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Gardening Thread

So my peppers never came up. Oh well, I'll get a few plants and then start some from seed in my mini greenhouse and plant them in a few weeks. Green beans and corn are doing great.

Pepper seeds are notoriously hard to sprout. I tried this year for the first time, and out of two flats, I only got two plants.
 
What kind of peppers? You really do have to start them indoors. We have some habaneros that are now in their 10th generation (when we moved in to a place in Winston, they said they were 3rd generation, and we always keep a ton of seeds), and they get hotter every year. Sweet peppers are a bit easier in my experience.

In somewhat related news, something we've found keeps bugs away, is totally organic/chemical free, and doesn't harm the plants or soil is to soak some cayennes, chili powder, and garlic in water for a couple days, and then drain the water, put it in a spray bottle, and spray the plants. The bugs stay away from the plants altogether. Obviously, you don't want to do this directly to the fruits you're eating, or to the leaves of leafy veggies, or anything like that, but it has worked wonders for us so far, and the plants don't mind at all. One suggestion to go along with this is to wear a mask or cover your mouth while you spray, because that stuff will burn like hell if it gets in your throat (think homemade pepper spray).
 
We've tried to grow habanero, cayenne, jalapeno, and green peppers. In the past we've always bought the plants, but were trying from seed this year.
 
I made a salad the other night with only things from the garden; ended up with carrots, tomatoes, cucumber, and lettuce. The carrots aren't quite ready, but they were still pretty good.

I've got 4 melons that are growing as well, so we'll how those turn out.

Herbs and Tomatoes are coming along nicely, and the pepper plants are really starting to grow now that it's getting hot.

Strawberries were a huge bust; I won't be doing those again.
 
OK...I have a few questions.

First, here is our garden as of today:
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Here is a picture of our Yellow Heirloom tomato plant. It is producing way more tomatoes than any of the other three. Should we prune any of the tomatoes or just let them go?

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Here are some pictures of our zucchini and cucumbers. The zucchini looks like it is getting close to picking but how do I know when it is time? What about the cucumber?
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Thanks!
 
I think I posted this on the girl thread, but not here. We got a bit of a late start to our garden so the only thing we really have right now are spinach, lettuces, cilantro, and basil, but the rest of the stuff seems to be coming along well (or as well as I can tell as a first time gardener!!)

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I'm really hoping to get some peas before it gets too hot, because they look to be growing well, but I know they don't do well come summer. The cucumbers seem to be growing well, and we are trying to get them to go up our trellis (will post pictures later). The bush beans are also going crazy.

It's pretty ridiculous how crazy the squash and zucchini are with their gigantic leaves. We are trying to stake them and they are still taking over. I'm a little worried the squash is overshadowing the zukes (since I prefer zukes to yellow squash), but it's still fun testing stuff out.

We tried some peppers from seeds inside and they sprouted fine, but we had some trouble transplanting them to the garden, so we ended up giving in and buying some seedlings last weekend. We have jalapenos, mucho nacho jalapenos, gypsy peppers, and red, orange, and yellow bells. LadyDeacToy is really looking forward to those.

Anyone have any experience and/or tips with eggplant or okra? Those are two I don't see often when I'm reading about gardens (we have 2 squares of eggplant and 1 of okra), so I'm curious how that will go.
 
OK...I have a few questions....

...Here are some pictures of our zucchini and cucumbers. The zucchini looks like it is getting close to picking but how do I know when it is time? What about the cucumber?

I will leave the real answer to the more veteran gardeners, but I've heard that for both you should pick them before they get to huge (i.e. both pictures you showed look good for picking). I think for a lot of veggies the larger they get and the longer they stay on the vine, the tougher, less tender, less flavorful they can be.
 
We have always harvested our Zucchini when it was around a foot long. A lot of times it depends on the type of Zucchini you have your personal preference. Harvest one around 12-14 inches if it is to firm for you once cooked harvest around 8-10 inches. we just harvested 25 Zucchini plants all from 12-16 inches and made 25 bags to freeze. I used some in some home made Japanese last night and it was delicious.
 
pick both the zucchini and the cucumbers from the pics, they are bordering on too big.

eggplant is tough to get started from seed and slow moving early on. but when it gets going, they are pretty easy - basically let them do their own thing.

i've gotten lettuce, cilantro, green onions and one cuke from my garden (started from seed) in NC. have a ton of tomatos and snap peas on the vines, as well as some cantelopes. peppers (10 varities) are taking hold but slow going as they always are. spinach grew and went to seed too damn fast, should have started it earlier than i did. no major insect issues thus far so the decision to not grow zucchini and squash this year (and avoid the asian stink bugs) has paid off this far.

only concern thus far is tomatilla...lots of blooms but no fruit yet. have had issues in the past where some of the plants never go to fruit.

regarding peppers from seeds, my best success has always been, in order:

jalapenos
cayannes
habaneros
...large gap...

any variety of bells.
 
Dillion is correct. The zucchini and cucumber (depending on kind) are almost too big.

One thing to remember is that if we don't get a good bit of rain, the cucumber will become sour. We pick the zucchinis when they are about 6-8 inches. If you pick them too big, you can make them into zucchini bread (another day when I'm coherent I will post my recipe that I always use).

As to the tomatoes, I would just leave them. Don't prune them back.
 
Dillion is correct. The zucchini and cucumber (depending on kind) are almost too big.

One thing to remember is that if we don't get a good bit of rain, the cucumber will become sour. We pick the zucchinis when they are about 6-8 inches. If you pick them too big, you can make them into zucchini bread (another day when I'm coherent I will post my recipe that I always use).

As to the tomatoes, I would just leave them. Don't prune them back.

As a general rule, I agree with this, but they seem pretty cramped. I wouldn't mess with them just yet, looks like you've got posts there that you can trellis them on as they grow up, which will be nice.
 
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Yes, it is a community garden. Thanks! This is our first time and things seem to be going well. 4 types of tomatoes (Heirloom, Roma, German Johnson and Beefsteak), 2 types of peppers (Bell, Chocolate), zucchini, cucumber, cilantro, basil and mint.

Thanks for the advice.
 
Dillion is correct. The zucchini and cucumber (depending on kind) are almost too big.

One thing to remember is that if we don't get a good bit of rain, the cucumber will become sour. We pick the zucchinis when they are about 6-8 inches. If you pick them too big, you can make them into zucchini bread (another day when I'm coherent I will post my recipe that I always use).

As to the tomatoes, I would just leave them. Don't prune them back.

Below is the zucchini bread recipe that I use. I sometimes will use apple sauce instead of vegetable oil. I will also sometimes throw in chocolate chips. Come July, I normally make at least 10 loaves and freeze most of them.

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/paula-deen/zucchini-bread-recipe/index.html
 
picked 2 pints of strawberries today and will be making preserves/jam this time next week.
 
Regarding "pruning" the tomoatoes. The common wisdom is to sucker indefinite (vine) varieties like German Johnson & Beefsteak since they'll use energy producing plant instead of fruit. Leave indefinite (bush) varieties like Roma alone since the plant will only grow to a certain size and stop, so suckering doesn't limit plant growth. I plant about 50 tomato plants a year, and this has worked well.
 
Regarding "pruning" the tomoatoes. The common wisdom is to sucker indefinite (vine) varieties like German Johnson & Beefsteak since they'll use energy producing plant instead of fruit. Leave indefinite (bush) varieties like Roma alone since the plant will only grow to a certain size and stop, so suckering doesn't limit plant growth. I plant about 50 tomato plants a year, and this has worked well.

sorry....what does sucker mean?
 
So if I am reading it right, on my German Johnson I should prune some of those smaller "suckers"...correct?
 
So if I am reading it right, on my German Johnson I should prune some of those smaller "suckers"...correct?

Yes. The suckers are new branches that start in the "crotch" between the stem and the branch. If you let them go they'll just become new branches, and the theory is that the plant is using energy growing these new branches instead of growing fruit. I'm not sure whether there is or isn't anything other than old wive's tales to back that up, but I have found that if you let them "sucker" too much the plants get topheavy and branches start breaking, etc.

I just pinch off the suckers when they are little like in that picture above. If a sucker has already grown out and become a new branch before I catch it, I usually leave it alone because I am afraid that I will damage the plant too much by breaking it or cutting it. Others may have different opinions.
 
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