The San Antonio Sandbur Patch

[MarkAndre]

...I have read (not personal experience) that legumes and alliums, particularly onions, do not like to be grown near each other. I can’t say at all if that’s really true.

I've hadn't heard beans and alliums didn't like each other. Maybe there is a subterranean war going on in my garden.

One year I decided to test that and planted some beans right next to scallions. The beans didn't do well at all. Maybe they wouldn't have anyway in that particular spot but I've always had good beans there before. Beans planted in other beds at the same time as the ones near the scallions did fine. So who knows?

But that thing about legumes and alliums has been around a long time and I haven't yet read anything that would disprove it. To be on the safe side I don't plant them together.

That’s guts! It can be a real eye-opener when you challenge accepted wisdom, as pointed out elsewhere in this thread. Love that you put it to the test.

Hmm, well I am putting that to the test then, I have green onions in the containers that I seeded the beans in. The onions are at least 18 inches from the beans and the beans are growing fine, other than the wind being unkind to them. It seems to me all three of the large containers I have the beans in are all doing well, with only one having onions in it I did recently transplant some leeks into another one of those containers.

That’s good to know. I can think of a few variables that might come into play, from the varieties grown, to the weather and growing conditions, to the fact that they are in containers. (Perhaps they react differently in an in-ground biome than they do in containers?) Or there could simply be nothing to it at all. Either way, I appreciate you sharing your experience.

[Wildcat82]

Mark - I'm very interested in your heat tolerant tomato experiment. I'm doing the same thing. About 1 May, I'll be setting out some heat tolerant types: Porter, Juliet, Abu Rawan, Black Cherry, Super Sioux, and Rose Quartz. I'll also be setting up some shade cloth to see if that helps. Keep us updated on your progress this summer. I would be very interested.

[MarkAndre]

Mark - I'm very interested in your heat tolerant tomato experiment. I'm doing the same thing. About 1 May, I'll be setting out some heat tolerant types: Porter, Juliet, Abu Rawan, Black Cherry, Super Sioux, and Rose Quartz. I'll also be setting up some shade cloth to see if that helps. Keep us updated on your progress this summer. I would be very interested.

Same here - I look forward to seeing your results as well. The shade cloth should really help.

I don’t know what I will actually get in the ground, but I have seedlings of Black Cherry, Porter’s Pride (Victory says they finally have the real one), Bison, Tropic, Homestead 24, Homestead (maybe…one dinky sprout with only seed leaves so far), the dreaded Purple Calabash, Matt’s Wild, and Stupice to boot just because. All
Of these are new to me, except Black Cherry, which I grew successfully in the summer probably more than a decade ago. I’m most interested in the Bison. I want to build some type of small enclosure with a mesh cover I purchased last year, with a mind to keeping the LFBs and deer out and possibly providing a small amount of sun protection. Maybe a CRW cage nested inside a larger CRW cage covered in the mesh. Lift it up and stab it back into place to harvest. Just thought of that right now.

[Wildcat82]

After failing to get 6 of the 7 cuttings to root (Bourjasotte Noire the exception) I broke down and bought 3 figs online. Here's my lineup I'll be planting shortly, from left to right: Bourjasotte Noire, Violette de Bourdeaux, Black Madeira, I-258

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I'm excited to see how these will do this year - hopefully I will get a few figs.

[Wildcat82]

It's too mucky in the garden so I'll have to be satisfied just taking a few pictures.

All of a sudden the tomatoes are setting pretty good and the long beans are up. Good germination rate for the long beans- I only had 3-4 skips.

Before our latest round of storms, I dug up some of my volunteers. I have no idea where I will plant these but I couldn't resist. Can someone please explain why my volunteer plants look better than the in-bed transplants I put out much earlier? The transplants have been pampered while the volunteers were neglected.

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[bower]

I guess your volunteers are from seed that was grown and shed on site, so they know just what to expect in your environment and are prepped for that!

[MissS]

My volunteers always were stronger and sturdier than my started plants. My guess is that they get the cold treatment which slows their growth while their indoor counterparts are nice and warm which encourages growth and they also get the wind and weather that makes them nice and sturdy.

[Wildcat82]

With the nicer weather garden plants are starting to pop. The eggplants have set 1-2 fruit per plant and I noticed a few plants are blooming again. Most peppers are starting to bloom and there are a handful of baby peppers are hanging from the plants.

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[MarkAndre]

Looking really good! Time for ratatouille!

[worth1]

Ratatouille my favorite movie.

[MarkAndre]

They do make it look good.

[Wildcat82]

Back in early January, I repotted my Bearrs Lime into new media (the Al Tapla 5-1-1 mix) and continued fertilizing just as I have for years with a tablespoon of 20-10-10 citrus fertilizer every 1-2 weeks per the directions on fertilizer box. By early April almost all the leaves had dropped and the plant looked like it was about to croak. Since this 4 year old tree has always looked sickly and produced exactly 4 limes on its sparse foliage, I got mad and dumped 1.5 cups of fertilizer on it. I wanted it to either start growing or die.

It decided to grow.

I applied the same tough love to my horrible looking 4 year old Meyer Lemon last fall. I give probably 4 times the amount of fertilizer that's recommended and it's never looked this good.

Same thing happened to my blueberries. After years of zero growth using the recommended amounts of fertilizer, I read on the growingfruit.org websites that 1 tablespoon of ammonium sulfate (22-0-0) per month would really boost growth. It didn't, so out of exasperation I started upping the fertilizer even more til I saw signs of growth. The past 2 years I've been giving my blueberries 1/4 cup of ammonium sulfate every week during spring and fall. I've had zero leaf burn, plants are now 5 ft tall, and are heavy with fruit.

Go figure.

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[GoDawgs]

When all else fails, sometimes ya just gotta give plants a kick in the butt!

[MarkAndre]

This is something I will definitely file away. Conventional wisdom and instructions aren’t always correct, or at least not for every situation.

[Wildcat82]

I don't understand Curly Top Virus.

From what I've read, curly top virus seems to affect just about everything including beans, peppers, tomatoes, eggplant. Yet, in one row in my garden, I have 4 unaffected tomato plants, then 2 tomatoes in containers horribly deformed with curly top,then a row of green beans that look great and producing a lot of beans. IN the next row three foot away, my peppers and eggplant look horrible with stunted growth and twisted leaves. In my cattle panel hoop house, I have 2 Super Sioux tomatoes loaded with tomatoes directly adjacent to my Chinese long beans which look deformed.

Maybe given enough time will everything be affected. Some websites say to rip out all plants and start over while others say the disease doesn't spread in a linear fashion and it doesn't do you any good to remove infected plants.

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[Wildcat82]

This weekend I pulled out all my raised bed tomatoes, eggplant and peppers. The eggplant and peppers seem stunted. I initially thought the problem was curly top virus but now I'm not sure. I totally discounted broad mites since I had been spraying with commercial miticides (Minx and Oberon) every two weeks as directed since I planted. Both curly top and broad mites induce herbicide type damage but I think curly top virus supposedly kills the plants while broad mites only stunt the plants.

Blush, Supersweet 100, Black Cherry, Super Sioux tomatoes in my cattle panel hoop house look fine but both Indian Stripes seem afflicted.

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Tonight I planted a couple Juliets in pots. I learned a couple years ago to add a couple tablespoons of water sparing chrystals to all my pots to keep the plants from wilting in the summer heat. If you don't use these here, be prepared to water your plants a couple times per day.

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[MarkAndre]

Man, I’m sorry. I like that you hit right back with those Juliets though. I hope the rest of the pots pull through and give you a harvest.

I’m going to look into water sparing crystals.

[Wildcat82]

Man, I’m sorry. I like that you hit right back with those Juliets though. I hope the rest of the pots pull through and give you a harvest.

I’m going to look into water sparing crystals.

From 1 Dec to the end of February, I sow seeds every two weeks and constantly clone new plants the rest of the year since I typically suffer a couple wipe outs each year. I need to have replacement ready at all times.

[karstopography]

I’m going to look into water sparing crystals.

It’s SAP or super absorbent polymer, the same stuff that’s in disposable diapers among other things. BASF has a SAP manufacturing plant right down the road from me. Once upon a time a still wet behind the ears engineer there at the plant told a co-worker down the food chain to wash out all this “dust” on the floor of a warehouse. Turns out the dust was SAP which swells immensely when exposed to water. They had six inches of SAP snow to shovel out.

[worth1]

With my method of container growing I don't water but maybe twice a week in the heat of the summer.