Watermelon season ahead
lucillle
2 years ago
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Comments (20)
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I can't get ahead... plans for next year
Comments (23)I have bad soil, half your garden size, and it greatly improved for things not effected by juglone, squash, corn, melons, etc. You wouldn't believe the size difference of the year before, so I'll always compost or at least throw leaves all over garden area. All you have to do is dump bags of leaves about a foot or two high over the whole garden area, maybe mow them to speed up decomposition, and you will have given your garden lots of great leaf mold, plus you already have your manure. I think the manure could be new because it can age all year before you throw it down. I wouldn't waste the manure until about a month or 2 before planting, or maybe even half at the end of the year, save the other half at the beginning, but some in the middle of the year too. I've got beds for next year, waiting to put them in, but I'm waiting for the leaves to fall and looking into local pastures for manure. I couldn't give advice on weeds being I'm going to plant some good weeds over the area until the beds are in. Try ragweed, dandelion with the flowers pruned off, yellow dock, and a few other deep rooted types of weeds that bring nutrients to the top of the soil. They will make good compost....See Morenot a bad first season, planning ahead for second season
Comments (1)Seed catalogs come out around December/January, so that's the time to order seeds. You can make a wish list before then and also write down what you already have. For me, I like to shop in the stores, too, so I buy some off the rack in late winter. Ah, springtime......See MoreLooking ahead, brine question
Comments (1)Because your dealing with small cukes, and they should be very fresh when they are being brined, it would be more effective to make several smaller batches, or try to gauge the output and pick as many that you can that are a suitable size all at once, the brine them. Cukes usually grow very fast and an inch of growth overnight is not uncommon. You could probably refrigerate a bunch, but once they are stored and dealyed from being brines, they will become softer. I usually pick cukes almost every day and find that I have quite a lot of them within a single day. I use the Mrs. Wages dill pickle mix as it has the necessary salt and also contains dill flavor, far more intense compared to just adding fresh dill. also, if your doing dill pickles, a good crop of garlic can also be grown, as well as many dill plants/ Last year, I didn't plant dill, and any that did grow was from dropped seeds from the previous year. By the time they were flowering and forming green swelled seed heads, the cukes were also ready to pick. My half sours are still stored in the fridge and I will get a few every once in a while. Adding a continous supply of cukes to an already percolating brine is not good. You can't tell which ones were there the longest in the brine. Adding more after a day or two seems to change the natural fermentation of the cukes. For a larger supply of cukes, plant more seeds....See MoreSo I give up...for this season...Need help for next season..
Comments (9)Scarleta- I've had a lot of trouble with aphids in my lighted shelves indoors where I start seedlings. It's all because I foolishly brought some plants back in from outside. Those aphids really get around. Is there some time you can have the greenhouse empty to get rid of them and then never bring any plant inside that has been sitting outside to reinfest them? Perhaps it's harder with a greenhouse since it's outdoors and perhaps the aphids can find ways to get in. There must be some way to control them like Safer's Insecticidal soap or Neem. I also tried soapy water without much success and damaged a few seedlings. Have you tried the real heat-lovers in your greenhouse like okra, watermelons, and cantaloupes? It's not hot enough here to grow them in the ground. You might find lots of good ideas on the greenhouse and structures forum, /strucs. Here is a link discussing peppers. I don't have greenhouse experience to help you. Is yours heated in winter? Do you use it to start seedlings for outdoors, and make cuttings in winter? That's what I do with my lighted shelves but I don't have sufficient light or space to grow tomatoes or peppers to fruiting stage in winter, which would be nice. My peppers don't do well in our cold soil so I have them and eggplants in pots on my deck and they are fruiting and have no signs of aphids. Here is a link that might be useful: greenhouse forum on peppers...See Morelucillle
2 years agolast modified: 2 years agolucillle
2 years agoZalco/bring back Sophie!
2 years agolast modified: 2 years agolucillle thanked Zalco/bring back Sophie!
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