oldmobie's Doings

[flowerweaver]

It depends on the bug and the plant, but the things that attack here are big and easily dislodged with just a whack! to the branch of whatever it is and the insects tumble into the bucket below. I don't do much hand picking. You can get pretty quick with practice. Only the small leafy things require hand picking. For bugs that are more pernicious that cling or stick to the plants I find the jet spray setting from the garden hose does a pretty good job.

I've learned many bug infestations are caused by planting at the wrong time. For instance if I fall plant my kale and broccoli it does well but if I spring plant it everything gets eaten by bugs. Same for fava beans. Sometimes just being several weeks late can make a difference. I keep notes on when these bugs appear and try to work around them. If I rotate where I plant things each year it definitely cuts down on infestations. Good luck with your battle, but don't harm yourself in the process!

[Walk]

Aug 29, 2014 21:31:07 GMT -5 oldmobie said:

Does this qualify as organic? It's a start. I got results, and without sevin.

You could go straight to the eucalyptus and use some eucalyptus essential oil. I think that would be more organic than a product that has synthetic fragrance and other unwanted ingredients. Then you would know if it's the eucalyptus that's giving the desired outcome or not - too many variables in the product pictured.

[oldmobie]

Our weather has cooled down again, so I took advantage and did a bit of weeding and fall planting today. About 1/3 of this year's failed potato patch is cleaned up, about a 5' X 8' area. All the potatoes harvested from that area filled about 2/3 of my colander. We'll probably eat them in one meal, along with store bought potatoes. I also found one little potato fruit. It feels slightly soft, and it fell off the vine with no help from me. I figure I'll open it up and check for seeds.

Leaving a walkway, I planted a 4' X 4' area in hand sown radishes. All the various "eating" radishes I've purchased or traded for are in there, as well the groundhog radishes that are meant to draw nutrients up from below and break up hard soil. Next to them I hand sowed a 1' X 4' block of turnips from trade.

As I clear up more space, I think I'll put in greens, peas, maybe some of my seeds from michihili cabbage and pac choi. I'm also wanting to try buckwheat as a cover crop, without making it compete with grass. Maybe I can find a little spot for some.

[oldmobie]

The radishes and turnips I sowed on the second are starting to germinate.

I started fermenting tomato seeds yesterday: Yellow Pear, cherry, roma, yellow slicer. Still need to collect from the beefsteak and from more fruits of the yellow slicer, as all of those seeds so far have come from a single fruit I knocked off by mistake and ripened on a window sill.

Almost done collecting seeds from watermelons. Got a bunch drying now. The "mother" plants were Black Diamond and Crimson Sweet, both store bought, and seeds from a yellow melon the neighbor gave us and my own seeds from last year's Black Diamond and volunteer melons. I've thrown them all together. I guess that won't interest most folks, but I have plenty to share, if anyone would like some. I planted 33 seeds this year. I've collected about 3-4 cups so far.

Took advantage of another cool evening and weeded and replanted a little more in the old garden. In a four by four patch, we planted eight lettuce, four swiss chard and sixteen spinach. (Square-foot spacing in my native soil. I put everything one per square except the spinach at four per square.)

My zucchini are not producing anymore. There are only one or two fruits at a time, and by the time they are 4" long, half the fruit (the blossom end) is black and withered. I should have gotten a picture. I don't know what's up with them.

[oldmobie]

I finally got a few corn plants to grow to respectable size. The one I circled is 7'- 8'. No idea what corn it is, as it's from my attempt to produce red corn for my red/ white/ blue popcorn project. I mixed red kernels from Astronomy domine, indian corn and rainbow earth tones dent. The day it silked I took a piece of tassle from the same plant and pieces from a few neighboring plants and rubbed them all over the silks. Don't know what I'm doing, but hopefully it'll be well pollinated. There seems to be a second ear forming, so I plan to do the same. If it's sweet corn, I'm gonna include it in my planting next year. Probably will if it's flint or pop or flour, but might detassle in that case.

One white popcorn germinated. It tassled, so I rubbed that on the silks too. I also attempted to self pollinate it.

One blue popcorn germinated. No tassle, no ears, no silks. I'll probably try again next year.

In the foreground you can see my eight zucchini plants. The four melted looking ones in back, on the brink of death were from store bought seeds. The four in front won't win any prizes, but at least three look like they could make it. One of those is slowly growing a fruit. These four are from Joseph's seeds. I think those seeds will become the basis of my future landrace.

[oldmobie]

Finished weeding and planting the old garden (east of sidewalk) today. Planted peas about 6" apart in two rows next to the "tunnel" trellis. Assorted store bought on the west, Joseph's on the east. Left a walkway through the middle, east to west. Sowed collards with the peas south of the walkway. Buckwheat with the peas north of the walkway. Watering in now.

[oldmobie]

Picked these out of the dry bean patch because I thought they were interesting. Joseph's. Cooked a sample of them with a sample from a Carole Depp's Resilient that was all dryed down. Pretty tasty. The CDR imbibed water, but more reluctantly than the Joseph's. My growout is so small that I'll probably sample each plant but save everything for seed from satisfactory plants.

My step mother gave me a bunch of old garden stuff. There were a bunch of seeds she saved over the years from yellow watermelons she liked! They range from 1998 to 2009, so my expectations are low, but that's worth a germination test.

[oldmobie]

Planted a 4' row of kazedwards ' Chesnok Red garlic bulbils today between the radishes and turnips. About 1.5" - 2" apart. If they're successful, I'll probably have to thin in spring. Also tossed a few into the collard bed, but didn't rake or hoe because I didn't want to disturb the collard seedlings.

A few peas are coming up out there. A few collards and turnips. The radishes and buckwheat are thick, though not very big yet. Scattered germination among the chard/ lettuce/ spinach.

[oldmobie]

Collected (the remains of) my seed sweet corn today. I should have watched closer; something ate most of it. It's not an enormous loss, since I have lots of leftover seed from last year, but I want to save all I can of the adaptation that happened this season.



That's an old box fan I hope to convert to a seed drying rack. I need something covered and cat-proof. After the pic, I put the other grill back on. Hopefully it will one day be lined with window screen for use with smaller seeds.

One of my "ears" was the most uneven seed developement I've ever seen. Poor pollination.



I found my beet seeds today and some snowpeas kazedwards sent me and onion seeds. I was limited for space in the section of garden I've cleaned up for fall planting, so I tossed them in the old tractor tire and covered them with some grass clippings. Also notice: unusual for me, I've been weeding & I've made nice walkways with feed sacks that were given to me and grass clippings.



On the right:
Foreground - Carole Depp's Resilient beans
Midground - Joseph's Dry Bean Landrace
Behind them (not visible) - buckwheat with peas behind

In the middle:
In the grid - lettuce, spinach chard
In the tub - carrots, garlic chive, carrots, rosebush
Beside the tub - gypsy peppers
Behind them (not visible) - collards with peas behind

On the left:
Foreground - radishes, garlic (not up yet), turnips
In the tire - onions, beets, snowpeas

[steev]

Well, I've certainly seen worse seed corn development than that! This year's seed corn really sucked.

[oldmobie]

Sept 12, 2014 22:08:44 GMT -5 oldmobie said:

My step mother gave me a bunch of old garden stuff. There were a bunch of seeds she saved over the years from yellow watermelons she liked! They range from 1998 to 2009, so my expectations are low, but that's worth a germination test.

1998, 2001, 2007 were a flop. But 2009 germinated 90%! Gonna have more yellow genetics in my (proto) landrace!



Kinda hard to see in this pic, but the two circled seeds have little white tips coming out.

[steev]

I thoroughly agree about trying old seeds; worst that could happen is that they'll fail.

Might be something non-commercial there of value.

[oldmobie]

My first ever success with malabar spinach! Now I'm looking for ways to use it. With actual spinach I like to use it in salads. Malabar is "mucilaginous". I don't care for it raw, though chopped with other greens and drenched in ranch it's unnoticable. I cooked it with rice, veggies and meat broth into a crockpot "casserole" that I enjoyed thoroughly. The malabar didn't affect it much. It was just hidden vitamins. Tried something new today, a variation on kale or spinach chips. Rubbed the leaves with salted olive oil and stuck 'em in the borrowed dehydrator.



They taste of spinach. Apparently crispy dried spinach chips aren't to my taste. They're edible, but little more.

This being the first time I've had the plant do more than grow to about 6" and die, I'm letting them go to seed. Looks like there will be a bunch. If that goes well, I'll probably buy or trade for seeds from different source(s) and start developing a landrace.

[steev]

Just today, I noticed a volunteer malabar spinach growing, ~1' tall.

[flowerweaver]

Thanks oldmobie for the Malabar chips idea! I've grown it for years but I haven't found a way I like to eat it yet. Will have to try this.