Garden!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[ORCUS DEMENS]

My first year trying carrots, yeah it is a real challenge. CAH if you are having withdrawl, I have some pickled beets from last year I could share.

 

[wslayer]

Can't get my spinach to grow last 2 seasons. Gave up on carrots. Using irrigation, so don't know why it doesn't take.
My onions usually suck too, lot of growth on top, nothing underground.

 

[Davey Crockett]

Are you using good fresh seed ? I thought I hit the jackpot a few years ago when I found my moms big stash of old garden seeds. I was happy right up until I realized that about 95% of them werent ever going to germinate.

 

[pointer]

Your garden is to rich if you can't get your root stock to grow, old German told me this years ago everything else was great, the potatoes had better than two feet of growth, tomatoes were killer, peppers same, out of sixty potato plants didn't get a five gallon bucket of taters. Carrots ,beets and onions were non-existent, all nice tops nothing underneath

 

[CatDaddy]

I'm waiting for @LBrandt to bring wisdom to these questions/garden ailments.....

 

[LBrandt]

I'm waiting for @LBrandt to bring wisdom to these questions/garden ailments.....

This is what I do when starting carrots. Wet the area hat I want to plant and fertilize with 10-10-10 and till deep, My walk behind tiller leaves that little two wheel track that I use as a row marker. I have a heavy steel tooth garden rake that is about 12 inches wide and I tamp down the soil in-between the wheel marks leaving tooth marks. I sprinkle carrot seed with a spice bottle with small holes or lay down toilet paper to put seeds on so I can see how thick I am planting seeds. Cover with about 1/4 inch of soil and tamp down lightly with a block of 2/4 say a foot long. Then water with the hose set at the lightest setting of sprinkle. Then for the next two weeks its a light sprinkle every morning and night to keep that top soil moist. I know some times I even water at noon but I am in my garden every day but I like my carrots. The worst part for me is thinning out carrots when they come up because I have to pull more than half of they out and weeding them for the first time is a bitch. Do you know how many kind of weeds look like sprouting carrots. I put in a lot of time into it but my grand nephew said it best when he bit into one of the bucket full that I gave his Mom. Uncle Larry thats a REAL CARROT and coming from a 10 year old that was a complement to keep. In can be a real challenge but me and the good Lord spend a lot of mind healing time in my sand lot I call my GARDEN. Hope this helps LB

 

[Lycanthrope]

Carrots are tough because they are planted so shallow and from my expierence they often get just enough moisture to germinate and then they dry out before they get a chance to come up or if you spray water and get a crust on top they can't break through the crust. We have tricky soil here that I am finally getting in better shape with lots of straw mulch but still pull chunks when I deep till in the fall. A couple years ago I laid some drip tape down the carrot rows and I was fascinated with the difference. I reused it last year with the same results so this year I broke down and laid drip tape in the whole garden and gardening has never been so easy. No more moving the old spray watering systems back and forth and then watering the weeds between the rows. . I roll it up in the fall with the cordless drill and bring it in. The 3 year old stuff is still holding up strong.

for carrots, I put seeds in a salt shaker thats just big enough to shake them out an a slow pace, drill holes larger if you need to. Then I use a standard garden hoe and hoe a row, flat but about 1/2 inch down, so its a trough about .5 inches deep by 7 or whatever inches wide. Then I shake my seeds in from a reasonable height so they spread out and cover the whole row. Then cover the seeds with something that doesnt crust over, like promix or something. Water immediately but gently and then spray it a little every day or 2 so that the surface doesnt ever dry a lot. They should start coming up in a week or so. One row of carrots grown like this will create a ton of carrots.

 

[Davey Crockett]

I bought one of these a few years ago and really like it . It came with 6 different seed plates and will seed everything I've tried except for mammoth sunflowers because it crushed the shell .
The first year using it was a learning curve, I had spotty results because seed depth wasn't consistent. They need more weight or down pressure to keep consistent seed depth. At first I added a weight on top of the hopper and cured that but now I just grab the handle right above the seed hopper and hold a little down pressure when I am seeding and it works like a charm.
Once I lay drip tape I seed carrots on both sides of it at a normal walking pace and they come up real fast and even.
No matter how you plant and grow and caring for a gardening it's good therapy and theres no wrong or right way how to sow a seed but since having back issues Iv'e had an obsession for doing things the easiest way I can figure out how to get it done.

 

[Lycanthrope]

I bought one of these a few years ago and really like it . It came with 6 different seed plates and will seed everything I've tried except for mammoth sunflowers because it crushed the shell .
The first year using it was a learning curve, I had spotty results because seed depth wasn't consistent. They need more weight or down pressure to keep consistent seed depth. At first I added a weight on top of the hopper and cured that but now I just grab the handle right above the seed hopper and hold a little down pressure when I am seeding and it works like a charm.
Once I lay drip tape I seed carrots on both sides of it at a normal walking pace and they come up real fast and even.
No matter how you plant and grow and caring for a gardening it's good therapy and theres no wrong or right way how to sow a seed but since having back issues Iv'e had an obsession for doing things the easiest way I can figure out how to get it done.

how does that work in chunky soil? My home garden has clay soil and it takes forever to dry enough to till, and even then I often have 1-3 inch hard chunks near the surface. Plants grow fine in it usually, but it isnt nice and fine like a sandier or loamy soil.

 

[LBrandt]

Going to have too replant my second crop of carrots and beets. That hard rain we got at 7 pm last night beat the seeds right out of the ground. I had planted them monday morning. Crap. LB

 

[Davey Crockett]

how does that work in chunky soil? My home garden has clay soil and it takes forever to dry enough to till, and even then I often have 1-3 inch hard chunks near the surface. Plants grow fine in it usually, but it isnt nice and fine like a sandier or loamy soil.

Chunks don't bother it to bad, the hoe pushes them to the side.

I forgot to mention, If I were looking for another one I'd look at some of the other models to see how the hoppers are designed. They might be all the same but with this one you have to plan for extra seed to fill the bottom of the hopper so the seed disk can pick up the seeds.

 

[LBrandt]

I got one from Northern Tool and supply and it will work out every last seed. I use it for when I plant sweet corn and it works great. LB

 

[LBrandt]

Colorado beetles have walked or flew this far north already. A solid doz died this morning including a couple that were fornicating. LB

 

[Davey Crockett]

Are they a RR valley thing or are they found statewide ? I've never heard of em.

 

[BDub]

They are state wide. Fortunately I have only had them once or twice in Bismarck. They are annoying plus they will strip away the potato leaves.

 

[LBrandt]

Now about once a day for awhile I will walk my tater patch with a gallon ice cream pail and knock them off into the pail. Then take them to a hard surface and dispatch the little bastards. LB

 

[sig357]

Got my garden going a little later then I would have liked this year but it is coming in nicely. By the way Faulkners has their sale on this week where you can buy a tray of plants for $20 which some are excluded but the ones excluded are 25% off.

I also released some lady bugs this year(500 i think). Didnt think much of it but we have seen lady bug larvae in our trees quite a bit.

 

[LBrandt]

Having coffee and cleaning up my pruning shears for trimming up the tomato plants before they get out of hand. Its an all day job with about 160 to do. Will have a lot of red in my garden this year and some yellow. Have people asking about buying from me again this year already. Wife retired from working in Fargo so her co-workers called and said they plan on getting together and doing some road trips. Could get interesting this late summer and fall. Might have to put a wine fridge in the garage. LB

 

[Davey Crockett]

Sig, your garden looks nice. Our garden shrunk by two and a half rows , I had two 130' rows of mammoth sunflowers ,we usually roast some and the birds get the rest . Wife had just finished weeding those two rows and the same night the deer ate almost every last one of the tops off the sunflowers. I was so pissed that I hopped on the tractor and tilled them under. they also got 60'row of beets so trying a 3-d electric fence to see if that will work. Going to put a cotton ball in a tin container and hang it on the fence and see if I can get a trail cam pic of the arc when they sniff it. Good things though is that for everything bad, something good usually comes. I was starting to get a soft spot in my heart for deer but that's long gone, I'll enjoy pulling the trigger this fall and eating more venison.

 

[Davey Crockett]

I forgot to ask if anyone found anything that works to keep deer away from the garden ? I have my wires up but someone help themselves to our electric fencer so I'll make one from a car coil to see if that has enough zap.