| T O P I C R E V I E W |
| Bella |
Posted - Aug 17 2012 : 12:51:32 PM
I worked so hard on my spring/summer garden this year and was disappointed with just about everything. All of my lettuces and radishes were lovely. With the exception of the cherry tomatoes, the 25 or so heirloom and organics I planted produced very few tomatoes. Cukes and peppers were okay. I planted 129 hills of organic potatoes which yielded only two bushels. Other plants like corn, carrots, and melons did not fully develop. Can't understand if it's the heat (a record high in my area, even higher than a documented reading back in 1936)or the soil that's causing this. We did put down lime and I used a high quality organic fertilizer. Now, I will concentrate on planting my fall garden and see how that does. Has anyone else had similar problems?
"Just living is not enough, said the butterfly. One must have freedom, sunshine and a little flower." -Hans Christian Anderson |
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| neeter302 |
Posted - Nov 11 2012 : 12:09:07 PM
Our garden did very poorly as well this year, so disheartening & discouraging. Not only did we have to deal with record heat and drought, the little that did produce was consumed by critters. I've never seen such a difficult garden season. Early on turtles came from the creek and ate all our strawberries, raccoons dessimated our corn, tore down the stalks and ate every last ear of corn, green beans didn't do well at all, tomatoes were a disaster and have been for the last three years, DH went out a couple weeks ago to dig up our sweet potatoes and shrews had eaten almost all of them, we got about a half basket and were planning on having sweet potatoes long into winter. We have enough for thanksgiving but that's about it! I guess I should be thankful we even have that. One thing that flourished to the point of having to cut it out were sunchokes/Jerusalem artichokes, but we don't eat them very much and don't know anyone who does so cleared them out, they were taking over. I sure hope next year is better, my goodness, only thing I got to can this year was some spaghetti sauce and apple butter. Very disappointing. Our local apple orchard owner's crop did so poorly this year he had to take an outside job, first time in decades his family has not been able to earn a living from their apples. Our farmer's market has dwindled down to very few, local health department stopped farmers from selling eggs, and other sellers from vending their honey, etc. Sad situation for sure. |
| Nancy Dawn |
Posted - Oct 01 2012 : 03:32:37 AM
Karen, I actually have three ducks and five geese! The oldest one is Charlie and he is a Brown Chinese. We got the other four to hopefully have a mate for him but they ended up being African geese. The ducks are a male mallard and two female Khaki Campbells. I put up temporary fencing to keep them out but they found a way in. So...more fencing! Actually the plants they gobbled on have come out of it very nicely. As soon as it dries up here I plan on side dressing the plants with more berries. ;)
Brenda, let's not talk about fruit flies! I cannot get rid of them! I have been battling for months!
I had beautiful sunflowers but I have no idea how or when to harvest the heads. Any tips?
We pruned our fuit trees in the spring, one died and none of the others produced a thing. The blueberry bushes were loaded and then it frosted and wiped out everyone of them.
This truly been a crazy weather year!! Wondering what Fall and Winter weather is going to be like!
http://lifeatelevenfifteen.blogspot.com
Ecc. 4:12 ...a strand of three cords is not quickly broken. |
| brightmeadow |
Posted - Sep 30 2012 : 8:51:35 PM
I also had spectacular failures this year. I did harvest several bushels of tomatoes from 48+ plants (ask me about hte fruit flies in my kitchen), and a bushel or more of green beans from thousands of plants, sunflower heads from almost all of our sunflowers, and 1 watermelon. I planted the peas too late, and didn't harvest them, my lettuce bolted in the heat, my apples suffered from frost damage, and overall it was a dismal year. We did get some sweet corn from the 1/2 acre we planted, but not enough to make it pay. Hope next year is more like normal and not a repeat of climate change.
You shall eat the fruit of the labor of your hands - You shall be happy and it shall be well with you. -Psalm 128.2
Visit my blogs at http://brightmeadowfarms.blogspot.com (farming) http://brightmeadowknits.blogspot.com (knitting) or my homepage at http://home.earthlink.net/~brightmeadow |
| Bella |
Posted - Sep 30 2012 : 5:45:44 PM
Thanks, Nancy. Your use of the bunny berries is quite ingenious. I love those beautiful creatures and don't mind sharing a bit of green with them. The geese; however, are another story. Are they the Candadian kind? They can be quite pesky. When they frequent our pond, they bring with them what we call "duck weed," which makes a mess. We usually have a pair of Mallards and a lone Crane, that are quickly scared off by the geese. And, they think nothing of coming into the yard and onto the driveway and carport, leaving their droppings behind. They are beautiful creatures, but I'd rather they kept their distance! I do have a few lettuces coming up, arugula, and radishes. We had four inches of rain yesterday, so I'm hoping that will give the garden a growth spurt.
"Just living is not enough, said the butterfly. One must have freedom, sunshine and a little flower." -Hans Christian Anderson |
| Nancy Dawn |
Posted - Sep 28 2012 : 6:52:13 PM
Hi Karen,
On one hand, I am envious of your rocks! On my parents place, my dad is always digging up rocks and he has made some beautiful rock walls! I do not have that many rocks on my place so no rock walls for me.
This year I have rabbits and I used those bunny berries to fertilize part of the Fall garden. So far those plants are doing much better than the ones where hubby put down 30-0-0 fertilizer.
We have broccoli, a variety of lettuce, cabbage, collards, cauliflower and Brussel Sprouts. I have 5 geese that thought the collards were scrumptious!!!
Good luck!
http://lifeatelevenfifteen.blogspot.com
Ecc. 4:12 ...a strand of three cords is not quickly broken. |
| Bella |
Posted - Sep 28 2012 : 5:59:20 PM
I've planted my fall garden and hoping/praying for the best. It's not huge, just a couple different kinds of lettuce, spinach, radishes, etc. Also made a small plot for turnips/collards/mustard greens. As several of you recommended, we will do soil testing at the end of this year's harvest. We have a friend who gets rich soil from the city yard once a year. The city gives it away once a year and it is basically mulch from leaves that have been collected during the year. And, we do need a good cover crop. One other thing that I battle in my gardens is rocks. We plough, dig, till, and the rocks keep coming. I'm piling them up for now and will figure out what to do with them later on. My mother told me, "When you buy fish, you buy bones. When you buy land, you buy stones."
"Just living is not enough, said the butterfly. One must have freedom, sunshine and a little flower." -Hans Christian Anderson |
| Nancy Dawn |
Posted - Sep 25 2012 : 07:38:16 AM
I recommend soil testing too. And if you have any bare spots plant a cover crop this fall. I was blessed to have a wonderful garden this year. We have a pump down at the creek and pipe water up to sprinklers around the garden. Only thing is, the creek is fed by an underground spring and when the temps were so wretched, the creek would dry up until morning. Hope you have a tremendous fall garden.
Ecc. 4:12 ...a strand of three cords is not quickly broken. |
| Bear5 |
Posted - Sep 09 2012 : 09:22:03 AM
Our garden was almost a flop! The okra was plentiful, and still producing. I refused to give up on the tomatoes, but finally pulled them all out of the ground. It wasn't our year to grow tomatoes.
Hopefully, Karen, next year your garden will be wonderful.
Marly
"It's only when we truly know and understand that we have a limited time on earth- and that we have no way of knowing when our time is up- that we will begin to live each day to the fullest, as if it was the only one we had." Elisabeth Kurler-Ross |
| Bella |
Posted - Sep 04 2012 : 1:26:17 PM
Thanks, Connie. I do need to do that. My husband is a chemist, so he should be able to take care of the testing. I have started planting lettuce seed and plan to plant turnips and other greens as well as radishes. I recently ordered some organics from Southern Seed Exchange. Hopefully my fall garden will be a success.
"Just living is not enough, said the butterfly. One must have freedom, sunshine and a little flower." -Hans Christian Anderson |
| mickib |
Posted - Aug 30 2012 : 12:37:07 PM
Our garden was hit or miss this year. We took out all our old raspberries and replaced them this spring, so they were pretty pitiful. Tried growing tomatoes in pots for the first time and got blossom end rot really bad but only on one of the plants. Tried all the helpful hints but never could get rid of it - so that plant is pretty much a waste. Grew lettuce in boxes on the patio and cabbage worms took out one whole box of lettuce. On the plus side, we've got a bumper crop of blackberries this year and it looks like our grapes will finally be mature this year. Win some - lose some. |
| 82kygal |
Posted - Aug 30 2012 : 07:59:10 AM
Ours was a flop too. The only thing I had tons of is my zukes. We had such high temps and no rain early on and that stopped a lot of growing. Hoping for better next year.
With God, all things are possible. (Mark 10:27)
What ever you are, be a good one. (Abe Lincoln) |
| naturemaiden |
Posted - Aug 30 2012 : 02:01:49 AM
Hi Karen, I recommend testing the soil to make sure nothing important is missing. sometimes the weather takes a toll. my cukes and squashes dies off from fungal issues with the humidity we had. i went to college for horticulture but yet i cant make everything grow. nature has control.
with the cool weather around the corner it's a good time to get some cool weather crop seed in now.
Connie
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| AlyssaMarie |
Posted - Aug 29 2012 : 4:16:41 PM
My garden had some real hits and misses this year for sure! My germination rate was pitiful - maybe about 1/3 of the seeds I put in the ground ever came up. Finally I am starting to get some produce and last week I had a frost - CAN YOU BELIEVE A FROST IN AUGUST!?!??? I'll be doing a lot different next year for sure!
AlyssaMarie @ Link'd Hearts Ranch
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| FarmDream |
Posted - Aug 22 2012 : 3:35:54 PM
Ours was a flop too. We will put our efforts into the winter garden. That one seems to be turning out much better.
~FarmDream is Farmgirl Sister #3069
Live Today, Cherish Yesterday, Dream Tomorrow
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http://julie-rants.blogspot.com |
| Annette Kath |
Posted - Aug 21 2012 : 9:42:08 PM
Sorry to hear that your garden didn't fair well.
It was very, very dry in our part of Illinois but our garden did quite well. We planted everything early due the mild spring we had. We put up 14 qts peas, 15 qts and 13 pints of pickled beets and gave some away. So far I've harvested about 50 lbs potatoes and I've also canned 7 qts green beans. My tomatoes have been quite small and the green beans have been slow in coming on.
One thing we did that helps tons is we put newspaper between the rows and around the plants and covered the newspaper w/straw! It keeps the moisture in and the weeds out!
Annette |
| melody |
Posted - Aug 21 2012 : 07:08:24 AM
I had very big plans this past winter to have the ultimate raised garden beds-UTTER failure. It was very dismal and nothing grew bigger than the greenhouse plants I bought at our local nursery. I invested in quite a few Rosemary plants ( I LOVE Rosemary) and I wanted to dry all of it for the winter months-I also use a lot in my Herbal Salve and cooking.Every once in a while I will snip a few leaves or so, but the plants are so small and puny! I have NEVER experienced anything like this before and it was very disappointing. Just about 4 weeks ago my flowers along side my picket fence in the backyard took off so at least I have some zinnias and wildflowers to look at from the kitchen window. The weather cooled and we finally had some decent rain for a stretch. But, No fruit to speak of in Michigan... lost about 80% of their Apple crop, and my plums dropped a lot of fruit early on, but I will still be able to make plum jelly in September-And not a thing you can do about it... Nature is just being Nature.
Melody
Farmgirl #525 |
| SandraM |
Posted - Aug 21 2012 : 06:29:03 AM
Sorry to hear about your garden.
Ours did not do well either. We had record breaking heat and no rain for a large part of the summer.
I have to believe that had a lot to do with it.
The only thing that did really well was the ragweed.
We are going to get some peppers and cherry tomatoes but not much else.
Sandra
www.mittenstatesheepandwool.com |
| chickenmom |
Posted - Aug 20 2012 : 7:43:03 PM
My spring/summer garden didn't do well either, neither did last years. Very few beans even came up much less produced. Tomatoes got leaf curl, peppers are suffering from lack of calcium from lots of watering due to excessive heat, squash, pumpkins and winter squash all overrun with squash bugs, carrots never came up, and only 2 beets. However, my DH plays music at our local farmers market on Saturdays, the vendors all donate items to "pay" him with. This weekend he came home with bags of squash, cukes, eggs, tomatoes, peppers, homemade english muffin bread, cinnamon rolls, stuffed squash, canteloupe, watermelon and more, so I'm not doing without fresh produce!
DH and I were talking about his grandmother planting by the "signs" and never had a failed garden, so I decided to follow the planting guide in the Farmers Almanac www.farmersalmanac.com to plant my fall/winter garden. Last week planted root veges, and they are all already appearing. Latter part of this week is good for above ground crops so I will be planting those. (weather permitting I can sometimes grow "summer" veges as late as November here) Next year I'll do the same if able. Let the fall garden prosper... |
| ceejay48 |
Posted - Aug 20 2012 : 7:23:08 PM
We didn't even plant a garden this year . . . very, very, VERY uncharacteristic for me (us)! Last year, and the only year in our gardening history, our garden did SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO poorly that I was so disheartened and discouraged I quit going out there. And, because of that and being stretched to limit with work this year and a poor snowfall this winter with drought conditions I just said "I have absolutely NO interest in planting a garden"! People who know me thought I'd lost my mind!
Hopefully things will smooth out and I'll be ready for next year!
Hang in there!
CJ
..from the barefoot farmgirl in SW Colorado...sister chick #665.
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| Bella |
Posted - Aug 20 2012 : 6:49:52 PM
Thanks everyone for all the good advice and well wishes. I did the soaker hoses on my tomatoes but it didn't help, just gave me an enormous water bill. I am in the piedmont region of North Carolina and we've had sweltering heat this summer.
The thing about using fish as a fertilizer is very interesting. And, a friend who does raised beds because of limited garden space told me that I'm not getting enough shade on my garden. It is in direct sunlight. He also incorporates the free mulch (from leaves) that a neighboring town offers once a year, and he had a bumper crop of tomatoes this year. It still puzzles me that all of the different lettuces, i.e., large head, romaine, arugilla, purple leaf, thrived for weeks. I harvested those until the heat made them taste bitter. Spinach, which usually does great, did not do well. I do agree about the Foxfire "planting by the signs." I usually follow that, but did not this year, so there you go. I'll do better next time. Good luck to everyone with your fall gardens.
"Just living is not enough, said the butterfly. One must have freedom, sunshine and a little flower." -Hans Christian Anderson |
| AnnieinIdaho |
Posted - Aug 18 2012 : 11:16:29 AM
How disappointing! I am curious about the folklore I've been reading in the Foxfire series. These mountain folk passed down their "systems" which seemed to work in their region of Appalachia. They followed the signs of the moon, etc. Foxfire Book 4 section on Gardening has these quotes: Lizzie said, "They'd never plant corn when the signs was on the new of the moon; it would grow so high you couldn't reach the ears. They planted corn on the full moon, and it'd grow short and the ears would be full. And the potatoes the same way--if you planted them on the new of the moon, they'd make all vines and no potatoes. So we'd plant potatoes on dark nights in March or April." Her mamma would plant things grow leafy on the new of the moon.
Esco Pitts remarks, "You want'a put onions out in March. You can put them out earlier, but they do better to put them out on a dark moon, for they make underground." (Time to establish a root system). Interesting remarks on all the various vegetables in this book. They did use ashes a lot to enhance their soil. And back in their day since they burned the soil to rid weeds, their gardens were pest free. I think the soil benefitted from the burning too. So interesting. But too, this year with drought and rains out of balance, some too much, others too little and too early it is not surprising. I know my sister said the early rains in Michigan wiped out the apple and cherry chops there. They had to ship in cherries from out of the country to celebrate the annual cherry festival. Crazy! I know I would have starved in the pioneer days as the only place I had a green thumb was in Virginia, and it wasn't because of my skill level..it was just a good weather pattern.
Best to you. Sorry for your disappointment. But keep a trying!
Annie
"The turnings of life seldom show a sign-post; or rather, though the sign is always there, it is usually placed some distance back, like the notices that give warning of a bad hill or a level railway-crossing." Edith Wharton, 1913 from 'The Custom of the Country'. |
| Dorinda |
Posted - Aug 18 2012 : 10:10:30 AM
Okay so I have been gardening for 33 years. I have tried both types of gardening. Organic and not organic . I have found that the organic gardening just does not seem to yeild as much produce. So what i have done is roto tillered off 2 gardens. One organic with heirloom plants and the other all hybrid plants and of course fertilizer and bug dust. The organic garden never produces as much produce but the taste to me is so much better and of course a little more work. The hybrid garden produces a lot more veggies but does not seem to have that sweet taste I get from the organics. But is great for canning and freezing. I love eating all the organic veggies fresh. But like I said I do not get alot of produce so it is just enough for my table at dinner but not to freeze or can. Also some years my garden has done great and some years not so great. So maybe your fall garden will do much better and as time goes by it seems like I learn something new every year. I have kept a journal of my gardens.
Seize The Day!
Dorinda |
| prayin granny |
Posted - Aug 18 2012 : 08:15:17 AM
I container garden some on my balcony. My herbs did well as always but not tomatoes. The intense summer heat just did them in this year!
So true, can't go backwards? So let's hope next years gardening season goes better for some of us!
Farmgirl blessings,
Linda
Country at Heart |
| 22angel |
Posted - Aug 18 2012 : 06:05:01 AM
My "garden" didn't produce very much either - a handful of peas (organic) & maybe 2 handfuls of beans. No spinach grew, my pepper & tomato didn't grow/produce. Sad it didn't do anything. At least I wasn't really looking to have a lot of stuff to keep me over the winter :s. It would have been nice to have some beans & peas for a few meals anyways. Oh well. What's done is done & we can't change it. Thinking next year I need to put some fertilizer or something in the pots.
Life isn't about finding yourself. It's about creating yourself.
"When I grow up, I want to be dirt." seen on a box through construction in Wyoming 2010 |
| Fiddlehead Farm |
Posted - Aug 17 2012 : 8:57:57 PM
Karen,
Where abouts do you live? Tomatoes are pretty heavy feeders and require calcium to set blossoms. Pruning the suckers helps also because the plant can put more energy into blossoms and fruit than leaves and stems. I saw a post on some gardening web-site where a guy puts a whole dead fish in the hole before he plants his tomatoe plant! I don't do this, but I do get special tomato food from my garden center. I also use compost. I water the tomato plants with drip hoses at the base which helps from soil born diseases damaging the leaves. I also use straw for mulch to maintain the moisture. Tomatoes like a couple inches of water per week. I live in Southern Wisconsin and we have had one of the worst droughts and heat since the 30's also. I had to be very dilligent about watering my gardens this year.
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