***What's growing? The official garden thread***

deadendp

West Coast Dreamgirl said:

What are you gonna do with that massive tomato? @deadendp Are you gonna bake stuffed tomatoes?

I made a caprese-esque salad with it for my daughter and mother-in-law. Believe me when I tell you that it made probably 4 servings. 

Purple Fairy Tree

deadendp said:

West Coast Dreamgirl said:

What are you gonna do with that massive tomato? @deadendp Are you gonna bake stuffed tomatoes?

I made a caprese-esque salad with it for my daughter and mother-in-law. Believe me when I tell you that it made probably 4 servings. 

What a great an idea, I didn't actually know what a caprese salad was so I googled it and I've actually made one of these before - beef toms, mozzarella and basil. Sounds really yummy, I bet your large tomato was really fleshy and juicy.

You know some places have vegetable growing competitions for who can grown the most gigantic vegetable.

Look how happy this man is with his giant onion:

deadendp

lastexitlondon

Gourd-ious

GlowGirl

How is your plot @lastexitlondon? Has the water receded? Were you able to save more of your garden? 

lastexitlondon

No sadly environmental health have closed the site. Not safe. The water is still there and contaminated.  Awful

deadendp

lastexitlondon said:

No sadly environmental health have closed the site. Not safe. The water is still there and contaminated.  Awful

So it ended up being sewage contaminated?

Butternut squash! Just still green. 

GlowGirl

lastexitlondon said:

No sadly environmental health have closed the site. Not safe. The water is still there and contaminated.  Awful

So sorry to hear this. I was hoping it would go the other way. It is terrible that it got contaminated. I really hope there can be a good clean up effort done on your behalf.

rgambs

Very sorry to hear of a total loss like that, big time bummer.  Hopefully the contamination is biological as opposed to chemical.  You could see bumper crops next year.  Fingers crossed for ya.

deadendp

Surprise! Butternut squash growing up and through one of the butterfly bushes. 

rgambs

If it's a volunteer, eat with caution.  If it's bitter it could cause cucurbit poisoning.

deadendp

rgambs said:

If it's a volunteer, eat with caution.  If it's bitter it could cause cucurbit poisoning.

Not a volunteer, but good information to know. Had no idea. 

I put in a bunch of seeds assuming that since it was a 25 cent pack mom gave me, I thought it would have a low germination rate. It didn't.  I also somewhat underestimated how far these will run. Whoops. 

rgambs

They run like crazy!

lastexitlondon

I will now only be a voyeur of veg in this  thread. Love to all who grow.!

deadendp

lastexitlondon said:

I will now only be a voyeur of veg in this  thread. Love to all who grow.!

Any update from the council? 

Pulled 2 butternut squash yesterday. I read to leave a top stem so that they may keep better. 

I'm going to have a fair number of green tomatoes. My plan is to paper wrap and store them. I have done this before. The neighbor suggested paper lunch bags as opposed to sheets of newspaper. My mother believes the paper sacks won't work. I think paper lunch bags seem like the way. (Or, at least easier.)

To all this, @rgambs , what say you? 

rgambs

I have never tried storing green tomatoes.  I've never actually done anything with green tomatoes, in the early season I wait for them to ripen and in the late season I usually don't have many, and by then I'm glutted and tired of picking and preserving lol

My garden suffered pretty bad from this drought we had through August...and for anyone following along who doesn't know, deadendp and I live in the same region, I'm guessing she's not more than an hour's drive away! 
The chickens also got into my tomatoes a few times and wrecked about a bushel, but I'm not concerned because last year was a bumper crop and so I'm more concerned about peppers, because they were pitiful last year.  Fall beet planting didn't survive, so that's 2 years running without beets 😠
I've only got a few butternut squash this year, late planting plus late drought = not good.  I'm not so concerned about this either, because while it's nice to have your own, grocery store butternut squash is a very high quality produce item, mine don't come out any better.  

I'm picking 🍅 and 🌶️ today for salsa and for cowboy candy.  This will be my first time making the candied jalapenos (cowboy candy) and I'm very excited.  It's something we recently found in Amish Country and we've been putting them on everything.  

rgambs

Your mother might be right, paper lunch sacks are quite a bit thicker than newspaper, if complete contact with the fruit is the goal, youight fall short of that with the thicker, stiffer paper...

deadendp

We really aren't that far away. I'm the more northern neighbor. But drought oh drought. Only today did we mow the lawn for the second time in 2 months. Even then, it wasn't long. 

The Brandywine toms and micro toms have done decently well. The Gooseberry toms hit the ditch a while back. 

My peppers did for shit. I usually have quite a bounty. Not so this year. A couple here and there. Nothing great at all. I planted Belgian (my biggest producers), Ozarks and Cali Wonder. I did move them to a different place, so that may have been part of my struggle. I did that because ye ole PITA neighbor sprayed and continues to spray his droughted lawn. 

(BTW, have any of the lawn treater subscribers noticed that their lawns are burnt and have giant bare spots? I don't care, but they are paying money to burn the very lawn they are trying to "save." I don't get it. Mine may be weedy, but it doesn't have swaths of bare ass dirt hanging out. I pay nothing for the variety of blooming goodness that the critters love.)

Summer squash production has been quite limited. I guess I could say that for butternut as well, but I never grew those so on an experiment year, I consider any a success. I've also learned that just because you have a lil guy on and growing doesn't mean it's going to make it through the year. Lesson learned is that I will do it again, but in a way that allows them to trellis up a leaned fence or some structure. I did support with tall tomato cages. Not quite sturdy enough though.

My beans were eaten by every critter who calls our tiny city plot home, as well as all but one corn stalk that ended up sneaking by. I considered doing a fall planting of beans, but I just don't have it in me. 

rgambs

I plant beans for a meal or two and then they usually just sit there looking at me all sad lol

lastexitlondon

more heartbreak. Its rained again and now this again. I fear its all over.