"songbird" wrote in message
...
Terry Coombs wrote:
...
Hmm , not sure my neighbors would hold still for pigs , and no way we
can
let 'em roam the woods . Already got a big problem in this area with
feral
swine , and I won't take a chance here .

i didn't mean let loose without fencing and
tags, perhaps even making sure they are sterile
so even if they did get loose they couldn't
procreate.

feral pigs are on the upswing around here too.
haven't seen any yet on this property. it is
open-season on them any time.


I've been around pig farms , I think I'll stick to buying my pork ...
besides , if we run low on meat here , the deer reproduce like rats in a
grain silo . And the only water for miles runs thru my land ...


The chickens are another thing
entirely , several neighbors let theirs roam during the day - though Tom
down the road lost a couple last week , he thinks a fox got 'em . And
during
the day ! Great benefit here to let chickens roam , they take care of the
ticks ...

they can strip a green area bare and scratch
the soil searching for bugs. some people use
them to clear gardens before or after harvest.


There are 12 acres of woods for them to harvest bugs from . Between ticks
, chiggers , and fleas plus whatever else lives here that doesn't bite
they should have plenty of protein . We have no "lawn" , just whatever wild
grasses that were already here .


only potential problem is the dog . She's never been around birds
, might decide they look tasty . And she's big enough to easily take one
down .

i think if you raise them from eggs or chicks
the dog might cope better. if you can find a
broody hen to take care of them even better
(so they would be raised as normal birds and
have some protection by an adult bird)...


songbird

Actually , she's a pretty good dog . Once she knows they're off limits I
don't expect trouble .
--
Snag

wrote:

Everything is fertilized with 10 10 10. The peppers
(bell) do not have very thick walls and I thought I had
read that this would help. There is a lot of irrigation
to the garden, so am I wasting my time and effort? The
burning issue concerns me too. Would early morning be
enough to combat that?

it may be still too early to pick them, try
giving them a bit more time to develop.

if your soil is not holding moisture well and
requires a half hour of watering each day that is
a good sign that your soil could use some added
clay and organic matter. this also would help in
holding nutrients for the plants. also top dressing
lightly with a mulch (once the soil warms up after
the spring) will help hold moisture.


I have had the soil tested many times at through
the cooperative extension office but it has been a few
years. I don't remember the exact results but there was
never anything that stood out and the 10 10 10 was their
recommendation.

if nothing stood out they should have
left it alone, but anyways...

have you had the water tested? is it
city/treated or well water?

are you watering using hoses that are
laying in the hot sun all day? if you
spray that directly on plants fresh out
of the hose that's not a good thing...
when i water i always flush the hose
first until the water runs cooler and
then use...


The soil is fairly sandy and slightly
acidic due to the pine trees near by.

use a little agricultural lime (powder acts
fastest, grit lasts longer) in your garden. if
you make your own compost add it to the compost
heap. how much you need depends upon how far off
your pH is from neutral. if you are 6.5 to 7.5
that is fine for most garden plants (other than
those well noted for needing acidic conditions).
don't add a lot all at one time, but over the
course of a few years you should be able to
gradually increase the pH. however, if your
soil is mostly sand and has little clay or
organic material to hold the moisture it can
be leached away quickly once stopped. that is
why i recommend adding a little clay and organic
material to help hold things in place and to
give the rest of the soil community more to
work with.


I have never been
able to figure out what is in the soil that causes my
tomato plants to develop wilt but they do every year. In
fact I took some dirt out of the garden, put it in a pot,
planted the tomato plant and it too has wilted.

diseases can be a problem for some plants.
do you start your own seeds? have you tried
different varieties? do you do crop rotation
or are you planting tomatoes and peppers in
the same soil year after year? if you are
starting your own seeds you could be using
infected seeds/trays/pots/starting mix, tools,
watering can, hoses or location. if your
starting process is flawed then it all follows.

what do you do for soil organic matter? do
you add compost? do you grow other crops in
the area and turn them under?

we've grown tomatoes for years and had some
problems with fungi (after flooding and heavy
rains), but not wilt. we also rotate plant on
a minimum three to five year cycle (tomatoes
first on new soil, then peppers, then beans,
peas, beets, greens, then cover crops like
buckwheat or alfalfa or trefoil. if we've planted
the same crop two years in a row it is because
i've turned the soil deeply enough to not worry
about diseases.

also, mulching lightly to reduce rain and
watering splashing of soil on the leaves. some
people even remove the lower leaves of the
plants once they get growing to keep disease
problems from having an easy start. i don't go
that far...


But back to the peppers, I put a tablespoon of the Epsom
Salt around the base of each plant and I sware the plants
are greener. How often should or can I do this? The garden
is watered twice a day for 15 minutes. The plants are just
getting flowers.

i dunno, around here both magnesium and
sulfur are at reasonable levels and we amend
enough with other materials that they shouldn't
be getting depleted.

you could be picking them too early. when we get
thin walled peppers it is those at the end of the
season when the temperatures are lower and the light
is not as strong. they are still edible up until
the frosts get them, but the flavor isn't as good
as prime time.

you could also try different varieties.


songbird

On Monday, June 3, 2013 9:18:01 AM UTC-4, songbird wrote:
wrote:



Everything is fertilized with 10 10 10. The peppers

(bell) do not have very thick walls and I thought I had

read that this would help. There is a lot of irrigation

to the garden, so am I wasting my time and effort? The

burning issue concerns me too. Would early morning be

enough to combat that?



it may be still too early to pick them, try

giving them a bit more time to develop.



if your soil is not holding moisture well and

requires a half hour of watering each day that is

a good sign that your soil could use some added

clay and organic matter. this also would help in

holding nutrients for the plants. also top dressing

lightly with a mulch (once the soil warms up after

the spring) will help hold moisture.





I have had the soil tested many times at through

the cooperative extension office but it has been a few

years. I don't remember the exact results but there was

never anything that stood out and the 10 10 10 was their

recommendation.



if nothing stood out they should have

left it alone, but anyways...



have you had the water tested? is it

city/treated or well water?

The water comes out of the lake we live on and is acidic although I do not know the actual number. It is an irrigation system that waters around 10 pm and then again around 5 am.


are you watering using hoses that are

laying in the hot sun all day? if you

spray that directly on plants fresh out

of the hose that's not a good thing...

when i water i always flush the hose

first until the water runs cooler and

then use...





The soil is fairly sandy and slightly

acidic due to the pine trees near by.



use a little agricultural lime (powder acts

fastest, grit lasts longer) in your garden. if

you make your own compost add it to the compost

heap. how much you need depends upon how far off

your pH is from neutral. if you are 6.5 to 7.5

that is fine for most garden plants (other than

those well noted for needing acidic conditions).

don't add a lot all at one time, but over the

course of a few years you should be able to

gradually increase the pH. however, if your

soil is mostly sand and has little clay or

organic material to hold the moisture it can

be leached away quickly once stopped. that is

why i recommend adding a little clay and organic

material to help hold things in place and to

give the rest of the soil community more to

work with.





I have never been

able to figure out what is in the soil that causes my

tomato plants to develop wilt but they do every year. In

fact I took some dirt out of the garden, put it in a pot,

planted the tomato plant and it too has wilted.



diseases can be a problem for some plants.

do you start your own seeds? have you tried

different varieties? do you do crop rotation

or are you planting tomatoes and peppers in

the same soil year after year? if you are

starting your own seeds you could be using

infected seeds/trays/pots/starting mix, tools,

watering can, hoses or location. if your

starting process is flawed then it all follows.

ALL of the above. I start my own seeds, I have tried everything from seeds from actual tomatoes, cheep ones from Wal Mart, disease resistant seeds from a mail order place in Florida. All of my utensils are correctly used.

what do you do for soil organic matter? do

you add compost? do you grow other crops in

the area and turn them under?

Yep rotate every year. Have not turned them under, especially the tomatoes because of the wilt. Organic matter is just fallen leaves and not much else.. I cover the garden is black plastic for the winter (November - February)to kill the weeds but whatever is there gets tilled in. We are homebrewers so any spent grain gets put in the garden but nothing else compost wise. I have tried it and it just doesn't seem to work for me.



we've grown tomatoes for years and had some

problems with fungi (after flooding and heavy

rains), but not wilt. we also rotate plant on

a minimum three to five year cycle (tomatoes

first on new soil, then peppers, then beans,

peas, beets, greens, then cover crops like

buckwheat or alfalfa or trefoil. if we've planted

the same crop two years in a row it is because

i've turned the soil deeply enough to not worry

about diseases.



also, mulching lightly to reduce rain and

watering splashing of soil on the leaves. some

people even remove the lower leaves of the

plants once they get growing to keep disease

problems from having an easy start. i don't go

that far...

I do. I remove all the lower leaves on everything.



But back to the peppers, I put a tablespoon of the Epsom

Salt around the base of each plant and I sware the plants

are greener. How often should or can I do this? The garden

is watered twice a day for 15 minutes. The plants are just

getting flowers.



i dunno, around here both magnesium and

sulfur are at reasonable levels and we amend

enough with other materials that they shouldn't

be getting depleted.



you could be picking them too early. when we get

thin walled peppers it is those at the end of the

season when the temperatures are lower and the light

is not as strong. they are still edible up until

the frosts get them, but the flavor isn't as good

as prime time.



you could also try different varieties.

Again have done this too. The ones I have had success with have been from seeds harvested from grocery store peppers, believe it or not.





songbird

Thank you for your time and information. I just feel like I have been doing this long enough that I should be growing perfect produce

MJ

wrote:

Everything is fertilized with 10 10 10. The peppers (bell) do not
have very thick walls and I thought I had read that this would help.
There is a lot of irrigation to the garden, so am I wasting my time
and effort? The burning issue concerns me too. Would early morning be
enough to combat that?
MJ

I've been mixing up in a spray bottle 2T of molasses, 2T organic liquid
seaweed fertizer, and about 1T+/- of Epsom Salts pre-disolved in warm water
added to this mixture... then I fill the bottle with rain water or tap water
if I have no rain water. I've been spraying that mixture 1 time a week on
everything that I have planted. Cukes, tomatoes of various types, melons,
jalopeno peppers, and habanero's. I did the same thing with my peas, but it
burned a few pea leaves. I ended up pulling up my peas anyway because they
didn't like where I planted them and I replaced them with pole limas that
have broken ground over the weekend. Everything else I sprayed that mixure
on is growing like crazy and my peppers have nice big blooms on them now. I
even sprayed it on a kumquat tree that I overwintered indoors and had just
put outside. It was dropping leaves and a couple branches died back, but
now even my kumquat is growing like a weed!

This is the first time I've opted for mixing this combo of organic fertizers
and hand spraying them every week, so it's an experiment for me this year,
but seems to be working out so far.


--
Natural Girl

In article ,
songbird wrote:

Terry Coombs wrote:
David Hare-Scott wrote:
...
As well as all this keep in mind that a foliar spray is a quick fix not a
long term solution and it doesn't last long. Unless you want to do it
every few weeks study your soil and see what needs to be done to provide a
long term balance of minerals.

My land is mostly oak forest , the piece where we have made a garden was
woods until recently ~12-15 yrs ago and the soil is acid enough that
low-bush huckleberries thrive . Because a local recommended it I've been
adding 1 tbsp of ES under each tomato and pepper plant as I transplant .
Seems to be working ... and much as I hated to do it , today I used some
13/13/13 on the lettuce and a couple of the tomato plants . I'd rather
build
the soil naturally , with mulches and composts . But our situation won't
allow a couple of years to let the soil become productive , I have a
feeling
we're gonna need it sooner rather than later . Chickens by the weekend ,
we
just haven't decided whether to get chicks or older birds .

if you have scrub woods that you can trim back
you can use the green leaves in a mulch pile
and chip the wood and add that. use agricultural
lime to increase the pH, short term the finest
powder acts quickest, for a longer term amendment
use limestone grit.

it doesn't take much to get worms going and
they can generate many lbs of calcium rich compost.
a few yards within a year.

pigs can do a lot of conversion of forest grub
into manure. i'm not into using animals here on
this small a site, but a larger farm with more
acres and plenty of woods might support a small
population of pigs in rotation to clean up the
acorns and fruit tree droppings. but then you
have to be a farmer/farmer for that as once
you have animals to take care of then that's a
whole different arrangement than if you are
just doing veggies and worm wrangling (both of
these you can leave go for a few days if you
have to).

for a free range bird fertilizer solution a few
of the permaculture authors recommend having a
pigeon loft as then you can get the droppings
underneath there for the scraping when you need
hot fertilizer or extra nitrogen for the compost
heap. i'd probably just site the compost heap
under the pigeon roost -- then once in a while
add a layer of carbon and dirt and water it a
bit. empty it once a year and start over...
the birds are unpaid employees gathering bugs,
fruits, seeds, etc. and turning them into free
fertilizer. i like this approach even better
than having chickens. sometime in the future i
hope to raise quail, pheasants and/or bob whites
as they can free range and i don't have to go
after them for meat or eggs if i don't want to.
just be nice to have more of them around again.


songbird

If you're lazy like me, you'll just put out a bird feeder, and a bird
bath. It might be just coincidental that i've never had problems with
bugs.
--
Remember Rachel Corrie
http://www.rachelcorrie.org/

Welcome to the New America.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hA736oK9FPg

Natural Girl wrote:
wrote:

Everything is fertilized with 10 10 10. The peppers (bell) do not
have very thick walls and I thought I had read that this would help.
There is a lot of irrigation to the garden, so am I wasting my time
and effort? The burning issue concerns me too. Would early morning be
enough to combat that?
MJ

I've been mixing up in a spray bottle 2T of molasses, 2T organic
liquid seaweed fertizer, and about 1T+/- of Epsom Salts pre-disolved
in warm water added to this mixture... then I fill the bottle with
rain water or tap water if I have no rain water. I've been spraying
that mixture 1 time a week on everything that I have planted. Cukes,
tomatoes of various types, melons, jalopeno peppers, and habanero's.
I did the same thing with my peas, but it burned a few pea leaves. I
ended up pulling up my peas anyway because they didn't like where I
planted them and I replaced them with pole limas that have broken
ground over the weekend. Everything else I sprayed that mixure on is
growing like crazy and my peppers have nice big blooms on them now.
I even sprayed it on a kumquat tree that I overwintered indoors and
had just put outside. It was dropping leaves and a couple branches
died back, but now even my kumquat is growing like a weed!

This is the first time I've opted for mixing this combo of organic
fertizers and hand spraying them every week, so it's an experiment
for me this year, but seems to be working out so far.

there are other solutions that don't require spraying every week.

D

On 6/3/2013 6:29 PM, David Hare-Scott wrote:
Natural Girl wrote:
wrote:

Everything is fertilized with 10 10 10. The peppers (bell) do not
have very thick walls and I thought I had read that this would help.
There is a lot of irrigation to the garden, so am I wasting my time
and effort? The burning issue concerns me too. Would early morning be
enough to combat that?
MJ

I've been mixing up in a spray bottle 2T of molasses, 2T organic
liquid seaweed fertizer, and about 1T+/- of Epsom Salts pre-disolved
in warm water added to this mixture... then I fill the bottle with
rain water or tap water if I have no rain water. I've been spraying
that mixture 1 time a week on everything that I have planted. Cukes,
tomatoes of various types, melons, jalopeno peppers, and habanero's. I
did the same thing with my peas, but it burned a few pea leaves. I
ended up pulling up my peas anyway because they didn't like where I
planted them and I replaced them with pole limas that have broken
ground over the weekend. Everything else I sprayed that mixure on is
growing like crazy and my peppers have nice big blooms on them now. I
even sprayed it on a kumquat tree that I overwintered indoors and
had just put outside. It was dropping leaves and a couple branches
died back, but now even my kumquat is growing like a weed!
This is the first time I've opted for mixing this combo of organic
fertizers and hand spraying them every week, so it's an experiment
for me this year, but seems to be working out so far.

there are other solutions that don't require spraying every week.

D


I'm all ears! er .. eyes!

--
Natural Girl

Natural (Smoking Gun) Girl wrote:
On 6/3/2013 6:29 PM, David Hare-Scott wrote:
Natural Girl wrote:
wrote:

Everything is fertilized with 10 10 10. The peppers (bell) do not
have very thick walls and I thought I had read that this would
help. There is a lot of irrigation to the garden, so am I wasting
my time and effort? The burning issue concerns me too. Would early
morning be enough to combat that?
MJ

I've been mixing up in a spray bottle 2T of molasses, 2T organic
liquid seaweed fertizer, and about 1T+/- of Epsom Salts pre-disolved
in warm water added to this mixture... then I fill the bottle with
rain water or tap water if I have no rain water. I've been spraying
that mixture 1 time a week on everything that I have planted. Cukes,
tomatoes of various types, melons, jalopeno peppers, and
habanero's. I did the same thing with my peas, but it burned a few
pea leaves. I ended up pulling up my peas anyway because they
didn't like where I planted them and I replaced them with pole
limas that have broken ground over the weekend. Everything else I
sprayed that mixure on is growing like crazy and my peppers have
nice big blooms on them now. I even sprayed it on a kumquat tree
that I overwintered indoors and had just put outside. It was dropping
leaves and a couple branches
died back, but now even my kumquat is growing like a weed!
This is the first time I've opted for mixing this combo of organic
fertizers and hand spraying them every week, so it's an experiment
for me this year, but seems to be working out so far.

there are other solutions that don't require spraying every week.

D


I'm all ears! er .. eyes!

I didn't mean solutions as in solute plus solvent I meant ways of keeping
your plants healthy.

Foliar feeding is handy if you want to provide a quick boost or if you want
to diagnose a deficiency. For example, you can apply a differerent mineral
solution to each of a set of plants and see the outcome of each quite soon.
But the effect doesn't last long. This is because the plant absorbs via the
leaves and into the vascular system but if there is no more liquid spray
(probably a few hours after application) it has to stop. The overspray
will drip into the soil and be absorbed by the roots as well but being
soluble much will leached out when you water unless your soil has good
binding capacity.

If you make your soil healthy with the right minerals, organic matter and
microbes and you won't need foliar feeding.

D

On 6/3/2013 9:03 PM, David Hare-Scott wrote:
Natural (Smoking Gun) Girl wrote:
On 6/3/2013 6:29 PM, David Hare-Scott wrote:
Natural Girl wrote:
wrote:

Everything is fertilized with 10 10 10. The peppers (bell) do not
have very thick walls and I thought I had read that this would
help. There is a lot of irrigation to the garden, so am I wasting
my time and effort? The burning issue concerns me too. Would early
morning be enough to combat that?
MJ

I've been mixing up in a spray bottle 2T of molasses, 2T organic
liquid seaweed fertizer, and about 1T+/- of Epsom Salts pre-disolved
in warm water added to this mixture... then I fill the bottle with
rain water or tap water if I have no rain water. I've been spraying
that mixture 1 time a week on everything that I have planted. Cukes,
tomatoes of various types, melons, jalopeno peppers, and
habanero's. I did the same thing with my peas, but it burned a few
pea leaves. I ended up pulling up my peas anyway because they
didn't like where I planted them and I replaced them with pole
limas that have broken ground over the weekend. Everything else I
sprayed that mixure on is growing like crazy and my peppers have
nice big blooms on them now. I even sprayed it on a kumquat tree
that I overwintered indoors and had just put outside. It was
dropping leaves and a couple branches
died back, but now even my kumquat is growing like a weed!
This is the first time I've opted for mixing this combo of organic
fertizers and hand spraying them every week, so it's an experiment
for me this year, but seems to be working out so far.

there are other solutions that don't require spraying every week.

D


I'm all ears! er .. eyes!

I didn't mean solutions as in solute plus solvent I meant ways of
keeping your plants healthy.

Foliar feeding is handy if you want to provide a quick boost or if you
want to diagnose a deficiency. For example, you can apply a
differerent mineral solution to each of a set of plants and see the
outcome of each quite soon. But the effect doesn't last long. This is
because the plant absorbs via the leaves and into the vascular system
but if there is no more liquid spray (probably a few hours after
application) it has to stop. The overspray will drip into the soil and
be absorbed by the roots as well but being soluble much will leached out
when you water unless your soil has good binding capacity.

If you make your soil healthy with the right minerals, organic matter
and microbes and you won't need foliar feeding.


ohh ok One thing I've noticed is I don't see any more slugs on my
plants since I've started spraying them. I wonder if that's just a
coincidence?


--
Natural Girl

wrote:
songbird wrote:

sorry this seems so frustrating to you, but
there's a lot of things that the rest of us
don't know about what you are doing and so in
order to try to help it is important to find
out as much of the history and methods you are
using. when i ask a question i want a specific
answer to that question. if you think you're
repeating yourself you might not be getting the
point i'm after. already below you've revealed
a few things that i didn't note from before so
they can help longer term. patience...
the more complete you can be the more it helps.

onwards...

have you ever been able to grow tomatoes there
at all? you say you've planted different varieties
but have you tried cherry tomatoes or smaller
varieties?

have you ever tried growing tomatoes (patio or
cherry tomatoes) in a brand new pot using potting
soil and not using water from the tap?

for an experiment get a bucket, put a few
holes in the bottom, fill it with potting soil
and put a patio or cherry tomato plant in there
and keep it watered using distilled or spring
water (i.e. don't use tap water or water from
the lake). fertilize it lightly only after it
gets growing for a month.

if you can keep that plant alive then at least
we know it's not you...


Everything is fertilized with 10 10 10. The peppers
(bell) do not have very thick walls and I thought I had
read that this would help. There is a lot of irrigation
to the garden, so am I wasting my time and effort? The
burning issue concerns me too. Would early morning be
enough to combat that?



it may be still too early to pick them, try
giving them a bit more time to develop.



if your soil is not holding moisture well and
requires a half hour of watering each day that is
a good sign that your soil could use some added
clay and organic matter. this also would help in
holding nutrients for the plants. also top dressing
lightly with a mulch (once the soil warms up after
the spring) will help hold moisture.

i still think this will help overall for your
garden apart from everything else.


I have had the soil tested many times at through
the cooperative extension office but it has been a few
years. I don't remember the exact results but there was
never anything that stood out and the 10 10 10 was their
recommendation.



if nothing stood out they should have
left it alone, but anyways...



have you had the water tested? is it
city/treated or well water?

The water comes out of the lake we live on and is acidic although I
do not know the actual number. It is an irrigation system that waters
around 10 pm and then again around 5 am.

your soil is sandy loam? the soil tests
should tell you what type of soil it is
and how much clay (the percentage). if clay
is too low then you're low pH water will be
leaching nutrients from a sandy soil.

test your water. find out what you are
up against (at the rate of 30 minutes at so
many gallons per minute) each day.

i'm not sure if irrigating at different
times would help too. is your irrigation
system buried so that the water isn't being
heated up at any point along the route
from the lake to the garden?

is it being stored in a tank that is
in the sun or does it come straight
from the lake to the garden? (to
adjust pH some folks run acidic water
through a crushed limestone gravel bed,
this works well for a while, but the
gravel can eventually get a coating on
it which then decreases the adjustment
so after that it needs to be stirred.
a much, much easier approach is to use
earthworms and limestone grit. the worms
use the pieces of grit in their gizzards
to grind things up. along with their
calcium secretion glands they are very
good for maintaining pH.


are you watering using hoses that are
laying in the hot sun all day? if you
spray that directly on plants fresh out
of the hose that's not a good thing...
when i water i always flush the hose
first until the water runs cooler and
then use...





The soil is fairly sandy and slightly
acidic due to the pine trees near by.



use a little agricultural lime (powder acts
fastest, grit lasts longer) in your garden. if
you make your own compost add it to the compost
heap. how much you need depends upon how far off
your pH is from neutral. if you are 6.5 to 7.5
that is fine for most garden plants (other than
those well noted for needing acidic conditions).
don't add a lot all at one time, but over the
course of a few years you should be able to
gradually increase the pH. however, if your
soil is mostly sand and has little clay or
organic material to hold the moisture it can
be leached away quickly once stopped. that is
why i recommend adding a little clay and organic
material to help hold things in place and to
give the rest of the soil community more to
work with.

important...


I have never been
able to figure out what is in the soil that causes my
tomato plants to develop wilt but they do every year. In
fact I took some dirt out of the garden, put it in a pot,
planted the tomato plant and it too has wilted.



diseases can be a problem for some plants.
do you start your own seeds? have you tried
different varieties? do you do crop rotation
or are you planting tomatoes and peppers in
the same soil year after year? if you are
starting your own seeds you could be using
infected seeds/trays/pots/starting mix, tools,
watering can, hoses or location. if your
starting process is flawed then it all follows.

ALL of the above. I start my own seeds, I have tried everything
from seeds from actual tomatoes, cheep ones from Wal Mart, disease
resistant seeds from a mail order place in Florida. All of my utensils
are correctly used.

have you ever lifted a plant and looked
at the root system? compared a healthy
plant with a wilted plant? perhaps you
have root knot nematodes (sandy soil ...)?

it may not be wilt. just curious what you've
examined and if you've sent a wilted plant in
for diagnosis? if so, what was the exact name
they gave?


what do you do for soil organic matter? do
you add compost? do you grow other crops in
the area and turn them under?

Yep rotate every year. Have not turned them under, especially the
tomatoes because of the wilt.

ok, how are you rotating? how large an area?
have you ever double dug an area?

if you have another area far enough away that
has never been gardened put a tomato in that
spot and see what happens (even if it doesn't
get enough light you can still examine the
root structure later on or see if it wilts
in the same manner).


Organic matter is just fallen leaves and not
much else.

not much actual nutrition in fallen leaves.

your soil is crying out for a more balanced
diet.


I cover the garden is black plastic for the winter (November -
February)to kill the weeds but whatever is there gets tilled in.

is wilt a fungal, bacterial or viral disease?

if it is a fungal disease then covering the
ground for that long a period of time and not
encouraging bacterial populations is not going
to help...

the sun sterilizes the surface of the soil
(UV rays). earthworms will also help change
the bacterial and pH characteristics of a soil.
also growing plants will help. if you can switch
to planting a mixed cover crop for those months
and then turn it a few weeks before planting the
garden i think you'll eventually be in for much
better results.

once you learn more about what is going on (is it
a fungal disease, bacterial or viral) then you can
also adjust your practices to encourage the other
factors to reduce the problem.


We are
homebrewers so any spent grain gets put in the garden but nothing else
compost wise.

again, another very limited nutrient material.
perhaps also too oriented towards fungal (like
covering with plastic for months at a time will
accomplish).

if you can afford fertilizer you can afford a
bag or two of alfalfa pellets or alfalfa meal.
top dress your garden with that and lightly mix
it with the top few inches of soil. mulch lightly
over that. in combination with added clay (if you
don't have enough) some agricultural lime (probably
needed) you'll greatly increase the bacterial and
fungal counts. if you do this along with adding a
bit of composted cow manure and other known good
quality compost then you'll help to add more
competition to disease organisms. this is best
done a few weeks to a month before planting.


I have tried it and it just doesn't seem to work for me.

"I have tried it" what is "it"? compost or
cover crops or ?

there's a lot of history we don't know about
yet. we have no idea how long this garden has
been going, if you've ever been able to grow
tomatoes there, what the light situation is
like, etc.

i'm trying to find out. if you answer
each question i ask (bear with me, but each
question is important because it gives me a
better idea of what you are doing).

already we are getting a clearer picture of
what's up...


we've grown tomatoes for years and had some
problems with fungi (after flooding and heavy
rains), but not wilt. we also rotate plant on
a minimum three to five year cycle (tomatoes
first on new soil, then peppers, then beans,
peas, beets, greens, then cover crops like
buckwheat or alfalfa or trefoil. if we've planted
the same crop two years in a row it is because
i've turned the soil deeply enough to not worry
about diseases.



also, mulching lightly to reduce rain and
watering splashing of soil on the leaves. some
people even remove the lower leaves of the
plants once they get growing to keep disease
problems from having an easy start. i don't go
that far...

I do. I remove all the lower leaves on everything.

do you use any mulch, covers or what?


But back to the peppers, I put a tablespoon of the Epsom
Salt around the base of each plant and I sware the plants
are greener. How often should or can I do this? The garden
is watered twice a day for 15 minutes. The plants are just
getting flowers.



i dunno, around here both magnesium and
sulfur are at reasonable levels and we amend
enough with other materials that they shouldn't
be getting depleted.



you could be picking them too early. when we get
thin walled peppers it is those at the end of the
season when the temperatures are lower and the light
is not as strong. they are still edible up until
the frosts get them, but the flavor isn't as good
as prime time.



you could also try different varieties.

Again have done this too. The ones I have had success
with have been from seeds harvested from grocery store
peppers, believe it or not.

likely California Wonder (the most common green
bell pepper found in stores).


Thank you for your time and information. I just feel
like I have been doing this long enough that I should be
growing perfect produce

you're welcome. i enjoy problem solving and
perhaps others can learn something too. i don't
consider it a waste of time, but it speeds things
up if you answer each question even if you think
i should know the answer already. not everyone
reads the backstory or the past articles and
someone far wiser than i may see something
obvious that i haven't...

as for growing perfect produce. well i can tell
the bugs which plants to eat and they listen. just
joking... every year i learn more and i've been
growing houseplants and gardening for more than 40
years. the more i learn the more i appreciate what
a fine world we have.

getting back to your problem with tomatoes...

i think i would lay off using the brewing
leavings and instead use those in a compost
pile (to reduce the yeast populations and to
introduce a wider variety of bacteria and
fungi to the compost, which then gets added
to the gardens). i would add a little lime
to the compost pile, and use dirt and
composted cow manure from a different site
to innoculate the pile.

you want to encourage a wider population of
soil creatures than what you currently have.
many of them will help fight an imbalance, but
you want to get these soil creatures from a
whole different location and source than what
you have now.

if you want a prime example of how this type
of process works look at the problem of c. diff
in people. it's a very nasty bug of the digestive
tract. very resistant to drugs. yet they can
treat it in a fairly inexpensive manner by taking
a healthy person's poop and putting that in the
infected person's digestive system (simplifying
the description, but that's about what they do).
c.diff almost killed my aunt. before this
treatment was made known, she was not really ever
fully recovered... now they know a lot more and
more people are able to be treated.

garden soil is a whole community much like the
digestive system. if you can find the imbalance and
correct it that is good, but you might also need
to give it a boost with a new community of
organisms to provide competition with whatever
is causing disease.

a few things you are doing is pushing your
soil community towards the fungal life, but
also certain types of fungi (yeasts and those
that thrive in low light and warmth) does
that sound familiar? like the understory of
a tomato plant in summer humidity?

stop smothering the soil for months at a time.
plant a mixed cover crop and turn it under about
a month before planting. at that time add some
lime, new compost from a known good source
(innoculated with soil from a known good area
not at all close to yours). if you can get
native earthworms (not composting worms) to add
at the time you turn the cover crop and add the
lime (add the lime first and water it before
adding worms) this will help things a great deal.
clay too. don't forget that if your soil is too
much sand. a little bit goes a long ways.

another thing, is that earthworms (not composting
worms) don't tend to hang out in poor sandy soils.
they like a little clay and they like a little grit
and they like green stuff up top and cool enough
temperatures below. give them grit, green stuff and
a bit of clay and they will work for free to help
you keep your pH up. they are great garden helpers.
a light layer of mulch after the ground has warmed
up enough to plant will also help give them a bit
of protection from the heat and drying out. composting
worms are ok too, but they are more up top creatures
and what i would want to encourage in your situation
is actual soil dwelling worms.


songbird

Billy wrote:
....
If you're lazy like me, you'll just put out a bird feeder, and a bird
bath. It might be just coincidental that i've never had problems with
bugs.

we have birdbaths but no feeding as then the
birds have to forage. we grow plenty of seed
sources and bugs are all about. i'll continue
to try to train the birds this year to eat
japanese beetles and other bugs that they don't
seem to be picking up on (rhubarb bugs and the
stink bugs). except i've yet to find a stink
bug on any plants... dunno where they hang out
other than in the house when it gets cooler.


songbird

In article ,
songbird wrote:

Billy wrote:
...
If you're lazy like me, you'll just put out a bird feeder, and a bird
bath. It might be just coincidental that i've never had problems with
bugs.

we have birdbaths but no feeding as then the
birds have to forage. we grow plenty of seed
sources and bugs are all about. i'll continue
to try to train the birds this year to eat
japanese beetles and other bugs that they don't
seem to be picking up on (rhubarb bugs and the
stink bugs). except i've yet to find a stink
bug on any plants... dunno where they hang out
other than in the house when it gets cooler.


songbird

My black oil sunflower seed feeder is for small birds (mostly
chickadees, chookadees?). They can be extremely fussy about what they
eat, and may toss away as many as 20 seeds before finding one that is
just right for them. Some seeds fall to the ground, and larger birds
come to take advantage of the free food. Large, and small, I then see
them scratching up the yard. Salatin mentioned in "Salad Bar Beef" that
birds will venture about 200 ft. from cover to find food.
--
Remember Rachel Corrie
http://www.rachelcorrie.org/

Welcome to the New America.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hA736oK9FPg

In article ,
"Terry Coombs" wrote:

"Billy" wrote in message
...
In article ,
"Terry Coombs" wrote:

"Billy" wrote
Being reclaimed forest, you may have acidic conditions. Turning the
soil
the next couple of years to incorporate organic material, and to deepen
the growing zone (top 2 ft.) will let some of the CO2 blow off, raising
the pH. Then I suggest you go to no till. Joel Salatin says that 12
worms/ sq. ft. will give you 3" of soil per year. Organic material (5%
by weight, or 10% by volume) will encourage the worms.
--
Remember Rachel Corrie
http://www.rachelcorrie.org/

Welcome to the New America.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hA736oK9FPg

Shades of Ruth Stout ! Actually , Billy , what you suggest is my basic
plan . This fall I'll be tilling some straw or hay in , followed by more
manure/compost before planting next spring . Every pass with the tiller
gets
more rocks up and deepens the loosened soil a little . Light
supplemental
feedings with 3/13 only if necessary . Since the ground has a slope , as
I
till I'll be terracing this area .
We got between 4 and 6 inches of rain last night , looks like more of
the
same tonight/tomorrow . That terracing thing helped a lot , only had a
couple of minor washouts and the county road into our place was washed
out
in 5 places this morning ... .
--
Snag
Bet that 13/13/13
got washed away ...

Clay may have held on to part of it, but that is part of the beauty of
organic fertilizers, they are more likely to stay put.
--


Every hole/hill I planted a seed or start in was a 50/50 mix of soil and
manure/compost . The row stuff all got a side dressing of same m/c on the
uphill side . Got 2 bags of straight manure to be added as the season
progresses . So far weeds haven't been a problem .

There are two basic groups of cover crops: legumes and grains. You may
choose to plant one or the other, or combine the two types, depending on
your goal.

Grains, such as oats, BUCKWHEAT and winter RYE, are very good for adding
bulky organic material to the soil (increasing water retention).

Legumes contribute nitrogen in addition to organic matter. Where soils
are depleted of nitrogen, a nutrient essential for plant growth,
leguminous cover crops help restore fertility.
=====

In addition to all the living organisms you can see in garden soils (for
example, earthworms), there is a whole world of soil organisms that you
cannot see unless you use sophisticated and expensive optics. Only then
do the tiny, microscopic organisms‹bacteria, fungi, protozoa,
nematodes‹appear, and in numbers that are nothing less than staggering.
A mere teaspoon of good garden soil, as measured by microbial
geneticists, contains a billion invisible bacteria, several yards of
equally invisible fungal hyphae, several thousand protozoa, and a few
dozen nematodes.

The common denominator of all soil life is that every organism needs
energy to survive. While a few bacteria, known as chemosynthesizers,
derive energy from sulfur, nitrogen, or even iron compounds, the rest
have to eat something containing carbon in order to get the energy they
need to sustain life. Carbon may come from organic material supplied by
plants, waste products produced by other organisms, or the bodies of
other organisms. The first order of business of all soil life is
obtaining carbon to fuel metabolism‹it is an eat-and-be-eaten world, in
and on soil.

Most organisms eat more than one kind of prey, so if you make a diagram
of who eats whom in and on the soil, the straight-line food chain
instead becomes a series of food chains linked and cross-linked to each
other, creating a web of food chains, or a soil food web. Each soil
environment has a different set of organisms and thus a different soil
food web.

Most gardeners think of plants as only taking up nutrients through root
systems and feeding the leaves. Few realize that a great deal of the
energy that results from photosynthesis in the leaves is actually used
by plants to produce chemicals they secrete through their roots. These
secretions are known as exudates. A good analogy is perspiration, a
human's exudate.

Root exudates are in the form of carbohydrates (including sugars) and
proteins. Amazingly, their presence wakes up, attracts, and grows
specific beneficial bacteria and fungi living in the soil that subsist
on these exudates and the cellular material sloughed off as the plant's
root tips grow. All this secretion of exudates and sloughing-off of
cells takes place in the rhizosphere, a zone immediately around the
roots, extending out about a tenth of an inch, or a couple of
millimeters (1 millimeter = 1/25 inch). The rhizosphere, which can look
like a jelly or jam under the electron microscope, contains a constantly
changing mix of soil organisms, including bacteria, fungi, nematodes,
protozoa, and even larger organisms. All this ³life" competes for the
exudates in the rhizosphere, or its water or mineral content.

At the bottom of the soil food web are bacteria and fungi, which are
attracted to and consume plant root exudates. In turn, they attract and
are eaten by bigger microbes, specifically nematodes and protozoa
(remember the amoebae, paramecia, flagellates, and ciliates you should
have studied in biology?), who eat bacteria and fungi (primarily for
carbon) to fuel their metabolic functions. Anything they don't need is
excreted as wastes, which plant roots are readily able to absorb as
nutrients. How convenient that this production of plant nutrients takes
place right in the rhizosphere, the site of root-nutrient absorption.

At the center of any viable soil food web are plants. Plants control the
food web for their own benefit, an amazing fact that is too little
understood and surely not appreciated by gardeners who are constantly
interfering with Nature's system. Studies indicate that individual
plants can control the numbers and the different kinds of fungi and
bacteria attracted to the rhizosphere by the exudates they produce.
During different times of the growing season, populations of rhizosphere
bacteria and fungi wax and wane, depending on the nutrient needs of the
plant and the exudates it produces.

Soil bacteria and fungi are like small bags of fertilizer, retaining in
their bodies nitrogen and other nutrients they gain from root exudates
and other organic matter (such as those sloughed-off root-tip cells).
Carrying on the analogy, soil protozoa and nematodes act as ³fertilizer
spreaders" by releasing , the nutrients locked up in the bacteria and
fungi ³fertilizer bags." The nematodes and protozoa in the soil come
along and eat the bacteria and fungi in the rhizosphere. They digest
what they need to survive and excrete excess carbon and other nutrients
as waste.

Left to their own devices, then, plants produce exudates that attract
fungi and bacteria (and, ultimately, nematodes and protozoa); their
survival depends on the interplay between these microbes. It is a
completely natural system, the very same one that has fueled plants
since they evolved. Soil life provides the nutrients needed for plant
life, and plants initiate and fuel the cycle
by producing exudates.
======

Your garden soil shouldn't be more than 10% (by volume), or less than 5%
(by weight) organic material.

Garden soil should be 30% - 40% sand, 30% - 40% silt, and 20% - 30%
clay. You can check your soil by scraping away the organic material on
top of the ground and then take a vertical sample of your soil to 12 in.
(30 cm) deep (rectangular or circular hole). Mix this with water in an
appropriately large glass (transparent) jar. The sand will settle out
quickly, the silt in a couple of hours, and the clay within a day. The
depth of the layer in relationship to the total (layer/total = % of
composition) is the percent that fraction has in the soil.

Garden soil needs a constant input of nutrients, i.e. carbon, e.g. brown
leaves, and nitrogen, e.g. manure in a ratio of C/N of 25 - 30. This is
the same ratio you will want in a compost pile.
-----

Let it Rot!: The Gardener's Guide to Composting (Third Edition)
(Storey's Down-to-Earth Guides)
by Stu Campbell

http://www.amazon.com/Let-Rot-Compos...580170234/ref=
sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1294901182&sr=1-1

p.39

Compostable Material Average C/N

Alder or ash leaves ........................ 25

Grass clippings ........................... 25

Leguminous plants (peas,
beans,soybeans) ........................... 15

Manure with bedding ....................... 23

Manure .................................... 15

Oak leaves ................................ 50

Pine needles .............................. 60-100

Sawdust................................. 150-500

Straw, cornstalks and cobs ............... 50-100

Vegetable trimmings ...................... 25

Aged Chicken Manure**.......................7

Alfalfa ................................. 12

Newspaper............................. 175
-----

http://www.motherearthnews.com/organ...ts-system.aspx

--
Remember Rachel Corrie
http://www.rachelcorrie.org/

Welcome to the New America.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hA736oK9FPg

Billy wrote:
....
My black oil sunflower seed feeder is for small birds (mostly
chickadees, chookadees?). They can be extremely fussy about what they
eat, and may toss away as many as 20 seeds before finding one that is
just right for them. Some seeds fall to the ground, and larger birds
come to take advantage of the free food. Large, and small, I then see
them scratching up the yard. Salatin mentioned in "Salad Bar Beef" that
birds will venture about 200 ft. from cover to find food.

ah, you got around to reading it. what
did you think? i preferred it much over
his more recent book. seemed more practical
and more descriptive of what he actually does
for the beef part of his operation.


songbird

Terry Coombs wrote:
songbird wrote:
Terry Coombs wrote:
...
Hmm , not sure my neighbors would hold still for pigs , and no way we
can
let 'em roam the woods . Already got a big problem in this area with
feral
swine , and I won't take a chance here .

i didn't mean let loose without fencing and
tags, perhaps even making sure they are sterile
so even if they did get loose they couldn't
procreate.

feral pigs are on the upswing around here too.
haven't seen any yet on this property. it is
open-season on them any time.

I've been around pig farms , I think I'll stick to buying my pork ...
besides , if we run low on meat here , the deer reproduce like rats in a
grain silo . And the only water for miles runs thru my land ...

i've been around pig farms too. never
wish to return. bad enough to make me not
want to eat pork again. but good BBQ is
hard to resist. there are ways of doing
pig that aren't quite so smelly and nasty.
permaculturists are able to run them in
small groups to clean up woodland tree
leftovers. a little smell, then shift them
to a new spot. use good electric fences
and rotate regularly so the area can recover.
sounds possible for people with more patience
than i have.

deer here are the same way. if we get deep
enough snows in the late winter they'll come
through in large groups and browse the cedar
trees. i've had them bed down about 30ft from
where i am now. i can hear them chuffing and
wandering around in the night.


The chickens are another thing
entirely , several neighbors let theirs roam during the day - though Tom
down the road lost a couple last week , he thinks a fox got 'em . And
during
the day ! Great benefit here to let chickens roam , they take care of the
ticks ...

they can strip a green area bare and scratch
the soil searching for bugs. some people use
them to clear gardens before or after harvest.

There are 12 acres of woods for them to harvest bugs from . Between ticks
, chiggers , and fleas plus whatever else lives here that doesn't bite
they should have plenty of protein . We have no "lawn" , just whatever wild
grasses that were already here .




only potential problem is the dog . She's never been around birds
, might decide they look tasty . And she's big enough to easily take one
down .

i think if you raise them from eggs or chicks
the dog might cope better. if you can find a
broody hen to take care of them even better
(so they would be raised as normal birds and
have some protection by an adult bird)...

Actually , she's a pretty good dog . Once she knows they're off limits I
don't expect trouble .

that is a good thing. the other aspect of having
a mother hen for the chicks is that she'll help
them figure out what is good to do and protect
them while they are growing up better than if you
just get chicks and let them wander around and
have to figure it all out for themselves. follow
the leader is much more efficient.

good luck! i was drooling over acreage the
other evening.


songbird