The Garden Thread that two people wanted

[Mark Gardner]

I pulled all the river rocks out and finished the bed. One of my concrete caps broke, so I'll need to replace it. I dug out a bunch of gravel and used it to fill in the cinder blocks. It's not level so there are gaps, but I'm not *too* concerned about that.

[notthatamanda]

Is the soil you put in going to be a full 12 inches deep? It looks about that deep. I've got a less elegant bigger set up, but I am going to be putting in an underground soaker hose and topping it with loam for a raised bed type thingy. Unsure how deep to go with the loam, complicated by the fact in the spring I'll move the compost there and top again.

[Mark Gardner]

The cinder blocks are ~8" deep. I figure the average height of the river rocks will be ~5" tall. I'll dig out the bottom about an inch so I can remove some plastic sheeting that's under the gravel. With a 2" cap, I expect to have 6" of growth medium. I'm thinking the bottom 4" will be filler dirt and some dried leafy material. The top 2" will probably be a mixture of mushroom compost, steer manure, vermiculite, perlite, raised-bed soil, and potting mix. (It's what I make for the potted flowers and vegtables.) Then when planting season starts, I'll cover with red mulch for the tomatoes and brown mulch for everything else.

I'm doing open-air compost for leafy yard waste, egg shells, coffee grounds, and fruit peels. I'd like to get a rotating composter, but the decent ones are ~$200.

I thought about a soaker, especially since my rain barrel is only about eight feet away. It's also about four feet higher, so gravity might be enough to push through. In the end, I decided to just hard-water the bed.

Is the soil you put in going to be a full 12 inches deep? It looks about that deep. I've got a less elegant bigger set up, but I am going to be putting in an underground soaker hose and topping it with loam for a raised bed type thingy. Unsure how deep to go with the loam, complicated by the fact in the spring I'll move the compost there and top again.

[Vijaya]

It's still got a lot of life. If you add another taller support, you'll get more. And that's a lovely square of a garden plan! The kitchen garden is my favorite.

[LilyBLily]

I dream of the day when I will have a reliable source of water again instead of a well. I gave up watering my plants when I discovered that I lost all water pressure in the house after doing so. The previous house had a very deep well, but even so, I more reliably got water leaking in my basement than on my plants. And then there's the little matter of sunshine. I'm in a forest. It's quite picturesque, but there's not much sunlight.

My tomatoes on the deck are about done. Between the many days of high heat and now daily downpours, they've given up. The colchicum (often confused--by me--with autumn crocus) is coming up and soon to bloom with a lovely pinkish lavender color. No sign of the lycoris, but I'm still hoping. 

[notthatamanda]

The cinder blocks are ~8" deep. I figure the average height of the river rocks will be ~5" tall. I'll dig out the bottom about an inch so I can remove some plastic sheeting that's under the gravel. With a 2" cap, I expect to have 6" of growth medium. I'm thinking the bottom 4" will be filler dirt and some dried leafy material. The top 2" will probably be a mixture of mushroom compost, steer manure, vermiculite, perlite, raised-bed soil, and potting mix. (It's what I make for the potted flowers and vegtables.) Then when planting season starts, I'll cover with red mulch for the tomatoes and brown mulch for everything else.

I'm doing open-air compost for leafy yard waste, egg shells, coffee grounds, and fruit peels. I'd like to get a rotating composter, but the decent ones are ~$200.

I thought about a soaker, especially since my rain barrel is only about eight feet away. It's also about four feet higher, so gravity might be enough to push through. In the end, I decided to just hard-water the bed.

Is the soil you put in going to be a full 12 inches deep? It looks about that deep. I've got a less elegant bigger set up, but I am going to be putting in an underground soaker hose and topping it with loam for a raised bed type thingy. Unsure how deep to go with the loam, complicated by the fact in the spring I'll move the compost there and top again.

I have a rotating one and it is not all it is cracked up to be. Can't put that much in it. We have an earth machine that we got from the town recycling commission and that is the best. If I was really into finishing the compost having two of those would do. As it is we just pile it in there all winter, spread it in the bed in the spring and cover with a landscape tarp for a couple of weeks, turn before planting.

[Mark Gardner]

Today’s update. The cinder blocks are done. It’s not level at all. Put down breathable weed cloth both to keep weeds out, and to help hold the volume of dirt. The river rocks are back in, and there’s gravel in there. All to help support drainage.

[notthatamanda]

I moved a lilac bush to the other side of my front door. The one I did last fall did flower this spring so I think it is a better, sunnier spot for it. It was only about 4 feet tall but there is still plenty left over in the original patch.

[Mark Gardner]

Today, I'll probably move a tomato and pepper plant to the raised garden bed. I also have radish sprouts, but I think I'll keep them in their container. The girls are very interested with Aubrey demanding she be allowed to water the empty bed.

[LilyBLily]

Very cute, and about as effective as the watering I do.

[Mark Gardner]

Transplant complete.

[idontknowyet]

I finally got a chance to check my sweet potatoes. Though the first ones weren't supposed to be ready until the end of the month i pulled some up.


They are perfectly formed disease and bug free, but they're tiny. It's like i have fingerling sweet potatoes. I think i'm going to give them another month in the ground.

[LilyBLily]

And here are the lycoris and the colchicum. Best year ever for the lycoris.

 

 

[idontknowyet]

And here are the lycoris and the colchicum. Best year ever for the lycoris.

Those are stunning!

[notthatamanda]

I love funky looking flowers. The purple ones aren't crocus? I've heard of later blooming crocus.

So I did dig up the garden and get the soaker hose in for next year. Put down 3 yards of loam. Husband says it looks like a mass grave.

Yesterday Phoebe the dieffenbachia toppled over, across the plant table, not off it and onto the carpet, very considerate of her, so I gave her a bigger pot.

[Vijaya]

So pretty, LilyBily.

[LilyBLily]

Apparently the true autumn crocus is slightly different and smaller and more likely to be a single bulb. Regardless, I don't think the deer care that it is a different variety; they have eaten them in the past. This time around I sprayed the flowers at several stages to keep them safe.

The lycoris are somewhat like shubertii allium, like a fireworks sparkler. Unfortunately, the voles eat most of my allium varieties, leaving only the not-very-showy drumstick type. Better than nothing, but shubertii are really pretty and I'm sad that I can't have them.     

[notthatamanda]

I've heard coyote urine works. But I don't really want to spend money on urine.

[LilyBLily]

The voles go after the bulbs in the winter. I often find their tunnels under melting snow. I'm afraid fox urine isn't likely to do the job under those conditions.

[Maggie Ann]

The voles go after the bulbs in the winter. I often find their tunnels under melting snow. I'm afraid fox urine isn't likely to do the job under those conditions.

And who wants to follow foxes or coyotes with a specimen jar! 

[notthatamanda]

The Itoh and Shima Nishiki peonies I ordered might not ship until November so I had to cancel them. 

[Mark Gardner]

I've been saving grounds and eggshells from my daily coffee and hardboiled egg. I added the mixture to to a grow bag and added equal parts topsoil. I think I'm going to try to grow a potato since that likes acidic soil. After winter, I think I'm going to try my hand at vermicomposting.

[Maggie Ann]

I use eggshells on my orchids when they are blooming.

[notthatamanda]

I use eggshells on my orchids when they are blooming.

Do you peel the insides out because I heard otherwise they get stinky?

[notthatamanda]

I've been saving grounds and eggshells from my daily coffee and hardboiled egg. I added the mixture to to a grow bag and added equal parts topsoil. I think I'm going to try to grow a potato since that likes acidic soil. After winter, I think I'm going to try my hand at vermicomposting.

My friend worm composts in her basement, teaches classes on it and everything. But why would you wait until after winter? Around here you vermicompost indoors in the winter because worms can't live outside in the cold and everything in the composter freezes and stays that way until spring.

[Maggie Ann]

I use eggshells on my orchids when they are blooming.

Do you peel the insides out because I heard otherwise they get stinky?

Yes. I peel out the membrane and then wash the shells. I stick them in the microwave for 30 secs but I only do two at a time. I crush them, but if you have a coffee or spice grinder, it's better to do that.

[idontknowyet]

I dug up some sweet potatoes today. 2 of my seven beds of them. They were all pretty tiny though i got a few full sized ones. Out of 18 plants i got maybe twenty pounds which isn't terrible but not great.
I either need to enhance my soil next year or i need to plant them a bit earlier. Everyone around here seemed to plant them a month or so earlier than i did.

I'll probably do both.

Next up moving those beds and getting my fall seedlings in.

[LilyBLily]

I'm girding my loins to make a curbside pickup from a big box hardware with enough top soil and bulb food for the several hundred bulbs set to arrive next week.

Wild asters are blooming white, plus there is a pale lavender that I am wondering might be a crossbreed of the purple dome aster I had planted in that spot (it seems to have vanished). Phlox colonize each others' colors and mostly end up pink. Maybe asters do, too.

The lycoris are near their end and have been lovely. I have lots of black-eyed susans all over to give final color. For a native plant they are tremendously invasive. The nursery-bought version is just as competitive and has much bigger leaves but doesn't last as long into the fall. It and the echinaceas are done for the year. Goldfinches came to eat their seeds.

[idontknowyet]

I dug out 3 more beds of sweet potatoes. I got around 35lbs of sweet potatoes this time.

Results from planted potatoes vs slips. The slips were more consistent. I got 2-3 nice sized potatoes from each slip. Whereas the planted potatoes gave me more potatoes but they were erratic. Some produced nothing but masses and masses of roots. Others produced a half dozen or more small potatoes (think fingerling). Yet others produce  a couple of larger potatoes.
This leaves me unsure of where i want to go. I think next year i'll do a mix of both slips and potatoes.

Still have two more beds to dig out.

[Simon Haynes]

My younger daughter came over this afternoon, and she chucked dried branches and plants into the electric mulcher while I pulled up weeds. We cleared one large bed and I planted out my capsicum and sweetcorn seeds.

Dug up half a kilo or so of potatoes - I gave those to her to take home. Also 'lent' her a large potted blueberry bush (covered in ripe fruit) which I'm looking after for her older sister, who moved interstate last year.

In return she gave me an avocado tree, a small banana plant and some perpetual spinach. Her boyfriend's mum gave me three freshly baked cookies, which were very nice.

[LilyBLily]

What I'm doing right now is gathering up large numbers of fallen branches before the oak leaves drop and cover them all. I'm also weed whacking hundreds of new tiny would-be oak trees. I almost killed my ride-on mower yesterday trying to mow them; it hit a rock and made a terrible noise and then stalled a couple of times out of pique. Today it's working normally, which is a relief; apparently I didn't bend a blade after all. The shale that is our common rock here is not very hard. Still not recommended to mow rocks. 

My bulb order should show up next week, and it's supposed to rain early next week, so the ground might actually be soft enough to penetrate with my pitchfork.

My new gallardia has come up to bloom and the morning glory gives me one blossom every few days. I raised that from a seed indoors but it still didn't start blooming until September. I have several kinds of wildflowers: native asters and goldenrod plus black-eyed susans, to the delight of the bees.

The hummingbirds left a couple of weeks ago. Lots of leaves have already fallen and we're getting some nice autumn color but are not quite at the height since few of the oaks have turned. We have hundreds of oaks, and they often drop all their leaves on November 1 exactly. Right now the weather is very mild, so maybe not this year. 

[notthatamanda]

I have what I am not absolutely positive are potatoes growing. Of course it is a little too late for them, but I will tarp them when the weather is getting colder and hope for the best. It is 75 here today, which is ridiculous, it will be cooler next week but no frost in the forecast over the next 10 days.

Indoors both my peace palms got two new flowers. One of my amaryllis, which I stuck in the corner when it was done in like April, started growing again. I put that one in it's own pot and put the other two in the basement to plant in January. My neighbor is moving and I got some tomato supports, chicken wire, and potting soil from his free pile. Also two Adirondack chairs, plastic, but in good shape, husband already took a nap in one today.

[Mark Gardner]

I don't think that there's much time left for my pepper and tomato plants. I tried to save some pepper seeds, but they got moldy in the container... I'll have to research how to harvest tomato and pepper seeds.


The grow bags are doing okay. I'll probably harvest a round of radishes in the next two weeks.


The college I go to has a robust composting and vermiculture program. I'm going to email the head of the Sustainable Food Systems to see if I can get worms come spring. I think I'm going to try binning the vermiculture compost.

[idontknowyet]

Tomato seeds are super easy to harvest.  Put the seeds while gooey in a small filter/colander rinse them to get as much off as you can then soak the seeds in water for 12/24 hours. Rinse again. All the slimy coating should be off then put them on a towel completely dry. Then store in your freezer for years.

[LilyBLily]

Tomato seeds are super easy to harvest.  Put the seeds while gooey in a small filter/colander rinse them to get as much off as you can then soak the seeds in water for 12/24 hours. Rinse again. All the slimy coating should be off then put them on a towel completely dry. Then store in your freezer for years.

Since we're mostly using hybrids, will the seeds even propagate? When I used to have small orange trees in my apartment, their fruit would only produce large orange trees (very big leaves) and no fruit. I used them as Christmas trees.

It sounds as if the treatment for tomato seeds is similar to what one does with pumpkin seeds: have to get that cellophane-like coating off.

[idontknowyet]

They might or might not produce. I've had peppers i got from the supermarket do exceedingly well. I only bought organic tomatoes from the market to reseed. So far they are looking lovely. But its the same process with hybrids or hierloom.

[Mark Gardner]

Tomato seeds are super easy to harvest.  Put the seeds while gooey in a small filter/colander rinse them to get as much off as you can then soak the seeds in water for 12/24 hours. Rinse again. All the slimy coating should be off then put them on a towel completely dry. Then store in your freezer for years.

That's good to know. I'll try that today!

[idontknowyet]

So far i've direct sewn 162 pea plants though there were in groups of 81 each. Of the first 81 plants, all but  6 germinated already. I'm going to give them another day before replanting in those spots.

My kale is already starting to germinate and those were only put in a few days ago. While my cauliflower and broc are about ready to transplant.

Oh my tomatoes are looking soo good. I only put a few in this season. Like 12 plants. They seem to be doubling every day.

I miss seeing the sweet potatoes trying to take over the yard. Not to mention missing all the pretty purple flowers.

[notthatamanda]

It's all about raking here now. Avocados are a buck each now so we're eating lots and I'm trying to get five to start growing in a ziploc bag with a wet paper towel stored in the cupboard with the coffee mugs. I used to have an avocado tree in the living room, but one winter it went dormant and didn't come back.

[idontknowyet]

It's all about raking here now. Avocados are a buck each now so we're eating lots and I'm trying to get five to start growing in a ziploc bag with a wet paper towel stored in the cupboard with the coffee mugs. I used to have an avocado tree in the living room, but one winter it went dormant and didn't come back.

We have a twenty or so foot avocado tree in our back yard. It's yet to produce anything. From what i've read it can take more than 10 years to fruit when you start it from a seed rather that cuttings.

[notthatamanda]

My mom grew up with an avocado tree in Miami. I will never get any fruit from it here in Massachusetts, indoors but it makes a nice addition to the indoor plant collection.

[Simon Haynes]

My mum had an avocado tree at each of her last two houses, and my dad pruned both of them a bit too much. No more avocados.

Bear in mind if you grow them from seed they might revert to a lesser variety.  Best bet is to grow the tree from seed then graft on a cutting from a tree with good fruit. (I did this last year but we had a long hot summer with too many days of 100F/39c. Wish I'd moved it inside.)

[Maggie Ann]

My mom grew up with an avocado tree in Miami. I will never get any fruit from it here in Massachusetts, indoors but it makes a nice addition to the indoor plant collection.

My mum had an avocado tree at each of her last two houses, and my dad pruned both of them a bit too much. No more avocados.

Bear in mind if you grow them from seed they might revert to a lesser variety.  Best bet is to grow the tree from seed then graft on a cutting from a tree with good fruit. (I did this last year but we had a long hot summer with too many days of 100F/39c. Wish I'd moved it inside.)

I had an avocado tree in Miami, too. It was loaded with fruit and a guy offered to harvest and buy the avocados. My tree never bloomed again.

[LilyBLily]

Has anybody ever had an apricot tree? I saw one with fruit in April in Greece years ago and it was very impressive. Not a large tree but fuller than the olive trees all over. I've always lived where it is too cold in winter for such a tree.

[Simon Haynes]

Has anybody ever had an apricot tree? I saw one with fruit in April in Greece years ago and it was very impressive. Not a large tree but fuller than the olive trees all over. I've always lived where it is too cold in winter for such a tree.

My parents have one. They grow it under netting to keep the birds off. (Western Australia)

I also had one at my previous house, but the fruitfly would get to the apricots when they were still green.

[LilyBLily]

I have two peach trees that grew from when part of this property was an orchard. The apple trees remaining do not bear, but the peaches do. Unfortunately, the squirrels go after them when they are green. The prior owners had a dog, so our first year here I got peaches and made a pie. Then the squirrels realized the dog was gone. That was it for the peaches.

[idontknowyet]

Sweet potatoes are totally invasive. Shoots keep popping up even though i thought i got ever pink root out of the beds.

Current state of my garden. I have 162 ish sweet pea plants coming up had less than a dozen not germinate that i replanted. They are growing super slow because of the heat wave we're still experiencing. The second planting of carrots are going exceedingly well. The first one i tried with a new method. (i did something very wrong.)
Soo many tiny little spinach plants are comming up. I planted 4 beds of 81 plants each. No lettuce up yet.

My tomatoes are stunning. They are over a foot tall, but no flowers yet.

My kale seedlings arent ready to plant yet.

Cauliflower and Broccoli arent liking the heat either, but they are hanging in.

[LilyBLily]

The next day or two will probably put an end to my tomatoes, although one of them has been ignoring the weather and is flowering. They're far too tall to bring inside, alas. Apparently, when they built this house, they forgot to build the conservatory.

[notthatamanda]

Tarped the potatoes in prep for the snow tonight. Probably useless but it only took five minutes. I will definitely try potatoes early next year. I just got one organic potato, cut it up and let it try for a couple of days on the counter, then planted. I have nice plants now, I just did it too late.

[LilyBLily]

I've planted 25% of my bulbs so far and am taking a break while it rains all day. Tomorrow afternoon should be good for digging. Meanwhile I'm making wire cages for the new crocus bulbs in case the squirrels will be unable to get through them. It's a nice thought, anyway.   

Many leaves are tumbling down, but the oaks are taking their time, as usual. It has not been seriously cold yet; there's even a petunia still blooming that grew on its own and is sheltering under the cannas. Otherwise, a couple of gallardia blossoms and the last of the black-eyed susans, and that's it for flowers.