Posts in category: Garden

I enjoy squash, particularly a good, winter squash.  In fact, maybe I’ll cook some tonight for supper!  But, in the past years I’ve had mixed results in the squash beds, and quite a challenge controlling SQUASH BUGS and CUCUMBER BEETLES.

Lakota Squash

This year I planted 8 varieties of squash:  2 summer squash (1 yellow and 1 green zucchini), 2 each of these winter squash:  Winter Sweet REBA Acorn (bush variety), Burgess Buttercup, Sweet Meat, Long Pie Pumpkin, Nutterbutter Butternut, and Lakota.  Of all these, I harvested only 2 Nutterbutter, 2 Lakota, and 3 Long Pie pumpkin, along with a small few of the zucchinis.

The demise of my squash is a mystery to me.  I saw very few of either the squash bugs or cucumber beetles.  I tried very hard to prevent the appearance of these bugs and I was successful.  I proactively sprayed the plants and soil around them with neem, pepper/garlic spray, sprays made with boiled rhubarb leaves and none of these should have caused the death of the squash plants.  The newest organic pesticide I tried was SurroundWP.  I believe this helped a good deal.  Its effective ingredient is kaolin clay, a white powdery substance which is mixed with water and sprayed onto the plant leaves.  Apparently the bugs don’t like it and avoid the sprayed leaves.  The Surround also helps protect the plants from UV rays.  It looks kind of funny, seeing the white spotty leaves, but I think this was quite effective, and I don’t believe it was the reason so many of the plants died.  I’ve also read that mint and lemon balm can repel those bugs.  Rather than plant these invasive perennials near the squash, I’ve planted them in other areas of the garden (where I don’t care if they invade) and some mint in a large pot; I cut off the leaves and sprinkle them around the squash.  Unfortunately, I’ve done so many things to prevent the bugs, I can’t say what does and doesn’t work.  I wanted so badly to attack these bugs I went ahead and threw everything I could at them.

So the early death of the squash wasn’t due to bugs.  All plants were doing quite well until the end of July, when they all started keeling over, one by one.  One day they’d be fine, the next they’d look a bit wilted, the next they were pretty much dead.  The plants all had immature squash growing on them.  I tried pruning off the deadest parts to salvage the remainder of the plant, but that didn’t help.  I just don’t know why this happened.  Could it have had something to do with the wood mulch?  (I don’t think so.)  I did not see an abundance of sowbugs in these beds as I did the others, and don’t believe these were a problem to the squash.  The two summer squash plants never really took off as usual; they did survive a little longer than the winter squash, but they succumbed as well.

All I can say is that some of my neighbors experienced the same symptoms with their squash, so I’m not alone.  Maybe it was the weather.  I was so hopeful to try the new, unique varieties such as Sweet Meat, but I’ll have to try again next year.  I was grateful for the two big Lakota squash.  So far, I have cooked one and it was absolutely delicious!

Last year, the 2012 garden, I had followed some advice that it would be good to store the potatoes in the ground, under mulch, and that they would be fine until spring.  So, in the fall I threw extra mulch (mostly hay and manure) over them and let them be.  I dug some up in December and they were good.  Then, I went out to dig more up in February, only to find that most of them had frozen.  Some were no good at all, and some were ok, but tasted a bit sweet and had an odd texture.  I cooked them all, mashed them, and froze them for future use.  Gee…I’ve still got some in the freezer that need to be eaten!  🙂

This year, 2013, I did leave them in the ground as long as possible.  However, last week when the weather forecast was calling for sub-zero temperatures, I went out on a crazy windy day, prior to the storm, and dug up the remaining potatoes.  I think this was a good plan–storage in the ground as long as possible was better than storing in the refrigerator, and now that they are safely in the refrigerator, that is better than risking them freezing in the ground.

The Rio Grande Russets I planted were small, but good.  The Yukon Golds were bigger and best.

A couple of years ago I’d planted a row of tomatoes under our cottonwood tree, and they did not do well at all.  Many died, those that lived produced very few tomatoes.  I blamed it on the variety I had chosen, and have not planted those since.  Then I realized that the strawberries I’d planted near that tree have never done well.  I’ve replanted the same area with strawberries for 3 years, and just couldn’t get them to grow.  I got to wondering if maybe the cottonwood had something to do with these problems. I did some research, and the answer is YES!

Cottonwood trees, like the Black Walnut, produce the chemical, juglone.  Juglone is very toxic to some vegetables and fruits including: tomato, pepper, potato, eggplant, blackberry, blueberry, apple.  These plants will yellow, wilt and die.  I didn’t see anything about strawberries not growing there, but in my experience, they didn’t.  There are also several ornamental plants that won’t grow near them, but I don’t do those.  Vegetables that are tolerant to juglone include: beans, corn, melons, squash, beets, onions, parsnips, carrots.

I will no longer be planting tomatoes, peppers or potatoes or strawberries near these trees.  I also try to remove all leaves and twigs that fall onto the beds.  Apparently it’s ok to compost the leaves and twigs, but they should not be left on fresh.  It is best to add additional organic matter/compost to these beds, which will lessen the effect of the juglone.  

This year I planted several perennial herbs in the area which had been my strawberry bed.  They’ll just sit there and I won’t worry about what to plant there in the future. These did quite fine.  One of the things I planted directly under the tree was mint.  I know that mint is quite invasive, and I thought that if it would grow there, it would be just fine!  I’ve read that mint leaves are good to repel squash bugs, so rather than planting the invasive mint among the squash, I will let it grow by the cottonwood if it can, then cut the leaves and scatter them around the squash.  The mint grew there quite well, along with some chives, lemon balm, marjoram, lovage, thyme and salad burnet.  In the spring I will discover what survived the winter.

For more information, read these articles: 
http://pubs.ext.vt.edu/430/430-021/430-021.html
http://www.buzzle.com/articles/tree-roots-effects-on-soil.html
http://hort.uwex.edu/articles/black-walnut-toxicity
http://davesgarden.com/guides/articles/view/1186/

The 2012 garden is planted–see maps below.  Whew!  Everything is in its place and I’m on to less urgent maintenance projects, like weeding and catching up on the blog.  We’ve been working hard, and it’s nice to have a break.

NEW THINGS 2012:

• We’ve completed framing all of the beds!  The raised beds without frames worked well enough, but the framed ones are so much better at keeping the weeds out, and with the sloping edges of non-framed beds there was less planting space.  With the frames I can plant much closer to the beds.  Also, we think that the frames should keep the ducks out of the plants should we let them into the garden to snatch bugs.
• I’m trying some Minnesota Midget melons.  I’ve tried some melons before without success, but these are smaller, with a shorter growing season, so I’m giving them a go.
• We created a new “Three Sisters” patch of corn, beans and squash.  We’ve done the 3 sisters before, but this year we put a new 15’x25′ bed off to the side, near the ducks.  To keep ducks and bunnies out, we framed it and added a couple feet of snowfence around the perimeter.  See photo below.  I’ve planted 3 varieties of corn to mature early, mid and late season.  All are organic, non-gmo, non-hybrid corn.
• I’ve sprayed with beneficial nematodes to hopefully limit the bugs which grow in the soil.  I hope this helps, particularly with the cucumber beetles I had so much difficulty with last year.
• I’ve done a much better job of mulching everything right from the start.  I’m using some chopped up moldy hay we’ve had sitting around, mixing it with some dry manure.  It seems to be working well, except that the manure is full of weed seeds.  I figure I’ll just deal with weeding that first batch of weeds that pop up to get the benefit of the manure in the garden.
• The tomatoes are spread out a little more this year.  Instead of doing double rows of tomatoes in the beds, they’re all in single rows, mingled throughout the garden and planted with tomato companions: basil, carrots, onions, marigolds, thyme.  I’m using a variety of trellising methods, as I haven’t decided on a favorite.  There are pros and cons to all the methods I’ve tried so far.
• The greenhouse worked well and was used for getting plants ready for transplant in addition to winter edibles.  We had fresh greens for salads just about all winter.  Some seedlings were planted in the greenhouse beds until ready for transplant, others were just put into the GH during their “hardening off” time.  I also planted just a few (4) tomatoes in the greenhouse to get off to an early start.  The tomatoes on those plants are green and growing at this point.  We’re looking forward to fresh tomatoes soon!  The last couple of months it got pretty hot in there some days, so to add additional ventilation and cooling we installed an old swamp cooler Tim had previously used for the house.  We put it on a thermostat and were able to keep the greenhouse from reaching the mid-90’s down to 80 or lower.  It was very helpful!  We’ve now removed the polytarp cover on the greenhouse, and it is open air for the summer.  
• I fixed up a small area with a few perennial flowers.  It’s a hot spot against the wall on the south side of the house, and not good for most veggies.  Hopefully the flowers will survive.

Main Garden 2012

3 Sisters Patch

I’ve mentioned previously this cool tool at growveg.com to create a garden plan.  My current plan is now published and can be seen here: 2012 Garden Plan  I’ve also placed a link in the sidebar at the right.  This only shows the main garden area.  It will look something like this:

We’re also preparing a patch to the west for “three sisters”: corn, beans and squash.

I’ve been busy studying garden catalogs and websites to find my seeds for the 2012 garden.  Seeds are ordered, and mostly in!  I’ve already started a few things indoors, under lights.  Some will go into the greenhouse for an early start: mostly greens, and a couple of tomatoes.  The greenhouse is a new adventure, so everything I do there now is an experiment.

The greenhouse is holding strong, even with all the gale-force winds.  And the plants are doing well, I guess.  (I don’t really know what to expect.) We still have a little lettuce left from what was planted in the fall, although it’s been attacked a bit by aphids.  Other than that, we’ve had some nice, fresh kale, spinach and swiss chard.  The beets, kohlrabi and rutabagas have yet to form bulbs, but they have some nice foliage.  The peas have blossoms and one of the napa cabbage has been eaten–the other is ready to pull.  Next fall I’ll do things a bit differently, but this was a good start.  Some days it’s 80 degrees in there, the mornings are very rarely below freezing, but since everything in there can handle it, the plants bounce back after it warms up.

The ducks are still producing 4 eggs almost every day.  If anyone would like to purchase some, they’re $4/doz.

I’ve been way too busy to write about what I’m doing.  I’ve picked and preserved almost 300 lbs of tomatoes.  I’ve canned diced tomatoes, tomato sauce, marinara, mexican sauce, salsa, bbq sauce, ketchup, tomato chutney, taco sauce, tomato butter, and I’m sure something else I’ve forgotten.  I’ve also dried several batches of the tomatoes.  There are still some tomatoes on the vine and I’d like to make more salsa.  Other than that, I’m about done.

I’ve picked, frozen, refrigerated or dried other things, too: corn, beans, peas, carrots, onions, garlic, basil, thyme.  I didn’t get much summer squash this year.  One by one, all the plants died after a slow start to begin with.  They had trouble starting due to cold weather, then cucumber beetles.  They were finally growing ok, but the squash bugs got them one by one, then some powdery mildew on the last two survivors.  I pulled them up and trashed them, as they were also being eaten by the squash bugs that wouldn’t die from the organic pesticides I tried.  I guess next year I’ll be more proactive with bug control!  After working to get cucumbers to grow I had two plants, until one shriveled up and died.  The last plant produced two cucumbers before its end.

The raspberries and blackberries are giving us their first fall crop of nice berries.  I got ONE honeyberry off one of the two plants–hopefully next year they will bear more!  The older strawberry plants have been producing a fall crop after a midsummer rest, but the newer plants (planted this year from starts I bought from the nursery) haven’t produced at all.

I did more beans to dry this year, and they are hanging up drying–ready to shell now, I’m sure, but I’m too busy to do that just yet.  After I see how many I get and cook them, I’ll decide whether I want to do that again.  They are so cheap to buy, it may not be worth the bother, unless the quality is much better.

Soon I’ll be digging up potatoes and sweet potatoes.  The butternut squash is still on the vines, although I suppose I could pick it any day.  For all the vines, I only got about five delicata squash, which are picked and curing.  The buttercup didn’t make it at all, I fear they also suffered from cucumber beetles and squash bugs.  Dang!

I’m already beginning to sketch out next year’s garden, deciding what to grow and where to put each thing.  I’ll be planting onions and garlic soon, so needed to know where I will put them.  I’ve planted a few things in the area that will be a fall cold frame.

Tim is beginning to construct our greenhouse, and I’ve begun some seedlings in the house that will go out there for the fall.  Hopefully I can grow some salad items, kale, leeks, beets and kohlrabi for an extended period of time.  Then, I should be able to start a few things early in the greenhouse, and use it for growing seedlings and hardening things off before going outside.

Whew!

Hornworms

I found a hornworm looking thing wandering across the concrete, and thought, “Oh, no!”  I looked around on the tomato plants and didn’t see more worms or any obvious damage, so I was puzzled.  I expected to find some tomato plants defoliated near the top with just stems and leaf spines like I’d seen a couple of years ago when I found the nasty worms.

Defoliated grapevine

Later, Tim hollered “What happened to the grape?” and one of our grape plants was COMPLETELY defoliated.  Not one leaf left!  We looked at the others (we have three grape plants) and found a few more of the creepy worms.  We picked them off, sprayed some neem, and will keep watching for them.  I’ll also be spraying the tomatoes with neem and hope that keeps them away.

Where do these things come from???

These grape vines are being grown tall to grow overhead on a trellis that is not yet built.  It will be a roof over a small patio area.  Hopefully this poor grape has not met its fate, and will survive this ordeal!