Gardening 2024 - Whatcha got going on this year?

[day_trippr]

Summers are booming now, plus the first Cubanelle...

Cukes are a day away...

 

[bailey mountain brewer]

Not my garden but a friend of mine, we picked fresh this morning. About 100 ears or so.

 

[day_trippr]

First bells and cuke, couple more Cubanelles...

Soupy af outside this weekend, it's grab anything ready and then beat feet inside! Ugh...

Cheers!

 

[Deadalus]

Those bags attract the bugs and fill up with hundreds still around to continue their filthy orgy.

I've used Sevin in the past and that does a decent job of clearing them out. This year I've been applying Bacillus thuringiensis galleriae to my hops, and they're still getting chewed on but they don't seem to be hosting the completely massive orgy they have the past few years.

@kumah

I didn't know they had a BT for them, good to know. Any other pests attack hops? One of these days I will figure out a spot for hops.

 

[day_trippr]

Spider Mites are your Number One enemy wrt growing hops, followed by aphids.
Dr Bronner's Pure Castine Soap and Neem Oil can be your friends...

Cheers!

 

[Agent]

First bells and cuke, couple more Cubanelles...

View attachment 854739

Soupy af outside this weekend, it's grab anything ready and then beat feet inside! Ugh...

Cheers!

I'm a bit jealous of the pepper to cuke ratio. I was sooooo late seeding my starts. We've gotten maybe 4 peppers from our store bought starts. And the cukes are "slow" to get going this year too.

And this is a first year planting for us, but did you know a single stand-alone collard greens plant will put out 2-3 meals/week worth? I sure as hell didn't.

 

[bailey mountain brewer]

Psshhhhh.. your way ahead of me but my cukes have a ton of flowers so we'll get bombarded soon, and I'm ready to make some damn pickles.

 

[day_trippr]

Yeah, cukes have been super late here, but the vines are covered in 1-2 inch little dudes now, which for sure will all be pickable on the same day
Got the first ripe heirloom toms today along with more cubanelles and summers. Nothing like same-day-fresh stir fried veggies...

Cheers!

 

[corkybstewart]

Not my garden but a friend of mine, we picked fresh this morning. About 100 ears or so.
View attachment 854735

I miss fresh sweet corn, people just don't eat it here. They use a little canned corn in salads and such, but to just eat a fresh ear of corn doesn't happen.

 

[corkybstewart]

I'm a bit jealous of the pepper to cuke ratio. I was sooooo late seeding my starts. We've gotten maybe 4 peppers from our store bought starts. And the cukes are "slow" to get going this year too.

View attachment 854876

And this is a first year planting for us, but did you know a single stand-alone collard greens plant will put out 2-3 meals/week worth? I sure as hell didn't.

View attachment 854877

You can keep the cukes but we do love collard greens. I haven't planted any in a while but I think I'll have to next spring. I wonder how they would do as a "mild winter" crop?

 

[Deadalus]

You can keep the cukes but we do love collard greens. I haven't planted any in a while but I think I'll have to next spring. I wonder how they would do as a "mild winter" crop?

They are fine down to freezing but not quite as hardy as kale.

Sunday's picks:

I like to go pull a few things for stir fry or the night's dinner too. I brewed yesterday, then ran outside to grab a couple crooknecks for dinner, I already picked the zuke. Toasted some pine nuts and made some basil pesto for a little squash pesto rigatoni. I only used half the basil, I think I will dry the rest, that's what I did with the oregano.

 

[Agent]

Took off work a bit early to prep for a dinner party and found myself in the garden for a bit squashing squash bugs and training cuke vines.

Looks like in a turn of miracles, every head of broccoli isn't going to be ready within the same three days this year!

And the carrots are letting me know they are ready by practically blasting themselves out of the ground.

 

[Agent]

Still trying to figure out how to make celery stalk up a bit. Guess it'll be fine for a ton of stock and soups later.

Fennel is surprisingly looking good for a late start and first year attempt. I've purchased fennel root literally once in my life, so I need to figure out what I'm going to be doing with it...

And much to SWMBO's chagrin, beets are ready!

 

[Deadalus]

Fennel is delicious roasted in olive oil in the oven. Bake at 350F until it turns soft and translucent like a sauteed onion. Then some crusty bread and olive oil to accompany it. One of my kids makes a fantastic paella inspired dish with it too. It's from a vegetarian cookbook. I'm not a fan though of the greens, as they remind me too much of licorice, but you can put them in salads.

The dirty rotten slugs around here adore them however and always wipe mine out. I tried starts this year but they ate those too. Next year I will try to grow them in the greenhouse.

I grew celery one year but it stayed small. It takes a long time too. Mine ended up fairly woody since I was wanting it to get bigger and I left it out most of the growing season. I think it requires some special attention, I've seen pictures of using hay. It may be something like potatoes which get hilled. I don't know if the hay keeps it softer, lighter colored, and or makes it grow bigger.

 

[corkybstewart]

Still trying to figure out how to make celery stalk up a bit. Guess it'll be fine for a ton of stock and soups later.

View attachment 855099

Fennel is surprisingly looking good for a late start and first year attempt. I've purchased fennel root literally once in my life, so I need to figure out what I'm going to be doing with it...

View attachment 855100

And much to SWMBO's chagrin, beets are ready!

View attachment 855101

We're eating beet/tomato/carrot salads for lunch almost every day now. With chive, basil leaves, and my wife's vinaigrette dressing. We love the beets.

 

[hottpeper13]

Celery is a very water intensive plant that I don't have time for. I have a Loveage plant that gives me leaves to dry, stalks to use (pull them out like bay leaves), also the seeds are what celery seed comes from. German herb to go with my schnitzel and Lager.

 

[Kent88]

A couple years ago I tried that hack where you regrow celery from one you bought in the store and ate from. I'm pretty sure it lived until fall, but I had no new stalks grow.

 

[Deadalus]

This week's harvests. Peppers are starting to turn. Some fresnos and Nardellos, plus a green Anaheim.

 

[day_trippr]

^very nice^

I may put all of these ('cept the cukes) on the grill tonite..

Cheers!

 

[day_trippr]

Garden has thickened considerably since its first appearance here...

Meanwhile our resident chipmunk herd has developed a taste for our toms so we're picking a day or so early to stay ahead of the li'l bastids. They particularly enjoy the mutant heirlooms. Can't have that! Those are for sammiches!!

Cheers!

 

[Deadalus]

You may know this but once the tomatoes blush they are good to pick and will ripen just fine. The plant cuts them off and it's more temperature and the ethylene that ripens them.

WV has a drought going on and increasing reports suggest that critter damage may also be increasing due to water scarcity. Some suggest providing a nearby water source may alleviate some pressure in the garden. May not be the case by you but I mention it. I've had birds in the past peck holes in red tomatoes. Now that I've heard about these local drought stories, I've wondered if a dry spell might have contributed to that.

 

[day_trippr]

We have a ~4000 square foot pond on the other side of the house from the garden, so I don't think this is about thirst. They're just li'l freeloading bastids...

Cheers!

 

[day_trippr]

1st tom sammich of the year! Heirlooms look crazy but taste wonderful!

Cheers!

 

[day_trippr]

Garden is pumping out the tomatoes now. Been having a tom sandwich for lunch every day and playing with "toppings".
Love the simple ones, but this one is "loaded" with shallots and hot pickled peppers. Really tasty!

Cheers!

 

[Agent]

Our incessant rains have produced a new leafless tomato variety that's super easy to pick!

Or it's just all the blights.

 

[Kent88]

I'm dealing with that too. I gave up. I'm getting tomatoes but the leaves just look like garbage.

 

[Deadalus]

Organically you have to do a lot of preventative maintenance to keep the blights and septoria at bay. Regular copper treatments are helpful for tomatoes and powdery mildew on cukes and squashes. Usually a losing battle with tomatoes but it can get you to some canning if that's the goal.

 

[day_trippr]

Thought we spotted our first Joro spider this afternoon but it turns out to be a "black and yellow garden spider". Never seen one of them before, it had built a big web in our basil and was chowing down on a dragon fly it netted. Freaky

Cheers!

 

[Kent88]

I'd rather have the dragonfly

 

[day_trippr]

Having a natural pond on the property we have tons of dragons, and damsels too, keeping the less desirable bugs at bay.
I'll take the excitement of seeing a totally different (and pretty cool) wee beastie every once in awhile

 

[bailey mountain brewer]

My struggling garden finally got us some cucumbers so doing our second batch of dill, some will include some jalapeno and chilies. This is 7lbs of cukes

 

[Agent]

Just a couple heads of broccoli that got away from us.

 

[Deadalus]

Was away over the weekend, just arriving home. One zucchini and one cucumber got away but otherwise a good haul. Still leafy greens that need picking and rapini.

 

[passedpawn]

dayum

 

[bailey mountain brewer]

Getting small picks like this about every 2 to 3 days now.. can't complain with the weather we had this year and our late start.

 

[Agent]

The inlaws came up for their annual share of the carrot harvest and dug up about 1/3 of the carrot rows...

 

[Deadalus]

Look at what I found hiding in the cucumber section.

The butternuts are in the next bed over.

 

[Deadalus]

Here's today's picks, thought you all might find the jalapenos interesting. Finally turning red, really corked out. Tomatoes keep rolling, kale, broccoli rabe, collards, and cukes. Left to right peppers are a habanero, jalapeno, giant jalapeno, and four fresnos.

 

[corkybstewart]

We got home just before dark after a week trip. I picked these tomatoes, my wife is outside picking a basket full. Lunch today will be tomatoes and beets in vinaigrette dressing.

 

[Agent]

I'm keeping up on my updates like I am the garden - only just barely.

Broccoli coming once a week.

Cukes on the assault. Green beans tapering out. And finally seeing the first coordinated wave of tomatoes. Unfortunately, it's a diced tomato year so I have to pick and process the same day or so.

Saucing was sooo easy, because I could quarter and freeze whenever. Then when the freezers were full, I could knock out 20-30 quarts in an afternoon.

And I had one photo-consenting assistant with picking out our county fair specimens.