Thanks for the good information. I hadn't considered how non-seed
people might be mishandling seeds. I don't think I'll go so far as
direct ordering 4-5 little packets of seeds since the shipping costs
would cost so much as to make it prohibitive, but I will buy my packets
at the privately owned nursery instead of a big box chain anything.


I have the Victory Garden book and have seen the picture you're talking
about excising the borer, but I've never had the confidence to try it.
This year I will. I'll also buy new dirt for the barrel. I'd been
hoping to avoid that but can see that I'll have to.


The one trouble with planting late in the season is that I prefer to buy
seedlings from the garden center over planting seeds. The exceptions
are the aforementioned kale, radishes, arugula and beans. I can't even
get basil to sprout. I know there's a lot I could do to get seeds to
sprout, but I'm taking this gardening stuff one step at a time, and I'm
having a lot of fun and learning a lot. I'm not ready to venture out
into seeds yet. There are never any squash plants in the stores after
Memorial Day. I may have to break down and plant zucchini seeds in July.


Thanks.


--Lia


Doug Kanter wrote:

OK, Lia - one subject at a time. :-)

1) Kale: If it grows in hot weather, it won't be awful, especially if you're
picking young leaves as you mentioned. Mature plants will get really tough,
but they're still useful (and delicious) in soups. So, go ahead and plant
some now. I have no idea what the right temperature is for sprouting the
seeds. Outside, my soil was pretty chilly. Indoors, I had my trays on gravel
with heating cables underneath. They both sprouted at about the same time,
give or take a few days. I suspect the problem was your seeds. So....

2) Don't take chances with seed. There may be other sources for great seed,
but for almost 30 years, I've been using Burpee, and ordering most of them
directly. I don't know what they do differently, but whatever it is, it
always performs better than anything else I buy. The seeds you bought
might've sat in a hot UPS truck for 2 days. Or, maybe they were beat up at
the store. I was at a home improvement store a few weeks ago and there was a
lady running the outdoor plant area. She told me in no uncertain terms (and
using language like a sailor) that the staff had originally put the entire
seed display in the outdoor area where they keep the fertilizer and bricks
and fence materials. She said it was exposed to direct sunlight and
dampness, until she had a talk with the manager. So, you never know. Order
your seeds directly. You get one or two chances a year to make things work.
Why mess around?

3) Space: Go to www.bn.com and in the search box, enter "square foot
gardening". That's an ancient book which explains how to pack a lot more
production into spaces much smaller than the seed packets recommend. Great
book. It *almost* doesn't matter what you've planted already, with
relationship to whether there's space left for kale. There probably is
space. Look at how weeds grow in a farm hedgerow - right on top of one
another. Buy the book. And, tuck the kale plants in any empty space you can
find. Don't forget to plant some seeds in August, to mature in October and
later. You can harvest it when there's six inches of snow around the plants.

4) Squash vine borer: Forget the poisons - you've already noticed that they
don't always work. In his book "Crockett's Victory Garden", Jim Crockett
says that sometimes you can pick out the borer with a small knife, and then
mound up the soil around the hole, and the plant will be fine. This has
worked for me in some years, not in others. I think it depends on how
quickly you notice that the plant is wilting. We expect some plants to sag a
bit if the weather's really hot, and/or the plant needs water, but with
squash, you can't assume anything. You have to get down on your knees and
look underneath at the first sign of trouble.

This link provides some helpful information on dealing with the bug:
http://www.attra.org/attra-pub/squashbore.html

The primary means is obvious: Don't plant cucurbits (squash, melon,
cucumbers) in the same place each year. The bug overwinters in the soil, so
move the plants around. And, in northern states, it says only one generation
is produced each year. So, what might help is to plant more seeds after you
put the first plants in the ground. The second crop will probably reach
production age after the borer is gone for the season.