Gardening Questions & Answers

[Copperhead]

How about mulching tomato and squash? My tomatoes are growing nicely (thanks, Kordax!) and the squash are learning to live in their garden plot. Is mulching necessary?

[Justin Thyme]

Mulching will help maintain moisture in the soil and will reduce the amount of weeding you will need to do. Is it necessary? No. I would recommend it though.

[LimitedRecourse]

I personally don't mulch my vegetables...I do mulch the flower gardens, though.

[tnponder]

Slugs and bugs love to hide in the mulch and devour my veggies,so I do not like to mulch my vegetable gardens. If you do, keep it a couple inches away from the plant or it will most likely rot. Do not mulch fruits or veggies that lay on the ground. ie: Squash, cantelope

[spastikcomma]

I have a tiny garden in a field that is double dug and was mulched for about a year before I planted a watermelon and three tomatoes (2 from Kordax) in it. The rest of my tomatoes I planted in a plowed area my dad had made. The tomatoes in the plowed area are doing ok, but the ones in the pampered spot are gigantic. They're 3 times as big and much greener. Double digging and mulching is a lot of trouble, but we're definately going to expand the area.

[LimitedRecourse]

There is no doubt that mulching can be beneficial. I just don't prefer it with vegetables. Mostly because I have limited gardening space, and the mulch would quickly overtake the soil after a few seasons without more tending than I have time for.

The Kordax tomatoes/peppers are doing very well on the estate.

[LimitedRecourse]

I have picked the first hot peppers!

[thb]

I have a pesty tough vine like growing in several places. It has thorns and an almost heart shaped leaf. Any ideas what it is, besides and aggravating pain to dig and pull away from the house and fence?

[Tsavodiner]

Crabs.

[thb]

Jul 18, 2008 22:17:41 GMT -5 Tsavodiner said:

Crabs.

[tiarella]

I have a pesty tough vine like growing in several places. It has thorns and an almost heart shaped leaf. Any ideas what it is,

Probably a type of saw briar or cat briar.

[LimitedRecourse]

I am still harvesting tomatoes and peppers. Thanks, again, Kordax!

[Warkitty]

My plants are all suffering severe neglect. I have two snake plants (aka mother-in-law's tongue) that I'd be happy to see go to a good home. They and an aloe are the only remaining indoor plants I have here.


Sadly, my flowers outside are also doing poorly, except the jasmine. If we get a hard freeze before I can wrap it in burlap though...

Just one of the sad things about never being home to take care of things.

[Ringleman#5]

Just one of the sad things about never being home to take care of things.

I feel ya Kitten.
On that note, I've decided to use ground cover on a steep part of my lawn which was a real pain to keep mowed this season. Any suggestions?

[LimitedRecourse]

Crepe Myrtle is a good choice...very hardy. For a "prettier" show, you could using Creeping Phlox...comes in several colors.

[Kordax]

Some time this week, I'm taking down all the tomato stakes, cutting the plants up into little pieces & tilling everything under. I had several tons of manure delivered & will be spreading that on top of the gardening & tilling it under as well -- gotta nurish the soil for next year....

If you guys would like to have hierloom plants again next year, I plant to germinate between 500 -- 1,000 this time around & will give away @ 500 of them to all takers. We had the best tomato year in our family's history this year -- hundreds of pounds worth with over 100 quarts of canned maters put up on the shelf & tons of tomatoes given away to friends & neighbors.....

[julia]

Has anyone had any experience with growing asparagus in this area? I am considering a container gardening experiment and would like input to determine if it would be worth the effort/expense.

[tiarella]

My mother-in-law near Nashville has a bed of asparagus. I don't know about growing it in containers, but you don't harvest it the first year it's planted. It would be nice to grow, since you can harvest it daily in the spring, and it's very pretty after it leafs out. Thanks for the idea.

What other edible plants do you grow in containers?

I have 4 blueberry bushes, various herbs, and usually hot peppers. The only sunny area we have is the deck and only for a couple of hours a day there.

[julia]

I've grown tomatoes and various herbs, strawberries.

I'm wanting to be a little more adventurous this time around. I'm going to add carrots, lettuce, onion, and bell peppers. I looked at blueberry bushes, too. How big a container do you use for those?

[tiarella]

I looked at blueberry bushes, too. How big a container do you use for those?

I re-pot each year to a larger pot. They were in gallon pots when I bought them 4 years ago, and now the largest one is probably in a 16" diameter pot. It was very prolific last year.

[LimitedRecourse]

I have done a "salad" garden in a large container before. Tomato plant in the middle, green pepper plant on one side, carrots/radishes one the other with 2 or 3 varieties of leaf lettuce in a circle around the edge. One year it worked great (with cherry tomatoes). The next year it didn't do as well.

[julia]

Jan 9, 2009 16:07:41 GMT -5 tiarella said:

I looked at blueberry bushes, too. How big a container do you use for those?

I re-pot each year to a larger pot. They were in gallon pots when I bought them 4 years ago, and now the largest one is probably in a 16" diameter pot. It was very prolific last year.

Did they bear fruit the first year? I've also learned now that asparagus takes three years to produce and takes a lot of bed space, so it's not really good for a container garden.<shrug> Guess I'll let that one go. I needed to get the seeds started this week for them anyway and missed doing that. Mom is talking about putting in a garden on her property. I may go in with her on some of the things I cannot get going in containers.

LR, I was thinking about doing a salad container and also a pizza container with a different variety of tomato and peppers. Do you think maybe the salad garden container should have been repotted to keep it going?

[LimitedRecourse]

I think the second one not doing so well had more to do with the weather than anything else, but one should always dump out the old soil, clean the containers with a mild bleach solution (1 part bleach/10 parts water) every winter and use new soil for best results and disease control.

[tiarella]

Did they bear fruit the first year?

I bought them early in the spring the first year, and I don't think they were pollinated well in the greenhouse, so there were just a few blueberries. Also they were small plants with only had a few small, short branches to produce fruit.

The second year had a better crop, but last spring there was a late freeze that killed a lot of blooms. They went on to bloom more and have a respectable crop, but this year was far better. There were lots of berries for grazing and even enough ripe at one time to make jelly.

My dad was impressed when he visited in the spring and asked for blueberry plants for Christmas, so I bought him 3 large plants. Hope he has a good crop this year.

[julia]

Hope he does, too. That sounds like a great Christmas gift!

I've never used a bleach solution to clean , just rinsed them well before putting new stuff in. Thanks for the tip though.

[Warkitty]

(I loved the blueberries from tnponder's yard)

[LimitedRecourse]

This is the perfect weather for pruning trees/bushes (that are not spring flowering) and grape vines.

[Kordax]

Time for my 2nd annual newspaper request: if any & everyone might be able to save old newspapers, I would love to be able to use them for garden mulch again. There's no such thing as too much this year -- I need all you got.

In addition, I will give away scores of heirloom tomato plants once they're ready for prime time outdoors. I'm planting the seeds this weekend in plats which should cover my 9-foot pool table end to end -- let's have the best year ever tomato-wise ....

[Babs]

We can get you lots of papers! We get the daily paper, Sunday paper and Sunday New York Times.

[mikeydokey]

I can get you some online papers, I will send you the links by PM.