Vegetable Gardeners check in!

[janey99]

A few months ago we had a surge of threads about people getting their seeds and gardens off the ground - now that some growing time has passed, how's everyone doing?!

We ended up blocking off 1600 SF of our yard for a garden with 12 raised beds, and we are having the best time as a family with our garden!

We are already enjoying multiple varieties of lettuce and spinach (and giving away bags and bags). Last night we had sausage, pasta and broccoli rabe using our own rabe. Our snap peas have a pod here and there, with tons of flowers coming out, and our soybeans, pumpkins, watermelons, carrots, radishes, squash, cucumbers, broccoli and tomatoes are all coming along. I've been really aggressive with trimming bottom shoots off the tomatoes, and really forcing them to vine high, and it looks like it's paying off with lots of flowers (crossing my fingers - I have so many different varieties I'm relying on each plant self pollinating, so I need lots of flowers on each one). The only disappointment is our pepper plants - every variety seems to be on the smallish side with blossoms clustered at apexes - not sure how much "crop" we're going to get. Our strawberries have been producing really well too, and our herbs are getting bigger.

DS10 loves checking things every day, and is eating a lot of things right off the plants as he finds them. I love showing him how the various fruits and veggies emerge from the various parts of the plants. At first, he wanted to save every bug we found, until he came out one morning and found a giant green caterpillar on a decimated broccoli plant - now he ruthlessly squashes caterpillar and cheers on spiders that he finds. Each kid in our extended family (2 DSs and 2 cousins) has been "assigned" a giant pumpkin vine, so the race is on to see who gets the biggest pumpkin by Halloween.

Additionally, DH and DS built a worm box that we have filled with compost and worms.

What about everyone else - I love hearing about other people's gardens too!

Jane

 

[T16GEM]

I don't have as much space as you and a lot of mne is growing in containers - I am growings peas, carrots, strawberries, beans, pumpkins, chili peppers, raspberries, red cabbage, purple brocolli, lettuce, tomatoes and onions.

Things are going well so far, my DD3 loves to go and pick the strawberries, and she simply loves tomatoes so once they start to fruit she will be in her element!

 

[worm761]

I had a huge garden all planned out then found out I am pregnant. So no garden for me. It was 95 degrees at 930am yesterday. It feels like over 100 around here so I won't have a garden this year. The one thing I did get to do is plant some berry bushes. I planted 4. the blueberry bush and both raspberry bushes died but my blackberry bush seems to be living. No fruit yet though. So I will not have a garden until next year. I am thinking about growing some herbs in some pots I have. that wouldn't be too hard to do while pregnant.

 

[Chim Chiminy]

DH and DS put in four 4X8 beds for my birthday/mother's day gifts.
We have broccoli, several variaties of tomatos including some heirloom, sweet peas which are vining, zucchini which is growing like crazy, black beans, green beans, snow peas, carrots, two kinds of cukes and peppers.
Also several types of herbs and glads, because I like cut flowers.
I need to build some trellising for the plants also, since we can grow more vertically.

Also our compost pile has some cukes growing in it, so we are leaving that part be. And we have wild raspberries along our back fence.

 

[Chicago526]

After two years of bad crops from our back yard garden due to the lack of sunlight (biiiig sycamore tree..) I switched up and put some plants in pots on the south side of the house. So far, so good. Our 3 green bell peppers, 3 red bell peppers, 1 sweet basil and 1 patio tomato are all doing really well, much better than they did in the back yard.

If they do well this year, we may put planter boxes along the side of the house to plant more veggies and still have it look nice, since our side yard is totally visable from the street.

 

[Topper]

Did you know there is a flower and garden forum on the DIS?
http://disboards.com/forumdisplay.php?f=66

 

[minkydog]

Our garden is a bit smaller this year. It's getting harder and harder for DH to work it and he really loves his garden. We had a friend come over with his tiller to do the heavy work. We've had so much rain here in Georgia that our clay soil is just saturated (Not complaining--we've been in an extreme 4year drought.) DH had a great idea--make the rows and pour potting soil in the troughs, then plant the seeds. They're going like gang-busters!

We planted yellow squash, green beans, tomatoes, bell peppers, jalapenos,& cucumbers,onions, garlic, and a few sugar pumpkins. I edged the garden with marigolds, short suflowers(4ft tall) and the regular Mammoth sunflowers. We harvest the seeds for the birds during the winter. I wish we could grow lettuces, spinach, and broccoli here, but it's just too darn hot. We use organic methods and we love our compost pile.

Our motto is "Enough for us, enough for the neighbors, and enough for the critters." Don't want to accidently poison the bunnies

 

[D&DDisney]

I've got a small garden against the back of the garage. Faces south and everything grows great.

Planted... cukes, tomatoes (cherry & roma) lettuce, green beans, green onions, & cilantro.

So far everything is growing slow but good. Temps haven't been too warm yet.

 

[merekc]

I've got my first garden planted this year!

I have two raised 4x4 beds based on the square foot gardening method (thanks to a Diser who mentioned it). I'm having successes and failures.

My broccoli had some small heads, but now it is getting too hot and it got worms, so I'm thinking about pulling them out. Unless they will come back in the fall, which I don't think they will.

My carrots have about 4 that I think might be growing.

Onions (from sets) are growing, but not like my inlaws huge ones, so not sure how they are doing.

Pepper plant looks wimpy. I thought it was suppose to be an easy one to grow. Not sure how it is doing.

Zucchini is huge and has huge blooms. Getting excited about that one.

Cucumbers have blooms and are growing, but leaves are really yellow (and have been). I assume it is doing ok.

Tomatoes are looking good. Growing like crazy and I'm training them up a trellis. Have a handful of various size tomatoes on the vines. Should I be cutting off the lower branches? I've got several that have all the sudden burst out huge lower branches.

I need to start researching what I should be doing with these plants. Maybe I'll check out the gardening forum.

 

[pweyl36]

We put in 2 cukes,red let,butter let,and 2 pepper plants that are growing slow. The cukes are growing like crazy with lots of blooms.

 

[janey99]

All the gardens sound great!

I'm sort of glad to hear I'm not the only one with disappointing peppers. Maybe all the really robust stuff like zucchini and tomatoes just make them look wimpy?

to merekce - I've aggresively pruned the bottom shoots off my tomatoes up to about one foot off the ground - this seems to be encouraging flower bearing, rather than leaf bearing shoots on the upper half of the plants. It also makes it easier to stake the tomatoes since I'm just attaching the stem to the stake, not working around a ton of leaves. If you have a bunch of plants, it might be worth trying this method on a few to see how it goes.

Minkydog - I've got my lettuce in dappled shade and it is doing really well - maybe something you could try?

worm - sending you some virtual vegetables and good luck with your pregnancy!

Good night all!

Jane