Went out to peruse the gardens again this morning and it appears I have
98% of the black crowder seeds have come up. That's the best I've ever
had on store bought seed. These are from Victory Seeds so I will
probably order more seed from them as time goes on.

The cucumber seeds, so far, are about 50% above ground. All of the
plants from the nursery are doing fine. We have tiny tomatoes on some
"free" tomato plants, ie. the seeds grew from the compost pit and are
doing well. Sometimes we just take the compost bucket out to the garden
and pot hole it as a faster way to make real compost. Poking around the
area of the free tomatoes turned up several earthworms so we're happy
that we do, indeed have some earthworms on the property. Possibly from
some we ordered last spring and put into the raised beds and in the
fence rows. At any rate, some worms are better than no worms.

Looks like there may be some rain today, we can only hope. Yesterday I
strung out one of those flat, green, three tube soaker hoses. It was
thirty feet long and was a gift from one of our neighbors who moved last
year, still in the package and much stronger than soaker hoses made from
recycled auto tires. I had forgotten about it until I ran up on it in
the garage. I had already bought another one twenty-five feet long at a
close out sale at a local store. We shall see how long they last but
they do appear to do a good job of soaking.

George

George Shirley wrote:
Went out to peruse the gardens again this morning and it appears I
have 98% of the black crowder seeds have come up. That's the best
I've ever had on store bought seed. These are from Victory Seeds so I
will probably order more seed from them as time goes on.

The cucumber seeds, so far, are about 50% above ground. All of the
plants from the nursery are doing fine. We have tiny tomatoes on some
"free" tomato plants, ie. the seeds grew from the compost pit and are
doing well. Sometimes we just take the compost bucket out to the
garden and pot hole it as a faster way to make real compost. Poking
around the area of the free tomatoes turned up several earthworms so
we're happy that we do, indeed have some earthworms on the property.
Possibly from some we ordered last spring and put into the raised
beds and in the fence rows. At any rate, some worms are better than
no worms.
Looks like there may be some rain today, we can only hope. Yesterday I
strung out one of those flat, green, three tube soaker hoses. It was
thirty feet long and was a gift from one of our neighbors who moved
last year, still in the package and much stronger than soaker hoses
made from recycled auto tires. I had forgotten about it until I ran
up on it in the garage. I had already bought another one twenty-five
feet long at a close out sale at a local store. We shall see how long
they last but they do appear to do a good job of soaking.

George

Y'all are a bit ahead of us . I've got lettuce , spinach , bok choy , and
snap peas in the ground . Peas were just planted a couple of days ago ,
everything else is coming up now . Strawberries are starting to come to life
too . I thought I'd lost part of the patch from grass strangulation , but
maybe not . I'm cautiously optomistic .
Pepper and tomato seedlings are doing well in the window . Got some herbs
planted but they haven't come up yet . We seem to be about 3 weeks ahead of
usual temps , but I don't trust it , gonna wait until at least the second
week of April before I set seedlings out .
--
Snag

On 3/18/2016 1:16 PM, Derald wrote:
George Shirley wrote:

Went out to peruse the gardens again this morning and it appears I have
98% of the black crowder seeds have come up. That's the best I've ever
had on store bought seed. These are from Victory Seeds so I will
probably order more seed from them as time goes on.
I planted a 3x8-foot block of 219 zipper cream crowder seeds from
Victory on 14 March and most of them are up as of this morning. They
began appearing yesterday morning. Germination rate (not percent) could
be better but, in fairness, the seeds are shaded part-day by remaining
mustard and turnips, which I remedied somewhat this morning by removing
some mustard leaves. Will give them another day or two before deciding
whether to fill in. The turnips keep my other half happy while the
mustard blossoms do the same for the fauna. This far along, the mustard
leaves are inedible but the unopened flower buds and their tender
supporting stems are quite good sauteed with garlic in a bit of olive
oil. Reminder: Timing of the garlic is critical—it can overcook between
heartbeats.

The cucumber seeds, so far, are about 50% above ground.
My yellow squash is up but the the cukes, planted on the same date,
have not responded and were re-planted yesterday. Not optimistic,
though: Seeds are 7 years old and finally died. More on the way and
plenty of time left in which to plant, so I'm saving the space. Down
here, in the constant humidity and with early onset "summer", the best
hope with squash and cukes against mildew, fungus and insects is to make
an early crop and try to maintain it until diminishing returns hits in
May or June.

All of the plants from the nursery are doing fine. We have tiny tomatoes on
some "free" tomato plants, ie. the seeds grew from the compost pit and are
doing well.
I don't even have any tomatoes planted yet, much less ready to
transplant. Guess I could get store-bought transplants but tomatoes
don't mean that much to me and they don't have a place in the garden
every year. Received a freebie with a recent seed order from Reimer, in
California, called "World's Smallest Tomato". Who the hell wants a
_small_ tomato? At least the seeds are small enough to fit into the
Dumpster and the package will compost if I can ever get that damnable
foil "lucky dog" seal off.
Damn, you could have sent me the seeds, my wife plants more !@#$%^
tomatoes than anything else. How do you make a BLT for lunch with tiny
little tomatoes?

Sometimes we just take the compost bucket out to the garden
and pot hole it as a faster way to make real compost. Poking around the
area of the free tomatoes turned up several earthworms so we're happy
that we do, indeed have some earthworms on the property. Possibly from
some we ordered last spring and put into the raised beds and in the
fence rows. At any rate, some worms are better than no worms.

Looks like there may be some rain today, we can only hope. Yesterday I
strung out one of those flat, green, three tube soaker hoses. It was
thirty feet long and was a gift from one of our neighbors who moved last
year, still in the package and much stronger than soaker hoses made from
recycled auto tires.
I tried using those flat vinyl hoses that have two or three rows of
holes in the 1970's. Those I used did not distribute water evenly along
their length and at low "drippable" pressure the water often did not
make it to the end of the hoses. About twenty years later, I had a bad
experience with those hoses made from tires. My wife still taunts me
with their packaging when I step too far out of line.... After a very
few years of contending with that crap, I moved over to "real" dripline
and wish I'd done so sooner. It's just the inexpensive 1/4-inch PVC
stuff with 1/2 gal/hr emitters on 6-inch centers. One gal/hr/foot makes
guessing at watering volume easy. To accomodate the budget, I made the
transition over a couple of gardening seasons. In the years I've been
using drip irrigation, I've simplified the installation a bit by
eliminating pressure regulators and the timer but a pressure guage is
essential. The shutoff timer is a great convenience but the clockwork
unit I bought only lasted a couple of years and I can't find a better
quality mechanical unit. If I'm going to use batteries, then the timer
app on the "smartphone" works well enough.--
Derald
Peninsular FL, USA
USDA 9b

I've got the plans and supplies needed on my desk for just about the
same thing you did. Will eventually get to do it when SWMBO decides all
the other ways don't really work well for us. Of course here I will have
to put in a anti-back flow device in according to county rules, not a
big deal. When I get to do the job there will also be a timer and a shut
off when it rains. Rains a lot here mostly, but some summers have been
pretty dry. It irritates me no end when I see neighbors lawn sprinkler
systems throwing away water in a rain storm. A rain shut off isn't that
expensive.

Right now we're awaiting a thunderstorm, at least that's what the
weather heads are saying. Just happens it is very sunny out here at the
moment.

Derald wrote:
"Terry Coombs" wrote:

Y'all are a bit ahead of us . I've got lettuce , spinach , bok choy
, and snap peas in the ground . Peas were just planted a couple of
days ago , everything else is coming up now . Strawberries are
starting to come to life too . I thought I'd lost part of the patch
from grass strangulation , but maybe not . I'm cautiously optomistic
. Pepper and tomato seedlings are doing well in the window . Got
some herbs planted but they haven't come up yet . We seem to be
about 3 weeks ahead of usual temps , but I don't trust it , gonna
wait until at least the second week of April before I set seedlings
out .
I'm still getting garden peas planted in mid-October (picked some
this morning). They suffered a bit from a couple of near-freezing
nights but weren't seriously damaged. However, mature plants
accustomed to cooler weather don't cope well with the sudden onset of
warm weather (as I've mentioned, "spring" down here is about ten days
in February most years). Their replacements were planted on 23 Feb.
to share the same trellises. The late planting on 11 March, in a
separate bed has germinated fully (near 100%) as of today. Summer
squash is up; no cukes yet. No lettuce this year. It's a winter
crop down here and most winters are, as was this one, too warm for
lettuce. Open-head "leaf" lettuce does OK from about October 'til
about May but _real_ crisphead lettuce demands consistently cool
temperatures and this winter simply was too warm (as most are) for
even so-called "summertime" crisphead. Bok choy is holding on,
although it wilts down every day and we still have two small patches
of edible turnips and mustard greens, as well as several gigantic
"volunteer" plants in the yard. Have planted pepper seeds but no
tomataoes. Might not do tomatoes. Eggplant is next.
I continue to plant spinach and carrots sequentially, although, I'm
just about out of space for them because I need it for beans. I'd
like to get a sense of the warmest temperatures they'll
tolerate-nobody seems to know or, at least, they ain't talking. I've
been interplanting them with onions but have space in the last onion
bed for only one more planting of each. Must make other
arrangements, I guess. Crowder peas should be fully leafed out by
tomorrow. Prepping a bed for first planting of snap beans: Delinel.
Should be planting tomorrow or next day. Still too chilly for okra
though; bummer. Nothin' better than peas with a little slimy okra
cooked in with them; yum. Have enough frozen to get us by until
fresh comes in, though.
Of course, it would happen that in this time when the garden wants
consistent attention, a neighbor has gifted me with three
recently-slaughtered oak trees which must be limbed, bucked and
transported. I cut firewood to stove length in the field so that once
it's here no more chainsawing is needed. Ah, well, my old body needs
the abuse and my old ass will be a little closer to staying warm this
winter.
Have you selected a variety of ("cow", "field", or "Southern")
peas yet?

No , and after this year's seed swap I've got even more choices . I have
seed for red rippers , skunk , clay , whippoorwill , and purple hull peas .
We really liked the red rippers last year ... I'll probably plant 2 kinds
again this year , RR's and one other but I haven't decided which .
I'm sitting here enjoying the aroma of the pizza sauce I just made , it's
been simmering on the stove for an hour or so . Started with 3 cups of San
Marzano's from last year's crop that I froze . A can of paste , chopped
onion and garlic , spices , and a dash of red cooking wine . If the smell is
any indication I think I've found my sauce recipe - been tweaking this one
for some time now .
--
Snag

On 3/18/2016 6:28 PM, Derald wrote:
George Shirley wrote:

Damn, you could have sent me the seeds, my wife plants more !@#$%^
tomatoes than anything else. How do you make a BLT for lunch with tiny
little tomatoes?
Foot. FWIW, I did try to retrieve the little dears but I'm long
past that "try and try, again" bs. I'll do better next time. A couple
of online seedsmen throw in lagniappe, from time to time—usually seeds
nearing expiration or one of those "what were we thinking" varieties. I
usually just toss them. I suppose I could advertise them in the NG and
see just how many people I could **** off....

Yeah, we used to get strange seeds from a couple of seedsmen we used to
use. Their seed got worse and worse as for germination so we quit buying
from them. We buy a good many seed packets and live plants from a
nursery nearby, Arbor Gate, have not had a failure yet with either their
seeds or their plants. Don't know who packages the seed but it has their
name on it and, so far, have been okay. This place must cover several
acres and takes some time to cover.

Back before 9-11 I used to swap sweet and hot chile seeds all over the
world. Seeds from aficionados in Bulgaria, Peru, etc. Crossed several of
them at the time, culled the ones I didn't like and then traded off
those that I did. I miss those days but understand the need not to do it
anymore. Of late it's all I can do to eat a mild chile, much less a hot
one.

Derald wrote:
"Terry Coombs" wrote:

Derald wrote:

Have you selected a variety of ("cow", "field", or "Southern")
peas yet?

No , and after this year's seed swap I've got even more choices . I
have seed for red rippers , skunk , clay , whippoorwill , and purple
hull peas . We really liked the red rippers last year ... I'll
probably plant 2 kinds again this year , RR's and one other but I
haven't decided which .
I have grown whipporwill and a couple of varieties of purple hull
but not the others. I grow two varieties, also. Most reliant on
"zipper cream", a so-called "crowder" pea that is smaller, milder more
buttery-flavored than the darker peas. As an alternative, most
years, I also grow a black or pink eyed, more strongly flavored, pea.
This year it's two-or-three years old first-generation saved pink-eye
purplehull. I probably have enough for one season after 2016. I only
use firs-generation homegrown seeds because of increasing
susceptibility to a ubiquitous (in sunny FL, at least) soil-borne
bacterium.

I'm sitting here enjoying the aroma of the pizza sauce I just made
, it's been simmering on the stove for an hour or so . Started with
3 cups of San Marzano's from last year's crop that I froze . A can
of paste , chopped onion and garlic , spices , and a dash of red
cooking wine . If the smell is any indication I think I've found my
sauce recipe - been tweaking this one for some time now .
We basically use tomatoes as an ingredient in a limited number of
dishes for which these do nicely, without spraying or picking off a
single hornworm ;-):
http://www.cento.com/sanmarzano/sanmarzano.html. We use few, if
any, fresh tomatoes so, many years, they don't make the cut.

Well , I guess that's one way to get 'em ... BTW , the sauce was superb
IMO . The wife will be rendering final judgement today after the Cold Pizza
Test . She took the last 2 slices for lunch .
We use quite a lot of tomatoes , between sauces , soups , and best of all
fresh sliced . My 2 oldest granddaughters can strip a cherry tomato plant of
ripe fruit as fast as they can gobble them .
--
Snag