Bugs, Disease, Rain, and a Late Blight Alert!

Well we had a short break in the rain over the weekend, but of course it's back.  I was able to get a some things done while the sun was out for a few days.  Saturday I reapplied Bonide Copper Fungicide to my tomato plants since it rained on Friday, and I also sprayed my cabbage and beans again with Bonide Rotenone-Pyrethrins, to prevent flea beetle and Japanese beetle damage.  It's a good thing I decided to re-spray the insecticide, because when I sprayed the cabbage, flea beetles came out from the base of the leaves. Sorry fellas, dinner is NOT served!  :)  I also got to witness the lovely sound of Japanese Beetles hitting the plastic in the garden, as they fell after being sprayed.  I remember thinking, 'Yikes!  That was fast!'.  And since I was in a spraying mood, I reapplied Cutter Bug Spray to the lawn as well.  The neighbors were out of town on a camping trip, so I figured it was an excellent time to get out there a spray while they and their dog were gone.  That way the Cutter spray would have a chance to dry before Gunner, the dog, went in the yard again.  And I know the human neighbors will appreciate the reduction in mosquitoes!  So far there has been a reduction, but there are still quite a few out there.  No where near as bad as other places I have been to in Wisconsin though!

And speaking of destructive critters, I have two plant pathogens of some sort reeking havoc this year.  One is affecting my Peter Pepper plants.  It looks like some kind of bacterial infection, from what I have seen online, but I will be bringing some of the leaves into my local garden center to confirm.  I am crossing my fingers that it is something treatable!  The other peppers in the garden still look fine, but they probably have more resistance because they are not a novelty species.  The other problem is pictured above.  Something seems to have destroyed my zucchini plant!  The other two plants look fine at the moment, so I am at a bit of a loss.  I think it may be Powery Mildew, which is a group of fungi that can affect many plants. However, I had mildew on my zucchini leaves last year, and they didn't die.  In fact, they seemed to be completely immune!  And the fact that the other two plants are still doing fine is a bit puzzling.  If anyone has an suggestions, let me know!  (I did spray some fungicide on the zucchinis in case it is Mildew.  I think the plant in the picture is no more though.)

And while we are on a disease kick, let me bring to your attention the latest on Late Blight in Wisconsin.  As of July 23rd (the latest report to date), five counties have reported Late Blight on both potato and tomato crops.  Here are two links for more information! http://www.uwex.edu/ces/admin/2010_tomato_late_blight.html  http://www.plantpath.wisc.edu/wivegdis/

While there have been a few incidents of bad news recently, it hasn't all been bad.  Everything is still producing.  Even the 'dead' zucchini plant has a few fruits on it somehow!  Another good thing is the Pumpkin Pie mega vine has a couple new pumpkins on it that are actually getting bigger!  This is exciting news since most new growths would appear one day and be yellow and fall off a couple days later.  The current contenders have been on there for days and are increasing in size.  That is a sure sign that they are on their way to being full grown pumpkins!  

Another thing that I did that should help the pumpkin plants, including the two that are 'normal' size, is cover the "compost" section with black plastic.  This will provide the smaller vines with a better surface to expand onto, as well as protect any fruits from the sticks, hay and other random organics in the "compost" section.  There is an off shoot from the mega vine that was already in the "compost" section, so I guess it will benefit as well.  I tell you, that vine is INSANE!  Tom went out to check out the garden with me today and when I showed him where the end of the mega vine is currently, he said, "Wait, is this vine from ALL the way back there!?"  Yeah, it is.

In other news, the fence remains in limbo, but is trying to make progress.  I put markers out for the remaining fence posts, and started getting the ground ready so that the fence will lay flat.  I can't remove anymore old fence at this point, because if I do the garden will be a free access location.  Unfortunately I just don't have the strength to put the posts in, so I  can't put up the rest of the new fence without Tom.  After the rain ends, he said he'll be out there; with a massive coating of bug spray all over his body.  The mosquitoes REALLY love him!

I have a very limited photo gallery this time around, but it does show the pumpkin vine and a couple of the new pumpkins that are on their way.  Feel free to check it out!

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Canning and more Fence Removal!

Well the canning on Tuesday was a success!  My mom and I made Zany Zucchini Pickles and Pickled Beets.  The beet recipe came from the Farmer's Almanac and is supposedly a "State Fair Winner".  We shall see!  Even though we used 14 cups worth of zucchini, there are still several zucchinis left in my refrigerator.  I even gave some to my mom to take home with her, and some others to our neighbors!  And just today, I picked two more.  I hope to make some zucchini bread, but that won't make much of a dent in the supply.  I may have to do more canning!

In addition to the canning, I also did some work out in the garden this week.  I planted another round of beets after weeding and re-tilling the ground.  I had done a second planting earlier this summer, but it didn't turn out.  I am not entirely sure what happened (it may have been rabbits), but I am hoping that the extra tilling will help this time around.

I also did some work on the fence.  Mainly, I was just attempting to remove the old fence from the back part of the garden.  Since we are expanding in addition to putting in new fencing, there is a bit of a buffer between the old fence and the new fence by the watermelon and zucchini.  The new fence is still only halfway around, as we have not added more of the new stuff yet, but not all of the old fence has been removed.   It has been extremely difficult getting the old fence out, since it became buried over the years and is being held in place by grass roots.  That means that when Tom and I last worked on the project together, we just decided to leave the 'back wall' section of the old fence in the ground and put the new fence around it.  With the new perimeters it works out fine.  I would like to get that fence out of there though, because the zucchini plants could use more space.  Or more accurately, the plants that are being overrun by the zucchini could use more space.  Slowly but surely it will happen!

I will leave the rest of the update sharing to the pictures.  Enjoy!
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New Fence, New Pictures, and Canning!

So I thought I had only neglected to post on here for about a week, and then I noticed that it has been almost two weeks!  Yikes!  I apologize.  In my defense, it has been crazy busy here, and the busyness is still on-going.  I expect the non-garden related stuff to be over soon, but with all the produce that is growing out there, I know I will be plenty busy with garden stuff!

After my last post about flea beetles, I discovered that there were young rabbits still managing to make their way into the garden.  Talk about maddening!  This prompted me to get more fencing since the current fence is very old and rusty, and is not even two feet tall in some places anymore.  I just wanted enough to encompass the cabbage and beets at one end of the garden, since that is were the dining was occurring.  Well, Tom decided we should not only redo the ENTIRE fence, but make the garden space bigger while we were at it.

So we went out and bought 100ft of 28in garden fence, as well as new posts to put the fence on.  We then spent two days working on it last week and only got halfway around.  I had an out of town event that I had to leave for last Thursday, and was hoping that Tom could do more work on the fence while I was gone over the weekend.  Well I returned on Monday to find no progress was made, and the fence is still only halfway finished.  The good news is that there are no holes and the rabbits seem to be gone... for now.  And Tom was not sitting around twiddling his thumbs.  He had to pick up our charge for the week: Willow the dog.  Yep, we have been busy dog sitting this week.  A new experience for cat owners who are used to sleeping in, and not having to take walks everyday.  Oh yeah, did I mention my parents are cat sitting for us?  We had to transport them to their temporary home as well.  Like I said, it has been crazy busy around here!

But how is the garden doing?  That is a great question!  I am happy to report the plants are doing well despite all the hiccups and the fence that remains in limbo.  Turns out plants keep growing regardless of the busy lives of their human tenders.  Good thing, or most of us wouldn't have gardens!  To prove how well things are growing, I have attached an updated album at the bottom of this post with pictures from July 19th through the 23rd.  I was unable to get out there yesterday (July 22), because of severe thunderstorms and thought I wasn't going to get out there today due to more rain in the forecast.  However, the bulk of the rain held off until about an hour ago, so I was able to take a few photos.  I was disappointed to see that the severe weather caused one of the main branches coming off my large Mr. Stripey plant, to break.  It was still attached to the plant, just ripped, so I repositioned it gently with twine, and then added additional supports. I also put two more tomato spirals in place, (one for the 'broken' stem and one for another large stem), that I probably should have put out there a long time ago.  I had a few ripped branches that survived and kept growing on my tomato plants last year, so I figured I would try to salvage the stem and see if it survives too. Unfortunately, sometimes something bad has to happen before you get your butt in gear!   Lesson learned.

Last but not least!  With all the produce that is becoming ripe, especially the zucchinis, I have decided it is time to start canning.  The calendar is marked, and my assistant has been called!  Next Tuesday, my mom and I will begin canning.  I will try and take some photos of that to post for your enjoyment as well.  Wish us luck!
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Early Blight and Flea Beetles

I am happy to announce my tomato plants are not only healthy, but are also protected against Late Blight and other related fungi as of today.  This is particularly good news considering what I learned at the garden store.  Apparently a LOT of people have been bringing in diseased tomato leaves to have diagnosed.  No Late Blight leaves yet, but plenty of Early Blight which means conditions are perfect for Late Blight to move in.  I also witnessed Septoria leaf spot, another common fungus, on tomato plants at my parent's neighbor's house, on my last visit.  While Septoria is rather easy to control, Early Blight is more difficult, and Late Blight requires you to destroy your plants.  The fungicide I picked up and used on my tomatoes today was Bonide Copper fungicide.  It is the fungicide I mentioned in my Late Blight post that is safe for use in organic farming/ gardening.  It is important to spray the entire plant from top to bottom, to the point that it is dripping.  This ensures that you covered the whole plant.  You also should spray at a time when the plant can dry, so sometime during early to mid day and not right before rain is predicted.  And be sure to repeat as directed for maximum protection!

The other chemical spray I picked up today was for my flea beetle problem.  For that I got Bonide Rotenone-Pyrethrins Spray.  It is also approved for organic gardening, and is apart of Bonide's Naturals line.  I technically could have used the Ortho spray I picked up for Squash Vine Borers, but it is not approved for use on the edible parts of the plant, and I needed to spray my cabbages.  It's a good thing I did that today as well, because when I went out to spray the tomatoes, two of my Chinese Cabbage plants had all their leaves eaten down to the vein!  Evil, evil bugs!  I feel terrible killing anything, even bugs, but it had to be done.  I just take comfort in the knowledge that there are exceptionally more insects on this planet then there are any other creature.  And since they have been around for millions of years, I doubt a few sprays of insect killer in my garden will upset the balance in the insect world.  Sorry bugs!

Because of all the bad news (bugs eating everything, fungus taking over), I decided there needed to be a bright spot in my day.  So along with the pesticides and other miscellaneous gardening items I purchased at the store today, I also picked up a replacement Roberto.  Roberto is our Ficus Rubber plant that Tom whisked away to his office at work.  Roberto was suppose to be a house plant, not an office plant, but Tom needed the air-cleaning qualities that Ficus plants possess.  Since there is probably no hope of Roberto returning in the near future, I decided to purchase Roberto 2.0.  If Roberto 1.0 ever does return, he will have a friend to hang out and purify the air with.  It feels cleaner in here already!

Tonights dinner with fresh from the garden zucchini!!  I had to share. :)

July 8th: Race for Garden Domination

Nothing is more exciting for a gardener than discovering that first blossom or first fruit on a plant you have put so much time and energy into helping grow.  And as anyone who grows several types of plants knows, everything has it's own blooming and fruiting schedule.  Well when I was out in the garden on Wednesday I was excited to find pumpkins already forming on two of the three plants!  However, my excitement was followed by confusion.  It is only the beginning of July, so I assumed it would be a bit longer before I saw any pumpkins.  After all, most people don't go pumpkin shopping around here until October, and there are farms were you can go pick your pumpkin straight out of the field!  And those are BIG pumpkins; I planted two small varieties!  If they have already started making pumpkins now, does that mean they will just keep churning out pumpkins till the fall frost does them in?  Will I have hundreds of pumpkins and nothing to do with them?  Will the plants produce so many pumpkins that they roll down the hill and bury the house?  I guess we'll find out!  Anyone want some pumpkins? ;-D

The discovery of the pumpkin fruits, made me wonder about the watermelon.  And sure enough, there was a watermelon fruit starting on the long vine as well!  That doesn't surprise me as much as the pumpkins, though I did think the vines would get a bit longer first.  I was hoping there would be plenty of watermelons, and it is looking like my wish will come true.  G-ma B will be pleased as well!

Good news/ bad news on the garden pest front.  First, the second application of liquid fence seems to be keeping the rabbits out.  Yay!  As long as it stays that way, I will be happy.  The bad news is I discovered there are Flea Beetles eating my cabbage.  The little buggers (pun intended) have put holes in my Chinese Cabbage leaves and are starting to munch on my Cabbage Babies as well.  I plan on asking the people at my local garden store what they would suggest I use on them.  The limited research I did do brought up so many choices that I decided I would just go straight to an expert since I need to go to the garden store anyway.  Will let you know what I end up with and if it works!

Last little tidbit.  The pumpkin and bean vines are competing in the Backyard Garden Domination competition.  I was unaware there was such a competition until both plants clearly showed me differently, with their excessive need for more and more space!  The question is, who will win?  (My money's on the pumpkin plants, but don't tell the beans!  They scare me!)  See the competition, and other photos, in the album below!
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Tumbling Tom And Squash Borer

It is official!  The big Tumbling Tom tomato plant has made it into the garden.  When I removed it from the pot, I was somewhat surprised to see roots all the way down to the bottom!  Everything came out in one piece as well; no soil left in the pot.  I guess I assumed the size of the pot was WAY bigger than was needed, and that the short time the tomato would spend in said pot would not have allowed it to have roots that deep.  Obviously I was wrong!  I then took the pot and put the Mr. Stripey plant, which has been growing from seed, into it.  Since the Tumbling Tom plant used all that space, I figured the Mr. Stripey seedling would enjoy some extra room as well.  So far he seems to be loving his new home.  I am pretty sure he will love being in the ground even more.  As soon as he has some branches, in the ground he'll go!

And speaking of late bloomers, I put one of the remaining pumpkin seedings into a mound right off our porch.  Both pots that contained the extra pumpkin plants got knocked over by a naughty chipmunk.  I left the pots as they were since I wasn't going to be needing either plant.  Well, one of the plants died, but the other one not only didn't die, but it made flowers!  I felt bad for it, so I decided to plant it in the "sand box" next to our porch.  I had wanted to plant flowers there last year, and so I pulled out all the weeds and starting digging, only to find that below the small layer of gravel there was sand!  I also found sandbox toys, and a container for holding lost teeth shaped like a molar.  No teeth were inside, thankfully!

After finding these treasures last year, I went with plan B.  I already had a flower I wanted to plant there, so I just dug a hole in the sand, dumped in a bunch of soil, and planted the flower.  It did great, so that is where the pumpkin went this year.  I had some extra soil, so I gave it it's own mound.  At first the leaves, which were a bit yellow when I put it in the mound, started dieing.  But now there are new bright green leaves, and even the stem looks better!  I predict that it will be a bit late in it's production, but if we get an extended growing season like we did last year, there will be pumpkins into early October!

And speaking of the squash family, I was doing my normal walk around the perimeter of the garden before actually working in the garden, when I noticed a squash vine borer!  I was actually on the phone with my mom at the time (reception is better outside), so I didn't swear when I saw it, but she can attest I was rather upset and wanted to swear!  My eyes got as wide as they could and I probably had the look of wrath on my face.  I immediately reached for my scissors to cut the damn thing in half.  However, it managed to fall into a rather thick area of grass, and therefore escaped certain death.  I use the very evil 'cut in half' method on Japanese Beetles, because I don't want to spray all of my edible plants directly with a chemical, and because they tend to just sit there when I move in with the scissors.  Bad news for the bugs, but great news for my plants.

With the advent of the squash vine borer's appearance, and it's much swifter movements, I knew I needed more than scissors, so Tom and I heading to the Home Depot and got some Ortho Max spray that is safe for use on edible plants.  I then sprayed my zucchini plants, which is were I saw the bug, and will keep watching my pumpkins to see if I need to spray them too.  I really don't like to use chemicals unless I absolutely have too.  And one chemical I had to use again was the liquid fence spray.  On a separate occasion from the squash borer, I came out to the garden to find two rabbits inside the garden!  Luckily they did not do too much damage, but I immediately got the liquid fence spray and sprayed the perimeter of the garden when I was done working for the day.  Crossing my fingers that they stay away!

More photos of the garden's progress from July 1st!
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Late Blight Warning!!!

Last year my tomato plants became infected with the Late Blight fungus, so I have been watching for any reports telling me to start prevention treatments.  Well, it finally happened.  It is extremely important for the home gardener in Wisconsin to treat their plants with an anti-fungal spray or powder, not only to prevent Late Blight on your own crops, but to prevent Late Blight from spreading to the commercial potato industry.  Not many people know that Wisconsin grows and exports potatoes every year, or that it is a big part of our farming industry, but it is right up there with dairy on the 'foods that come from Wisconsin' list.  There have already been reports in Michigan, so that is why they have been sounding the alarm for preventative measures here in WI.  

Links: http://milwaukee.uwex.edu/hort/index.cfm

To see what Late Blight looks like on different parts of the plant with a descriptor, click on the "Managing Late Blight in Tomatoes" link on the above page.  You will need Adobe Reader or a similar program to see it. 

http://fyi.uwex.edu/rockhort/2010/06/23/late-blight-prevention-recommended-now/

Late Blight used to only be prevalent South of Wisconsin, but it has finally made it up North and seems to be here to stay.  If you want to find out if Late Blight is affecting crops in your area, or about other plant diseases, I suggest contacting your local Cooperative Extension Office. You can find yours here: http://www.csrees.usda.gov/Extension/ You'll want to look under "horticulture" when you get to the extension homepage if there is nothing right out in front.  Also, local greenhouses and garden stores that sell tomato and/or potato plants, should have information as well.  

Once the plant gets infected, it is very difficult to control the spread meaning you have to completely destroy your plants.  The anti-fungal products that work against Late Blight do best as preventatives.  Their success at control is limited, and they cannot get rid of the Blight all together.  If you have Blight infected plants you should pull them completely out of the ground and put them in a plastic bag to go out with the trash.  DO NOT COMPOST INFECTED PLANTS!  

If your plants are still disease free, then you will want to get a fungicide spray or powder.  They have Copper based products (like Bonide Copper Fungicide) that work well and are considered safe for use in organic gardening.  There are also other products like Bonide Fung-Onil Multi-purpose Fungicide that will not only prevent Late Blight on tomatoes and potatoes, but will also prevent and/or kill a bunch of other fungus based plant diseases on several different plants.  Either way, you'll be good to go!

PLEASE take the necessary steps to prevent the spread of Late Blight.  Your tomatoes (and neighbors) will thank you!

Things are Fruiting!!

I have been avoiding working in the garden as of late, because of the insane amount of mosquitoes we now have.  Due to the massive amounts of rain that have fallen on us this month, mosquito populations have exploded seemingly overnight!  Our local news station said that they should all die off in a couple of weeks without leaving millions of offspring, IF there is no more rain in the near future.  Well the forecast for this week looks dry so far, but that doesn't mean it won't rain again next week!  So in the interest of retaining as much of my own blood supply as possible, I sprayed Cutter Bug Control on the lawn.  I sprayed it Saturday, and when I went out today (Monday), I noticed a huge difference!  Thank you Cutter Bug Spray!  I was careful not to spray it in the garden, or even up in the air in a manner that would allow it to drift in and affect the plants.  It is not that I don't want to prevent bad bugs from being in my garden, but I would rather not consume chemicals that come with a warning label specifically telling me NOT to consume them.  Crazy, I know!

As the above title claims, things in the garden are fruiting!  One of the Jalapeño, two of the Cayenne, and one of the Hungarian Wax plants have peppers on them.  Many of the others have been flowering, so I expect they will soon have fruits as well!  And there are a bunch of zucchini fruits growing with a ton more flowers forming.  I think I will have to start my canning efforts before the end of July!  I also noticed my very first tomatoes of the season beginning on my "Husky" Cherry Tomato plant.  The other tomato plants in the garden are growing taller and taller with more and more flowers on every new branch.  They should have there own fruits forming very soon.  I brought the big Tumbling Tom plant out with the intention of transplanting it into the garden today, but after a good hour and a half weeding session, I decided I would save that for tomorrow.  It is rather big now, and I should be able to bury a good number of 'baby' branches while still leaving some foliage on top.  I imagine it will start growing insanely as soon as it realizes it has a ton more space!  I can't wait!

Another little adventure in gardening that I dabbled in this last week was SURPRISE! flower planting at my parent's house.  On the evenings of the 24th and 25th, Tom and I made a trip down to my parent's place to plant some annual flowers and to drop off the tomato and pepper plants I had been plant-sitting.  I should probably mention that Tom didn't actually plant anything, and was inside the air-conditioned house for most of the time we were at my parent's, but he did participate.  He was SURPRISE! updating my parent's computers as well as cutting the tomato cages so that they would fit in the pots.  So he did do something, it was just much cleaner, cooler work.  My parents were enjoying their final days overseas while we worked away.  They just arrived home Sunday and are pleased with what they have found!  You could say 'we done good'.  ;-)

I have attached two photo albums to this post.  One is of the flowers I planted and the other is a progress report on the garden.  Enjoy!

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Rain, Rain, and More Rain! 6/22/2010

June 22, 2010:
Our wet and wild summer continues!  There have been storms and flash flooding with more on the way.  I have only watered the garden manually a couple of times this season, and it doesn't look like I will have to be watering it much in the near future.  And with all the water that has been dumped on my garden, I am amazed that everything is still doing so well!  There is one pepper, my serraño, that is not doing well.  Ironically it is wilted and looks like it needs water!  I am pretty sure that is not the case though.  I am holding out hope that it will bounce back.

I did get out into the garden today to do some weeding and stake the tomatoes.  I used tomato spirals for the first time last year, and I really liked them.  I put additional supports around the plant after it has grown more, but it seems to be easier for me to get to the produce and to manage the indeterminate tomato plants with the spiral. Of course you have to make sure you keep the main stem working it's way up the spiral, so if you have a ton of tomato plants, or not a lot of time to spend in the garden, you may want to stick with a cage or something similar. You can see two of my tomato plants on the spirals in the album below!

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Cabbage Nibbler

Bad news on the cabbage front. Turns out the blood meal didn't do the trick and more leaves got eaten. Some bean leaves are missing as well and carrot leaves. I decided to bring out the big guns; aka Liquid Fence Spray. I used it last year after I noticed nibbling and it seemed to help. The only issue is it smells horrendous when you first spray it, and last year I started gaging when I was using it. It dries odorless to humans, so that is good, but that initial application can be brutal! They suggest you apply it a couple of times the first month you use it as well, so I will probably have to go through it again. Because of my experience last year I wrapped my face in a scarf before using the spray. Worked like a charm! No gaging, though I did look ridiculous. I like the spray though, because it doesn't harm the animals or the plants, and it uses odor and bad taste to 'train' animals not to eat your plants. With the nice weed fence we have growing in and around the actual fence, it makes it even easier to apply, since all I have to do is spray the weeds on the parameter of the garden and that keeps bunnies and other culprits away!

I finished planting all the peppers bringing the total to 21. Two of my seedling peppers didn't make it out in the garden. I think they got flooded and it was just a bit too much for them. I bought replacements for them and planted them in their place. Luckily it was the two Jalapeño seedlings and not the Peter Pepper seedlings. They don't sell Peter Pepper plants anywhere around here, so I would not be able to replace them. The three Hungarian Wax seedlings are doing well, though they could be replaced if needed. They are continuing to get bigger though, so I think they will survive.

I have yet to put my Tumbling Tom tomato plant out in the garden, and there is space for at least one other tomato plant. There are actually two Tumbling Tom tomato seedlings that survived, but only one of them is getting bigger at the moment. I put a picture of it in the album below. Once it gets a bit bigger I will transplant it. I want it to be big enough that I can bury some of the branches after trimming them, so that the tomato plant will make more roots quickly. It is pretty neat that tomatoes can do that! Really helps them get a firm foundation right away. The other, tiny Tumbling Tom plant hasn't died, but hasn't really grown any more either. I replanted it into a bigger pot while also checking to see if it had any signs of damping-off. It's stem and roots are in good shape, so maybe the change in scenery will get it growing. I also replanted some Mr. Stripey seeds, and two seedlings emerged. It is now a race to see who wins the final spot in the garden, the tiny Tumbling Tom, or Mr. Stripey! Although Tumbling Tom had the leg up, I am betting Mr. Stripey will win this one. Feel free to start a pool amongst yourselves, and I will let you know the winner!

You will also see in the album that the peanut plants have started flowering! It is very exciting and fascinating, since I have never seen peanuts grow. At least I know they are doing well! Check out the beets and updated photos of my giant zucchini plants! I noticed there are some flowers starting to form on the zucchini as well, so that means soon I will have WAY too many zucchinis. Can't wait to start sharing them! And last but not least, the watermelon replacement I planted is doing well. That means the extra pumpkins are not needed. They hung in there well, but I am afraid I will have to bid them adieu! Enjoy the photos!

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