Veggie Garden Update

I got a lot done in the garden this morning, and finished up by about 2:00pm, right before it started raining.  Yay - it has been pretty dry so I am glad to see some rain.

First, the tomatoes needed some pruning and staking.   The row of tomatoes along the back of the veggie plot are supported by just a rough homemade bamboo frame (made out of bamboo stakes stuck into the ground with a couple of bamboo "cross-beams" running horizontally).  Since there is nothing to attach the frame to the side of the house, the weight of the tomatoes is starting to pull the frame over.  I should have taken a photo of it earlier - you can kind of see in this older photo how the plants are starting to list to the left.

The vines have been growing like crazy in the heat, so I needed to pinch off many of the suckers (which grow in the crooks between the main vine and the leaves).  Some of them had grown quite large, so I felt bad about pruning them but it had to be done.  I needed to figure out some way to support the bamboo stakes so they would sit a bit more upright.  So I tied the right side of the bamboo frame to a pipe that sticks out from the side of the house.

Then I took an old metal stake that I found rusting in the backyard when we  moved in to the house and hammered into the left side of the plot and tied it to the bamboo frame on that side.

So far, this seems to be working.  We will see what happens as the tomatoes continue to grow:

slightly more upright

I also pruned the tomatoes in Tomato Pot Alley and added some fertilizer to each of the plants.

The extra orange bucket you see there is filled with water mixed with the tomato clippings I pruned today.  We read that water steeped with tomato clippings makes a good insect repellant.  After it steeps for a while, we will drain it and put it into spray bottles to spray on the plants to keep bugs away.

While I was pruning and staking the tomatoes, I noticed this:

One of the tomatoes is starting to ripen!

And this:

Another ripening tomato!

Second, I continued my cleaning up of the veggie plot by removing a bunch of the marigold plants.  You may recall that when I first planted the marigolds (which I did to deter insects from eating my veggie plants), they looked like this:

But, before long, they turned into this:

In other words, many of the marigolds have been completely overtaken by the other plants.  I was planning to just pull a bunch of them out and discard them, but for whatever reason, the Moth has developed an affection for them and wanted me to save them - despite the fact that we have more than enough marigolds in containers on our front steps:

The Marigolds are just there to protect the basil plants I have growing in containers

So, I pulled four of the marigold plants out of the veggie plot and transplanted them into a pot, which is now at the corner of our walkway, leading up to the front door:

After clearing out the veggie plot, and harvesting yet more of the basil plants, the peppers are finally getting a little room to breath.  I noticed that some of the hot peppers were bowing over a little, so I hammered a couple of bamboo stakes into the ground and tied them up:

I just use ordinary twine (which I cut into pieces from large ball)
to tie up my tomatoes and peppers

More peppers being staked:

And some new teeny purple peppers on one of my black pearl pepper plants:

Kissed by raindrops (yes, I'm poetic)

Another more disturbing thing I discovered while I was doing all this pruning and cleaning is that the stems of my zucchini plant (closest to the ground) looked as though someone had been chewing on them.  After some internet research, I realized this was probably not a furry pest, but an insect.  Maybe a cucumber beetle or squash vine borer.  There's a lot of different advice on how to combat them, but this is what I decided to do in the end:

I cut into the affected area with a sharp knife.  Any disgusting insects that crawled out (of which there were many) I shmooshed and killed.  Then, I sprinkled the vine with Diamotaceous Earth (which I had purchased on Amazon previously because I read it was a good insect repellant and/or killer).  Then, I sprayed with hot pepper spray, buried the vines with moist soil and then sprinkled again with DE. This is how the area looked after all of my machinations. 

I hope I'm not too late and the evil bugs have not already killed my plant.  We will see.  For good measure, I sprinkled the rest of the veggie plot, including the squash plant, with DE and sprayed some hot pepper spray.  Of course, a couple of hours later it rained, so it may all have to be reapplied.

Finally, I pulled up some very small onions that I have interplanted throughout the garden:

I was hoping they would be a bit bigger by now, but - okay - we will just call them red scallions.  How about that?  They are supposed to cure for a while before using - at least according to the internet.  Although, since I'm not exactly planning to store them for the long cold winter (this about half of the amount of onion I use for one dish) I'm not really sure if that step is necessary.

Cool bean!

I'm not a huge bean eater and I've never grown beans.  For some reason, I had it in my head that they were complicated and difficult to grow.  But, over the past few months several people have asked if I'm growing beans and have mentioned how easy they are to grow.  So, a couple of weeks ago, I picked up this colorful mix of beans:

I don't have any more room left in my little vegetable plot to add beans, so I've decided to try growing them in a large pot.  I drilled holes in the bottom and added some empty plastic bottles for drainage and to make the pot lighter and easier to move around.  Then I filled it with potting mix, combined with fertilizer, some manure, blood meal, and granulated lime.  I planted the bean seeds (which were all different colors) in a circle around the edge of the pot.  I added three bamboo stakes which I tied together at the top with twine, so the beans have something to climb.  According to the package, the plants are supposed to start sprouting in about 7 to 14 days.  A couple of days ago,  I saw the first sprout, and today I took a photo of the little guy:

My First Bean Plant!

I keep the pot on a wooden dolly on the side of the driveway that we never use.  That way if I ever need to move it around, it should be fairly easy to shift:

Questions About Hardy Lilies

The MOTH fell in love with this Lily when we were at a local garden center a few weeks ago:

So, we bought it and I transplanted it into this container.  Since, then it has been losing flower petals pretty much every day. I assume this is pretty normal, but I have not been able to find much information about "Hardy Lilies" on line, and they are not mentioned in my plant book.

My questions are:

• Once the flower petals fall off, should I remove/pinch off the little nub at the bottom or just leave it.
• Will any flowers grow back this season, or are they gone for good? 
• Once all the flowers are gone, what do I do - should I cut the foliage or just leave it? 
• What do I do with it over the winter?

Any help would be fabulous!

Why Aren't My Greens Growing?

I have been following several of the Harvest Monday posts by various gardening bloggers.  Each Monday, participating bloggers post about their harvests for the week.  I am so jealous of the stuff that people are harvesting.  It seems that people are growing huge amounts of greens, among other things.  I originally planted these greens (lettuce and swiss chard) back at the end of March.  On May 13, they looked like this:

Lettuce and Swiss Chard as of May 13

Today, they look like this:

Today

There are a few more leaves on the Rosalita lettuce (on the far right) and some of the other leaves are a bit bigger, but it looks pretty much the same.  I had a lot of issues with bugs eating these greens, so I moved the pot around a few times, sprayed them with organic insect repellant, and added some more mulch made of dead leaves.  I also read that the spiny "maces" that fall from Sweet Gum trees are a great for deterring slugs that attack lettuce, so I added those to my pot.  I also originally had it in the sunniest part of my garden, so I moved it to a slightly less sunny location, since I read that too much heat and sun isn't great for greens.

But still, I'm depressed about the results.  When I see the gorgeous greens that other bloggers are producing, I can't figure out what I'm doing wrong.  I've been reading all kinds of advice about growing greens, but still don't know what I should do differently.

Hoping others will have some advice for me.

Need Help With Problem Plants

I'm seeing some problems on some of my plants.  If anyone can help me identify the problem and what to do about it, I'd be very grateful.

First, there are brown spots on some of my tomato plant leaves.   Interestingly, even though I planted four different types of seeds, the brown spots only appear on the San Marzano plant leaves.  Here are shots of several different plants:

Second, I planted several carrot seeds outside over a month ago.  Only one has had any significant growth and it was looking pretty good until yesterday.  Now the leaves are all mottled, like this:

Finally, I bought some succulents at Home Depot, which I planted in a container.  One of them is starting to turn an yellowy orange.  The first photo below the top part of the plant, which looks pretty much as green as when I first bought it.  The second photo is of the ends of the plant, which are now turning yellow.

Any help would be appreciated!

More Container Plantings and a Surprise Gift

It was a beautiful sunny day here in Metuchen, New Jersey, so I decided to plant my herb barrel.  I picked up the barrel a few days ago and have been very eager to get some herbs into it.  I had originally purchased one from Amazon but it was badly packed, so it arrived broken.  I returned it but did not want to wait for a replacement to be delivered, so just bought a new one at the local Home Depot.  I usually have great experiences with Amazon and have never had to return anything, so I was extremely impressed with how easy the return process was.  I just printed out the label, repacked the barrel, slapped the label on and my mail carrier picked it up.  A couple of days later, I had my refund.  I didn't even have to talk to anyone to complain or ask for a refund.  Amazon is pretty awesome, I have to say.

Anyway, some of the herbs came from the Rutger's University garden day (which we attended last weekend), but I grew some of them myself from seed.  I started by putting some plastic bottles in the bottom of the barrel and filled it with potting mix, peat moss and some dry fertilizer.  Supposedly the plastic bottles make the pot lighter because you use less potting mix and improve drainage.  Also, it's great for us because the MOTH drinks tons of bottled water (which I hardly ever drink) and I always feel so guilty about throwing those little bottles into the recycling bins.  Who knows if they don't just end up in some landfill somewhere anyway?  So, now I can actually use them for something productive and positive.  Then I transplanted herbs, watered them and added a layer of mulch.  And Voila!

Clockwise from the top, we have:  tarragon, flat parsley, oregano, curly parsley, sweet basil, thyme, sage and (in the center) lemon verbena.

I also planted a container of succulents.  Again, most of these are from Rutgers, but I picked up a couple more from Home Depot to fill out the pot.  I planted these in regular potting mix but I added some extra perlite to make it lighter and improve drainage.  Here is the finished product:

Finally, I got a nice surprise gift from one of the landscapers who is bidding for the job on my property.  He initially came by on Thursday (he's the one who noticed the bird's nest).  Then, he came by again today to take photos of the property, and gave me a Lily that he said was left over from another landscaping job.  It was a bit sad looking and dry with a bunch of yellow fronds, so I cut off the dead fronds and gave her some water.  Now I just have to figure out where to put her:

According to her tag, she is a Black Eyed Stella Daylily who should be planted in sun to partial sun.

Raking, and mowing, and laundry, oh my

Another weekend full of activity.  I did tons of raking and bagging in the backyard on Saturday.  This is what I left on my curb for pick-up tomorrow morning:

We also assembled the new lawn mower:

And the new garden cart:

You may recall how it looked before assembly:

I have to say, it was a huge pain in the neck to assemble, but it seems to be a great cart.  Very study and easy to navigate.

The seedlings I transplanted almost a month ago are coming along fine - you can see a few of them in the garden cart, above.  I have been hardening them off for the past week, bringing them in and out of the garage each day to soak in some sunlight.  I hope to transplant them next weekend.  Some will go in the side garden plot - but I also bought some containers today, where I'm planning to plant some of the herbs and maybe a couple of tomato and pepper plants.

My evergreen is still looking very sad:

I have applied the insecticide/fertilizer that the lady from the garden center recommended.  I hope it will work.

I decided my front stoop needed some sprucing up, so I bought a container and some plants from the garden center and made a little welcoming garden urn.  The plants I chose are supposed to attract hummingbirds and butterflies.

I forgot to mention this last week, but I bought these adorable little hose guards (or whatever they're called) in the shape of pine cones.  They work great, and look so much nicer than those plastic green things that the previous owners left:

Finally, I also did some indoor organizing today.  I have a tiny laundry area, with a stacking washer and dryer - really just a closet off the kitchen area.  Other than the appliances and a utility sink, it's just an empty closet, so we've been keeping our laundry detergent and an old hamper on the floor.  Not very satisfactory.  So I went onto amazon.com and bought a laundry cart (which I had to assemble):

And a laundry organizer with a bar to hang clothes that are too delicate for the dryer:

I can't tell you how exciting that is - up until now, we've been just hanging our delicates wherever they can fit on the closet doors or the bathroom door down the hall.  Now, we actually have a dedicated place to hang them.  I realize the fact that I'm excited about this makes me a huge dork.  Anyway, here's how it looks in combination:

 
No, it's not garden related, but, well, I wash a lot of garden-related clothes in there. And I'm quite proud of how it all came out.  Especially since I have such a small laundry space to work with and I ordered everything based on the measurements on-line, not knowing for sure how well it would fit.  I was particularly worried the cart might be too big.  But, fortunately, it all fits perfectly and I can wheel the cart in and out of the space easily if I need to.