It's planting season!

[Opsimath]

Well, it is here anyway.

Husband planted the Silver Queen sweet corn, lots of it, done with the tractor last weekend.

By hand we have Kennebec white potatoes and red potatoes (not sure what kind) in the ground, about 100 feet of each.

I have yellow onion sets to put out, hopefully this weekend.

I have never grown russet potatoes and it probably gets too hot for them here, but I had some sprouting like crazy in the kitchen. I love an experiment so I chit them today and will plant after the cut surfaces dry. We'll see what happens. If they don't produce spring moving into summer, and its accompanying heat, then I'll try again around late summer/fall going toward cooler days.

Cucumber, radish, and squash seeds waiting to be planted by hand. Tomatoes and peppers will likely be bedding plants but we don't have those yet.

After the corn sprouts I want to put bean seeds next to the corn. I read they make good companion plants. Definitely green beans (better than canned) and others yet to be determined.

I want to have herbs on the front porch again this year. They are really pretty and smell so good! At least a few different mints and basils, oregano, and rosemary. I'll try not to let the rosemary drown this year.

"My" little spot near the barn isn't ready yet because I still need to cut down the stuff making shade. I finally got chainsaw chaps and helmet on Wednesday so hoping to start learning chainsawing by next week! Woo-hoo!

Anyway I'm hoping to grow good healthy food and need far less of the grocery store stuff this year. We'll see.

I know we have some gardeners here. If you care to share, what will you be planting?

 

[lungimsam]

My wife plants various Chinese green leafy vegetables and squash, in her huge planters which we have sprawled around the back yard!! She is excited for this years' harvest! She has been "chumming" (spreading composted materials) in them for a few weeks now.

 

[FNG]

Love fresh chives, and fresh dill. Always have a pot of thyme growing. I'll buy a basil plant at the grocery when they look good.

With the long season, sweet potatoes would be productive.

I usually just wait until the local farmers market opens, get a bushel of sweetcorn, purple hulls, okra and cukes for pickling, and green beans all for the freezer. Save me the sunburn and fire ant bites!

 

[dreadnut]

Sounds like you've got your work cut out for you.

 

[gjmalcyon]

We're still 6 weeks away from the starting gun. Even then it can be a crap shoot until mid-May. Last year I had to put out the cloches and cover the raised beds a couple of times in May to keep the frost off. I'd really love to live in a place where I could treat my tomato and jalapeno and basil plants as perennials.

 

[Opsimath]

We're still 6 weeks away from the starting gun. Even then it can be a crap shoot until mid-May. Last year I had to put out the cloches and cover the raised beds a couple of times in May to keep the frost off. I'd really love to live in a place where I could treat my tomato and jalapeno and basil plants as perennials.

What? Tomato - perennials? I've not heard that, but there is a lot I haven't heard. I'm relatively new to this gardening stuff, started giving it a try about 2016 or 2017. Where could tomatoes be perennials?

 

[gjmalcyon]

What? Tomato - perennials?

The only thing that stops them from continuing to grow is frost or cold temperatures. They'll yield fruit for a couple of years if grown somewhere that stays above 60 degrees.

Disney had a tomato "tree" in Epcot that yielded 32,000 golf-ball sized tomatoes over the course of a year.

 

[Opsimath]

Impressive tomato tree. Apparently Disney is better at growing tomatoes than I have been to date. I wonder if they put egg shells in the planting hole. I also wonder what I would do with 32,000 tomatoes. That's a whole lot. So far, though, tomato overabundance has not been a problem I've had to solve.

One year my dad decided to run a rope from the back of the house to the shed and grow tomatoes on it. Mom said he had to use the stepladder to pick tomatoes.

By the way, gjmalcyon, I've always found it very entertaining that you call your girls Thing One and Thing Two. That is clever, and so funny! Isn't your wife She Who Must Be Obeyed? You are obviously one very intelligent individual!

 

[Guildedagain]

100' of potatoes x 2?

We plant garlic in the fall, it'll be popping up soon. Cold climate only crop probably, it needs a long freeze in the ground.

In spring, onions are the earliest, sweet onions, keeper onions, red salad onions, bunching onions, leeks.

Lots of radishes, lettuce is in the greenhouse already.

Potatoes later, Red Norland, Austrian Crescent, Carolla, Purple Viking, Allred (red inside like ham), Pinto, a white spotted red potato.

Turnips are great, a mild Japanese variety, Hakurei.

Tomatoes and peppers are already planted in trays, lots of jalapenos, cayenne, Hungarian hot wax, Anaheims for Chile Rellenos.

Eggplant, mostly Asian varieties.

Peas are soaking in inoculant for planting below fence trellis. Snap peas, Snow peas, and shelling peas.

Corn, sometimes not sweet but flour varieties. Popcorn.

Artichokes.

Kale, Chard.

Broccoli, cabbages, Brussel sprouts.

Summer squash, a couple cool ones beyond Zucchini are Pattipan Squash and Zapalito which grill up real nice on the BBQ.

Winter squash, lots.

Pumpkins.

Lots of Sunflowers.

 

[FNG]

Impressive tomato tree. Apparently Disney is better at growing tomatoes than I have been to date. I wonder if they put egg shells in the planting hole. I also wonder what I would do with 32,000 tomatoes. That's a whole lot. So far, though, tomato overabundance has not been a problem I've had to solve.

One year my dad decided to run a rope from the back of the house to the shed and grow tomatoes on it. Mom said he had to use the stepladder to pick tomatoes.

By the way, gjmalcyon, I've always found it very entertaining that you call your girls Thing One and Thing Two. That is clever, and so funny! Isn't your wife She Who Must Be Obeyed? You are obviously one very intelligent individual!

Tomatoes don't seem to do well in the hot, humid Florida summer. Most won't set a bloom if the nighttime temp is above 72 degrees.

The best luck I've had here (zone 8b), I planted them in mid February. Granted, I had to get through a couple of frosts, but they were very productive. About June they were done.

 

[Opsimath]

The rows are 50 feet, +/-. We have 2 rows white and 2 rows red. Yeah, probably a lot of potatoes, and historically it has been yours truly who digs them up, cures and stores them. That is usually a multi-day event. Something to look forward to.

Last year husband planted 2 rows each of squash and cucumbers, then a few weeks later planted 2 more of each. The first ones were still going strong when the second ones started producing. Oh. My. Goodness. I wasn't horribly dissapointed when weeds and dry weather put a good squelch on them. At that point I was running out of gardening steam!

 

[Opsimath]

Tomatoes don't seem to do well in the hot, humid Florida summer. Most won't set a bloom if the nighttime temp is above 72 degrees.

The best luck I've had here (zone 8b), I planted them in mid February. Granted, I had to get through a couple of frosts, but they were very productive. About June they were done.

I've been told they won't fruit in high temps. Last year our tomato production was ho-hum, likely due to heat. Thanks or the tip. I'll try to get them out much earlier next year, or maybe try some going toward fall this year.

 

[Opsimath]

100' of potatoes x 2?

We plant garlic in the fall, it'll be popping up soon. Cold climate only crop probably, it needs a long freeze in the ground.

In spring, onions are the earliest, sweet onions, keeper onions, red salad onions, bunching onions, leeks.

Lots of radishes, lettuce is in the greenhouse already.

Potatoes later, Red Norland, Austrian Crescent, Carolla, Purple Viking, Allred (red inside like ham), Pinto, a white spotted red potato.

Turnips are great, a mild Japanese variety, Hakurei.

Tomatoes and peppers are already planted in trays, lots of jalapenos, cayenne, Hungarian hot wax, Anaheims for Chile Rellenos.

Eggplant, mostly Asian varieties.

Peas are soaking in inoculant for planting below fence trellis. Snap peas, Snow peas, and shelling peas.

Corn, sometimes not sweet but flour varieties. Popcorn.

Artichokes.

Kale, Chard.

Broccoli, cabbages, Brussel sprouts.

Summer squash, a couple cool ones beyond Zucchini are Pattipan Squash and Zapalito which grill up real nice on the BBQ.

Winter squash, lots.

Pumpkins.

Lots of Sunflowers.

You are obviously not new to gardening. What is innoculent?

Does your popcorn pop well? I wanted to plant some a few years ago but husband doesn't want it to cross with the sweet corn. I don't either but I think it would be fun to grow.

What does the Allred potato taste like? Is it starchy or waxy? I like to try to grow things that are a bit out of the ordinary. I tried purple sweet potatoes one year but they didn't do well in my spot (too much shade). I hope to try them again but probably won't be this year since I don't have any to plant.

 

[rampside]

We can start plants indoors, but basically, another 8 weeks before anything can go in the ground.

 

[dreadnut]

Wow, guildyplleasures, that is an impressive garden! Where are you located in Washington State?

 

[twocorgis]

We got our bed in the yard going today with the addition of some nicely composted horse manure from a friend's riding academy. Expanding this year, and should have lettuce, cucumbers, tomatoes, red peppers, yellow squash, strawberries, and rhubarb. Rhubarb won't be ready until next season, but the blueberry and raspberry crop should be much better this year, so I should have some pie-making essentials.

Growing your own food is awesome.

 

[dreadnut]

Awesome, but my back can't handle gardening any longer. Stooping, bending over, squatting, kneeling are not in my wheelhouse any more. I decided to just do herbs & spices out on my upper deck, and get produce at our Farmers' Market in season. Supporting local farmers.

 

[Guildedagain]

Eastern WA, Zone 5 but should really be redesignated Zone 6, it's not as cold as used to be at all. Back in the 70's, January was 0º during the day, and -20 at night. Now it rains in January and the coldest we had all winter was down in the teens, we don't even see 0º anymore.

Allred tastes like any other potato, and probably a better fryer than a masher.

Popcorn did not pop like store stuff, but you get used to it, make 2 batches to make one big bowl.

You shouldn't grow two different kinds of corn in one year, it will cross pollinate.

The inoculant is used on peas and beans, on Nitrogen fixers, it promote the right kind of bacteria around the roots for the plant to fix Nitrogen better.

Growing any plant is totally about the soil, and all the micro organisms that live in healthy soil.

Any kind of synthetic fertilizer kills these micro organisms, as well pesticides.

You'll find it cheaper not to buy chemicals ;]

Soil amendments should be well composted manure, straw, organic matter.

Tomatoes don't like manure, prefer compost. The compost from your house and garden.

As mentioned also, eggshell, or bonemeal to prevent blossom end rot.

Never overwater, nutrients leach down out of reach of the plants roots.

Much better to use drip irrigation than sprinkler, especially if you have water issues.

We started having major water issues here in 2014. Catastrophic floods filled our creeks with rocks, our creek went dry and we lost our water.

We drilled a well and it went dry two years later. We could redrill even deeper but this time I want to spend the money on an underground cistern, fed from the gutters by rainwater.

We've been restoring the creek since it became a highway of rock and it's almost back to our house, that's where our water comes from.

Luckily, our place has an old water right, otherwise it's not yours to take.

Water on your property belongs to the state, here.

 

[FNG]

Does Fertilizer Kill Soil Bacteria?

Do synthetic fertilizers kill bacteria in soil? Is the soil food web right? Find out what really happens in the soil after adding fertilizer.

www.gardenmyths.com

 

[JohnW63]

I'm not letting my wife see this thread. We live in the "high desert" and the ground is sandy, or sort of clay-ish or if you dig a little it's caliche. That stuff laughed at me when I was trying to dig post holes with a power auger. We had to resort to raised beds that are about 4 X 8 feet. 14 of them. Then the gophers found their way in. We're digging all the soil out and putting in a tight metal mesh screen in the bottom of the beds.