.

Thinning pumpkins and buying annuals

I'm still sad about the demise of my lettuces, but I decided I have to move on. As you can see, my pumpkin bed was starting to get out of control and it is still only June! So yesterday, I did what I had been putting off doing. I thinned the pumpkins. When I planted the plants, I realized there were too many in too close quarters, but I wasn't sure how they would do and I planted extra in case. I figured I'd pull out the extras if they ever got too crowded. Yesterday was that day.

I took out half of the plants and they are still stretching to the limits of their space, but maybe they aren't so cramped now. Of course, with all of those plants out of the garden, my compost bin is filling up. And I have decided to start hand pollinating my squashes using the instructions from the people on the Vegetable Gardening forum at gardenweb.com. I was getting 3-4 zucchini at a time per each plant but they never got more than 3 inches long and then started deflating and turning yellow. I think poor pollination was the problem. I'll see if my hand pollination changes things at all.

I also finally went shopping yesterday for some annuals to put in containers on my back patio. That was the area that I've most neglected this year. This is the time of year when we start spending a lot of time, especially evenings, on the back patio and I wanted to spruce it up. Here's what I bought:

* Butter Daisy (Melampodium paludosum)
* Dahlietta Series Dahlia (Dahlia hybrida Dahlietta Series)
* Blue Salvia (Salvia farinacea)
* Periwinkle (Vinca) (Catharanthus roseus)
* Asparagus Fern (Asparagus densifloras "Sprengerii")
* Petunia (pink)
* Zinnia (Zinnia elegans) (gold)
* Serena Angelonia (Angelonia angustifolia "Serena Series")
* Dichondra
* Wave Series Petunia (lavender)
* Spike Dracaena (Dracaena indivisa)

I planted them in containers placed around the corners of my patio. Once I'm sure they've adjusted to their new homes and are thriving, I'll take some pictures to share with you.

Today's local weather:
High temp: 74 F
Low temp: 58 F
Isolated thunderstorms afternoon and evening

Hail Damage

Yesterday we had a storm come through and it started out with about 10 minutes of pea-to-nickel sized hail. I stood helplessly at my sliding glass door watching my garden get pelted with ice balls. This morning I went out to investigate the damage.
This is a pumpkin leaf that obviously became perforated by the hail. Several of the large leaves were like this.
Here you can see how one of my cucumber plants was damaged. It has the same holes in the leaves as the pumpkin, and it also has a broken vine. I hope that doesn't keep it from growing.

Overall the damage could have been much worse. Most of the plants showed no damage at all and those that were damaged look like they can probably shake it off and survive. I was lucky. This pumpkin still looks pretty good, don't you think?


Today's local weather:
High temp: 75 F
Low temp: 56 F
Sunshine and mixed clouds with slight possibility of thunderstorm