The Gardening Thread

Welp my shit is fucked. My tomato patch is a swamp. I thought I had gotten past the first few plants that died the others started to take off with maybe a little leaf curl. Went today after on and off rain for a week and there is a solid inch of swamp water. Everything is drooping. With the frequency of rain I don’t think pulling everything and tilling is viable. Don’t know if digging a drainage ditch is possible. Kind of at a loss. I’m certain not tilling is to fault. I’m never listening to hippie organic advice ever again.

 

I'm sorry your toms aren't making it Kub. Do you grow anything else in your garden?

I just harvested my first beefsteaks. I've had some cherry tomatoes come in, yellow pear and large red. My kid eats them all while we hang out in the backyard, but that's why I grow them. I took these beefsteak a couple days earlier than I wanted to save them from potential bugs. One was basically touching the ground. I give offerings to the pillbugs but I can't decoy them all away. 9.3, 8.3, and 6.8oz for these first beefsteaks.

 

What my kid thinks of tomatoes.

https://imgur.com/zQDmzR0

I harvested my first ever potatoes. I know I did several things wrong during the process, but I think it was worth the effort and will try it again. The other bags aren't ready to pull yet. This one bag netted me 1.6lbs, or a little more than I planted over the 6 bags.


A sampling I brought in this morning. The ducks got out and were wandering around the garden this morning. Pretty sure somebody laid eggs out in that jungle and I can't find them. Only got 4 eggs from the coop. There are a ton more peppers and other stuff ready to pull but I had to cut it short after trying to herd the ducks back into their run for 20 minutes.

 

All of this rain we've been getting has been awesome for my garden, which is growing like a champ. It hasn't been good for the blueberries however, which seem to be so wet the berries are burst open before I can pick them.

It's looking like a banner year for apples and peaches too. Even after culling some of the peaches, the branches are drooped like a weeping willow. And I've never seen this many apples on the trees. There was little to no "June drop", which is a first.

 

Trying to post the pics again.







Walt, that is awesome. I hope your canning supplies are waiting and ready to go. I wish we had as much rain as you. We have the usual 0". All my irrigation has to be supplied.

 

Word to the wise, don't use cages for cucumbers. It's a fucking jungle out there. I'm about to let them go up the netting on the duck run and they are trying to take over some pepper plants too. Also.... It's hard to see the fruit and I'm ending up with monsters. I'll spy an overlarge cucumber on the other side of the mound and then when I walk over I can't find it. Trellis your cucumbers in as organized a fashion as you are able.

 

Yeah... I didn't get the trellis built before it was too late, so my 5 cucumber plants are going rogue... and I'm going to let them, too.

I pruned the crap out of my tomato plants and they have responded with the fruit practically doubling in size overnight.

Took this picture this afternoon during a bit of a downpour we had.

 

@Nettdata ah, rain, I miss that. I'll have to give my tomatoes a hard trim and see how the fruiting changes, maybe some will enlarge. I've been pretty modest about the trimming, primarily concerned with suckers.


Your space is so pretty! I love that flowering arbor.

 

Thanks! It’s taken quite a few years to get it to the point it’s at now, and I’m really happy with the results so far.

 

Talk about a jungle:



There’s pumpkins, zucchini, tomatoes, peppers, tomatoes and sunflowers there and it all went apeshit thanks the the right combination of rain and sun. At this point the pumpkins are just doing whatever they want and growing into the other beds. May as well let them I guess.



As previously mentioned, the apple and peach trees are loaded with fruit:



I’ve been pulling the less optimal and even perfectly good fruit off in order to take some of the stress off the tree limbs. And we’ll still have an absolute shitload. I’m also gonna have to drive a support stake in the ground for that second tree as well now.

And the apples:


We’re at over 7 inches of rain this month alone, the fourth highest on record. Yet nothings rotting, at least not yet.

 

@walt I am envious of your fruit trees. I would be in hog heaven if we had fruit on the property. Unfortunately I learned that establishing fruit trees takes a lot of regular water and we practically live in a desert, so it doesn't really make sense. I think people do have blueberries, pears, apricots, and cherries around here, but I am looking to find ways to scale back on watering overall.

Whip up some apple butter and send me some!

 

@walt what's your picking technique? I know big commercial orchards have all sorts of equipment. Just a ladder and pull them off or what? Edit: on second look are you might be able to reach all the branches from the ground. How old are these trees?

 

Yeah usually I just go out and get what I can reach. There’s not usually this much fruit on them though so this year I may need to get the ladder. My dad has an old cider press he restored, so we may be making that this year, we’ll see.

We just pruned the he’ll out of this apple trees last year so that may be why their doing so well now.

Honestly I don’t remember how old the trees are. The apple trees are ten years, maybe a little more. The peach trees a year or two younger.

 

I'm really happy with how the herbs have done this year in the portable pots.

 

My crop last year was like that... .and my Mom gave it away to her friend.