Vegetable Garden Tips, Complaints, Concerns & Discussion

[Nobody]

Am I going crazy? I don't see a post from Ryman before yours, and Extreme started the thread.

I think you're losing it. Ryman has posts 1, 3, 6 and 12.








You mean you don't see that?

 

[Boone]

My keen sense of intuition told me that Ryman too has had soil issues. It's a feeling I've long had...

 

[Sarge]

So, who has what coming in?

 

[Nobody]

did anyone else have problems growing tomatoes this year? For the first time since I've been doing it, all of my tomatoes went to ****. As did my neighbor's, my mom's boyfriend's, and my daughter teacher's.

Everyone keeps blaming the heat, but I've had my best production in years hotter than this. They were slow to go from flower to fruit, and when they did grow the fruit, it would rot almost immediately. I have an auto-irrigation system installed with moisture detection, so over-watering isn't a possibility.

I tested the soil, and it was all perfect. I used the same fungicide I always use, so I'm at a loss. Now, what plants are left, have turned brown, almost like they were set on fire. I have been seeing this same thing happen with everyone's tomatoes in this area. Any ideas?

 

[Boone]

When you say 'rotted' - did they look something like this?

If so, that's called 'blossom end rot'. It usually indicates a lack of calcium in the soil, but it can also happen when it's very hot and dry, or if there is a lot of fluctuation from drought to rain during the growing season.

Not much you can do once you start seeing it, but mulching helps a lot (keeps the moisture level more constant). You can also add some lime in small amounts which will boost the calcium content.

I'm sure it's the intense heat that caused it this year.

 

[Nobody]

When you say 'rotted' - did they look something like this?

If so, that's called 'blossom end rot'. It usually indicates a lack of calcium in the soil, but it can also happen when it's very hot and dry, or if there is a lot of fluctuation from drought to rain during the growing season.

Not much you can do once you start seeing it, but mulching helps a lot (keeps the moisture level more constant). You can also add some lime in small amounts which will boost the calcium content.

I'm sure it's the intense heat that caused it this year.

I am a Nazi when it comes to keeping my sol levels straight, and this was the first year that I did mulch the garden. I had blossom end rot the first year I did them a while back, and learned all about it, but that's not what's happening this year.

Let me see if I can accurately describe this......when the tomatoes would form, they would get just under harvesting size, but they do it in a rapid time frame. However, once they get to that point, they don't grow anymore and they don't ripen.

On one plant in particular, I had a vine full of green tomatoes that were about full size and sat without ripening for 6-8 weeks. As you know, to call this abnormal would be an immense understatement. Then out of nowhere, the entire fruit would shrivel up like a giant raisin.

Out of all the things I've dealt with in the garden over the years, this is easily the most baffling. The thing that sucks, is they aren't even the green tomatoes I can fry up and eat, they are super dark green and rock hard, which is completely inedible.

My wife decided to pull some off and sit them in a paper bag to see if they would ripen, and put some in the window too. That was 3 weeks ago, and they are just as green and hard as they were when she brought them in.

Something about them is preventing them from ripening, and I'm at a complete loss. On the bright side, my cucumbers/zucchini/eggplant/broccoli are having record output far exceeding what I've been able to produce in the past. On the surface, that sound like maybe they are robbing the tomatoes, but that wouldn't explain why my neighbors tomatoes are doing it too.

I'm at the point now that I'm not even pissed about it, it's become more like trying to solve a murder

 

[Boone]

I'm still guessing it's the incredibly intense heat that's the issue. In my experience, tomato plants just don't like that and they are under severe stress. When any kind of 'fruiting' plant is under stress, they shut nutrients to fruit off and shunt it to their roots to survive. I'm sure that's what you're seeing. It's really just like a fruit tree - my pear and apple trees are dropping green fruit like crazy.

 

[Nobody]

Damn Summer I use tomatoes for so many things when I cook and make my own spaghetti sauce too. So frustrating.

Now that you mention it, my neighbor's pear tree is dropping an excessive amount of green hard pears this year, when they normally turn yellow first. That's it, we need to build a giant shade for the sun.

 

[Mrs.Goaldeje]

I agree with the above person that topsy turvy planters stink. We bought some good, healthy strawberry plants and they died very quickly. We had plants in the yard that grew just fine.
We have grown fruit trees successfully. We had one apple tree that grew enough for our family and just planted two pear trees a year ago. One got a disease, but the other is doing well.

 

[Boone]

I have a lot of fruit trees, although I won't spray them so tough to get great fruit. Pears are really susceptible to something called 'fire blight' - branches just shrivel up and turn black - here in NC. I've had great success with Asian Pears, blueberries, and Persimmons in particular....

 

[Sarge]

did anyone else have problems growing tomatoes this year?

It's been tough this year. My plants have come along but have been very slow to bear fruit. Needless to say, they get watered every day instead of every other day because of the heat and I throttled back on pruning them this year as well

I've also used a fish fertilizer on everything this year, which seems to have toughened up everythig but hte squash, which went to crap in the heat

 

[China]

Actually my tomatoes a doing well this year, which is unusual for me, they usually do poorly for me. My cucumbers died, which again is unusual as those usually do well for me.
We'll see how my peppers do.

My main complaint is that some critter usually gets to my produce before I do, just a day or so before I would normally pick. Grrrr.

 

[Nobody]

Actually my tomatoes a doing well this year, which is unusual for me, they usually do poorly for me. My cucumbers died, which again is unusual as those usually do well for me.
We'll see how my peppers do.

My main complaint is that some critter usually gets to my produce before I do, just a day or so before I would normally pick. Grrrr.

Birds and rabbits did this to me for years before I figured them out. Mesh net over the top, and dog fur around the base. Now if I could just stop those damn cabbage moths, I'd be set

 

[Boone]

One of the best non-chemical ways to keep bugs off your plants, especially greens Extreme, is sprinkling diatomaceous earth on them. You can get it commercially as 'Concern'. It's actually fossilized 'diatoms', tiny sharp-edged creatures that have been ground up. It's hell on insects, rips them to shreds if they try to crawl over it. I've found it to be very effective in the past when I had a lot of leaf-eating insects.

 

[Nobody]

I'm glad you said that Boone, because it's one of those products I've always wondered about, but didn't know anyone that had experience with it.

Anything non chemical that works is great stuff to me. I actually prefer the organic route over chemicals, because I can harvest when I want, and I don't have to worry about the kids and dogs around it.

 

[Boone]

I'm glad you said that Boone, because it's one of those products I've always wondered about, but didn't know anyone that had experience with it.

Anything non chemical that works is great stuff to me. I actually prefer the organic route over chemicals, because I can harvest when I want, and I don't have to worry about the kids and dogs around it.

You can actually get away with spreading it 'around' your plants rather than on it because most of the insects it's effective against are worms, caterpillars, etc.. I've had good luck with it.

 

[Goaldeje]

If I could get my wife to post again, she would rave about the stuff. We had ant problems a couple of years ago and put it around the primeter of the house, and suddenly didn't have quite the same problems anymore.

Not even gonna try to spell it, but that stuff is great, and has many different uses.

 

[Mrs.Goaldeje]

Diatomaceous earth is good to kill insects. It kills beneficial insects and spiders, too, though. To be safe around kids/ pets you need to make sure it's food grade. You also need to reapply after rain.

 

[Nobody]

I will definitely be giving it a try next year. Thanks for the info everybody. On a different note, anyone ever try to grow celery?

I grew it for the first time this year. I didn't want to use a bunch of space on it in case it didn't work out, so I planted 4 heads. Each one was doing great and getting very full, and then when they got about 18 inches tall, they started to curl up and look like they were wilting. After a bunch of googling, I found out it was a fungus that attacks the roots, but I was unable to stop it. I would like to try celery again next year, but I want to prevent this from happening again.

Anyone know a good preventative fungicide?

 

[Sarge]

Alright, what gets rid of grasshoppers? They're tearing the hell outta my limas