Mid-Atlantic: June 2012 - What's Up?

I'll be eating the last of my turnips soon and enjoyed lettuce & snow peas today. The tomatoes & peppers have liked the heat.

Finally got the netting up on my trellises this past week and the climbers are enjoying stretching out.

sfg4uKim wrote:I'll be eating the last of my turnips soon and enjoyed lettuce & snow peas today. The tomatoes & peppers have liked the heat.

Finally got the netting up on my trellises this past week and the climbers are enjoying stretching out.

Since this is the first year growing spring crops, I can honestly say there is nothing better than home grown spinach; problem is I didn't plant enough of it as you know in wilts up into so little..but Sooo good!

Also have brocolli, cauliflower, and cabbage coming along but think I planted it to late; perhaps I will get some soon. I think the last three would be better grown in the fall as they take a lot of room and are blocking the sun from many of my summer plants.

How do they grow in the fall as I have never grow them?

Everything seems to be doing well. The snap peas are about to the top of our trellis with flowers popping up all over. Our pepper plants have made a turn around and are now green vs. yellow. We are getting ready to harvest our second crop of lettuce and our broccoli is producing baby sprouts which are ready to pick.








Our red potatoes have a lot of greenery above ground but not sure what's going on down below. We haven't been able to continue putting dirt on them because they've gotten so tall that the mix would be falling out of the box. Next year we plan to build a deep box for them and put them on the north side of 4x4.

Renee

Took some pics of my garden in western, Pa.















The brocolli looks close but have to find out when it is ready as I have never grown this before. And my cauliflower is starting to head..perhaps I should have started this earlier.

But am glad to see little tomatoes forming; they are grapes, and I started then from seed first but my slicers should only be 2 weeks behind.

Looking great Floyd!

camprn wrote:Looking great Floyd!

Thanks.....but how do you know when the brocolli is ready and how to harvest it?

floyd1440 wrote:

camprn wrote:Looking great Floyd!

Thanks.....but how do you know when the brocolli is ready and how to harvest it?

Here is an article that explains what you will be looking for when thinking about harvesting broccoli.

Gregrenee88 and Floyd1440:

Your gardens look wonderful!

These past couple of weeks I have been picking my snap peas and they sure are yummy - I eat most of them before I bring them into the house!

I have three types of lettuce that we have been enjoying - romaine, buttercrunch and salad greens - I planted too many so I have been sharing some of them.

I also pulled some of my garlic.

I just saw flowers on my cucumbers yesterday! I usually don't do well with them but I wanted to try them again - I actually planted them earlier so we shall see. I also have pole beans growing, watermelon, pumpkin (for my grandson-pic), zucchini, bush beans, carrots, and for the first time I am growing butternut squash. I also have three kinds of tomatoes - cherry, rutgers and better boy; also two kinds of peppers - Ca. Wonder Bell and Sweet Stuffed.

Unfortunately it has been raining hard today so hopefully I will get to visit my garden tom - haha.

I had looked several places for rutabaga seeds, but could not find any. But one of our wonderful SFG friends offered to send me some. (Thanks again Llamamomma). She said she planned to plant hers around June 15th. Then I happened to go to the Agway store in Dallas. I almost never go in that direction, but my granddaughter needed a ride to work. Since I passed the store I decided to stop on the way home. Guess what! They had rutabaga seed, so I bought a packet. We have had an off and on drizzle all day today, so I went out between showers and planted one square of hers, and one square from the packet I bought. We'll see what happens. Also I decided to reseed my spaghetti squash and my zucchini as yesterday I saw no sign of anything from them and they were seeded several weeks ago. But just overnight I see two sprouts in the spaghetti squash square, so I didn't reseed that. I did put some new seed in the zucchini square. Tomatoes are coming along well. Also turnips, cabbage, lettuce, eggplant and peppers (one red bell, and four cubanelle). I only got five of nine beets and four of sixteen carrots, but if they grow nice, I will have at least one meal from each.

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My Peas were GREAT this year. Just finished picking some of my last ones.

Pretty much everything is up now at the end of June.

One of my tomato plants, the Jersey Devil, was showing BER. Considering it's in a bed with three other tomatoes that are all doing fine, I'm not sure why just that one has it. But I gave it some extra strength tums (hah!) to bolster the calcium, so hopefully it'll be better soon.

I'm thinking of pulling my peas - they're still producing but a lot of the pods are getting odd-shaped and the plants are beginning to brown a bit. I have absolutely no idea what I'm going to put in their place. I guess nothing, and just wait for the fall to plant some more.

The peppers are all doing well, as are all my herbs. I have two 20-gallon trash cans of potato plants - here's hoping they turn out (I guess they don't start producing potatoes until after they flower, right?).

The only thing that didn't do well this year was my shallot crop. Alas, I apparently put my second bed in a way too shady spot, and ended up getting mushrooms and other fungus growing in the bed, and the shallots were very stunted. Oh well, live and learn.

Plant some pole beans or climb a watermelon on the pea trellis. Lowes is still selling watermelon starts. Cantaloupe too.

Kay

walshevak wrote:Plant some pole beans or climb a watermelon on the pea trellis. Lowes is still selling watermelon starts. Cantaloupe too.

Kay

I'm just not a big fruit eater. Watermelon and cantaloupe would go to waste (and I'm the only one in my house!). Maybe a squash - they grow quickly and if Lowes has melons they might still have squash. Actually, I have some squash seeds . . . hmmm.

Yep, as of yesterday they still had squash and cuke starts at Lowes

And that here in the lower south.

Kay

walshevak wrote:Yep, as of yesterday they still had squash and cuke starts at Lowes

And that here in the lower south.

Kay

I picked up a couple cucumber plants today at Home Depot along with a parsley plant (I really like cooking with parsley) and a sage (I forgot to buy/plant this earlier). I hate to do it, but the peas are going to get pulled before July 4. I had to wait, because I found a bunch of ladybug eggs on some of the leaves on the pea plants, and wanted to be sure they hatched before I pulled them up. I can always use the extra aphid defense!

Moswell,

I had to pull my peas out of 2 squares 2 wks ago and they did extremely well! I then replaced the 2 sq. with pole beans and they are growing well as a 2nd batch since I previously planted pole beans next to them over a month ago and they are doing very well considering the heat.....

I have been watering my garden just about everyday this week due to the heat. Today I just found 2 baby watermelons (the size of cherry tom)! I picked my 1st cucumber yesterday, along with bush beans and a few carrrots. I just gave 4 bags of lettuce to my son and daughter-in-law to take to Conn. for the weekend and now have just the salad greens left - this is the best my lettuce ever did.....I planted much earlier this year. Anyway, I have lots of pumpkins flowers (male) and keep checking in the am for female to pollinate....awaiting the butternut squash to have flowers.....lots of green tomatoes on my various tom plants.

Good luck everyone with this heat.....