more garden pics

Here are a few shots of my garden this evening

Box 1 - 4x4 with some additional space between the street and driveway. (juliet tomato, african daisy, nasturtium, beets, green beans, onions).


Box 2 - 4x8 (caged cherry and san marzano tomatoes, beets, green beans)


Box 3 - 4x8 (green beans, beets, onions, english chelsea cucumbers on cattle panel trellis)


Box 4 - 4x4 (beets, green beans, jalapeno pepper, basil, tomatoes - juliet and big boy)


Box 5 - 4x4 (beets, peppers, green beans, basil, tomatoes - brandywine and big boy)


Box 6 - 4x4 (carrots and cucumber trellis - english chelsea, marketmore, and county fair)


Box 7- 2x4 (newly planted mucho nacho jalapeno and poblano peppers where the peas were finished)


My front yard SFG (additional 2x2 box with more beets)


Nice big beets...need to pick these soon.  Some are really nice...some all tops and no beet, even in the same square.

OMG it looks so great! Well done!

I accidentally hit send before I was done...so I edited to add some more pics.

WOW! Those are some awesome looking gardens and as camprn said "well done"!

Wow! Is this all in your front yard?

Do you like the hardware cloth towers for your tomatoes?

This was great for me to see. I've never seen such full carrot tops - DH was just asking me if I thought our carrots were ready for any kind of harvest. They're not, and our carrot tops look like babies compared to yours.

yep, front yard right by the curb as I have four large bur oak leaves that pretty much shade everything else.

I used the wire mesh for caging my peppers...I had some on hand...it works well for support and they keep the rabbits away.  I can reach my hands in form the top and use a long pair of scissors to get to any pepper.  I used some simple garden fencing for caging tomatoes at the house.  For my spot in a local community garden, I found a local producer going out of the tomato business and bought 70 really nice cages for $1 each.

Hopefully there are some great orange carrots under the green tops...never had tops this big before...lots of rain here over the past couple months.

Beautiful!  Just lovely.  

Holy mackeral! Somebody likes their beets and beans. That garden is amazing! Certainly pretty enough for curb side.

CC

This year I decided to only grow the veggies the family really likes to eat...beans and beets are high on the list...and I pickle both.

I'm jealous coz I can't grow beets worth a bean... 

CC

Cape...beets are very frustrating...I bet my success rate is less than 50/50 on a plant actually forming a nice beet.  Even more frustrating considering the time, effort, thinning, and space used in the garden.

I do use hardwood ash in squares of beets and carrots for the added mineral content.

Gorgeous! It looks so perfect. Did you plant your squares per Mel's rule of thumb? Your squares look so full thats why I wonder.

Picture perfect! Everything an SFG should be. Well done!

landarch wrote:Cape...beets are very frustrating...I bet my success rate is less than 50/50 on a plant actually forming a nice beet.  Even more frustrating considering the time, effort, thinning, and space used in the garden.

I do use hardwood ash in squares of beets and carrots for the added mineral content.

I soak my beetroot seeds in rain water for 24 hrs. prior to direct sowing .. it seems to work for me ( I also have my beds on a fine spray for 15 min at 05.00 each day .

Perhaps if that does not work for you .....experiment by getting beet seeds to germinate on  1/4 inch squares of kitchen roll tissue on a plate in a dark warm place.

Sow more than the square needs and see how many live germinations you get , then use tweezers to lift the seedling of the plate and lay them in a well watered square about 1/4 to 1/2 an inch below the surface and recover with MM .

You can also sow beet root as starts in 2 inch plant pots and once the plant is two inches high  soak the pot in water for 1/2 hr. or so to get things nice and sloppy then carefully slide the plants out in a wet pre prepared holes in a square .
Here in the UK we can often buy them as 12 packs or so of large plugs from our bigger garden centres chain stores .

R&R, here's what I shoot for:

Carrots - 16 per square
Beets - 16 per square
Greeen Beans - 9 per square
Onions - 9 per square

This year I did beets in the middle and green beans on the edge so they could spill over the side of the box.

Plantoid, I get 100% germination on beet seeds...then thin them accordingly...however, not every plant turns into a great beet.  Some form a really nice beet bulb and some are all greens on top with little to no beet below...often within the same square.

landarch wrote:Plantoid, I get 100% germination on beet seeds...then thin them accordingly...however, not every plant turns into a great beet.  Some form a really nice beet bulb and some are all greens on top with little to no beet below...often within the same square.

Me, too...100% germination, but no beets bigger than my thumb...ever.    The greens are delicious tho.  This year I just planted for the greens, giving up on the beet root.  Then recently I read The Answer Book and Mel says to add 1/2 t. Borax to a qt. of water and water the beets with that.  They need the boron.  Soooooo...I did that the other day.  He didn't say how often so maybe I'll do it every 3rd watering or so.  I've got nothing to lose...and maybe I'll actually eat beets.  

CC

CapeCoddess wrote:
Me, too...100% germination, but no beets bigger than my thumb...ever.    The greens are delicious tho.  This year I just planted for the greens, giving up on the beet root.  Then recently I read The Answer Book and Mel says to add 1/2 t. Borax to a qt. of water and water the beets with that.  They need the boron.  Soooooo...I did that the other day.  He didn't say how often so maybe I'll do it every 3rd watering or so.  I've got nothing to lose...and maybe I'll actually eat beets.  

CC

Careful with the boron, it is really easy to over do it.  I would only apply it once.   Some plants can not stand boron at all, like beans.  So there is a range.  You will have to think of htat when you rotate the crops.

Interesting read~ Boron Toxicity in Beans




PS....  Italics refuses to turn off.   So I guess I am listing today.  Must be the wind

Hmmm,,,,  is it my eyes or did some kind admin just push me upright again?