Gardeners come hither....

[Sir William Marcus]

We are officially done with all our planting. We now only wait for a few things yet to sprout.  I have added some specialty crops this year including the worlds smallest tomatoes, white cotton, sweet habanero's, fooled ya jalapeños and some peter peppers.  We patiently await for them to emerge!

[Tipsy Gypsy]

We grew one of the fooled ya jalapenos last year. Pretty neat! All the jalapeno taste, none of the heat. It was every bit as mild as a bell pepper.

[Sir William Marcus]

If you liked the fool ya jalapeños Tipsy Ive heard you gotta try the sweet habenero's. Sweet with no heat too!

[Tipsy Gypsy]

Nice, thanks for the tip! I love pepper flavor, but I'm a wuss when it comes to the heat. Gotta look for one of those to add to milord's pepper garden .

[Tipsy Gypsy]

Artichoke bloom the size of a cantaloupe. I bought the plant last year with the sole intent of just watching the darn thing grow, and hopefully bloom at least once. Anything after that was fair game for the table. Homegrown artichokes are delish! They're quite easy to grow too, it seems. The artichoke is basically a big thistle, and we know how hardy and tenacious thistles can be!



Anyone know of a good way to preserve them, should we not want to eat all of them fresh? Drying doesn't sound appetizing, but I doubt the plant will yield enough to can them. I've thought of steaming them and strippping the yummy stuff from inside the leaves to freeze for cooking with later, but I don't know how practical that would be. Ideas, anbody?

[Gwen aka Punstergal]

I've only done one thing with artichokes myself: sott'olio

Sott'olio is the Italian way of preserving them in oil. First, cook in vinegar (3 parts) and water (1 part) till just tender. Drain and dry (pat with a paper towel works fine). Then, put them in a sealable as air-tight as possible jar with spices of choice (cloves of garlic, bay, capers, sundried tomatoes, rosemary, etc). Fill the jar with olive oil to cover the artichokes. Close tightly. The artichokes will last for quite a while as long as the bottle is resealed every time it's used. They are great for tossing in salads or in pasta or on an antipasto tray with various olives.

[Morgan Dreadlocke]

Broccoli question?  The plants did fine this spring.  They's now producing mulitiple thumbnail size heads that are bitter (its over 100 degrees already). Do I yank 'em out? or will they produce good stuff after it cools off in oct?

[Gwen aka Punstergal]

I do know that broccoli is more of a cold weather crop (as in, you want the final maturation stage of the edible part to fall withing cooler times of year). Usual recommendation for planting broccoli in the South is to count backwards from your area's first frost (count back the number of days your seeds indicate as growth time) and use the date you arrive at (probably early summer) as your planting date.

Unfortunately, I've know idea how to salvage already existing plants. You might try eating the peeled stems more than the florets, as the flowers are the first to go bitter.

[Lady Neysa]

I have a question about my veggie garden.  My next door neighbor told me that he was getting root magots in his garden and several of his tomato plants were ruined.  He said he used diatamaceous earth sprinkled around the plants to control the pests, and things seem to be getting better.  He recommended I put some on my garden as a preventative since the two gardens are fairly close together.  I haven't noticed any problems with my stuff, but took his advice and used it anyway as a preventative.  Then I read somewhere that you should only use it if you have an infestation, as it will kill beneficial bugs too.  My question is - Did I just screw up my garden? 

[Sir William Marcus]

You should be fine. By no means did you ruin your garden.  Diatomaceous earth is a good natural/organic choice to control pest to your garden and will wash away with rain. 

Unfortunately, it will destroy beneficial insects like ladybird beetles & ladybugs just to name a few. However the non-beneficial insects numbers are far greater than the beneficial ones and you can always cover specific plants when treating especially when dusting. We do this with a small part of our garden that we use to attract butterfly's and have been able to control the pest without destroying the good bugs!

[Lady Neysa]

Thanks, that's a relief!  All of my plants are doing great so far.  I hated the thought that I may have damaged them. 

[Blushing]

I think I bought a dud packet of seeds.  Not one of my lemon basil seeds sprouted, so I planted again, late as it is.

All my lettuces are happy though!

[Tipsy Gypsy]

Lemon basil is fantabulous. I grew some for the first time last year from a plant bought on a whim, and I'm hooked. Hope yours comes up

[Tipsy Gypsy]

Any zucchini growers, here? This is my first year to grow zukes. I'm losing fruits to blossom end rot, and according to the searches I've done, it's most likely the same cause as with tomatoes- low calcium. I have quite a few eggshell fragments in our compost heap, and I'm wondering if composting around the plants or digging a few small holes (perhaps with a bulb planter?) and filling them with compost would provide enough calcium to correct the problem? If I just need to use a commercial calcium supplement, does anyone have any recomendations?

[Sir William Marcus]

Any zucchini growers, here? This is my first year to grow zukes. I'm losing fruits to blossom end rot, and according to the searches I've done, it's most likely the same cause as with tomatoes- low calcium. I have quite a few eggshell fragments in our compost heap, and I'm wondering if composting around the plants or digging a few small holes (perhaps with a bulb planter?) and filling them with compost would provide enough calcium to correct the problem? If I just need to use a commercial calcium supplement, does anyone have any recomendations?

I would think that a calcium supplement would do the trick. You would assume that the supplement would be more concentrated and perhaps have better absorption although I'm not real sure.

I wish I could be of better help Tipsy. Your going to have to let us know what you decide and what the outcome is. I have quite few zuke plants myself.