What did you do in the garden today?

[fuzzi]

I've never seen one of those. Cool! My son has one of these.

View attachment 3837460

This is what I use:

It's a Fiskars garden knife, and I love it!

 

[SarahLadd]

Do the side panels on your tomato bed come off for access?

Yes! The panels have pockets in them for simple flat top screw heads to slip into. Lift up to release. My oldest bed is 6 years old with this arrangement and it still works great.

 

[SarahLadd]

The posts also have holes in them for aluminum support poles, or I also have pvc pipe that I have used too. This is my first year not growing squash. I can't seem to save them from being claimed by something, mold, squash borers. When the carrots are harvested I'm not sure what I will be putting there.

 

[fuzzi]

My rattlesnake beans, butternut and zucchini squash seeds are coming up in spite of the cool weather. @fuzzi , nice looking peas and squash. Do your squash do better when trained to grow up stakes? I'm thinking about trying that with my zukes this year.

I started staking them last year after I read about wrapping the stalk from below the soil surface and up about a foot to deter borers, and the staking is part of the process. We have squash vine borers so bad here that I only get a few squash before all my vines die. Slicing the stalk to remove the borers is like shoveling against the tide, I won't use poison, and the one year I tried injecting BT it helped, but I got mediocre yields. So wrapping and staking the MAIN stalk, and pruning back the foliage is the way to go for me.

 

[SarahLadd]

I started staking them last year after I read about wrapping the stalk from below the soil surface and up about a foot to deter borers, and the staking is part of the process. We have squash vine borers so bad here that I only get a few squash before all my vines die. Slicing the stalk to remove the borers is like shoveling against the tide, I won't use poison, and the one year I tried injecting BT it helped, but I got mediocre yields. So wrapping and staking the MAIN stalk, and pruning back the foliage is the way to go for me.

Last year I tried row covers. They got septoria and powdery mildew. no bugs. Just disease.

 

[TJAnonymous]

Speaking of onions... I have some bulb onions that didn't grow very big before the tops died. Would you pull them out or leave them in the ground and see if they grow more next year?

 

[SarahLadd]

The fruits were very high quality while they lasted.

 

[SarahLadd]

Speaking of onions... I have some bulb onions that didn't grow very big before the tops died. Would you pull them out or leave them in the ground and see if they grow more next year?

I would experiment and see what happens! But that's just me. I've over wintered bunching onions a lot. A lot of my Thai recipes are best with the bulb part of the scallion so I like it when they get a lil rowdy after a winter.

 

[Fishychix]

I spray bug repellent and my pants cuffs and shoes before going into the infested areas

I do the same thing. Hasnt failed so far.
Our dogs get simparica. Pricey, but works. The cats still get revolution because they arent outside much, if at all.

 

[TJAnonymous]

Question for those who vacuum pack their food... Where do you buy your oxygen absorbers? Amazon is cheap but not sure if I trust them... Would like to hear others' experience and feedback