weather- blessing or not?

novice_2009

14 years ago

I've already learned that with gardening, you are pretty much at the mercy of mother nature and her everchanging whims. Maybe it's just me, but this seems to have been one crazy summer. First it was a long, wet spring. Then high temps. Now unusually low temps, more rain.

Pros: The grasshoppers feasting on my gardens have temporarily disappeared.

Cons: My tomatoes and melons have stopped setting fruit. Some weird fungus thingies were growing on my garden soil. Have no idea, but can't be good.

How's everyone else doing?

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Comments (12)

ladybug37091
14 years ago
Hi Novice, This year for me has been way better than the last several, weatherwise anyway. It sure beats blasting heat and drought. My biggest hurdle is time. I simply don't have the time to maintain my flower and vegetable gardens. I am seriously considering not putting out vegetables anymore. The vegetables I can buy. The flowers are an addiction that I have to have, weeds and all.
columbiastock
14 years ago
I have to agree with you Novice. Our garden has not produced as well for us. The beets did great, over 50 jars of plain and pickled. But by now I usually have 50 jars of green beans and only have 19. The tomatoes are loaded but have not started turning yet, I have to watch them close and pick them before I really want to or the birds will peck them. The yellow squash and zucchini are doing fair. Also the eggplant and peppers are slow.

Wanda
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Larry, Ouch! Do you really want dead carcasses in the road by the house all the time? The other day we had a dead armadillo in the road and the vultures swarmed around it all morning. Then they came and started circling the garden where I was working. I was wondering if they were trying to tell me that my time was about up, but then I realized they likely were attracted to the bone meal and blood meal I had added to the garden a couple of hours earlier. I often do get circled by vultures after I've used those particular organic fertilizers. Carol, My summer peas hardly made anything because those plants seemed to be the preferred food of blister beetles and grasshoppers. The fall peas are doing a lot better. I am about starved-to-death for fresh cowpeas from our garden. I really don't mind shelling them. I can buy them fresh and already shelled at Central Market in Southlake, or I even could buy them fresh, shelled or unshelled, by the bushel, from the purplehull pinkeye pea farm in Thackerville. I just prefer to raise my own whenever I can. To me, they taste best when I pick them, shell them, and put them right into the pot on the stove and cook them. While they're cooking, I make homemade cornbread. I can make a meal out of purplehull peas and cornbread. Progress in my fall garden goes slowly. Parts of it are such an overgrown jungle, and I have to go slowly while clearing it because of the snakes. It never ceases to amaze me how many snakes like to come into the garden and climb the trellised plants. It is such a rude awakening to be looking at a plant and to see those beady snake eyes looking back at you. It is a wonder I haven't had a heart attack and died right there in the garden. I make a little progress every day, but it is such a big garden that I feel like I am not making progress quickly enough. It is still so danged hot that most of my cool-season plants seem stalled and not growing much. I know they'll grow more as time goes on, but these windy, warm days with temps in the 90s aren't the weather that the cool-season plants prefer. The Seminole winter squash has watermelon vines, Grandpa Ott's morning glory vines, cardinal climber and some bindweed mixed in with it. I've been trying to cut out and pull out the watermelon vines (no melons or flowers on them at this point) and the bindweed vines without destroying the Seminole winter squash, morning glory and cardinal climber vines, all whilewatching for snakes. I could save time by leaving all those bindweed vines in there, but I'm trying to get them out before they set seed. I am hoping to get out in the garden early, early tomorrow at first light and do some clean-up of the vining areas while it is so cool that the snakes shouldn't be up and moving yet. Larry, That's the reason I haven't bought a pea sheller--I don't want a bunch of mashed-up summer peas. I went through a period of really wanting one during a good summer when we had oodles and oodles of peas, but talked myself out of it after talking to someone who had one and said it mashed up the green peas a lot. It is a lot of work to shell them by hand, but if you cook them fresh, nothing's better. Some years I get a lot of them put up in the freezer but I doubt this will be one of those years since the nights are already cooling down quite a bit. I'll be happy with a few meals of fresh ones though. I do always do put up one frozen packet of southern peas for New Year's Day. It is like summer in the garden when they're cooking on the stove. When I was a kid, shelling peas was just something you did in the evenings--that and snapping green beans. We'd just sit out there on the porch with a big pile of purplehull peas or green beans and work out way through them and, before you knew it, they were done. Dawn
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conniemcghee
14 years ago
It sounds like it's not been so great for vegetables.

For me, it's been a blessing. I have been collecting perennials for a new bed that's going in this fall, and all this rain and cool weather has made the task of keeping them alive a lot easier. Not to mention it has extended the season...I'm still buying stuff and putting it in, without fear of losing it in the blasting heat. :)

On the down side, BUGS! Good grief. I've had chiggers twice this year. And I've had more nasty fungus and mushrooms coming up in the mulch than I have probably seen in my entire gardening life.
columbiastock
14 years ago
I too have been purchasing perennials. Our local Lowes has an area they call--Distressed Plants. I stop by there to see what they have often. Some of their $15.00 plants, I got for $5.00 and a few for $1.50. If you have a Lowes and their garden section does not do this, talk with the person in charge of plants. Saves us and saves them.

And "BUGS" have been awful!!
tn_veggie_gardner
14 years ago
I am classifying it as 110000% blessing! lol. It has cured my pepper issue (flowers were just dropping off most plants, not producing peppers...now I have 15-20 already growing!). All plants seem to be producing fine now, even the Bells
(though it's almost too late for them :-\ ).It also helped a few other things like my Yellow Wax Bean bed has 15-20+ sprouts coming out now, my maters seem to be ripening better, etc., etc.. =)
Dave Townsend
14 years ago
It's been great for our garden so far. It's reduced the amount of watering needed a whole bunch. I went away for the week and didn't even need the timer for the irrigation system. I use raised beds which dry out faster and the extra moisture helps.

I've been enjoying the weather but the bugs are more noticeable!
conniemcghee
14 years ago
I like the sound of the "Distressed Plants" discount! I don't think I've seen that at our Lowe's. Maybe next time I'm in there I'll mention it!
pgriff
14 years ago
It's turning out to be a not good year for my garden. Tomatoes have been hit by late blight. (bought transplants at the local Co-op) and summer squash is slow producing. That's 2 things we really love in the garden. The only thing that has done super well this year has been the bell peppers. I've already picked a lot of them and they're still producing. Looks like we're in for another rainy week. :(
Dave Townsend
14 years ago
I'm changing my vote. This rain has gotta stop for a bit! 3 days in a row without rain would be great!
conniemcghee
14 years ago
I would like to change my vote too. It's getting a bit exteme!
april_h_o April Moore
14 years ago
Yeah, we got the veggies out late, so some things just aren't going to make. But the watermelons look ridiculously happy, as does the corn.

I'm like you, though, Connie - I've been transplanting a ton of things to the new area of the garden we are working on - I'd NEVER have been able to do that in a normal year. I am just thanking God AND my lucky stars for that one - I do hate replacing plants.

But as others noted, there have been a few casualties - mainly due to fungal diseases - and naturally, I didn't get the roses on a good spray routine this year due to work and travel earlier in the year. Ah, well, you win some and you lose some. The blackspot is pretty bad, but since the rain and cool weather seems to have halted the Japanese Beetles in my garden (I think all the grubs must have drowned or froze to death - lol) I've actually been able to enjoy the yellow roses blooming all of this month for the FIRST TIME EVER. Now that's a first I could learn to love!

I've been teasing all my former colleagues out in Portland, Oregon, though, that I stole their weather as part of my severance package and brought it back East when they laid me off. Let THEM enjoy the summer heat wave for once! Hehe.
Dave Townsend
14 years ago
April,

It sure does seem like Pacific northwest weather here. I'll take the temps and about 1/4-1/3 of the rain. I'm not picky. They say the sun is coming back...

weather- blessing or not?

Comments (12)

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