Guess What I Have Planned For This Weekend.....

I will be starting my tomatoes from seed.  Yes, according to our gardening calendar this is the weekend to start the seeds.  So looking forward to the new season and working the soil to produce some lovely vegetables.  I will be back later with what tomato seeds I decided to start this year.

I don't plan to go mad crazy with tomatoes as I did last year.  I have come to realize that my garden is small and the area it is located in only gets so much sun due to the house, shed, and fence, so most of the tomatoes struggled and the ones that did well shaded the rest of my vegetables, plus I have to move their location to help prevent disease.

I will also do some clean up in the garden and hopefully finish purchasing the soil and compost to fill the rest of the beds.  My husband helped me unload, re-cardboard the flooring (due to the excessive grass escaping through the cardboard/newspaper from before) and reload the soil back into the beds, so some of the depth is gone.

I HOPE (fingers crossed) I can go into the new season with a clean garden area and a clean shed (I know my husband would appreciate it).  Over the last week we have gotten drizzle to complete 2-4 inches of rain, so my garden area is well watered and hopefully Saturday/Sunday are good days to clean.  Also, this will give me a new outlook on where to plant the vegetables as last year I rushed to get everything in and the plan was haphazard.

Wish you all well and happy gardening.

Cynthia

New Ideas For The Garden

I am always looking for new things to try in the garden to try and make things better (mostly I like to experiment).  Today while reading through my favorite blogs, I came across Annie at Annie's Kitchen Garden and her recent post on her garden status.  I noticed these two posts on the right side of her blog and I read them again and thought this would be the year to give them a go.

The first one is making your own seed mats.  I have seen this all over the internet and mentioned in the various gardening classes I have attached and since I have plenty of seeds I will give this a try (also I did a cost comparison between standalone seeds and seeds already on plantable paper strips and there is a big price difference).  I think I would try it also with carrots as I tend to over plant and then I have to thin and I hate throwing away food only because they were planted to closely.  I figured out this year how to plant my onion sets and get them planted with good space around them.  I will know more at harvesting if I get bigger onions this go around.

The second one is bottomless tomato buckets.  This is the first time I have seen tomatoes grown in a bucket in this way before.  Last year I tried to grow a majority of my tomatoes in containers with only a few actually being in the raised beds (to tell you the truth I did not have enough real estate for ALL the tomatoes I started from seed).  I did notice that with the bucket method (which I placed on top of weed cloth outside the garden) that I had to water more often (I did get a few tomatoes, but not enough for what I put into it, also we had a drought last year).  I wonder if by sitting the buckets on top of the soil and allowing the plants to root into the soil below the bucket level, if it actually allows the plant to be more sturdy and allows it to take in more water and keep the soil moist (not sure, but will know for next time).

Thought I would share some new techniques from fellow gardeners.  I will soon be posting about my garden status and the plants that I started from seed and they are ready to go in the ground.  I should be able to start planting this weekend (knowing that there may be at least 1 or 2 more freezes possibly through April).

Happy Gardening......

Peppers In The Garden

I took a moment earlier last week to see what kind of peppers I had planted in the garden.  I also wanted to make a note of which ones were producing already, so they would be a likely choice (after tasting them) for next year.

Small pepper bed (transplants purchased):

• Sweet Banana Hybrid (4)
• Bonnie Green Bell (7)
• Cayenne Hot (4) already producing some peppers, picked 1st batch last weekend

Large Pepper Bed (grown from seed):

• California Wonder Bell (2)
• Jalapeno (2)

Large Pepper Bed (transplants purchased):

• Orange Sweet Bell
• Lilac (purple) Bell (2) already producing some peppers, picked 1st batch last weekend (the peppers were small, but were ready)
• Mucho Nacho Jumbo Jalapeno
• Serrano Chili already producing some peppers, picked 1st batch last weekend
• Tam (mild) Jalapeno already producing some peppers, picked 1st batch last weekend
• Sweet Banana Hybrid
• Yellow Bell
• Red Bell Sweet (2) already producing some peppers, still green
• Chocolate Bell (2) already producing some peppers, still green
• New Mexico 6-4L Chili
• Santa Fe Grande Chili

Sporadically Placed Around Garden (grown from seed):

• California Wonder Bell (2)
• Carnival Mix Sweet Bell
• Crispy Hybrid Bell (2)
• Jalapeno Early (2) 

Here are some photos of the peppers picked this weekend.


Lilac Bell Pepper

 

Serrano Chili Pepper

 

Sweet Banana Hybrid Pepper

 

Cayenne Hot Pepper



Red Bell Pepper (had to pick early as we needed one for dinner)



Sweet Peas

On a non-pepper note, while out in the garden picking peppers, I noticed the grape tomato plant had a few tomatoes that had turned red.  I had to taste them on the spot (2) and brought 2 inside the house.  They were good and slightly sweet.

Enjoy.

Here are some radom photos of how the peppers have been doing over the last couple of weeks.

In The Garden

Here is an update on the status of my garden.  I am feeling much better from having the flu and being in the hospital with pneumonia (although I was considerably behind while trying to get well, I have on 3 tomato plants left to plant, some plants are way too small for this time period, but they are in the ground).

I have noticed that since I moved the black/red raspberries and the blue berries to the patio there has been considerable growth.  I think next year will be much better since these plants are now getting total sun and they should be able to fruit up.  I am also giving the plants coffee grounds.

The potatoes are already starting to flower.  I would have thought it would have been a few more months before this occurred.  I planted them in March (I need to check the tag to see what the maturity time period is).



Here are the various tomato plants that I have actively growing in the garden.






2 photos above--Lemon Boy (store bought transplants)

 

Jelly Bean Hybrid (grown from seed)

  

Cherokee Purple (from seed, thanks engineeredgarden)

 



2 photos above--1 of 2 of my Roma Burpee plants, 1 is waiting to be planted (from seed).

 

Better Boy Hybrid (from seed)





2 photos above--Roman Candle 1 waiting to be planted (from seed, thanks engineeredgarden)

 

Burpee Sweet Snack Hybrid (from seed)

 

Early Girl Hybrid (from seed).  This plant had some frost damage, but so far it is almost as big as some of the other plants in the garden.

 

Burpee Sweet Hybrid (from seed)





2 photos above--Black Cherry (thanks engineeredgarden)





2 photos above--Bonnie Grape (store bought transplants)

 

Roma (store bought transplants)

 

Yellow Plum (store bought transplants)



2 photos above--Yellow Pear and it is forming tomatoes, since it is an indeterminate, we shall see (store bought transplant).  The last time I grew these were from seed and I got a lot of greenery, but one lonely tomato.



2 photos above--1 of 2 of my Paul Robeson tomato plants, it is starting to form tomatoes (thanks engineeredgarden)



3 photos above--Paul Robeson tomato plants, the 1st tomato plant is starting to form tomatoes, the 3rd is waiting to be planted (thanks engineeredgarden)

Pepper plants, most of the peppers in my garden, which there are tons, have all started to flower and/or produce baby peppers of some sort.



2 photos above--Chocolate Bell Peppers

 

Lilac Bell Pepper



Sweet Banana Pepper

 

Cayenne Pepper

Radishes

I have 3 egg plants in my garden and so far 1 of the 3 are starting to flower. 1 was about to flower, but since I moved it, the plant shock made it drop its flowers. My third plant was being shielded by the cabbage so I moved it and it is still a small plant (it is getting bigger by the day).

My cabbage plants are transplants and I have 4 of them growing.  Not sure if they are to close, so next year, I will try to plant them much further apart.

The green beans are coming along quite well.  I am not seeing the tendrils so not sure how big these plants will get.  I can't wait to try the green beans.  When I grew green beans during my first year of growing, I got enough to make one meal out of them and I was happy.  Hopefully I get more so that I can freeze them.

The peas don't look great, but they are flowering and have already started to form peas.  I love eating them right off the vine.

Cucumbers are starting to produce.  I LOVEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE cucumbers.  I accidentally picked up transplants that did not have the tags in there, but I do remember that some were Armenia, lemon, and burpless, will only find out which is which at picking time.  I don't mind.

The 1st photo below are the zucchini plants prior to them being moved into the buckets (2nd photo) as you can see they are very happy.  I have one plant in the bed in photo 1, just in case the buckets don't survive, it is not as big as the ones in the buckets, but it was planted much later.  They are all growing quite nicely.