Gardening: My Tomatoe and Pepper Progress

[Deadalus]

Sorry to hear that @bwible .

Harvested so far: scapes, garlic, brocolli, brocolli rabe, swiss chard, kale, spinach, y. squash, collards, kohlrabi, bok choy, slicing cukes, lemon cukes, and a good year for pickling cukes!

On deck: beets, pattypan and acorn squash, zucchini, 5 types of tomatoes, jalapenos, thais, and bell peppers. Going to make basil pesto later maybe. Waiting on the tomatoes and peppers to turn red!

Later fall: lettuces, brassicas, leeks.

I've got about 6 gallons of pickles fermenting. I used my brewing experience to make some 2 gallon fermenters out of food grade buckets from Lowes. Cheaper than a crock.

Here's some lemon cucumbers I started fermenting this morning. Going to make some water bath pickles later and some sauer-kohlrabi (like kraut).

 

[bwible]

Sorry to hear that @bwible .

Harvested so far: scapes, garlic, brocolli, brocolli rabe, swiss chard, kale, spinach, y. squash, collards, kohlrabi, bok choy, slicing cukes, lemon cukes, and a good year for pickling cukes!

On deck: beets, pattypan and acorn squash, zucchini, 5 types of tomatoes, jalapenos, thais, and bell peppers. Going to make basil pesto later maybe. Waiting on the tomatoes and peppers to turn red!

Later fall: lettuces, brassicas, leeks.

I've got about 6 gallons of pickles fermenting. I used my brewing experience to make some 2 gallon fermenters out of food grade buckets from Lowes. Cheaper than a crock.

Here's some lemon cucumbers I started fermenting this morning. Going to make some water bath pickles later and some sauer-kohlrabi (like kraut).

Oh I forgot about the garlic - yeah my wife grew a bunch of that. This was the first time we ever heard about scapes. The garlic we got this year was bigger than last year because we took off the scapes. We tried frying some scapes but I’m not really a fan.

 

[Deadalus]

Oh I forgot about the garlic - yeah my wife grew a bunch of that. This was the first time we ever heard about scapes. The garlic we got this year was bigger than last year because we took off the scapes. We tried frying some scapes but I’m not really a fan.

I like the scapes a lot but my wife isn't a fan. They are a little tougher than they look and need extra time to cook. I made scape rings out of them this year. Also stir fries.

Lots of garlic this year, all hardnecks so lots of scapes too.

 

[Jonakr]

We have basically three mini-pepper plants and two larger fruit ones. I wasn't able to keep up with all of them, even pickling some as we went along.

 

[bleme]

One thing I have noticed about having my garden on drip this year is that it makes it a whole lot easier to neglect. My wife said we were having tacos last night so I went out to get salsa makings and realized that I haven't harvested in a week as there was an abundance of red on all my pepper and tomato plants! I'll have to rope the whole family into helping pick this weekend or I won't have time to brew...

 

[Hanglow]

After a record breaking hot june, despite it being wet for the final week, we have now had almost two months of relentless rain and lower temps. Slugs wiped out my summer lettuce. I've not had to water anything outside, including pots, for all that time . Toms and peppers slower to ripen but good harvests from the greenhouses., at least i had overwintered chillis that I have been harvesting and making hotsauce from. Celeriac and leeks welcome the rain though

 

[Deadalus]

One thing I have noticed about having my garden on drip this year is that it makes it a whole lot easier to neglect. My wife said we were having tacos last night so I went out to get salsa makings and realized that I haven't harvested in a week as there was an abundance of red on all my pepper and tomato plants! I'll have to rope the whole family into helping pick this weekend or I won't have time to brew...

It's such a time saver though isn't it! I like to do a morning walk-thru of the garden with a cup of tea, could be first thing or if I am taking a break. It's a bit like meditating, I get to see everything growing bit by bit. I pull a few weeds here and there, try to get them when they are small. It took a number of years to exhaust the weed seed bank and switching to no till but I don't get a lot of weeds anymore. I also use grass clippings for mulch and I square foot garden. The garden does compete with weekend time for brewing though! Picking, cleaning, preserving.

 

[Deadalus]

After a record breaking hot june, despite it being wet for the final week, we have now had almost two months of relentless rain and lower temps. Slugs wiped out my summer lettuce. I've not had to water anything outside, including pots, for all that time . Toms and peppers slower to ripen but good harvests from the greenhouses., at least i had overwintered chillis that I have been harvesting and making hotsauce from. Celeriac and leeks welcome the rain though
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NIce tomatoes! Plants are looking good, I can't get the celeriac past the seedlng stage. They germinate but don't grow. Started them three times, twice in cell packs and once in the ground. Fennel too, same deal.

 

[Hanglow]

Locotos and aji limon/orange pepperonicini fermenting

 

[GreenEnvy22]

We’re getting terrible results this year. Mostly haven’t had time to take care of the garden. Almost no peppers, few tomatoes. My wife is growing a couple fig trees that are in their second year and those are getting bigger and about the only thing looking good. The biggest one has 2 tiny figs we’re hoping will have time to grow fully.

Same here, my peppers have done almost nothing this year. I've only picked a couple jalapenos and a couple Cayenne.
My reapers, scorpions, and ghost peppers stayed small 3 to 4-in plants for like 2 months after they were in the ground, only in late July do they start actually growing.

We did have a good year for onions, garlic, beets, cabbage. We're also drowning in pole beans.
I accidentally killed my cucumber plants earlier in the season when I sprayed them for bugs but messed up the ratio, The Replacements are three or four weeks behind where they should be. Tomatoes are doing okay, but definitely not as many as most years.

Our apple tree is useless this year, it has a total of eight apples on it.
My grapes look like they're doing really well though, I'm hoping to get at least a couple hundred pounds off of those for wine in the fall.

 

[Abrayton]

Purple Peach Snake fermenting next to the Orange/Yellow Torpedo.

 

[Abrayton]

Torpedo and Kraken Red. This is going to hurt in the morning.

 

[Hanglow]

You are braver than me! I stopped trying to grow superhots, can't take the heat

 

[Abrayton]

Pickled beets with purple peach snake and orange/red torpedo peppers.

 

[Abrayton]

Any fermentation experts know what this white glob floating in my jar of fermenting peppers is?

 

[Hanglow]

No idea, not sure I'd want to eat what's in the jar

Some of my tomatoes, zucchini massive as i was away for a couple of weeks, peppers

 

[Deadalus]

Canning, fermenting, and pickling up a storm the past few weeks.

 

[Deadalus]

Started my first pepper ferment this season. Red jalapenos and some tiny red thai peppers. Had some orangish bigger thais ready but not sure if they were going to go to red. Also what I think are fresno jalapenos but those are still a pale green so I will wait.

 

[Hanglow]

Autumn and winter veggies are doing well for me, all the rain in July and now has done them good. Just planted spring onions followed/ interplanted salads. Hope they make it overwinter, i also planted a few in the greenhouse.

Picked the Bramley apples, largest was 580g

 

[DBhomebrew]

Not a bad harvest for a free plant that had started as a volunteer in the middle of my colleague's lawn. Sat in a pot at his house for a few weeks *watered* by his dog. Another couple of weeks in the pot at my house until I finally got around to putting it in the ground. Not a lick of tending.



Not sure what monster this might be...

 

[Cheshire Cat]

 

[Deadalus]

Not a bad harvest for a free plant that had started as a volunteer in the middle of my colleague's lawn. Sat in a pot at his house for a few weeks *watered* by his dog. Another couple of weeks in the pot at my house until I finally got around to putting it in the ground. Not a lick of tending.

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Not sure what monster this might be...

View attachment 830010

Tomato hornworm. It will chew the hell out of your tomato plants! Probably more than one. You'll want to remove it at the very least or kill it.

 

[Deadalus]

I was planning on using the pineaplle in my latest batch (left) but didn't have room. So I added them to a batch (right) that I started last week. First time trying anything sweet in the mix.

 

[Tartan1]

First time trying anything sweet in the mix

Sounds like an interesting combination, let us know how this turns out.

 

[Hanglow]

This was the last harvest of peppers I made before trimming back my plants and overwintering them. I'm overwintering 7of the this year, capsicum baccatum and pubescens varieties, I'm not bothering with annuums as I get reduced harvests from them in subsequent years.

Still producing salads although it will be pretty small harvests due to reduced light levels till February or so. We've had a few frosts now, the lowest was about -4c which was lower than predicted.

 

[passedpawn]

So you plant your own garden
and decorate your own soul, instead
of waiting for someone to bring you flowers.

 

[Deadalus]

I received my pepper seeds last week. I'm doing the mild end of the charts with early jalapenos, giant jalapenos (free sample), fresnos, and anaheims. Then red and yellow bells. I bought from the same company as last year. He's probably making up for the free Thai pepper seeds they gave away last year by giving out the giant jalapenos. The free Thai peppers was so tiny. The regular Thai peppers aren't particularly big either being skinny. Put in the rest of my seed order today too but I won't be doing starts until mid-March! I think I had 6 tomato varieties I'll update those another time.

 

[passedpawn]

I received my pepper seeds last week. I'm doing the mild end of the charts with early jalapenos, giant jalapenos (free sample), fresnos, and anaheims. Then red and yellow bells. I bought from the same company as last year. He's probably making up for the free Thai pepper seeds they gave away last year by giving out the giant jalapenos. The free Thai peppers was so tiny. The regular Thai peppers aren't particularly big either being skinny. Put in the rest of my seed order today too but I won't be doing starts until mid-March! I think I had 6 tomato varieties I'll update those another time.

Maybe save seeds from superior plants. Use those next season.

 

[Deadalus]

Maybe save seeds from superior plants. Use those next season.

I grew several pepper varieties last year plus there's several gardens neighboring, too much hybridization. If I had more space between I'd do it but my neighborhood is residential. I'd have a huge garden out in the country if I could but at least no deer here.

 

[Oldskewl]

I just received my order yesterday from Johnny's select seeds. First time ordering from them. My biggest battle in my garden is with Late Blight on my tomato plants. They had a nice variety of highly resistant Late blight seeds. We will see how it goes this year. These are the seeds I went with

Tomato
Marmalade Skies
Abagail
Defiant
Plum Regal

Cucumber
Cool Customer
Unagi

Pepper
Hungarian Wax
Jumbo Jalapeno