Fort Worth first shot at local gardening with anything. Tomatoes. Don't know the variety just grabbed one at Walmart and plunked it down in May in the middle of a flower bed (Putting it in a flower bed is suppossed to trick the bad bugs out of finding it and surround it with beneficial bugs.)So far it's gotten HUGE and I've had two perfect tomatoes and two with a bite out of them.Same story with strawberries,bell peppers and hot peppers. (Except there were no bites out of any of the peppers. My bugs all must have a serious sweet tooth.)
Herbs. Can't go wrong with herbs. Grow like crazy.I have a big "Crook neck" squash plant that volunteered via bird from the lady across the street. I've seen some bugs flying around(cucumber beetles? Bright orange bugs that fly?) and some holes in the vine part but it keeps getting bigger and bigger. It has not set fruit yet tho. I'm not that crazy about squash anyway but I have a feeling it's going to give me at least some squash. I just toss any that's infested. I must be world's laziest gardener! LOL.PJ

I'll do you one better.

The Texas Master Gardeners of Travis County Recommended Varieties list of vegetable varieties that do well in Texas. DOWNLOAD (Word doc).

Texas Master Gardeners of Travis County has a great calendar for knowing when to start spring and fall crops.

Also the Texas A&M Fall Gardening guide has recommended varieties, dates for seeding and transplanting, etc..

Of course none of these sites mention heirloom tomato varieties that do well here.

Jaune Flamme, Sioux, Porter's, Arkansas Traveler, Eva Purple Ball, JD's Special C-Tex (early black), Matt's Wild Cherry, Sungold, Rutgers are all supposed to do fairly well here. If you don't mind the extreme blandness of Celebrity tomatoes, they grow like gangbusters here.

Originally posted by pjtexgirl:
I've seen some bugs flying around(cucumber beetles? Bright orange bugs that fly?) and some holes in the vine part but it keeps getting bigger and bigger. It has not set fruit yet tho. I'm not that crazy about squash anyway but I have a feeling it's going to give me at least some squash.

I'm afraid Squash Vine Borers won't let you off that easy. Not with squash, cucumbers, melons, or anything else in the cucurbit family. You won't get much if any harvest from this extremely hard-to-eliminate/control bug. The only thing I've heard of people having success with is a kind of spray-on grey clay called Surround that they won't dig through.

I had really good luck with papaya summer squash until the squash vine borers got them. But the plants themselves were very vigorous and productive. They survived an unexpected light freeze and the arrival of early heat.

Maxibel beans did very well for me. They grew slowly in cold weather but exploded when it warmed up. Very good filet bean.

Brandywine is doing unexpectedly well for me. I'm getting quite a few fruit off one plant when I didn't expect it to give me anything with our early heat waves.

I have a BHN444 tomato plant that's doing very well. I haven't eaten a tomato off it yet, but it's setting fruit in this heat, and the foliage seems to be remarkably trouble free.

My Husky Cherry plant is very productive. The tomato's skin can be a bit tough sometimes but the flesh is very flavorful.

Jalapenos and Sweet 100 tomatoes. My jalapeno status is based on last year's experience because this year the possum that likes to spend the night in my yard thinks my peppers are his salad bar. But despite having almost no leaves I still have several jalapenos. Last year I harvested several peppers per week from just one plant.

It looks like my Sweet 100 has quit setting fruit in this heat, but I still have about 50 fruits in various stages of ripening.

I guess I'm lucky. I ran out of veggie garden space and have zuccini, spaghetti squash & cucumbers growing in pots of compost alongside my driveway and they're doing great. No bugs and we're picking a couple cucumber & zuccini every day. My Galina cherry tomatos are doing poorly. The roma's & patio tomatos are full of green tomatos. My aunt Rubys german green (my favorite) has been flowering, but no tomatos yet. I have lots of radishes, garlic and onions that I've been harvesting. My snow peas are done for the year & they were terrific. I share my produce with 4 of my senior neighbors, they love coming over and picking their own veggies!

I'm in West Texas and my pumpkin plants are doing great! I have some fruit that just started right now, and I have my fingers crossed I'll have continued success. Also, dill seems to do very very well. I've grown it for a few years now, just in a flower box, and it's great.

My other vegetables are okay. Radishes are too hot, onions and carrots are spindly, and so far, my green peppers and peas are slow. But I do have a nice pumpkin patch in my back yard and that makes me happy!

Thanks Feldon 30 !We'll see how organic gardening holds up under the nasty SV borer! I have a ton of predator bugs but I don't know how'd they'd get to a borer...Hmmmm...PJ

Okra, squash, hot peppers and cherry tomatoes always do well for me. Squash bugs can be a problem sometimes, but I've never encountered Squash vine borers in West Texas (too dry for them here?)

Amarathus - the Viet. Burgandy leaf, only grow one so doesnt cross. Reseeds, beautiful magenta heads birds love the black seeds. Babys in salads, big leafs like grape leaves or pot greens, new leaf in mid summer heat on charcoal hambugers is great. and can use like arugula in italian.

Oreganos, Gk, Ital, Mex great ground cover

Pink Stemmed Cress - so sweet, reseeds ground cover in pots.

Lettuces, Oriental greens, arugula, italian greens, -- early spring, fall, winter in large plastic bowl pots.

Cukes if somewhat shaded.

Solid stem squash/zucs

Any indian, italian, mexican, indonesian, carribean(sp) tropicals close to our zone

Prostrate skullcap, bay, thyme, parsley, chives, horticultural dandilions all in pots tucked in raised beds or planted in same with passion vines for shade overhead.

Mulberrys, figs, passionfruit, citrus maybe? we shall see(check post in what doesnt do well)

Pole and bush beans, limas, just keep trucking.

Some years my tomatoes are covering the kitchen island and being frozen, made into sauce and the neighbors are smiling big at baskets on their front porch. The last 3 years have gotten bumpkus. Too cold early too hot early. But some years, oh my.

I get most of my seeds and plants from trades on the gardenweb or the 10 cent packs at dollar store. Seem to do better than all the fancy seeds i have ordered. Fresher and you can trade with folks in heat zones.

If find something that does well go out and save the seeds. Doing that now to the lettuces and parsley.

Mix flowers and herbs and veggies all in same raised beds - seems to work better and is prettier too. Love Balsam Impatia cottage flower, get three growths a season and reseeds. Small upright plant can use like aloe.

Plant near guage is what the roots are doing, - shallow, spreading, deep can be planted real near each other.

But as said below timing and weather (after you have your soil, compost, mulch in place), seem to be the final determinate. Plus i think organic really helps- lots of worms and toads.

And i try to plant and harvest in all 4 seasons, keeping the beds mulched and growing.

Sandy_8b going on Z9 in the heat sink of downtown dallas

bev_z, I'm actually considering going back to container gardening. I had good luck with it in my apartment, and my yard is just so small and there's still lots of flowers I'd love to plant. But I've never done cucurbits in containers. What varieties do you grow?

I got my spaghetti squash seeds from Walmart. My zuccini is a bush type. My cuc's are vining along a chain link fence along with my spaghetti squash. The cuc's are a smooth variety and I think they're burpless. I've been using the same pkgs of seeds for 4 years and thru the pkgs away this year. The germination was down to about 1 out of 4.
My pots are only 3 & 5 gal so I set up a drip system to water them 2 X a day.

My garden is located just south of Houston.

For those interested in squash borer resistance, I've had an excellent luck with a type of lemon squash, which runs on the ground and produces squashes that are of size and shape of lemons. I'm also trying a Pennsylvania Dutch Crookneck squash this year. So far so good: it displays desirable characteristics of putting down roots at every node.

I've been attracted to Asian vegetables because of our hot summers and I've had very good luck with Asian melons.

Swiss chard is prolific, and when not completely cut down when harvested, it's a gift that keeps on giving. I planted mine back in the fall and a couple of plants are still going strong.

The biggest success in my garden, however, has been basil. I typically grow some Genovese and Thai, but as summer progresses, a couple of plants set seed, and after that, I've got basil everywhere, including hybrids between Genovese and Thai. Basil grows as well as crabgrass, but unlike crabgrass it can be harvested and used for pesto, which I happily freeze and enjoy in the colder months.

Kasia

Spinach and Carrots were the easiest for me.

Thanks, bev!

Most success for me here in the D/FW area are
tomatoes: Brandywine, Beefmaster, hybrids 640 and 440, Yellow Pear (Mr. Stripey has been a huge - 8' - disappointment)

Ambrosia canteloupe - this is my 3rd year for this variety and it makes lots of delicious, super-sweet melons. (I've planted extra for the raccoons & possums - probably won't do any good)

Blueberries - most of these were washed away when we had spring floods a couple of years ago. The one that survived (bluetif) is doing great and 3' tall. I'll probably plant more next year.

Grapes - muscadines (not mustang)

I'm in Dallas and my best crop is snow peas. I put them in either the last week of January or first week of February (they're toast now). Green peppers, jalapenos & tomatoes do great. I found a new squash that's immune to the bugs. It's an Asian squash I believe called long squash. It's a light green color. Vines like crazy but produces all summer & fall.

summer of 2006 the following did well

texas longhorn southern pea
I loved these. They taste like boiled peanuts
SSE exchange yearbook says these are probably the same
as big red ripper

rice pea
these are mild on the verge of boring, and very tiny so you have to pick a lot to get a meal. They produced quite a lots of peas!

I tried the Juliet tomato this year. I believe it was called a grape, but it looks like a small roma with a rounded point on the bottom. It set and ripened fruit in the 100+ heat, but then, they were very tough skinned. In cooler weather, they are sweeter.

cynthia

I've had great luck with my green onions (Evergreen bunching, I think) this year. I planted them in spring, they survived the heat, and have divided to produce more onions which I've been harvesting on a regular basis. I have them in a container in partial shade.

My okra was a HUGE success. I only had a couple plants but one of them branched a lot so it produced tons of pods. The variety was Emerald. I also grew some dwarf okra in a container, but I've forgotten the name. This was during the hottest part of the summer, planting in June and harvest starting in August. I was picking pods until late November.

Asperagus finally got so huge it outgrew the raised bed I had it in. DH had enough fresh spears daily in May and June to make a meal every night. He shared a lot with the family.

Okra went wild. DH couldn't even keep up with it and wound up with a large hoard of seeds after the season was over.

He didn't even plant any tomatoes, but I have had tons of fruits from them in past years, no matter what variety I planted. I'd like to try some yellow pear tomatoes again this coming season, I haven't had any since 1999 when I grew them in Colorado. But I can still taste how sweet they were fresh off the vine.

I missed the whole season since I was deployed overseas, but he sent pictures of the garden (it looked like a disaster, weeds everywhere) and some of the vegetables. He tried corn, but didn't water it enough and it never grew. Probably the racoons dug up the seeds and ate them, and he didn't even realize it.

I have great plans for the summer of '07 though and have been clearing out all the debris from last year. Redug all the beds, divided the asperagus and moved the crowns to a larger space, and added leaf mold to all the beds. We have so many large weeds living out in the country and next to a horse pasture, I finally broke down and laid out roofing shingles in the walkways between the raised beds. Now all I have to do is figure out how to get rid of the fire ants in the raised beds so planting and harvesting will be safe.

Cheryl

I tried 4th of July,and Red October Tomotoes from Burpee Seeds this year and it was a hugh success. I was picking tomatoes from May through the end of June when the stink bugs started to ruin my tomatoes. Also few other veggies that are easy to grow are peppers,okra and squash.

Sonya

2007 gardening year.

bloody butcher tomato did not care one bit about our tons and tons of rain.

Produced a few tomatoes every other day or so for the whole month of june. It took a bit of a break, but now is making more tomatoes. This one is a keeper. Not sure how happy this guy would be in a normal year of extreme heat and drought.

With all this rain, I kept them picked early (as soon as they begin to turn red or what ever color they are supposed to be) as tomatoes tend to crack and or get buggy when they received too much water.

I'm southwest of Dallas and our yellow pear tomatoes (in a container) were awesome this year. The celebrity tomatoes did well, but have petered out, apparently.

I planted pumpkin seeds back in May and the plants are going crazy, there are blooms all over them and they are vining everywhere, but no fruit is apparent yet. They'll be ready to harvest about mid-October, if I'm lucky (whooo!).

I tried cantelope and the seeds sprouted, but the plants are teeny tiny and have just stopped growing. Not dying, not growing, either. I think all the rain did them in.

The zucchini and squash seeds didn't even set. I think the seeds were really old, though.

But this was my first year back in veggie gardening in about 10 years, so I'm taking it slow. I am interested in stuff to plant in the fall, though.

But you can't go by this year--what has done well in drought years?

I have tomatoes coming out my ears--Sweet 100's, Celebrity, some kind of Cluster tomato and Merceds. But last year, in the drought, very few. I like swiss chard, as it's similar to spinach but will grow in the heat. "Bright Lights" grows the best for me; the Rainbow didn't come up this year.

Have several varieties of tomatoes that are covered with tomatoes; have been eating Heat Wave for the last week or more and DH collected Sweet 100's today and Tiger-Stripe is turning pink so will be harvesting these before long.

Been harvesting yellow squash for 3 or more weeks; have put numerous vaccum sealed bags in the freezer plus served with our meals.

Have cantelopes that just need to ripen. Have several Sugar Baby watermelons (found another baby this afternoon, the vine had grown over a tomato that is about 6 ft tall).

Have many dill plants for the Swallowtail cats but need more! Never enough.

Planted many sweet potato slips, will see if we end up with any in the fall.

Planted a bonus package of Pink Corn...2 came up and the stalks are over 7 feet tall.

Have two varieties of basil and lots of sunflowers (if the Bordered Patch cats don't eat all of them LOL).

Have a pepper plant that has been blooming but thus far no peppers :( None of my direct sowed Sweet Banana Peppers came up, sow bugs got my WS sowed seedlings :(

Our nectarine and peach trees were covered this year. One peach tree lost a limb because it had so many peaches. This peach produces the largest peaches I have ever seen and they are so sweet. DH made a awesome nectarine cobbler last week with Splenda (he is diabetic). Put 112 cups of fruit in the freezer this weekend and have more on the tree to harvest in the next week or so.

Our blackberry vines fruited this year but crop was a disappointment considering all the wonderful rain; hoping next year is better.

Considering the sow bugs ate all the WS seedlings I planted, it is amazing that we have anything! I direct sowed seeds when that happened thus some of my tomatoes are just now beginning to put on fruit.

Happy Gardening to all!
Peggy

jdwhitaker
I'm on the western edge of Central Texas, zone 7b. We have always had to fight the squash bugs. Have already had an attack on one vine that is about 6 feet long. That vine has mildew, too. DH read online that spraying vanilla water on the plant would confuse the bugs...must have because I have not seen another. I cut the damaged leaves off and it just keeps growing and putting on squash.

(cynthianovak
I tried the Juliet tomato this year. I believe it was called a grape, but it looks like a small roma with a rounded point on the bottom. It set and ripened fruit in the 100+ heat, but then, they were very tough skinned. In cooler weather, they are sweeter. cynthia)

I have some that sounds like what you describe...they were sent in a swap as Large Cherry Tomato. Was told they are very sweet. Mine have begun to set fruit and it looks like a small eggplant.

Was so disappointed that all the Ground Cherry seedlings I planted were eaten by the sow bugs. Hope to swap for more seeds this year!

Also harvested our Elephant garlic.

Peggy

Sandy - What area of Dallas are you in? Your gardens sound like a lot of fun.

Our asparagus outgrew the bed this year, too. I'm about to divide it up into a second bed, because I love the stuff.

All of the chards did really well this year - first time growing them. They got eaten up a little as it got hot, and I finally just pulled them today.

My bigger tomatoes aren't doing much right now, but the cherry and currant varieties have gone bonkers. I can hardly keep up with them! For a while they all tasted like water, but this week they're much better now that it's not raining every day.

I have grown lots of fun heirloom squashes, and every cucumber I've ever planted has done very well as long as they get some shade in hot weather.

Grew gourds last year, but we only got one off that huge vine. This year I have 2 vines going - one didn't do a thing, the other was so loaded down it couldn't support any more weight. I cut at least 15 gourds off it yesterday and pulled both vines. Kids'll make birdhouses out of them once they've dried out.

I don't have much luck with green beans ever, because I haven't figure a way to outsmart the doodle bugs - That seems to be their favorite food in our yard aside from dog poop.

Fava beans did really well for me one year - I need to grow them again.

I'm beginning to move the root veggies out of the gardens and into the landscaping, so I've got carrots, onions, beets and potatoes all over the place right now. The tops don't look that great, because we've got dogs that run them over sometimes, but we'll see how things look underneath shortly.

We grew something called a Chinese red noodle bean this year, and they're really beautiful hanging from the vertical garden. If you let them go to cow peas, they get to be about 3 feet long!

We are still harvesting lots of tomatoes, have a yellow beefsteak that my husband really likes. Some are from the WS free tomato seeds offer. I was looking last night and told my husband one of the tomato plants is producing what looks like grapefruit...they are round and very large--can not wait to taste it. Hubby also likes the Tiger-Like Russian...nice and tart.

I have trimmed some of the tomato vines that were taking over our walkway and stuck the trimmings in one of my flowerbeds that had some room. Looks like about a dozen rooted and going to make it even with our upper 90's so hopefully we will have tomatoes into late fall again this year.

The volunteer pepper plant is now taller than me and turning out peppers...still do not know what kind it is. Shaped like Banana Pepper but they are dark green...not hot.

Sweet Potato vines are snaking through the beds and climbing sunflowers : ) Hoping we have something growing underground.

Have striped watermelons in my front flowerbed, one is the size of a bowling ball.

Have new squash up and vining. The oldest vine grew to about 10 feet but has begun to decline with just one or two areas still producing squash.

The corn has grown to 12 feet and has tasseled...will see if we get any corn LOL. My neighbor says I planted 3 days before a full moon...that is why it is so tall. He pooh-pooh's my methods but after seeing what I have done to create new beds he has begun to use newspapers and grass clippings to keep weeds down in the garden.

It's been a crazy year for gardening but it would not be Texas if it were any different. LOL

Next year we plant to put up a framework for our vining plants to climb to hopefully make more room in our garden.

Happy Gardening to all,
Peggy

I grew some GREAT green beans this spring. The first was Fortex, which kept popping out pods even when summer started (although the pods in summer were much smaller than in the spring). The only thing that finally killed the vines was my dad when he got enthusiastic with his new weed whacker.

The second bean was a "Cornfield" bean that I got from a swap from here on GW. I wanted them for a partly shady patch in the garden and they performed very well. The pods were long and nutty tasting. Very good. The two surviving vines (weedwhacker again) have now started growing again and putting out more pods! Yippee!

The next bean was Jumbo, a Romano style "bush" bean I got from Johnny's. They were very early for me, and grew close to three feet tall with HUGE, tasty pods. Very prolific, which is important to me in my tiny garden. These didn't produce as long as the other two beans, but they produced a quantity that made up for their brevity.

If you're planning a fall vegetable garden, broccoli and cabbage are good choices. Planting dates would be included with the Travis Co. info. Both of those do well in the fall.

(I'm in San Antonio, but I think these will keep going through out the fall in Dallas.)

All of our tomatoes have put on a LOT of new growth and many blooms; I harvested tomatoes yesterday from this new growth. The tomato trimmings I stuck in my flowerbeds are blooming, no tomatoes yet but have my fingers crossed. I have more trimmings in a 5 gal bucket rooting in water. That seems to work very well with less wilt when put in the soil. We may have to buy another freezer if all these tomato plants produce tomatoes and we have a late freeze! The neighbors will be happy...one neighbor said his wife wanted 8 lbs of tomatoes but our one little grocery store wanted $4/lb so he just bought 4 lbs! He was very tickled when we showed up with a bag of tomatoes for them. I have already swapped for over a dozen different varieties of tomatoes to try next year such as Big Zac, Cherokee Purple, etc.

The volunteer pepper plant is a Poblano and it is covered with peppers, am currently letting a couple of them ripen so I can save seeds. These two are a brillant red, very pretty on the tall plant which is taller than me. Some are over 6 inches long and hope to make some chili rellenos while my hubby is off the next two days.

Sweet Potato vines continue to snake through the beds and are blooming very pretty purple blooms. Gotta make trellis or arbors for vertical gardening next year!

The Delicata Squash turned out to be Spaghetti Squash instead. Mildew has been a problem with it since I use shower nozzle on hose to water, hoping to add soaker hose or drip irrigation next year.

Currently harvesting comfrey leaves for the compost pile and to make comfrey tea.

Yesterday harvested 3 yellow icebox sized watermelons and should have cantaloupe any day now from a volunteer vine that came up from last year's compost pile.

Am reading online to see how to harvest basil before a freeze gets it. Have two varieties this year and have swapped for seeds for 3 or 4 more for 2008 garden.

We are creating an outdoor living room. Currently painting our outdoor furniture some lively colors to go with all the flowers. The area has 2 walls consisting of cannas, 3rd wall is a lantana bed; we look forward to relaxing in the shade with a cool beverage and watching the butterflies and hummingbirds nectaring and laying their eggs on host plants. Have two pots of mint by the glider, chocolate mint perfumes the air (I crave chocolate after brushing against it!) but the orange mint is disappointing. Hoping to add other varieties of mint in 2008.

God Bless!
Peggy

yellow pole wax beans do great planted in sept

purple peacock beans are doing great also planted in sept

daikons radish

china rose winter radish

both planted anytime in sept.

I did not think I liked radishes until I cooked them.

Amarillo yellow carrot also did well last fall - sept planting

this carrot is very mild.

free crops - dandelion roots. I like to eat them steamed. Not too many as they are cleansing. Good for the liver!

dallas/denton area

My 2008 garden was my first ever. I made mistakes, but my jalapenos, banana peppers, and cayenne did very well and produced from June through October. I had 10 okra plants, Clemson Spineless, that produced an incredible amount of okra. I pickled many pints of okra with my cayenne peppers, plus cooked lots more with tomatoes, and froze some. But my squash and cucumbers never produced. My tomatoes had low yields of small fruit.

This year I've planted corn, cantaloupe, watermelon, green onion, yellow onion, Bermuda onion, shallot, egg plant, lettuce, carrots, jalapeno, habanero, cayenne, anaheim, bell pepper, tomato, okra, yellow squash, cucumber, green beans, and potato. Most are doing well so far, but my watermelon, cantaloupe, cucumber, and egg plants don't seem to be growing much.

I've eaten the lettuce, and I'm harvesting and eating my green onions, green beans, yellow squash, and banana peppers a little every day or so.

My tomatoes are starting to set fruit. I hope they do better than last year.

Hello from Lockhart (20 miles south of Austin). This is our first year with a big garden...some triumphs and some disappointments. I think the prolonged heat and drought is mainly to blame for our disappointments. Most of our tomatoes quit setting fruit once the temps climbed above 90, but the romas and the pears have hung in there. We are going organic this year for the first time, and the squash vine borers, aphids and flea beetles have gotten REALLY BAD. Trying to attract more beneficials for the fall planting.

Successes: roma tomatoes, pear tomatoes (slow to start, but we are so sick of them now - and they have continued to set fruit in the 100+ weather), yellow zucchini, vining pickling cucumbers, basil, parsley

Moderate successes: brandywine tomatoes, cherokee purple tomatoes, banana peppers, hot peppers

Failures: Zucchini (I can't believe it either!), watermelon, canteloupe, bush cucumbers

Hope this helps!

My garden is just South of Houston. I've posted an entry on it earlier in this thread.

This year I got serious about SVB control and my efforts have paid off. I've enjoyed yellow crookneck, yellow straightneck, patty pan and Black Beauty zucchini for three months. One variety that did not deliver was Cocozelle di Napoli; paltry set of very pretty zucchini and one would have to plant half a dozen to have enough of them to eat.
I've also tried and liked a Thai pumpkin that I have bought at Baker Creek; plants were very vigorous and they kept producing pumpkins through the hot weather. I'm starting several varieties of winter squash for the fall.

Eggplants: duds. I've tried Florida High Bush, Thai Green, and something that was supposed to be Rosita, but in all likelihood wasn't. Yields were good, but all of those were bitter and unappealing. I'm going back to Rosa Bianca next year.

Tomatoes: bad year, too dry and too hot too early in the season.

Asian yard-long beans (I'm growing a Thai variety this year) are delivering a bumper crop this summer. I cannot recommend Asian yard-long beans for summer crop enough. Just make sure you pick them when they are still skinny; they go from skinny to fat in about 48 hours.

Melons: duds. I've had only one Ogaden melon and I'm watching a nice specimen of Charentais. But I shouldn't have planted them in the neighborhood of Thai pumpkins; pumpkin and squash vines will outcompete melons. Lesson learned. I will try Ogaden again next year; the flavor and sweetness were extraordinary.

Peppers: success. California Wonder, NuMex Joe E. Parker, and Tam Jalapeno. NuMex Joe E. Parker has a great Hatch chile flavor when picked green and grilled. California Wonder has delivered some gigantic peppers in the spring. Both California Wonder and NuMex Joe E. Parker are vigorous plants; they are going through the summer lull right now and I expect them to pick up production once the weather cools off. I like Tam Jalapeno, too, but it is a mild jalapeno with just a hint of heat. Good for those whose little kids don't like hot foods (yet).

I never worried about variety of what plants I put into the soil. Just the type, "Cherry" type tomatoes do the best in out very hot summers. Any peppers, green beans, burp-less Cucumbers, eggplants, okra, Melons, Winter squash, and pumpkins. In the winter all Cole plants, carrots, all greens, most root plants, strawberries and herbs. I love Butter-crunch lettuce, they put on very large heads but will feed maybe 2 people as the leaves are not close together.

The Panhandle.

So far this year I have had the best sucess with my Minnesota Midgets they are going NUTS!!!! But everything else is doing wonderfully too, tomatoes, several different peppers, Annhiems are going crazy too. watermelons, cantalopes, squash, zuchs, and cucumbers. Despite not having any rain up here they are doing well, I live in a bubble that hasn't gotten rain hardly at all. lol :)

Best crop in the spring was strawberries but right now our okra is going nuts. Chives are coming along..:)