What Are Some Tips for Successful Gardening?

[Ouabache]

While out there, I noticed some insect damage to leaves of beans and peppers, as well as the previously-known rhubarb leaf damage, so I mixed up a watering can with BT (baccilus thuringiensis) to give those bugs belly-aches. The active ingredient is a natural non-toxic spore that paralyzes the guts of many leaf-eating insects. Since the rains have stopped, I intend to mix a little BT with my canola-oil tree spray to protect my fruit trees. I just killed my first Japanese beetle of the season, and I am NOT too happy to see any of those around. They attacked my raspberry bushes, peach tree, and others last year. Hopefully, I can get ahead of them this year and kill them off with BT before they have a chance to breed.

Do you know which variety(s) of BT are you using?

Here are some examples and what they target. (http://www.nysaes.cornell.edu/ent/biocontrol/pathogens/bacteria.html )
Bacillus thuringiensis
var. tenebrionis - Colorado potato beetle and elm leaf beetle larvae
var. kurstaki - caterpillars
var. israelensis - mosquito, black fly, and fungus gnat larvae
var. aizawai - wax moth larvae and various caterpillars, especially the diamondback moth caterpillar

I would probably go with some BT tenebrionis to go after the coleopterans on your vegetables.

 

[Ouabache]

Made 5 jars of strawberry jam today.
Nice photos everyone.

Yummm, I love strawberries
I wonder, have you had any success making jam that is low in sugar?

 

[Borek]

I have some lilies blooming

Nice ones

Too early for lilies here, they need some more time. But once they start to bloom I will post pictures as well.

 

[turbo]

Do you know which variety(s) of BT are you using?

Here are some examples and what they target. (http://www.nysaes.cornell.edu/ent/biocontrol/pathogens/bacteria.html )
Bacillus thuringiensis
var. tenebrionis - Colorado potato beetle and elm leaf beetle larvae
var. kurstaki - caterpillars
var. israelensis - mosquito, black fly, and fungus gnat larvae
var. aizawai - wax moth larvae and various caterpillars, especially the diamondback moth caterpillar

I would probably go with some BT tenebrionis to go after the coleopterans on your vegetables.

I'm using kurstaki, since most of the damage seems to be done by caterpillars. It may have no real effect on the Japanese beetles, but they are easy to smother with soapy water, anyway.

 

[Evo]

Beautiful lillies rew!

I was reading the "stupidest gardening mistakes" on the GardenWeb site and thought I would share it. This is the funniest I've read so far, lots more stories at the link.

* Posted by: MrsBeasley 4a Northern Ont on Wed, Feb 20, 02 at 21:56

My MIL had a big, beautiful garden on the side of a hill, and as her family was getting smaller, she offered me all the space I wanted. I planted a lot of vegetables, but the mistake I made was that I planted the whole packet of turnip (rutabaga) seeds. I had a row of turnip 50 feet long. I had the nicest crop of turnip you could imagine. There was only my husband and myself to eat them, but I know lots of people that like them, I could give some away.

When it came time to harvest them, I worked my heart out. I'd cut off the root and leaves, and fill the wheelbarrow, trot the wheelbarrow down the row and pile the turnips on the grass. I worked for hours!

Finally, I was done, I took the knife into the house and washed it off, and went back out to the garden to admire my turnips. I had a pile of turnips as tall as I am. I was almost up to this great pile when a few turnips at the bottom of the pile moved, the whole lot of them started rolling down the hill. I was chasing after them, I'd gather a few in my arms and when I'd reach for another the ones in my arms would get away and continue down the hill. I must have made quite a sight, because my brother-in-law was laughing at me. "You'd better catch them," he called, "They're going to wipe out the neighbor's house"!

I eventually got them rounded up, but it turns out everyone doesn't like turnip the way I do! :-) I wound up serving turnip at least once a week in every way you can imagine. I served them boiled, fried, in stew, I cooked them up and added pumpkin pie spice and made fake pumpkin pie! I thought it was rather inventive of me, but it was the turnip fritters that finally did me in. My husband took one bite and gasped. He had thought that he was biting into an apple fritter. He said he didn't care if he NEVER ate another turnip! I was NOT to grow them ever again! I guess he just doesn't have a sense of humor! LOL

http://faq.gardenweb.com/faq/lists/peren/2002092316009274.html

 

[turbo]

It's that time of year, again! Garlic-growers eagerly anticipate this season. This is when the curved central seed-stalk (called a scape) emerges from the garlic. Scapes must be removed to encourage more robust growth in the bulbs, but that's not the good part. The good part is that they taste kind of like onion tops, with a wonderful mild garlic flavor. You can use them in salads and stir-fries, and I found a recipe for scape pesto on the 'net, and I think we're going to try that, too.

 

[rewebster]

thanks, borekevo----


hey, turbo,-- 'scape'--hmm---I hadn't heard that term before, interesting term--do they have a recipe with goat?

 

[Andre]

Meanwhile, I visited my... errm ...remote island garden to find this beautiful darkest red rose.

the picture doesn't begin to express it's very delicate velvet apperance. Well it's the best I could do.

 

[turbo]

Here's the recipe that I thought sounded good. If you'll Google around, you'll find that a lot of people love these rascals.
http://blog.washingtonpost.com/mighty-appetite/2006/06/my_friend_the_garlic_scape_1.html

And one with pictures:
http://cc-calendula.blogspot.com/2007/06/garlic-scape-pesto.html

Scape-goats:
http://madeater.blogspot.com/2008/06/scape-goats.html

 

[turbo]

Today, my wife and I ripped out the first crop of spinach, which had bolted (you can see a bit of it in the garlic picture) and hoed up that row and planted several more flats of habanero plants and tomatoes. I also re-planted buttercup squash for the 2nd time - this darned rain is rotting the seeds and germination is poor. We had torrential rains again last night, lightning, and severe winds that broke one of my neighbor's lilacs. The greenhouse planted LOTS of vegetable seeds this year in anticipation of the high demand, and we got some pretty good deals on seedlings yesterday. If we're swamped with tomatoes and chilies - well, I'll just make more salsas and freeze the vegetables for soups and sauces over the winter. The salsas in the store are just nasty compared to mine, and my nieces and nephews love to butter me up when they visit for cookouts, etc, so I'll send a jar home with them. I'm trying to encourage them to make their own, but it seems that people in their 20s are just not "hooked in" to gardening, cooking and food preservation.

 

[Evo]

Meanwhile, I visited my... errm ...remote island garden to find this beautiful darkest red rose.

the picture doesn't begin to express it's very delicate velvet apperance. Well it's the best I could do.

Andre, it's gorgeous, do you know the name?

 

[rewebster]

Meanwhile, I visited my... errm ...remote island garden to find this beautiful darkest red rose.

the picture doesn't begin to express it's very delicate velvet apperance. Well it's the best I could do.

that IS a really attractive variety



(I don't exactly know why, but I thought of one woman's cheek that I used to go with (the woman, not just the 'cheek') when I saw that rose---(the 'cheek' between the nose and the ear))

 

[Andre]

Andre, it's gorgeous, do you know the name?

Most certainly, Evo

 

[rewebster]

ahh-hemm---you're pretty thorough about you putting labels for your flowers at your garden--(it's still one of the nicest varieties I've seen)

 

[rewebster]

here's another color of lily that opened:

 

[Andre]

ahh-hemm---you're pretty thorough about you putting labels for your flowers at your garden--(it's still one of the nicest varieties I've seen)

Please try to figure out what this introduction seems to be telling:

Meanwhile, I visited my... errm ...remote island garden to find this beautiful darkest red rose.

Hey I paid for visiting the place many times, so I consider it a little bit 'mine'

Anyway to make up, here are little crops of all the pics I took of "black magic" today

 

[rewebster]

those are great, absolutely great--I'm going to have to look for that variety locally

(I did get the '... errm ...' part)

got any more photos?

 

[Andre]

Shiploads, yes, but not of Black magic (Tantau 1997)

This for instance:

 

[OmCheeto]

It's that time of year, again! Garlic-growers eagerly anticipate this season. This is when the curved central seed-stalk (called a scape) emerges from the garlic. Scapes must be removed to encourage more robust growth in the bulbs, but that's not the good part. The good part is that they taste kind of like onion tops, with a wonderful mild garlic flavor. You can use them in salads and stir-fries, and I found a recipe for scape pesto on the 'net, and I think we're going to try that, too.

Is the same true of elephant garlic? I've got some 5 foot tall scapes right now, and they don't look like they're going to curl. Do you cut them all the way down, or just the tops?

 

[turbo]

Is the same true of elephant garlic? I've got some 5 foot tall scapes right now, and they don't look like they're going to curl. Do you cut them all the way down, or just the tops?

I snap them at the base where they emerge from the leaves. The section from the base until the swelling of the seed-pod is the good part. I remove mine as soon as I start to see a swelling in the scape. Yours are further along, but the base of the stalks may still be tasty. Get them off the plants ASAP, though, so the resources of the plant will go toward building bulbs, not toward producing flowers, seeds, etc. You need to neuter garlic as soon as it looks like it's going reproductive.

 

[Evo]

Shiploads, yes, but not of Black magic (Tantau 1997)

This for instance:

That's awesome.

 

[Evo]

here's another color of lily that opened:

Oh, I love that one!

 

[Evo]

Here's a rosebud on a miniature rose. It's about half the size of my tiny thumb.

 

[Astronuc]

For those interested in raspberries - here is what's happening in NZ:

http://www.hortnet.co.nz/publications/hortfacts/hf057008.htm

Note the soil and fertilizer requirements.


Except for Japanese beetles, our raspberries don't have any pests.



Some information from the US:

http://www.raspberries.us/

http://www.raspberries.us/varieties.htm

 

[turbo]

Here are my cultivated raspberries. The biggest cane is probably 8 feet, and this year for the first time the root system is big enough to start throwing off new growth from rhizomes - some 6' or more from the central planting. This started out a couple of years back as a handful of canes my my wife's co-worker gave her when thinning her patch.

 

[Evo]

Here are my plum tomatoes and a "twin" eggplant blossom.

http://img292.imageshack.us/img292/2826/plumtomatoes1jt5.jpg

http://img292.imageshack.us/img292/4273/eggplantdoublebloomfa2.jpg

 

[Andre]

Nice pictures, Evo

 

[rewebster]

yeah--lookin' good there evo---gardens on patios take special attention---and you're doing it

those eggplants blooms are nice---especially the two growing together like that---



funny, I was trying to think what other flowers had a texture like that--and then...(in that photo how the two composed)--if they were 'colorized' more toward the gray/black/brown-- they'd almost look like one of those close ups of a bat's face--one of those with a wrinkled face and nose.

your eggplant
http://img292.imageshack.us/img292/4273/eggplantdoublebloomfa2.jpg


bat

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15954125

your eggplant (colorized)
http://i226.photobucket.com/albums/dd236/rewebster/eggplantdoublebloomfa2.jpg

 

[turbo]

Here's a shot of my garden from earlier today. Amazingly, given the almost daily drenching that we've been getting for weeks, most of the stuff is doing OK. I've had to replant the cucumbers and green beans, and had to replant the squash twice. Seeds don't germinate well in mud. I have made it a habit to hoe my rows up to help excess water run off, and it has definitely saved the garden this year.

 

[baywax]

Amazingly, after about 11 months of rain, my garden is doing well too... Here's a micrograph of some of very healthy Stachybotrys Mold.