What Did You Do In The Garden?

[flowerbug]

Hey yall wanna know a secret? I did something that stopped a fungus they say on the net there is no cure for. Its that white bastard with black ball shaped tips that wants to get on squash flowers and then eat the fruit too. I killed that mf'ker and am very proud. I have been fighting him for almost 10 years now. Had to abandon chemistry and go for the biowarfare of organic control and blow me down I think it has worked. Cornmeal base. Trichoderma prepared mix I purchased, Actinovate. I am beside myself if this is repeatable. It gets wet here. Always a fungus to fight. Here is the usual drill which is basically never worked for me because of our wet climate.

Choaenephora Wet Rot Control: Tips On Controlling Choaenephora Fruit Rot

Choanenphora wet rot control is essential for those of us who love to grow squash, cucumbers and other cucurbits. You may not know the disease as Choaenephora, but you probably know what blossom end rot is. Learn more here.

www.gardeningknowhow.com

hope it works!

 

[Dirtmechanic]

hope it works!

I hope it is not just retreated because it got a little drier. I know its still there in the soil but even to get some control on it is a big deal. By the time you see it the damage is done.

 

[digitS']

@GrandmaDeKorte , that is an interesting website. The author lives in the Rogue River Valley in southern Oregon where I grew up.

Yes, elderberry bushes grow in good numbers here - the wild, blue variety.

Back in my winemaking days, about the most successful batch that I made was done with elderberries. Fairly good although I was supposedly trying to find a wine recipe for garden produce.

Last year, I had more time for harvesting them during their season and to give the winemaking another go. 2020 was an extremely dry summer and the berries didn't look good. The weather also sapped some of my enthusiasm. Garden produce or not, if my homemade wine could just be as good as what I can pull off the shelf at the market.

Steve

 

[flowerbug]

I hope it is not just retreated because it got a little drier. I know its still there in the soil but even to get some control on it is a big deal. By the time you see it the damage is done.

i used some wood chips to mulch a garden that had botrytis splashing up on the lily plants. it was causing spotted leaves. it worked. the botrytis was brought in by infected tulip bulbs. i can't mulch the tulip gardens so only the strong survive. still it was a disappointment for sure to lose many tulips to the fungi. however, it's really only a problem if you crowd the tulips to begin with and also if the weather is like ours (it's not prime tulip area for sure) as a lowland we get fogs too often and then there's the clay. they don't like any of that...

 

[seedcorn]

Today finished task of weeding the garden. @digitS' impressed that you have weed free parsnips. 3rd planting tonight as the grass seedlings beat the parsnips up.

Then finished strawing the garden-a job I love DONE. Tonight after supper, transplanted some garden huckleberry plants-3rd attempt here as sun baked the first 2- & marigolds.

 

[Zeedman]

The thunderstorms that rolled through this morning were loud & intense... but brief. The gardens were dry enough by afternoon to work in. I mulched everything at home that was large enough, then went to the rural garden... which to my surprise, was dry enough to walk in even on the low end, and no erosion. So I pounded T-posts to support all of the tomatoes, and a quite a few extra tall poles (will explain why at end).

Trellis construction, in steps, is (1) pound T-posts; (2) place PVC "T" on pole tops; (3) run 3/8" rebar rod through PVC; (4) run 3-4 horizontal strings between poles; and (5) run vertical strings down from rebar, wrapping around horizontal strings on the way down, and tying off at the bottom. I ran at least one vertical string, to wrap around each tomato plant (will add more strings later as plants branch out). I had hoped to finish all tomato trellises to get the plants off the ground, but was only able to complete 4 of the 6 tomato varieties. I'd also hoped to finish trellises for the bitter melon & runner beans (since both are ready to climb) but ran out of time...

... because I had to stop early to reinforce the fencing. For the first time in 10 years, a deer broke through (not over) the upper fence twine (6 & 1/2 feet up) and got into the garden. Footprints were everywhere. The deer topped several cucumber plants, ate a few of the cowpeas... and of course, mowed a row of heirloom soybeans. Fortunately, the damage was minimal - so far.

I usually plan tall trellises just inside the fence line (in the areas where deer have an open approach to jump from) and that has worked well; but those trellises were not up yet. So I put up a couple of the tall trellises that ran along the fence line; and where trellises ran perpendicular to the fence, I pounded in the outermost poles & put the white PVC "T"s on top for the deer to see them. Then ran several extra lines of heavy baling twine pole-to-pole around the fence, to hopefully discourage the deer from jumping through. The most likely landing zones for a jump are hopefully cluttered enough now to make the deer think twice.

In my experience, the best defense against deer is to discourage them from getting in the first time. Once they get in & have tasted something they like, they are hard to keep out. The property owner thinks her dogs scared the deer away, and I hope that's the case. But if it gets in again, I'll have to put up the electric fence wire.

On the bright side, the garlic is looking better than I've ever grown. I'm really looking forward to the harvest.

 

[ducks4you]

Over the weekend I got ALL of the purchased Sweet Bell Peppers into the ground. I use (and I had an ample supply of) tomato cages for my peppers. Right now, 18 bell peppers in the bed, and 2 jalepanoes. FINALLY got 3 inch peppers from seed up. Dunno exACTLY what I'm going to do with them. Hope to plant them SOMEWHERE and, if I get good peppers, I will seed save, bc they are bound to produce late. 5 of the peppers in the garden have fruit now, albeit small.

 

[flowerbug]

weeded and enjoyed the cooler and breezy day. tomorrow should be about the same and i hope to get most of the gardens inside the fence scraped.

yesterday i actually got a bit of a sunburn since i was working in shorts for a few hours. i knew i was getting some sun and i angled away from the sun as much as i could but i was out there an extra hour around noon which isn't what i like to do normally so that was a bit of a mess up on my part, but the burn wasn't bad at all and is pretty much gone today. at least i got most of that edge cleaned up - now the next thing i need to do is finish the very end and then start screening the gravel from the dirt. a long time mess made many many years ago. it's hard to scrape if there is gravel in the dirt and the dirt has enough clay to make it hard and crusty. getting most of the gravel out of there is a fun project for a hot day. a few hundred pounds of gravel is way too much to pick by hand and in one case i have a lot of smaller gravel in sand to sift out too so that will reclaim the gravel and also the sand.

i figure i really needed the natural vitamin D for a change and i was tired of wearing long pants on warm days. sunblock would have been good...

when i was done weeding i also raided the strawberry patch for what i could find. not too much left now. the birds, chipmunks and raccoons have been harvesting them. having them decoy the chipmunks from the edamame soybeans seemed to have worked pretty well this season.

 

[ducks4you]

Up potted 15, the Last of the beefsteak tomatoes that I started from seed, into my whiskey barrel planter. I placed it on top of the largest of the 3 cement pads that NEED TO COME OUT OF MY BED this Fall!!!
Up Potted Romas that I started from seed, some 30+.
Can't really count them all bc we will see who makes it.
I have plenty of room for the extra pots, and I can monitor them for watering, so I will SEE when they are ready for tranplanting.
No little green tomatoes on my beefsteak's yet, BUT lots more flowers.
Been a beautiful cool and Spring-like week, high's in the low 70's, going up to low 80's. Yesterday morning the low was 50.
Still, I was working outside and my plants were baking in the sun, all good.
The water level in our cistern, for which DH recently fixed the basement pump, is only 2 ft below the cement!!
Our water tables must be less than 6 inches below the surface right now.
So, I have free rein to soak as much of my garden beds as I want.
Okra is up, as well as last year's corn seeds, and pumpkins.
Gotta get the rest of my pumpkins out before the end of the month.
If you are wondering, the consensus advice from U of I garden experts is too plant all squashes late, as the Best remedy against vine borers and squash bugs.
Who am to argue with the pros?!?!?

 

[Marie2020]

No.

The organic fertilizer was not from the cat! Didn't realize how that was written until I reread it . She probably uses a sandbox much closer to home.

The fertilizer was from the garden center ...

digitS'

That's a relief too know