How does your garden grow?

[amerikat]

I live in the north east. Last year was a bust. The coolest wettest summer I ever
remember. Between the ground hog and the wet weather with almost no sunny days and
the late blight on the tomatoes it was a real disappointment. This year looks good so far.

I always look forward to spring because winters can be a little rough up here. My mind goes
from hunkering down for the winter to thinking about getting the garden planned and starting seeds.

This year aside from planning my own garden I was asked to get a community garden started.
I always like a big challenging project, so I said I would start the community garden.

WE started with a small group of about six people that met for the first time as a group
in March( I think). The mayor had a spot picked out and it was a good place. Full sun
all day long and the village provided a water source tied into the village water system.

I managed to lay out some order to the space. Put in some walking paths and marked out 10'
by 20' plots and now we have about 12 plots claimed, planted and growing. We have our challenges
like groundhogs and deer. I'll trap and relocate the hoggies. The deer will roam and eat at will.
I have no clue about deer remediation.

All in all, my home garden is doing great as is the comm. garden.

My home garden lacks a bit(how did I forget to plant cilantro but it will be )OK. I have two 10"
pumpkins growing, cantaloupe and water mellon are apparent. Small but it's early yet.

Who in their right mind would plant all heirloom tomatoes? That would be me.

3 Prime Times
3 Cosmonaut velkov
6 mortgage lifters
6 amish paste
3 black krim
8 unknown(gifted or grew from last years disasters).



I'll be learning how to can this year.
Summer is amazing.

tell me about your garden........and if you belong to a community garden tell me about that too.

[Raven]

1. Checking in from SW New Hampshire...I agree with you that

the difference between this year and last year is like day and night. Everything in my garden is thriving. I'm the town planner in a small town here and this year we decided to emphasize argiculture and sustainability. We began a community garden and a farmers' market and are conducting monthly seminars on topics of interest for gardeners and farmers. We began this spring with a "bug seminar" that was very well attended. We're planning seminars on canning and food preservation, water management, composting, soils, forestry, and on and on. The NH Cooperative Extension Service has been a wonderful help and we have a Master Gardener who has volunteered her time.

[amerikat]

4. It sounds that your town is a bit more organized

about everything than our town. Do you have any guide lines concerning
the community garden? I did the physical work of laying out the garden
but nobody came forward to do the details of fund raising, or coordinating the garden with other assets. I'm trying to bring the other assets together. The high school has a greenhouse. we're in a farming community so we have knowledge and experience. I'm disappointed that there are not any young folks involved. I'm hoping we can get a sustainable agriculture course going at the high school.

One of the gardeners has offered to give a hands on canning course.
We had a meeting about composting earlier in the season though not connected with the community garden. 50 people showed up. In was amazed at the turnout to say the least.

One thing that I would like to mention is the different levels of commitment of the gardeners. Some have planted and I guess they come by to water once in awhile but I never see them there. Others are there often. I think it is a form of therapy for them. They fuss over their plots and are very proud of what they have done.

We have raised $1000 for a tool shed and tools.
Much of the harvest is going to the town food bank.

I knew this year would be an experiment as I have no experience
with community gardening.

All in all I think it's going pretty well. We hope to have a harvest dinner for any village resident that would like to come.

I have ideas for next year. I want to attract more kids and plant the joy of gardening in them, perhaps a pumpkin growing contest or biggest tomato contest or best photo of the garden.

Do you have a website for the town or garden? If so send me a link.
Thanks for your reply.

[Raven]

7. We do have guidelines and we're working on a website. I'll PM you.

[amerikat]

9. Thanks!(nt)

[noamnety]

2. Mine's doing great.

The first Butternut squash is getting to full size but not turning color yet.

Last year I obsessed over tomato blight because of the news stories, snipping spotted leaves, dipping the clippers in bleach between cuts, obsessively watering ever so gently at the right time of day at soil level trying to avoid splashes.

This year I was tired of it, I saw the spots and thought well, if they die they die - and did nothing. And it turns out the bottom leaves are spotted but the top growth all looks just fine, tomatoes are growing with no problems at all. They sent a message loud and clear - "we don't need you, get away from us."

I had a thousand radish volunteers sprout where I planted the bush beans this year. When the beans just started to blossom, I went and pulled all the radishes so they'd have enough light. And that night a deer jumped the garden fence and ate the tops of every last bean plant. I learned that radishes are good to grow around beans because the prickly leaves provide protection from critters. Again: "get away from us" seems to be the garden's mantra. The husband says the same, leave them alone, they know what they're supposed to do.

That was the only deer intruder of the season, there's also a mouse who lives in my garden, I see it run around when I water. It dug up my carrot seedlings and had a party in there so I lost my carrot crop this year.

The yard long red beans are actually growing this year, unlike last year. No clue what the difference is. Last year the plants were a foot tall, trying to grow beans taller than themselves - they never developed the runners. This year they are already at the top of their trellis and just now starting to blossom. It's the first year (after 3 attempts) that the luffa seeds are making actual luffas, I am excited about that. And the eggplants I started from seed are producing fruit for the first time. My normal routine is plant from seed, watch them stall out at 3 inches and stop growing, buy plants at the nursery. I did that from habit but now the nursery ones and the ones from seed are loaded.

And the ground cherries are starting to come in now. I had them last year but they ripened later in the year. I had a decent crop but when the bushes were all the way full and I was still enjoying them, frost came. This year they are earlier and I am afraid of how many I'll get. I see frozen, dried, and preserved ground cherries in my future.

[amerikat]

5. Ground cherries? I have heard of them.

A midwest thing?

We have had deer in our garden also. no way to keep them out.
We can't even afford a small fence to keep the hoggies out. We'll just have to deal with the occasional deer.

We haven't seen any late blight yet. Someone had a few plants wilt and die but we think the fungus was on the seedlings when they were purchased.

We hope to have the high school ag club sprout all our seeds next year.

good luck with your garden.

[noamnety]

8. Definitely not a midwest thing.

I've never met another person whose grown them - or eaten them. Or heard of them.

I think they are native to south africa, but they grow great up here in Michigan as an annual.

[beac]

3. I guess this is the year for the Southeast to get walloped by terrible weather.

We had torrential rains in May that delayed planting and then it went from 50 degrees to high-nineties overnight and we had almost no rain at all in June and early July. Even my ever-reliable salvias gave up and stopped blooming. My tomatoes were pathetic, my peppers just sat there, green but barren, and my squash almost died several times.

I have to credit Lyric's milk bath trick for saving the day b/c once I started applying it every week and a half or so, things have been a LOT better. (I even cheated and gave it to two tomatoes that weren't yet fruiting but seemed stuck at the 8" stage and they got busy growing right away.)

As of a few days ago, we are having more normal summer weather-- cool in the morning, hot and humid mid-day and a rain shower in the evening. The garden is MUCH happier with this arrangement, though the each of the tomatoes has taken a turn being a drama queen and doing a scary wilting act for a day and then recovering like nothing ever happened.

Here's a couple of pics (terrible quality b/c taken in full sunlight w/camera phone):

[amerikat]

6. I want to try Lyrics milk bath.

I have some really health peppers with no flowers.

That's a lot of containers you have there.

We all get tortured with extreme weather. I hope yours gets more seasonal.

good luck with your garden.

[beac]

10. Lyric's milk bath is my 2010 garden co-miracle (sharing the spotlight with

planting icicle radishes around zucchini/squash to ward of Squash Bugs.) I cannot say enough good things about its milky goodness. :)