Sunflowers galore!

We really enjoy gardening!  I don't believe a day passes that we don't go out and just sit and admire what the Lord has allow us to grow.  This year we have already been enjoying some lettuce, radishes, zucchini, sweet corn, and a few herbs (chives and parsley) from our garden.  One thing - actually two - that we have been looking forward to is our sunflowers and zinnias blooming.  Here are a few pics.



This plant is about 7' tall.



This on is about 6' tall.






Zinnia in full boom.  I plant these to attract bees and butterflies.



Potted Gerbera Daisy



Me pulling weeds

This flower was cut off its plant by a cutworm, so I put it in a tea cup with some water and placed it on our dining room table.

My gardening tip would be to know your friends from your foes!  One of our foes this year is vine borers.  We have already lost one zucchini plant to these creatures.  Another is the cut worm.  I was prepared for them with our tomato and pepper plants; but not with our sunflowers.  We are still on the look out for the little culprit who has been cutting some of our sunflowers off our sunflower plants.  Helpful websites are here, here, and here.

Until next time,

Mary, Mary Quite Contrary...

Our garden area before we tilled it up.

How does your garden grow!  Every year we are excited about planting time.

My hard working husband

 This year we are trying a couple of new things - corn, stevia, and a few herbs.  My gardening tip is to plant attractive flowers in your garden to attract friendly bugs. Friendly bugs will help pollinate your plants and some can help keep pests away. Here,  here, and here are a few helpful websites about this topic.

I planted a lot of seeds in egg cartons this year.

After everything was planted this is how it looked.

My new thing is to use yarn to keep my rows straight.  These are my onin plants.  Red onion can be expensive so I planed my own this year.

This photo is about a month old.

Planting time for us is over, but I am still waiting for a few things to come up.  In the mean time my goal for my garden is to keep weeds, grass, and pests down.  Our garden is right in the middle of a bermuda grass patch.  Bermuda grass is sort of like cudzu.  It seems the more you pull, the more it grows.  I spend time almost every day pulling up weeds or grass.  It is a lot of work; but it will be worth it!

Growing.



My husband is an aspiring photographer!

Zuchini squash flower.

Growing!



More photography by Ray.



Until next time,

Spring Garden!

It's that time of year again and I am so excited.  We spent all day yesterday getting the garden ready for planting. This year we plan to add an herb garden to the mix.  I will do my best to keep pictures uploaded and share any tips with you that I can.   Today's tip...don't plant your carrot by your squash.  I did one year and it stunted the growth of my carrots. (A helpful website about companion planting here.) Also, plant some basil by your tomatoes.  It is supposed to enhance the flavor (I don't know about that) and also keep bugs away.  It did help with that.  One more tip and I have shared this before...Use fish tank water for all your plants as a fertilizer; but especially pepper plants.  If you know anyone with a tank, ask them for a few gallons of water from it when they clean it montly.  My pepper plants have grown as high as three feet and that is all I use on them.

Until next time.

Blossom end rot

Now is about the time when your tomato and pepper plants are fruiting, but it can be very, very discouraging when you see black spots on the bottoms of your tomatoes and find that the whole thing is ruined.  Blossom end rot is a common problem for those who grow tomato or pepper plants.  Usually the cause is not enough rain or poor oxygen in the soil.  These two issues cause a calcium deficiency in the plant which causes the fruit to be ruinned.  To fix this problem, go to walmart ( or a garden or hardware store) and find a package of BONE meal.  (not to be confused with blood meal - though both are beneficial to these plants).  Follow the recommendations on the bag.  Another good remedy is making sure earth worms are present in your soil.  They help to keep it aerated.  Hope this helps!

Protect your seedlings- Tip #4

Last year, about two weeks after I planted my seeds, I went outside one day to thin (pluck up the excess seedlings - baby plants- and create straight rows).  Everything was great.  I remember in particular my squash seedlings.  I left maybe ten plants at this point and they were doing fine.  The next day I went outside and about half of them were missing!  What happened!?! All that was left of them was a little stub! 

What happened was, I had an infestation of cutworms.  Cutworms are the larvae (catepillars - babies) of night flying moths.  The moths won't do any damage to your plants; but the babies can be lethal.  The moths can lay hundreds of eggs at a time!  I was blessed not to have a total infestation; just a slight problem.

So what do you do?

1.  Till you garden area in the fall to help prevent winter overlay of larvae.
2.  Till again just before you plant to expose and kill larvae or cutworms.
3.  Reduce egg laying sites (weeds and plant residue).
4.  Put a border around each seedling - most cutworms prefer plants about an inch to an inch in a half in height.   Be sure to push the border into the ground about a half and inch or so to prevent the worm from being able to access your plant.
     Border ideas:
          1.  Styrophome cups. (dixie cup or something like that)
          2.  Old coffee canisters
          3.  Cardboard collars
          4.  Pretty much anything that will prevent the worm from being able to climb up your plant.

These little buggers are most active in the late afternoon, so if you want to see them in action; that's when you should go and check your garden; otherwise you will just have to wait until morning to view the damage.

Garden tip #3 - Know your soil

First, you need to know what category your soil falls in (clay soil, loam, sandy, combination, etc.).   If your soil is mostly clay, you can add some sand and/or garden/potting soil to adjust it. (Clay soil will hold in water which can drown your roots.)  If your soil is sandy (water will not be retained and your plants will be thirsty all the time) you may want to add some clay and/or garden soil.  Perfect soil falls right between the two and maintains proper water levels to keep your plants properly hydrated. Remember that certain plants prefer sandy - clay soil (ie watermelon prefers sandy)so, only adjust in areas needed.
Next, I recommend that you check your soil's pH for maximum growth and yield potential. This will greatly impact your garden. You may need to add some lime  (to raise your pH) or iron (to lower it). A pH of 7 is generally best for most plants.  If you are interested in growing mostly one plant - find that plants prefered pH and aim for it.  If you want to know what your pH should be for a certain plant, email me and I will try and get that information to you.

Gardening Tip #2 - Check your zone

One thing that helped me in gardening is knowing what my hardiness zone was. This differes from state to state, and sometimes differs in different parts of the state. I live in zone 7. Knowing your zone can help you to know when to plant what. You can find out your zone online or in a home and garden book. The first year I gardened, an old Home and Garden book that I found at the library was my gardening bible. It had a zone chart, a chart that told me what to plant beside what, and when to plant each vegetable and fruit for maximum growth and yielding. Now I have a book called "Just the Facts". IT IS GREAT!

Garden Tip number 1 - Tomatoes

One of my favorite things to plant, grow, and eat every year is tomatoes. Here is one thing that I have learned about buying tomatoes. First of all, some things are better to buy and plant as seeds, others as plants. Tomatoes - to me - belong in the latter category. My first year gardening I bought eight plants and planted them all. One died leaving me with seven. We also had a problem with black spots on the leaves, vermacillan wilt, and blossom end rot. One thing that will help with all of these things is to:

A.) Buy a variety of tomato that is vermacillian resistant. (may not be spelled correctly)
B.) Fertilize once a month - but not too much. If you do experience fertilizer burn, just water the plant almost to death. It should recover.
C.) Don't over-water
D.) If you or someone you know has a fish tank - use the water from the tank when they clean it out at the end of every month - GREAT fertilizer.
E.) Finally, and most importantly, pinch off any suckers. The best thing about this is that you can buy a plant that has a few suckers on it (or wait, they will come). lrt it grow a couple if inches, and replant just the sucker (put 80% of the little sucker in the ground and watch and wait!). It will grow and be just as healthy and productive as the original plant.

Suckers are the part of the tomato plant that stems from between two essential parts of the vine. I wish I had a picture to show you; but I didn't know I would be posting this today, so I didn't take a picture last year. (I will this year to show you later, or maybe I can find one on the web and post it.) In an effort to make sure you understand what a sucker is...you have the main vine, then you will have off shoots from that vine. After a few days you will see little vines beginning to grow out of the "v". That is a sucker. It will suck nutrients from your plant and will cause it to grow more vines and leaves than tomatoes. Also, your tomatoes will be better quality if you are faithful to pinch suckers off. Anything that does not come off the main vine can probably be cut or pinched off. Last year I even cut off some extra leaves. Cutting off extra will ensure that oxygen,bees,butterflies, and light can easily get to your blossoms and eventually fruit. If you don't know what you are doing, don't cut anything. It will still grow and you will be fine. If you plant more than one bush; pinch and cut what you think is un-important and see if everything is ok before you try it on the others.
Hope this bit of advice is a help to all tomato lovers.

Tinyla

12 Days until Spring!!!

Above you will find a picture of one of our gardens. Time did not permit me to upload more pictures for today's post, but I will later. This year I am a little bummed about my plans for our garden for 2010. Whatever we grow will have to be in pots or something that will move well as we will be in transition. Last year we planted strawberries (YUM!!!); but they don't fruit until this year in June. Raymond says we are going to dig every plant up and replant them where ever our place of residence will be in Arkansas. Sounds like work, but it will be worth it. (Right now I am thinking of all the things I will be able to make with my strawberries!!!)

The first year we planted a garden I grew just about everything I could get my hands on - watermelon (didn't work - picked a variety that was too big for the space I have), peppers, tomatoes, squash, okra, lettuce, carrots, cucumbers, eggplant, many different varieties of flowers (they attract bees, which pollinate your fruit and veggies), vegetable spaghetti (aka winter squash), broccoli, etc. (You get the idea). I really didn't know what I was doing, but I would plant something, then get so excited when I would see it growing that I would plant something else.

Last year (our second year) I stuck to things that I had a lot of success with in the previous year, or things that disappeared quickly from the freezer. We had a great crop of cucumbers, so I made a lot of pickles and some relish. We planted a hybrid version of watermelon (much smaller in diameter), cantaloupe, some strawberries, and onions. Everything turned out great; but Aaliyah came right in the middle of June so the garden was put on the back burner for a while.

This year I have big plans! I will plant a garden that will be harvested in the fall instead of the summer. I will post how things go and any tips and tricks as we learn them.

Dreaming of homegrown tomatoes,

Tinyla Charice