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

[Davey Crockett]

Im new at peppers but plants that are loaded. can you pick them early and will they get ripe off the vine ? seems like if I picked them now I might get another crop of the plants, or maybe not ? It's getting late but there easy to cover and still a lot of fall left. Last year the deer moved in one night and cleaned me out so i'm getting the itch to pick at least some of them. I thought they would be the last thing deer would eat.

 

[tikkalover]

Bell peppers?

 

[Davey Crockett]

yes some are and they are green, not sure what color they are supposed to be. Others are banana peppers and some smaller ones. I didn't keep them labeled when I transplanted them.

 

[Ristorapper]

Harvested a few carrots today with the hopes of tossing them in the roast later this week. Yuck!! Raw, they didn't taste very well but will work with the roast, potatoes and carrots. C'mon frost, that'll sweeten them up for snack eating for sure.

 

[shorthairman]

Davey...I'm not a pepper expert, but I believe you can pick bell peppers at any size really. Green bells will turn orange/red if you leave them on too long. Baseball to softball size is about how large I usually pick them.

 

[LBrandt]

The green bells that turn red get sweeter to my taste. I have about 90ft of potatoes to dig yet. 6ft and I fill a five gallon bucket. The skin has matured enough for them to keep well. Onions are on the drying table and we have been trying the diffrent squash to see what we like best. Have Acorn, Butternut and Buttercup. Picked a couple Butternut that weighed right at 8lbs, thats like 4 meals for me and the wife. The Buttercup will wait until we get a good frost before I pick. Got a flock of BlueJays that moved into my giant sunflowers and are raising holy hell with them. I hate those birds.

 

[Davey Crockett]

Thanks, I better dig through my seed packets and try to decipher what the heck I have growing. They are slow growers, I started them real early in the house and they are just getting ready.

 

[shorthairman]

LBrant- You are correct, green peppers that turn red/orange does not mean they are bad (I didn't mention that in my first post). I agree that they become a little more mild as far as a pepper taste and sweeter. Davey, bananna peppers will be long and tapered and yellow. Probably can pick them when they get 3" or so.

LBrandt- On your potatoes how deep do you plant the seed? Do you plant them in a mound? Do you mound around the plant as it grows? I planted roughly 30 plants and only had 5 come up...pretty disappointing

 

[Kurtr]

my pepper plants have lots on them. habenaro, thai ,red pepper, and serano i dehydrate them and mix with salt to make different variety of heat

 

[Lycanthrope]

Some carrots I picked a few weeks ago, planted a phat row this year, gonna have more than Ill know what to do with... Ive got taters to dig also, plants havent really died back a lot yet, so no rush on those. Okra and tomatoes are still producing, zuchinni has slowed down a lot, still getting one every week or so. Cucs have slowed a lot also. Got sick of picking beans so Im letting them produce seed now.

 

[LBrandt]

LBrant- You are correct, green peppers that turn red/orange does not mean they are bad (I didn't mention that in my first post). I agree that they become a little more mild as far as a pepper taste and sweeter. Davey, bananna peppers will be long and tapered and yellow. Probably can pick them when they get 3" or so.

LBrandt- On your potatoes how deep do you plant the seed? Do you plant them in a mound? Do you mound around the plant as it grows? I planted roughly 30 plants and only had 5 come up...pretty disappointing

I plant 4 to 5 inches deep with "eyes" up and as the plants grow I slowly mound up the dirt around them every time I weed. I have very sandy soil so it is very easy to do and I water water water. Red nordland is my go to potato for keeping . I was able to take KDM some at the bullhead tourney that were baseball size so they will produce early. We always have fresh ones from mid July to freeze up and I plant enough to do that. Must have gave away 500# so far to family and friends. I plant my rows far enough apart to run tiller in between until vines get to close. Amazing what good old feedlot black fertilizer will do. LB

 

[Lycanthrope]

Ive heard that some supermarket potatoes are treated with something to keep them from sprouting. Ive been growing the same yukon gold for the last 3 years and really like them. I keep the small ones to plant the following year, eat the bigger ones. They were purchased at walmart originally.

 

[rhino2003]

Lycanthrope: Your garden looks awesome! What do you use for fertilizer to get such big produce?

 

[Wags2.0]

Picked onions yesterday...

Also was running low on seeds so I did a seed run by planting my smaller onions last fall and letting them grow this summer...

These should be enough to last a few years!!!

What on earth do you do with that many onions?

 

[Lycanthrope]

Lycanthrope: Your garden looks awesome! What do you use for fertilizer to get such big produce?

It does ok usually, actually I over fertilized last year and had some issues, nute sensitive plants were stunted. This year it seems to be back on track, sometimes less is more. I use all organic fertilizer and mix it up a bit. I have some outside pet rabbits so they supply me with a steady stream of 'rabbit pellets' which are great fertilizer. Ive used coffee grounds from starbucks and also alfalfa pellets from a feed store, bone and blood meal. Probably more important than fertilizer is watering consistently and frequently. My dad used to overhead water and would wait until it was obvious the plants wanted water before he would water. At that point tho they are already stressed and growth slows down. Better to water enough regularly to not stress them. also sunlight is very important, for most vegetables, full sun all day is ideal, any decrease in the amount of sun they get will negatively effect their potential yield. Shade trees are the enemy of a good garden... You also want to consider how other plants in the garden will shade lower plants. For example this year in my community garden, I planted some extra onions right next to a row of sweet corn, they still got full sun half the day, but didnt turn into anything worth harvesting, largest was maybe racketball sized, compared to other onions that got full sun all day and put a softball to shame. Ive been thinking about making a home made fish emulsion fertilizer with carp, but havent gotten around to it yet. Im sure the plants would love it! Probably the best thing you can do is get a soil test from your county extension office/ndsu, should give you a good idea where to start when it comes to adding fertilizer to your dirt. Most soil in ND is fairly basic, I also add some sulfur pellets every couple years, using a hand held fertilizer spreader. Espoma makes some pretty decent bagged organic fertilizers. I think you can get them for about $1/lb usually in the larger bags at walmart and such places. Holly Tone includes sulfur which is helpful, specially if you have clayish soil which is always too basic.https://www.walmart.com/ip/Espoma-H...RZujAb_N7xxg0l92KY-2tRj5vz7YVneBoCTOsQAvD_BwE

 

[rhino2003]

I appreciate the info! Any tips for weed control? This year has been the worst. Lots of crabgrass that got into the garden and lots of Purslane. I spread Preen all over a couple times a year but that didn't help. I put down grass clippings from mowing for mulch. I don't know if there is a spray I can use that won't kill the garden plants.

Next year we are going to skip planting a garden till we can get the weeds and crabgrass under control. And put a border around the garden.

 

[Lycanthrope]

I appreciate the info! Any tips for weed control? This year has been the worst. Lots of crabgrass that got into the garden and lots of Purslane. I spread Preen all over a couple times a year but that didn't help. I put down grass clippings from mowing for mulch. I don't know if there is a spray I can use that won't kill the garden plants.

Next year we are going to skip planting a garden till we can get the weeds and crabgrass under control. And put a border around the garden.

Ive got weed issues also, most important is to keep them under control till the plants can compete with them. Next year Im going to put landscape fabric between my rows I think, it should help. I bought a big 4ft wide roll of heavy stuff online, gonna fold it in half and lay it between the rows, with rocks holding it down.

 

[LBrandt]

Due to some health problems the weeds got away from me this year also. I got them under control but I know there is a lot of weed seed out there so I am taking my big propane torch to it before I do my fall tilling, Burn baby burn those weed seeds because once they are in the soil they will last forever. I hate using chemicals.

 

[Davey Crockett]

I was visiting with my neighbor who uses flame weeders and he says it's working good. He has a wheeled cart with 5 torches and covers a wide swath but we talked about using a bertha torch and they work well too. Found a pic online and the board trick looks like it would work pretty slick. I have tinkered with it in the past but I was really getting them hot. There is a science to it , They only need to get warm enough to curl the leaves. It will either kill it or stop it from growing.

USDA partners did a study on it that looks promising.

https://attra.ncat.org/viewhtml/?id=110

 

[LBrandt]

Thanks Davy that's a lot of good info. LB