Cohutt builds a garden, Chapter 2

[cohutt]

I was out of town from Tuesday evening through last night and found something not good tonight when I finally got to inspect things:



As much as I hated to do it, I cut it at the base and got it the heck out of the yard.  Fortunately none of the others have any sign of this yet.

[Roswell]

Ros you need to fire that leetle kitteh of yours if the rodents are taking you out..... 

Ironically, my cat, Hunter, is an indoor kitty.  However, I put some traps out tonight so, hopefully they will help me out.  I have thought about adopting an old tom recently just to live outdoors.  I was hoping our new puppy would scare them off, but when we took her with us when we went on vacation. 

[cohutt]

Ironically, my cat, Hunter, is an indoor kitty.  However, I put some traps out tonight so, hopefully they will help me out.  I have thought about adopting an old tom recently just to live outdoors.  I was hoping our new puppy would scare them off, but when we took her with us when we went on vacation. 

I have a hefty new outdoor tom that has adopted us that I will offer up. If you are interested I might even spring to make sure his cat balls stay here. 

[cohutt]

The only thing I've seen that grows faster than these gourd vines is kudzu.   

By yesterday evening some had made it to the top of the fence and well up the teepee frame (about a month ahead of when I thought they would. uh-oh)

[fritz_monroe]

As much as I hated to do it, I cut it at the base and got it the heck out of the yard.  Fortunately none of the others have any sign of this yet

Good move getting that out.  You put that in the trash, not the compost pile, didn't you?  If you compost it, it could spread to next year's garden.

They are bushes that seem to be sprawling out more and more as they grow

That's what I've seen as well.  Mine last year were much wider than tall.  They are also pretty hardy, the ones that the cold seemed to kill off are doing much better now.

I thought about hilling up over them where they touch another part of the bed

I've never grown potatoes, but from everything I've read, if you mound over them, they will root just like tomatoes.  Then you'll have potatoes all along that stem.

Garden is looking great, keep posting those pics.  My squash plants are starting to take off like those gourds.  Not a lot of length yet, but there is a noticeable difference from day to day.

[cohutt]

The one infected Roma plant that was  one that was planted later and wasn't caged for a time due to the lettuce growing around it; I'm hoping the setting or timing was the cause and that it will be the exception to the garden rather than a omen of bad things to come.

In the meantime the Roma VF plants are loading up heavily; each plant has at least 30 tomatoes set and what seems like double that in blooms continuing to pop out.   I've never grown determinate varieties before; assuming this crop doesn't fail from here, I'm going to have to contend with a couple thousand juicy plum tomatoes ripening in a relatively short period a few weeks from now.    This is the problem I've been working so hard over the last year to be able to have....

[cohutt]

Good move getting that out.  You put that in the trash, not the compost pile, didn't you?  If you compost it, it could spread to next year's garden.

Yes, I am careful of inadvertently helping disease and weeds spread via compost.   From what i have read, the fungus type issues like this that get tomato plants can and will "over winter" in the soil, so I am anal about removing any leaves that look remotely like they have spores on them, whether yellow brown or black or....

We have been distributed big yard waste bins were in the city, the "Herbie curbie" type.  I keep mine way up on the side of the house away from the garden in full afternoon sun.   It gets any and all crap that doesn't go to the compost piles, including potentially diseased cuttings and all weed and woody stemmed stuff.  Being in the sun, it turns into a super heated digester of plant material in the week or two between pickups.  
Confession time:  
I thought about torching it with some accumulated gunpowder from reloading spills and reclaimed rounds, but it was wet and drizzling here last night.
This plant rattled me so I put it in the commercial dumpster behind the restaurant a couple hundred yards over in the commercial block I adjoin.  Code says these have to be emptied daily here and lord knows I hear them banging at 5:30 in the morning so I know it is true.  Therefore, the spotted plant in the picture above is by now composting with food scraps and garbage in the landfill 12 miles south of here.  

Garden is looking great, keep posting those pics.  My squash plants are starting to take off like those gourds.  Not a lot of length yet, but there is a noticeable difference from day to day.

I took a couple shots of my modest squash bed last night too- two crooknecks with a zucchini in between, all of the bush variety.  Funny thing is the soils is the same and the seeds for the two yellow crookneck plants came from the same packet, but look at the difference between the two plants ((the left and right ones) both in overall size and leaf size:




LOL, I think I have an explanation though; it is a mutant plant on the left- look at the male double blossom it has developed......  

[fritz_monroe]

My bush squash aren't doing well right now.  The vining types are growing like gang busters.  The zucchini is doing ok, just not like the vining squash.

We always get hit by squash vine borers about half way through the summer.  So this year I looked for an alternative to zucchini.  I found the trombocino squash that is supposed to be a good alternative to zucchini.  It is also supposed to be fairly hardy against SVB since it will root along the stem as it touches the ground.

Here's a random picture I found on the web of it.

[cohutt]

Artichokes finally seem to be taking root and growing






Asparagus continues to send up spears and bush out

[cohutt]

Garlic harvest morning

Falling over and browning






Harvest in process and then the curing solution :

[cohutt]

And for the final post of the day, beans


Off the top of the trellis already.



Bush beans stuck in the ground where an old compost pile had been  are doing better than the beans actually in the sfg:

[fritz_monroe]

Garden still looks great, Cohutt

[Sweethearts Mom]

Yours is so much better than mine. Good job.

[cohutt]

Yours is so much better than mine. Good job.

Stop that.  You have already eaten tomatoes from yours.

Plus, like everyone else I am bad to only post about the good parts.

[outdoorlady79]

Just catching up on the posts from the last week or two, looking great Cohutt.  I think I'll refrain from showing my other half your romas, right now we're happy to have a fee small fruits on the "Sweet 100" plant that is growing.   

Fritz where did you find seed for that trombocino squash?  Might have to try some next year or maybe instead of putting some flowers in the bed the Zucchini is in after the cabbage come out I could squeeze one in there.

Glad that only one tomoato plant was infected with that nastiness.

[fritz_monroe]

Fritz where did you find seed for that trombocino squash?  Might have to try some next year or maybe instead of putting some flowers in the bed the Zucchini is in after the cabbage come out I could squeeze one in there.

Got them from Territorial Seeds.  Here's a link to the Tromboncino squash.  So far the plants are doing pretty well.  Each has 6 or 8 leaves on the vine.  One observation is the cucumber beetles seem to leave them alone.  So far, they are a repeater, but final will come down to production and taste.

[cohutt]

More trellis this weekend.....

The birdhouse kudzu gourds are growing a foot a day it seems.....

I decided that more for them to climb on would be a good idea, so out came the netting....

[outdoorlady79]

More trellis this weekend.....

The birdhouse kudzu gourds are growing a foot a day it seems.....

I decided that more for them to climb on would be a good idea, so out came the netting....

What are you putting in the water there Cohutt, LOL.

[cohutt]

Yeah these things worry me, at this rate my neighbor's garage apartment is in danger.  I think it may be the 6" of composted manure under the bed that has taken hold.

They are flowering now too, a dozen or so of these open in the evening and then close when the sun comes back up.  By the looks of things about 100 are in about to come online.  Geez.

[outdoorlady79]

Great pic :-)    I'm envious of your compost now, how sad is that.  I've been stuck buying bagged compost from the local places so far.

[cohutt]

I stirred the composting poop pile a little this evening in honor of you outdoorlady. :0




My beans have overrun their trellis already- not what I was expecting before summer solstice on 8 ft trellis.




I came up with a rig to extend them a little using a bamboo pole to anchor new twine run from the top.  As always my gardening continues to be a series of makeshift experiments literally strung together.

[Hare of Caerbannog]

Hey cohutt,
I haven't posted on this thread much, but I check it every time its updated. Great stuff. I show it to almost everyone who comes into my house.

I know this has probably been covered before, but where do you get your netting for your trellises? Do you buy it or make it?

[jawjaboy]

 

[cohutt]

HoC,

The square grid stuff on the bamboo bean trellis is from pogo there who just posted a smiley face between this post and yours.    He figured he wasn't gonna need it and graciously sent it to me so he could watch me make a mess of my yard with it.
You can get it online, it is a whole lot cheaper than buying it at Home Depot.  The square grid is easy to work with.

The diagonal running stuff on my tomato trellis and gourd canopy thing I found @  www.nylonnet.com - they have a lot of interesting stuff (The drawing had the square running stuff like Jawja sent me but it was the other type. ) It has a learning curve since it "accordions" some when you start hanging it.


The green twine that is in some of my pictures came from there too- tough stuff, UV resistant 300 lb and avaiable is several colors.

[TwoBluesMama]

jpg[/img]

Cohutt - I thought this was one of the best ideas ever for curing!  DH hangs ours by tying them up in bunches but I thought this was truly a great way to let them dry and so much less tedious work to tie and untie.  Thanks for the idea!

[cohutt]

Thanks TBM, my best ideas usually sprout from some degree of laziness.

______________________________________________________________

I wonder sometimes- it seems any time I have the opportunity my default mode is to start the installation process for a new bed.   My next door neighbor has been pouring some $$ into their old house lately, including the demolition of the old collapsing retaining wall and installation of a new monster deluxe version.

The soil there in my front yard was hardpan chert before it got uber-compacted and trashed by their equipment.   I told them not to worry about the repairing the grass since I was going to abandon fescue and have zoyzia sod installed; as hot as it is here in the summers the fescue has suffered greatly due to the loss of a couple of large oak shade trees to the west/sw of my front yard.

I blinked and crabgrass was well on its way to taking hold on the bare ground so I hoe'd it up some then went and pulled some furniture boxes out of a recycle bin down the street.  A few wheel barrels loads of compost later and the foundation for my new FRONT yard bed was laid.  (((insert sinister laughter here)))
I assured Mrs C that I would make it look good once constructed and after all it wasn't like I was going to plant corn in it or anything (well, maybe not)   Still a long way to go but this will stake a claim to the spot, suppress the weeds, and provide a base for the real bed coming later.

I really like the heat sink wall behind it- it might come in handy for winter greens eh?

[cohutt]

General garden update:

A couple of the very few acceptable carrots from the spring planting



"Christmas" pole limas will be coming soon



As will the Henderson bush limas - i hadn't realized they were so far along til I noticed the pods showing in the far left background of this Sheepnose Pimento Pepper picture.



Artichoke plants have not been killed by me yet:



And it seems this patch of Romas might just put out a tomato or two this year. :

[joeinwv]

Nice looking carrots. I have a few still in the ground. They are doing good, but just moving sloooow. Most are less than 3" long right now. I did get a half dozen turnips yesterday - hoping that now they are out of the way carrots will get more sun and take off.

[Roswell]

What kind of carrot is that? It looks like a red potato carrot or something, lol.   Those Romas are freaking amazing too. 

[cohutt]

St Valery and Dragon from SSE



The few carrots that germinated this spring have been putting some significant tops up.      Germination was decent last August and the carrots were a sweet treat for most of the winter.  When I seeded again this April I got spotty germination (time to actually read up on the proper planting times for North Georgia I guess).   

I was impressed with the superior growth of the few tops this spring vs last fall although the first carrots pulled were long and skinny.  (Edible, but not of braggadocios picture posting quality.)

Here is the rub:

At least one, and actually probably most, of the robust topped carrots were not spring germinated seeds.   

DUH

Carrots are biennial, in that the flowering and seed cycle takes part of two seasons to complete.  In other words, seeds planted this spring might generate some tasty carrots but if left to grow the tops would not flower this year.   The carrot has to remain in the cool ground over the winter in order to turn on the flowering switch. 

So in my slackness, i must have missed a few carrots last winter because I have a carrot stalk almost 3 ft tall about to flower:



God sometimes rewards the incompetent eh?