Hi Delta. When I planted them, a little growers mix, composted cow manure, Espoma fertilizer, and epsom salt went into the growing holes. They are mulched with grass clippings over newspaper and lightly side dressed with compost and an occasional dusting of Espoma fertilizer. Their growing area spent about five weeks prior to August under black plastic hoping for some control of the nematode population. They do seem to be kicking into some fruit set now. I occasionally have given them a light spray of an organic insecticide containing "spinosad" which is supposed to help with the leaf miners as well as some worms. Good luck with you plants. In gardening you never know how the season will go!

Great thread... thanks everyone for your input. I sure do hope you all will update this throughout the fall season. It really can be a great resource for us all to review. As for Raven Squash and Bon Bon Squash... never heard of those... I love most squash. I have tons coming up of the 3 winter squashes I planted, acorn, buttercup, and green hubbard. I also have a couple zucchini planted (but haven't come up yet) and one black beauty or something like that... I think that's another variety of acorn squash? I'm going to have to try to hit the traders up for a bunch of different varieties of squash for the spring! My tomatoes are really not doing too well. When they were babysat by my mom, her AC when out for about 5 days and they were in over 95 degrees of heat all day and half the night long... ugggh... some have passed on, but I'm hoping to save some of the last sadder-looking ones. They were just such babies, they couldn't take that kind of heat yet. So.... that's my update so far... And, EG, I would try doing your lettuce in there as you were thinking of. I think it's a great crop to try especially because of it's size. Plus, with the cut and come again method, it would like very nice and be convenient for harvesting. Let us know what you decide. ~Angela

3 years ago I planted a few seed potatoes(beauregard) that I purchased. Had a good harvest that first year, pulled it all up after harvesting. Next spring, sweet potato vines began growing throughout my garden, same thing this year. Am now just harvesting a few large tubers, expecting more (sweet potatoes need about 100 days to mature. White potatoes are more difficult, as they like it cold and don't tolerate excessive moisture/humidity. I've had success planting disease free seed potatoes - early maturing varieties. I ask the producer to send them to me as soon as he can so I can have them planted by Dec. 1. Water at the base and remove diseased leaves frequently. I also keep them out of the hottest, most intense sun - even in the winter, S Florida can be brutally hot. Best luck!

Where in the state are you? Because that makes a difference. As you can see from my username, I'm on the West Central Gulf coast, and my cool weather things don't come out until a couple of weeks before I'm ready to start something new - depending on planting dates in the UF guide. I only direct sow greens & legumes, generally, and lettuce and many other greens can also be started in pots and transplanted - many are pretty forgiving of that. Peas usually bear once and then they're done. You can tell because the vines start dying back. Lettuce can last awhile if you use the cut & come again method or just harvest outer leaves, otherwise, it doesn't grow decent side shoots after cutting the main stem, IMPE - neither does cabbage. Broccoli will usually sprout side shoots after the main head is harvested, and the amount and size of those varies depending on the variety. Tomatoes can keep producing if they are indeterminate, but not if they're determinate. Fertilizing after harvest will help with new production.