Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Here is my row garden:

http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i1...n/IMG_7479.jpg

What I am most surprised at, is that I am getting anything to grow at all. Florida is mostly sand, and I barely did anything to remedy the soil before hand. I just keep adding compost tea and letting mother nature work.

As you can see, the early straight neck and the crookneck summer squash are already fruiting. I don't know how you guys get such large squash plants, but as long as mine keep producing fruit, I am ok with little green.

Almost all of my sweet peppers died. I don't know why, but I assume it was ants. Oh well, the bell peppers are doing ok right now.

You can't really see, but those pole beans are almost over my 7' high trellis. I am amazed at how those things grow.

My European melons are doing well now. It took a while for them to start growing, but they seem to grow an inch or more everyday now.

I'll have to get some pictures of my soybeans. I am not sure if they are going to survive. The entered the nitrogen fixing stage and seemed to have a hard time coming out of it. So we shall see.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Great pics guys. I started digging up my soil this weekend and got rained on. Will have to waint until next weekend.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Well, I decided not to put the plant lights together and not to make plants this year. I just don't have anywhere to plant and have bitten off way more than I can chew for this Spring.
I might stick a few tomato plants in somewhere, but that's it. I'll plant my strawberry plants if it ever stops raining.
Later this summer, after I have the shop built in the garage and have the deck built, I can start building terraced beds in the back yard. Or something.
I'm not even ready to think about it yet, to be honest.
I'm sure gonna miss having a garden. I'll het her in next year, though. :tu

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Cliff, I love those Rutgers tomatoes. Used to plant them from seed years ago and they did very well. They produced huge yields for me and were quite good. I've since run out of seed and got away from raising from seed. Best of luck.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

You better!!! I sent you enough seed to feed Pharaoh's Army!
Always next year...

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

I have started all my plants (with the exception of the sweet potatos) from seed. Do most of you all start from a plant or from seed? That might be why mine seems to take a lot longer. Well.. that and the FL heat.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

For years I started my peppers the first week of Feb and my tomatoes in the middle of Feb. Both of these were indoors under bright fluorescents keeping the enclosure around 82-85F. I try to plant around my birthday, 4/9. The plants usually are 4-5" for peppers and 6-8" for tomatoes by then. This year and last I bought both already growing as I didn't have room or time to mess with seed. Everything else is started in the garden (cukes, beans, squash, lettuce, carrots, mustard, etc.). I did plant squash in cups this year to get a few weeks ahead of the planting date. The squash vines borers come around in May and June and usually take my plants out when they're hitting their best. I was lucky last year and made it until mid June. The heat starts weakening them by then anyway. I also buy onion and collards as plants. My fall garden has had various lettuces, broccoli, cauliflower, curly leaf mustard, broad leaf mustard, and brussel sprouts started from seed. Plant lots of them in rows (small seeds) and thin once they start going.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

I added them to the megaton of seed I already had, and the 100 bucks worth I bought this year when I was still gonna plant.
If I can ever get all my seed in one place, I'm gonna put it all in a five gallon bucket with a lid. I'm tired of boxes and bags inside of boxes and bags, it just ain't workin out. :D

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Mix them all together, cast them to the earth and grow a surprise mystery garden!

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Wayne, here's a couple of shots from a few years ago. I went through a heirloom tomato phase and grew 40-50 different types. I gave them away to folks at work, friends, and had my dad's garden stacked. Heirlooms don't cross-pollinate retaining specific seeds is quite easy. I ran into some really good tomatoes!

http://i160.photobucket.com/albums/t...omatoes06a.jpg

http://i160.photobucket.com/albums/t...tomatoes06.jpg

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Svillekid, those rutgers are great tomatoes. I grew one 2 years ago and had so many tomatoes I could not give them all away.

If any of you guys are in the north east when do you plan on planting your gardens? I sell veggie and herb plants up here and it has been a terrible year due to weather so far. My sales are down about 55% off of last years sales so far so I would like to know what the die hard gardeners are planing on doing this year. Looks like this weekend is going to be nice so maybe we will have some people getting their hands dirty in the next few days.

Oh yeah, if any of you gardeners are in New Jersey it would be in your best interest to send me a pm :)

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Jamie, you are planting three great varieties of tomatoes. I wish more people realized how good those celebrities are!

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Wow, sorry to hear that!

I've gotten 2 gallon jugs slap full of green beans in the last four days and got more to come. We have had great weather, just no rain. I have a sprinkler, soaker system on a timer thats been keeping the plants alive. We had about a 1/2" of rain yesturday; thats been it for a month+.
Ya'll get cold weather issues, we got heat issues in the south... looks like we should meet in the middle to grow.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Once our rainy season ends we get no rain until next one. 6 months with rain, 6 months without. Our biggest problem is late frosts. Later every year lately.
We are growing 8 different tomatoes this year (one is sungold, mmm...). My wife is crazy. Watch her come home with three sixpacks of squash plants.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

What kind of green beans are you growing?

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Went through a period of nothing but heirlooms - most are not disease resistant. That was my biggest issue. I plant in the same areas every year and the heirlooms started suffering. That and I had less time to grow from seed. Been with Celebrity for a few year - good yields, good taste, hardly any (if any) problems with rots or diseases.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Jamie, I have never heard or read the bold text above. I do know that tomatoes are self pollinating, but they can still cross pollinate should a bee, butterfly, etc fly onto one and then another variety.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

I just went and bought some trees and shrubs and composted cow poop.
I put in a weeping cherry and some kind of goofy pine tree earlier. Now I got two cultivars of spiraea, a boxwood, and a dwarf pygmy quadruple-split japanese maple of some sort. It's odd. More bushy than tree-sy.
I got a dozen bags of poop to poop up the front flowerbed that's full of bushes. I don't know what you call a flowerbed that has bushes in it. An "architectural element" maybe?
I got some more poop for my strawberries that I haven't planted yet, too. It won't quit raining long enough to improve the soil, so they still live beside the desk here on my floor.
I got a bag of weed and feed to kill these weeds in the lawn. I live in a development now and am actively ensconsed in a grass war with the neighbor. Mine will look way better than his inside another month, cause I'm a turfgrass growing sumb1tch of the first order. :D
It's nice to have a little yard so I can play these games. It sure is a departure from the farm, though. I'm not sure what I think yet. When I have my garden back, then I'll be happy. :)

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Well, change of plan for me. Appears that some of last years fallen maters left seeds behind that decided to sprout this year. :banger Counted five plants yesterday that were about 6+ inches tall already. :D

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

That is true, Wayne. Tomatoes are most likely to self-pollinate before cross-pollinating - most blooms will have self-pollinated themselves before they even open. I think the rate is something like 5% or less, with even lower percentages given space between plants and lower numbers of different varieties. Most of us home gardeners don't bag our open-pollination blossoms to prevent crossing. IMHO, I would suspect the rates are less than 5% for most of us. Sorry for the confusion.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Gotta love volunteers, Hal! (well some of them)

Word to the wise - cosmos - I planted a $1 packet of orange cosmos two years ago ('09) in the edge of my garden so my daughter would have flowers. I let a few volunteers come back last year for her to enjoy. I pulled up 20 6" high plants this weekend! No more cosmos for me. It'll take 2 or 3 more years to completely eradicate them.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

My wife and I are taking our first crack at this. I dropped a little over $100 so far, but that's building a 10ft by 5ft box and filling with garden soil mix. Planted our stuff yesterday. Doing lettuce, squash, zucchini, Greenbeans, some different peppers and broccoli. Setting up tomatoes separately. If it goes well we will do a second box next year.

The boy had fun planting things the girls were bored quickly.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Sounds like a great start. In the future, if you continue to do this, you may want to build the beds less wide. It will make keeping up with things a LOT easier and you won't have to stretch or step on your soil.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

We planted...
zucchini,
cherry tomatoes,
yellow bell pepper,
sweet banana peppers,
jalapeno peppers, and
An avocado tree.

Strawberries survived from last years planting!

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Yeah we thought about that, but where its located you can reach in from all sides so its not bad. We have a corner house so we have a long side run that we don't use much. It already had sprinkled so Just centered the box on the sprinkle.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Snap beans / green beens.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Do you know the name of them? Blue Lake, Contender, etc?

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Are those Bonnie Plants?

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

I want to say Contendor or Tendergreen from Ferry Morse, but will have to go find the package to make sure tomrrow for ya.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

http://i704.photobucket.com/albums/w...3/e7d7bcef.jpg

First fruit!

Still waiting on the strawberries, squash, cucumbers and peppers. Everything but peppers look like they are getting there.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Congratulations!!! :D
Don't eat them yet!!! ;)

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Jamie i was going to ask you used heirloom seeds while reading an earlier post you made, then I came across this qoute! I bought a big thing of heirmloom seeds in '07 from a site called www.survivalseeds.com pretty interesting read. (Based on your experience of buying heirloom seeds was this a good deal or not?) (Thanks in advance for your opinion!);)

I'm not sure if the canister is in my garage or not. I really don't have a lot of downtime, but i'm thinking i could maybe mess around with this on weekends. My Father always had gardens when we were growing up, and we used to help him maintain them until we became teenagers. I honestly don't remember most of those lessons anymore, but it can't be that hard to pick back up i'm sure.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Did some transplanting of the random tomato plants yesterday. Put the cages on them afterwards. Also put up a big trelis for my wisteria to grow up onto.
Wife and I hit the market yesterday and picked up a wide variety of basil plants to put in pots by the pool. Love me some fresh basil!
She bought a rose tree also?.?.... Kinda weird looking.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

The link is a bust - asking for login/password, etc.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

I finished plumbing the PVC for the irrigation yesterday. Now the watering can be automated. I recycle PVC that has been used for many things before. It's starting to get a lot of unions in it. :D
Nothing in the ground yet, but that should change by the end of the week.
I'm planting one box with perennials. Mostly berries, maybe asparagus if it grows here. Everbearing strawberries, raspberries and blueberries, so far.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

For God's sake get those things in containers. Blackberries are a horribly invasive and difficult-
to-control "weed". Once they get a good foothold, they will spread and put stickers where you
don't want em.

As for my gardening, too much shade in the area where gardening is safe. And too many idiot dogs
to trample everything. If I planted in the sun, it would be in the "front yard" where every idiot
neighborhood scumbag would just steal all the produce or vandalize the garden itself. SO I
must live vicariously through you guys' photos.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

I was doing some work in the front yard yesterday while a lady passed with her dog roaming in everyones yard pissing on everything. I hollered over to her, "Is that your dog?" She replied, "yes." I hollered back, "Did you know Tennessee has a leash law?" She replied, "no."
Idiot.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Pic:
http://fracstar.com/pics/20110501a.jpg

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Nice Arties, Lance!

My squash are loaded. I figure I'll get 25-30 in about a week. Saw some cherrie tomatoes about marble-sized. Peppers are flowering. Also dug a few potatoes from the compost bin.

http://i160.photobucket.com/albums/t...s69/squash.jpg

http://i160.photobucket.com/albums/t...69/squash1.jpg

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Thats what I want to try out next year. Run PVC pipes and a few sprinklers/drips for better water control. That and make another 10x20' addition to my garden.


I have gotten about 4+gallons of snap beans. I got 2gallons, the nieghbors got a gallon each and I probably got 3-4more gallons left growing.
My carrots are about pencil thick and 3" long.
The cukes have umpteen blossoms and minis showing up.
The Lima beans have tons of bloom and a few beens popping up.
The Soybeans will be picked either the end of this week or next week.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Going to transplant the tomatoes today. Wife wanted them in individual containers. Got everything today.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Ever find out what they were? I hate to be a bother about it, but that's an amazing yield and I would like to replicate it if I could.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

This is my entire garden until this summer.

http://www.cigarasylum.com/vb/pictur...pictureid=5691

Just some sweet basil in my hotel room. I have way more than I will ever be able to use by myself. I think I am going to start drying some to save. I am fighting the flower buds. It seems like every time I turn around it tries to bloom.


In about 10 weeks I will be able to grow some tomatoes and peppers. The only problem is that by then the heat will really stress out the plants so I will not have great yields. Maybe next year I will be able to get a "normal" job so I can plant the garden I have been day dreaming about for the last several years.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Sweet Corn, Tomatoes (6 varieties), Peppers (only 2 varieties this year), new potatoes, Green Beans, Butterpeas, Sweet Potatoes, Pink-eye purple hull peas, squash, zucchini, cucumber, okra, sweet Texas yellow onions. I think that about gets all in the pics.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Nice pics. Totally jealous of the size of some of your yards!

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

LOL! With 6 acres total (maybe 4 in woods), the garden is a productive and tasty way of having LESS grass to cut/care for!:D

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Damn, everytime I see this thread, I read it as, "Let's See Those 11 foot Gardens" and I think to myself, "is there some sort of special garden thats only 11'?

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Love looking at the garden pics. Hopefully when the ankle biters are knee biters I'll have time to start a garden and they can help. Till then just do a CSA share for veggies and fruit.

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

I put three more bushes in out front today.
I also tore apart an old workbench and have 2-2'(?)x8'x4" frames that will work perfect for a micro lady garden.
I guess something is better than nothing, right? I'll find a spot to put them in the back yard and start filling them with poop and dirt. There's tons of silt that washed out of the empty lot next door, plus Lowe's is aching to sell me more poop, so I'm gonna run on over there after a bit and gank some poop.
I'm really thrilled to put in a zuchini and maybe a couple tomatos and some lettuce and cukes. Just enough for salads, ya know?

Re: Let's see those '11 gardens!
 

Currently under construction;s
http://www.cigarasylum.com/vb/attach...1&d=1304817792http://www.cigarasylum.com/vb/attach...1&d=1304817820