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Garden Haps WAS: chive talkin'
On 5/7/2014 1:21 PM, Derald wrote:
songbird wrote: Derald wrote: songbird wrote: some people like the greens. (wonder how Derald is doing down there in FL with all the recent rains...?) He's getting very little of the rain. None of it that caused the recent flooding in the panhandle A whopping 0.4" overnight. hope things have improved? we're doing ok on some rain, but light rain and very scattered. frosts still here or there. not much warmth but perhaps that will change this week as we might break into the 70sF. Two or three cloudy, drizzly, "wintry" days gifted us with slightly more than one inch; none since. Nighttime temps are mid-60's and daytime in mid-high 80's. As I've mentioned in the past, "spring" down here is about ten days in February or March. The English peas are having a time of it: They indubitably do not prefer these hot, sunny days. This year's late planting rotated into a bed that gets early-day sun early in the year so they are adhering more closely to their normal "dwarf" stature than is usual and are covered with blossoms. Most years, the late peas are approaching the end of productivity by mid-May but this year's weren't planted until mid-March—almost a month later than in most springs. Have blossoms on the transplanted "volunteer" tomato of unknown lineage and noticed for the first time this morning a smattering of blossoms on the snap beans ("Contender"). Spent some time yesterday evening transplanting okra into a singular bed from a community bed (a "community" bed, not the reactionary utopian misnomer). I always forget that okra is a slow starter, especially when planted early, and often is outgrown (overgrown) by its interplanted bedmates. Boy, does it compensate later in the year when the heat turns up. ... those turnips.... the ones that survived the winter have surprised me the past few days, it looks like they are going to flower. i thought it would be sometime this summer or even in the fall before they would flower. learn something new all the time. you ever eat the flowers or seed heads from turnips? Nah; ours never stay in the garden long enough to flower. Turnips are biennials that do not thrive in warm weather so fall-planted turnips are pretty punched out by March or April and any planted after about Valentine's Day are basically just flea beetle fodder. Besides which, turnip roots are best eaten young; the longer they remain, especially as weather warms, the more likely the roots are to become fibrous or "pithy". I don't know what triggers flowering. i was also surprised by how the daikon radish seeds were reasonable edible. Those are untreated seeds of known origin, I assume. good luck with the carrots. i seem to recall that like some other veggies that they seem to get better after a bit of frost hits them. I was surprised these even germinated. They were planted on 14 April. Two other varieties planted during the first half of April are no-shows, although, fall and winter plantings all did well. If the Nantes taste like anything, then they definitely are late-season candidates for future gardens. Wife likes turnips but she's of German descent, I'm Native American and English and I don't eat turnips. In my youth they were grown as animal fodder. Wife planted spring carrots again, I know for a fact they will not mature. Our temps here in Harris Cty, TX are already in the low to mid eighties. We are getting a light rain drizzle right now and we badly need it. Last week I installed all new soaker hoses in the raised beds and they seem to be working better than the rain we don't get. Crowder peas are climbing the fence, Hopi red lima beans are climbing their netting as are the cukes. We actually have little tomatoes and cukes making and an eggplant is about ready to pick, the fruit is bigger than the plant. Leeks need pulling and will most likely given away to neighbors, they're way to strong for my taste. The fig tree has baby figs and the blueberries have very few berries coming on due to a late frost. Looks like we will go to a pick-your-own farm this year for blueberries and blackberries, the native dewberries and blackberries didn't get enough rain this year and are small and very seedy. I am happy for the rain we are currently getting. |
#2
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Garden Haps WAS: chive talkin'
On 5/9/2014 12:02 PM, Derald wrote:
George Shirley wrote: Wife likes turnips but she's of German descent, I'm Native American and English and I don't eat turnips. In my youth they were grown as animal fodder. Wife planted spring carrots again, I know for a fact they will not mature. Our temps here in Harris Cty, TX are already in the low to mid eighties. We are getting a light rain drizzle right now and we badly need it. Last week I installed all new soaker hoses in the raised beds and they seem to be working better than the rain we don't get. I used soaker hoses for a few years. They were those black things constructed of shredded tires. I wish now that I'd put the money I ****ed away on them into drip irrigation, which I now use. Crowder peas are climbing the fence Two questions: What variety of peas; Can (and will) you provide a trusted source for certified seed? Can't, we save seed every year and have for about fifty years. My family used to grow black crowders developed by a great uncle of mine back in the nineteen teens in Central Louisiana. My Mom tossed the frozen seeds when she moved to a nursing home while I was working overseas. Lost that strain so just bought some plain crowders at a farm store in Orange, TX, been saving seed every since we came home from Saudi in 1986. I reckon they're heirlooms now. G They were in a bulk bin at the store at about ten cents a lb at the time. The pods get about six to eight inches long and about as big around as a grown man's little finger with eight to twelve peas in the pod. Easy to string and shuck and taste good. There are some good heirloom seed places online though. I'd be happy with most any heirloom variety of crowder or conch peas. Any change from blackeyes and pinkeyes is welcome. Last spring, a nostalgia attack induced the planting of "zipper cream" crowders purchased from an organic seed exchange; mistake. Resulted in a bad experience and three beds that "technically" should be quarantined to legumes for three years. Looks like I'm back to more resistant varieties until I can find a source for disease-free seeds; bummer. , Hopi red lima beans are climbing their netting as are the cukes. We actually have little tomatoes and cukes making and an eggplant is about ready to pick, the fruit is bigger than the plant. It'll be interesting to have a correspondent whose gardening year more closely resembles mine than do those of the other participants in the NG. Shoot: Where I am, even the Carolinas is "up north" ;-) I'm a little south of you at a latitude closer to that of Corpus Christi so the solar timetable is similar but with warmer winters. We only had one frost this year, not unusual. What's your USDA heat zone, we're probably much cooler than you as we are in heat zone 8b. In SW Louisiana we were in 9b, edging into 10, probably more like your area. In a normal year we plant in late February, this year we had frost, hail, sleet, and snow into April. In Louisiana our last frost day was generally February 18. While them folks "up there" are anticipating finally being able to spend some meaningful time outdoors, I'm anticipating picking the green beans that are in full enflorescence. "Contender"; new to me. Planted on 04 April, fully emergent by 10 April and covered with flowers today. I think they and I might be friends. We generally grow Contender but am not growing any green beans this year. Had a giant crop last year and canned ninety percent of it, still got tons in the pantry. Will be good up until about mid-2015 unless the house burns. My cukes will get a fence wire trellis later today. In containers, I can grow eggplant as perrenials for a few years but winter eventually takes them out. Haven't grown eggplant for a couple of years, though, and it seems that I may have lost the touch: Having a hard time getting any started this year. Seeing nascent yellow squash but, if these follow the pattern of the past few years, those blossoms will be sacrificial due to the absence of pollenizers. We have cukes about two inches long now, I spent an hour putting the tendrils of the limas and cukes up on the nylon netting so they will continue climbing. We have four foot wide raised beds so the trellises are needed. Much smaller backyard than our old house. oh yeah, we've been eating yellow squash since very early May. Grandson is trying to give some of his away he has so many. Leeks need pulling and will most likely given away to neighbors, they're way to strong for my taste. No leeks. Only allium are onions, garlic, chives About twenty years a friend gave me a bag full of bunching onions. Still have them growing. Pull the bunch, take one out, cut off the top and replant, two months later you've got another bunch. We did that a month ago and the replants are already bunching. The fig tree has baby figs and the blueberries have very few berries coming on due to a late frost. Looks like we will go to a pick-your-own farm this year for blueberries and blackberries, the native dewberries and blackberries didn't get enough rain this year and are small and very seedy. I am happy for the rain we are currently getting. Dewberries and rabbiteyes never amounted to much in this part of Florida but the advent of heat-tolerant highbush hybrids has instigated commercial farming, even this far south, in pursuit of the very early, primarily Asian, market. The commercial season is pretty well over by late April, after which some growers open up to the handy homeowner market. Most, though, just prune and be done with it. Native blackberries have all but disappeared from these parts but those little tiny seedy things that travel under a different name (which I forget) persist, although, deforestation passing as "development" is likely, eventually, to get them, too. In my old age I've gotten clumsy so I no longer grow anything with briars, I end up looking like the aftermath of a scary movie with blood all over my arms and hands. We will go to one of the better pick-you-own places a little later this month and pick a few gallons of blackberries and blueberries. I will can them for later use in pies and cobblers, they're one of the easiest things to can around here. |
#3
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Garden Haps WAS: chive talkin'
Derald wrote:
.... I'd be happy with most any heirloom variety of crowder or conch peas. Any change from blackeyes and pinkeyes is welcome. are you talking for fresh eating, shelling or for dried use? songbird |
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