why is it town water does not do some garden much good you canit beat water
from storms specialywhen lighting helps plants allso
regards malcolm smith
"jOhN" wrote in message
...
The missus had me spending Saturday trying for a better crop of tomatoes
than we had this blow torch of a summer. Maybe the global warming will
make maters a winter crop around here ;-)

Selection of starters was pretty sparse - I bumped into a guy at Home
Depot that said the Natural Gardener had little to offer. HD had about 6-7
types from Bonnie Nursery - a few bush varieties, Early Girl, Carnival,
Goliath. They all had 60-70 day maturation dates so I got all three and a
Husky cherry. The problem with Bonnie is that just about everyone carries
them so that limits the number of varieties you can expect to find.

Next spring I'm going to start my own. Anyone have a favorite seed store?

Oh yeah, the 5 okra I did plant from seed are producing about 2-3 pods
each per day. After that rain last week I missed a couple of days and got
a half dozen 8 inch monsters.

My potted herbs and single strawberry plant are doing very well. The
string of pots are home to a plethora of baby anoles that scamper all
about when I water. The strawberry has some big long branching stems that
I'll get rooted pretty soon.

I had a bunch of purslane pop up this year from volunteer seed. Since it
has been a couple of years since I grew any on purpose it was a nice
surprise. Two red ones came up in between the pavers on my patio. Nothing
special there except the pavers sit on solid concrete. Talk about hardy.
The others, white, yellow and another red, preferred dirt and it shows in
their prolific growth.

Was surprised this morning when I cam across an althea that was harboring
about 1 billion white flies! I blasted the crap out of them with a high
pressure wash but they filled the air like smoke. Since we have a couple
of semi-vegetarian dogs I shy way from toxins.

I remember once at my parents house in the Rio Grande Valley the white
flies were so numerous that they actually looked like real smoke drifting
down the street. My dad said early morning joggers would wear those
mosquito hats so the flies wouldn't get inhaled. Yuk! To top it off, when
I stopped for gas in Falfurrias on the way back to Austin a bunch flew out
of the engine compartment when I lifted the hood. That was about my
creepiest insect moment.

Any body else with gardening news?

jOhN