A new disturbing practice for some Lowes garden centers
madgardener_ETN
20 years ago
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thorspippi
20 years agolast modified: 9 years agocherylm
20 years agolast modified: 9 years agoRelated Discussions
New Garden from scratch.. need some advice
Comments (18)There's a lot of conflicting and confusing about companion planting out there; when I was first putting together a plan I drove myself nuts trying to accommodate and incorporate everything, and then found out there's not a lot of scientific information supporting most of these practices anyway. It IS true that you should plant basil between/around your tomatoes--they yield about 20% more that way, though no one knows exactly why. The only thing I definitely would avoid doing is interplanting legumes (peas, beans) with fruit and root veggies. Legumes 'fix' (leach) nitrogen into the soil, and too much nitrogen can have negative effects on those plants. Instead, plant them with greens and lettuces, which feed on nitrogen. Some other plants, like fennel, are considered alleopathic and should be a little distance away from everything else because they can inhibit other plants' growth. Assuming you're in the northern hemisphere, put your tallest plants on the north edge and as you move south get shorter. This will ensure that your plants get the most sunlight possible. Traditional planting instructions (what you will see on the seed package) will advise you to grow vining crops in hills, with lots of distance between hills (winter squash, cucumbers, etc). This is not a very efficient use of space, especially if you only have a 16'x20' area. Instead, find some cattle paneling or create a trellis with stakes and netting. This will allow you to guide the plants to grow vertically, saving space and making harvesting much easier. They should be relatively tall (at least 4') so they would do well on the back row with the tomatoes. You could grow your tomatoes the same way, if they are indeterminate - they are vines and will grow fine up netting instead of in cages. Finally, you could use a space-saving method like square-foot gardening. You don't need to spend the money to build raised beds; simply mark off a 4'x whatever area and fill it with compost/topsoil so that it is a few inches off the ground. You may also wish to add coir or peat for roughage and water retention. Natural erosion will occur - you will have to shore up the sides sometimes, and add extra compost periodically (you would have to do this anyway, eventually). You may want to save up for beds in the future. Plan for 2-3 feet between beds in each direction. Make sure that the dimensions of the area are no more than 4' one way, so that you NEVER step on the bed and compress the soil. You will be able to reach in from the sides and harvest easily at this distance. The dimensions the other way can be any size - 4', 8', 10', etc. If your bed is longer than it is wide (say 4'x8') make sure the 8' goes east-west for the most sunlight. This method of gardening (as long as you never step on the soil in the beds--super important!) will allow you to plant many crops much more closely together. I've included a link that describes how to space plants under the SFG method. Here is a link that might be useful: My Square Foot Garden: Plant Spacing...See MoreI am new and I have some gardening questions
Comments (4)To get cross pollination you have to plant a different variety, not another plant of the same variety. Often it has to be a particular different variety--thus the pollination charts in Raintree catalog. 'Sugar' is described in CORNUCOPIA II by Stephen Facciola (Kampong Publications): "Small, oval fruit; skin dark reddish-purple, covered with thick bloom, very tender; flesh golden-yellow, juicy, tender, sweet, mild; quality very good; stone free; ripens early. Excellent fresh; good for drying and canning. Tree moderately vigorous, spreading; hardy; self-fertile, productive. Originated in Santa Rosa, California by Luther Burbank. Introduced in 1899." "Self-fertile" and "productive" are indications that you won't have to plant another variety to get adequate cropping--at least as far as pollination requirements are concerned....See Morelowes garden centers in MA
Comments (12)As far as I know, all the lowe's have garden centers. The only thing that might be different would be the available selections of left over plants. I haven't been to any of the big box garden centers this year so I don't know what kind of selections they had to start with either. Fran...See MoreCenter of new leaves/new growth turning yellow/white....
Comments (8)First of all, how do you post pictures here? Second, the link 'effects of glyphosate on tomato' left above by jean001a has a picture of a glyphosphate effected tomato plant and it looks just like mine do. To: dickiefickle, all my garden plants are planted in a garden, in the ground, except for a cucumber and a pepper. One problem I had, which is why I'm having such a bad weed problem, is that when I first decided to plant this garden, my plan was to use the rear-tine tiller owned by my landlord to till all the soil in the garden area, then to till in some bulk combo soil. However, the tiller has both a seized transmission and engine, so its useless. This meant that I had to plant the garden in what was currently a lawn area, with grass and weeds. So I planted the plants just like I would plant a shrub or perennial. I dug holes about 14"-16" in diameter, about 14" deep, then I mixed my soil up and filed these holes, then planted the plants in the holes. Before planting, I didnt spray Roundup on the garden area, because I figured my landlord would want it to be a lawn again in the future, after the garden was picked. But later, she agreed to allow me to spray it, but by that time the garden was 3 weeks old. However, the grass and weeds are still growing, so I first just weed-wacked them, but as the veggies grew larger, I couldnt take the chance of weed wacking the veggies by accident. But there are too many to pull every few days, so i did what I would normally do in an ornamental bed. I first pulled the weeds under the drip line of the veggie plants, then I carefully sprayed Roundup to the other weeds, with the wand very low to the ground, on a non-windy day. Also to dickiefickle: As far as my soil being too moist, the holes I'm growing in are 14-16" deep, and we live on the East coast where we have a drought just about every summer, where it wont rain for weeks at a time. Most watering is done by hand, and I never water too much or too often. Usually every 3 days or so, unless it rains, so the soil is never too wet for very long. However, I planted a Dahlia, a 40" variety called 'Contraste' back on about May 5. It already had a long stem growing out of the tuber, so once I planted it, it immediately was 3" above ground and started growing leaves at once. Then on about May 20, we had an extremely rare 7 day long rain spell, where it rained on and off every day, and was constantly overcast. It actually rained about 3-5 hours per day. One day after the rain ended, the sun came out and some plants were wilting a little initially due to the bright sun for the first time in 8 days, but then most plants perked back up, except for the one Dahlia. It continued to wilt for 8 more days, til I dug down to the tuber, and discovered that it had rotted from the bottom up and was slimy and easily crushed in my hands. ****Anyway, my most important question at this point is: Now that I've pruned the tomatoes back below the yellowing areas on top of main stem and laterals, will those tomatoes grow new stems from the area where pruned like most plants do(2 or more new stems), or will no new growth start where pruned, and only new lateral will grow from between the main stem and leaf branches? How do tomatoes normally react to their stems being pruned?...See Morethorspippi
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