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Gary350
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Re: Tennessee 2020 Garden

Bermuda grass is a nightmare it slowly creeps into the garden from the yard. I decided to till 2 ft on the north side to get rid of Bermuda grass next to the sand bed where carrots had been growing. First trip through the soil tiller dug up about 50 nice size carrots and made tiller coleslaw. When I planted carrots seeds some of the seed blew into the grass. 3 more trips through soil deeper and deeper then raking away the Bermuda grass pieces. No dough I did not get all the grass, it will return.

Now that tiller is in garden I decided to do a very fast walk through till soil surface 1" deep to kill grass and weeds. I pulled up 1/2 the fennel plants and cut the other 1/2 short.

Now that I can see the sand bed and all the grass & weeds are gone I decided to plant garlic. Garlic is so easy & zero maintenance why would anyone not want to plant garlic. 3'x10 ft bed already has 12 gallons of sand, I put 1 gallon of wood ash in the sand bed with about 1 quart of 15-15-15 fertilizer. After mixing in wood ash & fertilizer I planted 78 soft neck garlic & 84 hard neck garlic. If I had more hard neck garlic to plant I would not plant any soft neck garlic. Hard neck garlic grows faster, grows bigger, and has a better garlic flavor. I mixed 10 gallons of charcoal with 10 gallons of potting soil & 8 gallons of used flower pot soil together then covered garlic 2" deep to hold moisture and keep garlic cool.

I found a Master Gardener video, how to grow garlic. When planting grocery store garlic pull open the bulbs only plant the smallest cloves they will grow the largest bulbs. Plant garlic 2 months before first frost. Harvest garlic about 6 weeks after last frost. Nothing to do now but wait. I need a marker so I can remember hard neck is on the west side & soft neck is on the east side.

This new camera takes better pics in the sun than the old camera. Has anyone noticed sun is 1/2 as bright as it was 3 months ago maybe that is why camera takes good pics at the moment.
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Gary350
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Pepper plants are growing lots of peppers in this cooler 85 degree weather. One limb has 8 sweet bell peppers, another limb has 7 and another has 3. One plant got so heavy all the limbs broke off now we have another bag of sliced peppers in the freezer. New Mexico pepper plants make pepper with almost equal flavor as sweet bells only difference is New Mexico plants make 3 times more peppers that are smaller. 3 New Mexico peppers are about = in size to 1 sweet green bell pepper.

Now that we have all these peppers I am learning to cook new things for breakfast and dinner. German sausage, Kielbasa sausage, Cajun sausage with onions & peppers on the grill are very good.

Cucumber plants are starting to grow tiny cucumbers. A few more days maybe there will be cucumber to pick.
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Gary350
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It was nice to get away from life for a while. No garden, no TV, no internet, no cell phone, no covid-19, no mystery seeds, We went camping to relaxed and had fun for 3 days. I am tired of the garden & all the evil in the world we needed a break. After we returned home & unloaded the RV & vehicle I picked a garden water melon then threw it into the ice chest for a few hours. After dinner we ate 1/2 the melon it is the very best watermelon of the season. I ate 2 large slices and will probably have to get out of bed tonight 5 times to pee. LOL. It is FUN to eat melon in the yard like we did as kids then spit seeds in the grass & throw whine in the yard. After you throw enough melon scraps in the yard flies leave you alone at the table. :) We had several meals at the camp ground with sliced, green bell peppers, onions, and choice of 5 different kinds of sausages. Our camp site was right on the water edge.
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It looks like I am a garden addict. As much as I want garden to be over I can't resist growing something else. This morning when I went to cook breakfast I see several potatoes growing eyes. I cut 1 eye from a potato and made hash browns. I went to the garden as sun was starting to come up in search of green peppers for breakfast. I made another, onion, pepper, sausage breakfast with hash brown potatoes & coffee. There are many peppers in the garden that are not full grown, I refuse to pick peppers until they are full size. I will inspect my potatoes for eyes maybe I can find enough for a winter crop of potatoes.
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Today's harvest, 4 kinds of peppers, tomatoes, okra. I picked all the Red color Tabasco peppers, I'm not sure yet what to do with these. I picked all the jalapeno peppers & Mexican chili with tiny micro small cracks the cracks are an indicator peppers are full size and will not get any larger. If peppers stay on the plants they will take a month to turn red but cut them off they turn red is 1/2 the time. Green bell pepper on the left has a bug hole so I picked it early before bugs totally destroy the pepper. I think I will make a jar of Jalapeno peppers and vinegar to preserve them through the winter I like to cook with the red color spicy peppers. I am letting okra go to seed so I can plant a hedge row fence along the back property line next year. Last night I dreamed about making chili 6 or 7 times before I woke up. Tomorrow maybe I will make chili. Chili is not a good choice in hot weather but it has been several month sense we had a pot of chili. I picked some lemon thyme it smells very good, I need to cook something with it.
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imafan26
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Looks so yummy. I think it is a great idea to do something different once in awhile. I feel inspired. Even with a stay at home order, there is no reason not to have a picnic in my backyard. It would at least be a different routine from the usual microwave dinner.

The sausage and peppers look great. Did you braise it in beer?

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imafan26 wrote:
Sat Sep 12, 2020 1:42 pm
Looks so yummy. I think it is a great idea to do something different once in awhile. I feel inspired. Even with a stay at home order, there is no reason not to have a picnic in my backyard. It would at least be a different routine from the usual microwave dinner.

The sausage and peppers look great. Did you braise it in beer?
It is good to get away and do different things we are doing a day trip 1 day every week with a picnic lunch. Monday we are doing a day trip to a State Park camp ground 100 miles north it has picnic sites on the water and camp sites on the water too. We have picnic areas all to our self middle of the week, campground is almost empty middle of week. They are sold out on weekends.

I have been cooking sausage on both sides until dark brown with a tablespoon of soy sauce or Worcestershire sauce, I have not tried beer yet. We discovered 4 sausages in AL we have never seen in TN so we bought 1 package of each. We are returning to the same AL camp ground Oct 15 to 18 to camp with about 50 couples that all have an old vintage camper trailer. We are having great fun with 6 different vintage camper trailer groups we all meet at a State Park to camp for a 3 day rally.

I joined an online Sausage Forum it was fun to make my own sausage for a while experiment with all the herbs and flavors. It has turned into too much work & too much sausage, it is more FUN to buy all the different type sausages we can find. ALL PORK sausage is best, it is hard to find a grocery store that sells all port sausage most have a mix of, turkey, beef, chicken & pork.
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imafan26
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I think it is great you still have parks to go to. I used to go day camping once a month to the North Shore. Spent a whole day there picnicking and reading my garden books. I'd pack my bike sometimes since the park had a long driveway that was relatively safe to ride on.

Now, parks and beaches have limited access for exercise only and while people are now being allowed to sit on the beach, no gatherings of any kind, not even 2 people are allowed.

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Gary350
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imafan26 wrote:
Sat Sep 12, 2020 4:17 pm
I think it is great you still have parks to go to. I used to go day camping once a month to the North Shore. Spent a whole day there picnicking and reading my garden books. I'd pack my bike sometimes since the park had a long driveway that was relatively safe to ride on.

Now, parks and beaches have limited access for exercise only and while people are now being allowed to sit on the beach, no gatherings of any kind, not even 2 people are allowed.
TN has 117 campgrounds. Lots of State Parks, a National Forest, & a National Park. Also TWRA has their own campgrounds at all the lakes with boat ramps. Also many many private campgrounds. There may be more I don't know about.

Blight killed the watermelon vines so I pulled up the vines and saved the last melon. Melon was small about the size of a cantaloupe it turned out the be good I ate the whole thing. It was cloudy most of the day so I tilled the garden all the grass & weeds are gone. Soil is so dry it tilled up like powder. It needs to rain very hard for the garden to look like it rained at all. Maybe tomorrow Q-comber plants might finally have a few Qs large enough to pick. The 4 sweet potato plants keep getting larger & larger and it is full of grass and weeds.
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I picked 6 cucumbers from the new cucumber patch today. 7" of rain was very helpful in making these very slow growing plants finally make cucumbers large enough to pick. New Bread & Butter pickle recipe is so easy, pack jars full of sliced cucumbers then fill to top with brine. They are ready to eat in 1 month. I already tested this recipe pickles taste very good. Spring is the correct time for cucumbers & all plants not fall.

I harvested the sunflower seeds. I have about 1 gallon of seeds. Birds & squirrels won't eat them. Cats & dog won't eat them either. They make very nice yellow flower plants. Next year there will be a 40 ft row of these in the garden and maybe a 40 ft row of black sunflowers I know birds & squirrels fight of them.

I saw a yellow bird in the garden I have never seen before. No camera to take a pic and it did not stay long. I found this picture online, I think this is the bird I saw. I wish it would come every day and stay a while.

The new humming bird feeders are working great. These are the type feeders that don't squirt out all the liquid every time the sun comes up. I am surprises TN humming birds are the size of my little finger. I was surprised when I saw AZ humming birds purple color the size of sparrows.
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Bug of the day. I think this is a walking stick. I was outside eating lunch at the table when this bug came. Bug was not afraid of me until I tried to take a picture then it ran fast with those 2" long legs.

Harvest of the day, cucumbers & peppers. We have 3 more jars of pickles.
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Yep, that is walking stick or stick horse. Not sure what those things eat, I don't know how beneficial they are.

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Harvest of the day 2 cherry tomatoes from a volunteer plant.

Tacos for dinner with tomatoes.
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Time for lunch, dig in. I think 5 gallons of tomatoes & 1 gallon of vinegar will make a good chili sauce, but too spicy hot for me. Cooler weather & 7" of rain made a pepper explosion. I might make 1 pint of chili sauce with the few tomatoes I have. There are about 40 green Jalapeno peppers that I did not pick. The 1 gallon basket is over full. I have not tasted a Habanero pepper yet an won't. I wanted color like flowers but peppers go from green to red or green to orange, they look nice anyway. I need more, orange, yellow, purple, colors.
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After a week of rain there are no bugs. I was about to give up on Q-combers but today I decided to spray for blight again. I have been watching 6 cucumbers slowly get larger they should all be the correct size to pick tomorrow morning. 1 is larger than the rest I will check it at 10pm with a flash light it might be time to pick it. Temperature in the 50s tomorrow morning.

Wife put a pork roast in crock pot at 12 noon, 2 hours later she put in some potatoes and green beans. Then another 2 hrs later dinner was ready. Turn crock pot off let it cool a while so its not too hot to eat for dinner. This is my favor way to eat 1 meat & 2 vegetables. We had bread but I was too full to eat it. We still have 60 lbs of potatoes & about 10 lbs of beans. I ate a Honey crisp apple with Skippy peanut butter 1 hr after dinner.
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I moved my shade signs away from the basil plant 3 weeks ago hoping plant will make seeds but too late weather is too cool for it to bolt. It was 54 degrees again this morning cool weather has made basil grow larger and fill out with larger leaves. Plants has a small bug problem. It is probably time to pull all the basil leaves and let them dry. I had the 2 signs stuck on the soil at a 45 degree angle over the basil to block the sun it works excellent to keep plants cooler in 98 degree heat they do not bolt. I once had a 3 year old basil plant in AZ in 114 degree heat it never bolted in full summer shade.

Cool weather has stopped cucumber from growing larger. 1 more day of 85 degree weather 6 cucumbers will be large enough to harvest. There are lots of smaller cucumbers if weather stays cool the small Q-cumber will never get large enough to pick. Weather forecast is 85 degree weather next week for only 1 day. It is only 6 weeks until first frost.

I tied up the limbs on the pepper plants cooler weather made them load up with lots of peppers. I still lost 1 limb on the New Mexico chili plant it was too heavy with peppers. I lost 1 limb of a big Bertha sweet bell pepper to 60 mph wind last week.

Garden is almost over. I am still trying to decide if I should dig up sweet potatoes early, I always let frost kill the plants before I dig potatoes. Wife only wants 10 lbs of potatoes. I never dug potatoes early so it is possible potatoes do a lot of there growing the next 6 weeks in cooler wet weather before frost kills the plants. Frost makes digging up sweet potatoes several times easier leaves are gone then vines are easy to follow to each satellite potato and the mother plant too. Judging by the looks of these 4 plants there could be 100 lbs of potatoes, I often get 25 lbs per plant and 1 year I got 35 lbs of potatoes from 1 plant. Sweet potato plants are a zero maintenance crop, plant them in spring so they get full sun all day, do nothing for 6 months, dig potatoes after frost kills the plants.
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Gary, you kept a basil plant going for 3 years? Wow. I have cuttings I rooted in water, hoping to get indoor basil going for winter. But when potting them two days ago I discovered they had tiny flower buds. I nipped those off: Do you think I'm too late to get a useful not-bolting plant from these? The leaves get bitter after bolting.

Actually the cuttings look a bit sad in their new medium so I'm not sure they'll even thrive. The parent plants in the garden are about to flower so I should have good seed for next year.

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After lunch I picked the 6 cucumbers I have been waiting for to get larger. Then I decided I am tried of cucumbers & pickles I want this project to be over so I went to the garden to pick all cucumbers that looks large enough to be pickles.
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The new master gardener recipe says to pack cucumber slices very tight into quart jars then fill jars with brine. A week later hard cucumber slices become soft an pack tighter then jars are only 60% full. Today I decides cucumbers need to be soft before packed in jars so I bought brine to a boil then threw in the cucumber slices. When brine came to a boil again about 3 minutes I removed cucumbers then packed soft cucumbers tight in quart jars. Then I filled jars to the top with brine. Add seals & rings, clear jars, date lids, 5 quarts of pickles finished.

Next I made enchilada sauce. I have talked to several Mexican people about enchilada sauce recipes they are almost all the same with slight family differences. Most people do not put tomatoes in Enchilada sauce but we learned from eating factory make enchilada sauce in a can we like enchilada sauce with tomatoes best. Maybe that is why we like some restaurant enchilada sauce better than others? I have an enchilada sauce recipe from a Mexican lady that contains tomatoes that I have never made so I made it today. It turned out to be the best enchilada sauce I ever made. Recipe will be in recipe section of the forum soon.
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Today I picked 7 very nice size cucumbers and 6 smaller cucumbers 3 of which were all worms. About 50% the saved cucumbers were wormy. I decided to do as grandmother & mom did, cut out the bad & keep the good. Now about 75% of the cucumbers are good. I cooked cucumber slices in boiling brine about 2 minutes the soft cucumber pack much tighter in quart jars. 2 more quart jars of Bread & Butter pickles for the pantry. Recipe calls for onions I left them out this year I hope that does not hurt the good flavor. Oh well pickles will all become relish in a few more months. Maybe we can add onions when we chop pickles into relish if we decide pickles need it. The only thing we are harvesting from the garden now are, cucumbers, peppers, tomatoes.
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Today I expanded the hard neck garlic bed, 84 more garlic. I had to work quick and cover it with fence wire silly cats think soft soil is their new poop box. Hard neck garlic I planted 2 weeks ago is coming up. Soft neck is not coming up and not expected for another 2 weeks.

Winter garden experiment #1. Left to right = west to east. 10 Napa cabbage. 10 Waltham 29 Broccoli. 10 Russian Red Kale. I am going to observe how quick seeds germinate & how quick they grow as the temperature slowly drops to frost then freezing & colder. I ordered Chinese Savoy cabbage seeds, Red Swiss Chard seeds, round head green cabbage seeds. I will plant 10 of each plus more seeds if I get more seeds. I also have 2 other cabbage seed experiments to start next week. If we have a mild Nov we might have cabbage by Dec.

We replaced the old humming bird feeds with the new kind that will not leak out all the liquid in 3 days every time sun comes up. Humming birds have found both feeders sometimes there are several hummers. No birds coming to the other Black sunflower seed feeders maybe they have gone south already or maybe live bugs are better than seeds.

Bug of the day photo #7. I saw this tiny little cricket about 2 times larger than a grain of rice. New camera did a good job taking a close up photo.

Dinner, Thai Hot & Sour chicken & rice spicy vegetable soup. It has been a while since I made this, it was so good I ate 2 large bowls. I would love to have a soup bowl with a built in cooling system.

I also ordered 250 yellow onion seeds = brown onions = Spanish onions, not to be planted until about Feb 20 in the house then transplanted outside April..
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This morning I cut all the, 6, 7, 8 ft long limbs off of the tomato plants all they do is drain energy from the plants. Limbs with blossoms & green tomatoes can stay. Long limbs get up back 2" from green tomatoes & blossoms. This makes short stubby plants with green tomatoes that will grow larger and get ripe sooner.

I pulled up all the cucumbers vines too this will make a place for more winter cabbage experiments. There are so many bugs even the tiny finger size cucumbers are full of worms.

All the vines & limbs get sprinkled into the yard so sun will dry them out. About a week from now I well mow the grass with dead vines & limb and blow all the dead organic material into the garden where it can be tilled into the soil.

I picked more dry okra pods for seeds I think 70 is more than enough each pod has an average of about 75 seeds. Next spring I will sprinkle 5000 okra seeds along the property line to see if I can make hedge row like a 6' tall fence between us and the new subdivision to the south.
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Gary, how long does it take for an okra pod to mature and dry? I was hoping to save a pod or two for next year.

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TomatoNut95 wrote:
Mon Sep 28, 2020 10:56 am
Gary, how long does it take for an okra pod to mature and dry? I was hoping to save a pod or two for next year.
Once pods get too large to eat 1 more month they will dry out turn brown then cut them off for seeds. I keep pods inside the house to dry toss them some where and forget about them for 3 months. Feb when its cold and you need something to do pods will be splitting open on there own seeds are easy to remove. There are several rows of seeds in every pod.

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Bugs are eating pepper leaves but not the peppers. Plants are loaded with peppers. All 6 varieties of pepper plant leaves have more holes than Swiss cheese. I inspected leaves very close no bugs to be seen. I shake the whole plant 100s of tiny white bugs small as a grain of salt fly out 3 ft then circle around and fly back to the plant. I am amazed a bug this tiny can fly so fast they can fly out and back making a 6 ft circle in 3 seconds. Bugs totally disappear in the plant leaves. Basil plant leaves are full of hole too I need to pull up the whole plant and let the leaves dry. Something ate the leaves completely off other wild poke berry plants. I pulled up all the cucumber plants yesterday. I pulled up all the okra plants today. I planted a 25 ft row of cilantro today plants might live all winter they freeze at 15°F. I accidentally knocked a few pepper off the plants.

An advertisement came up on my computer about mixed chili powder. Years ago I found an artificial that said, the best flavor chili powder is a mix of about 95% very mild spicy peppers with very good flavor blended with 1 or more hot spicy peppers to give it the desired heat. I have about 100 peppers in my dehydrator today. Tear gas ran us out of the house so dehydrator in now in the garage.
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I picked only enough sweet green bell peppers to keep the limbs from being heavy and breaking limbs off. Plants are loaded if all those little peppers get bigger before first frost Nov 7 there will be a bushel basket of peppers. New Mexico pepper plants are loaded too some are large enough to pick but not until I have time to deal with them. I picked all the jalapeno peppers that are ripe peppers with tiny gray color cracks indicate they are ready to pick, there is probably enough jalapeno to fill a 5 gallon bucket. Tabasco peppers are loaded too I think cool weather has made them turn yellow color. The cayenne peppers are loaded too I picked enough for 1 pint jar full. Habanro plant is loaded too I have only been picking the orange & yellow color peppers, today I picked a few green ones. I'm not sure what to do with these peppers my sons refuse to take them and Mexican friend won't take them either. I will see if I can give them away on market place.

Today I dug up 1 of the white sweet potatoes. 5 more weeks until first frost I am ready to dig up 10 lbs and leave the rest that is all wife wants. I have a friend that will probably come digs the rest of the potatoes up.

Today my seeds arrived, I planted, red chard, savoy cabbage, broccoli, napa, round ball cabbage, kale, in a 36 ft row.

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3 jars of peppers. Jalapeno, Tabasco, cayenne, left to right. Each pepper was boiled in its own vinegar. Vinegar is used on food not the peppers. Jars can be refilled with more vinegar as vinegar is used.
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It must be too cold for seeds to germinate online info says 40° plants set there waiting for warmer weather. 42°F this morning & high today 55. Its been in low 40s every night & mid to high 60s every day. Row 1 was planted 11 days ago no plants. Row 2 was planted 7 days go no plants. First frost is 4 weeks away. Its too late seeds should have been planted a month ago. Green house is cancelled lumber prices are $1 higher than a week ago $9.50 each 2x4x8' board.
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42 doesnt sound too cold for cold crop seed to germinate. I never start my cold crops directly into the ground. Except for the few times I've done turnip greens. Also you've got keep the soil moist.

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Gary350
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TomatoNut95 wrote:
Mon Oct 05, 2020 1:11 pm
42 doesnt sound too cold for cold crop seed to germinate. I never start my cold crops directly into the ground. Except for the few times I've done turnip greens. Also you've got keep the soil moist.
Every thing I read about cabbage related seeds 40°F seeds & plants will both set there and wait for warmer weather. It has been dry no rain for a week. I have been watering but maybe it is too cold temperature peaked at 61 today at 3 pm. Temperature is below 50°f for about 12 hours every night. Starting tonight plants in trays stay in the house until plants grow. OH look 1 Napa plants is growing.

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It was 65°F & sunny when I put the fish aquarium green house over the plants & 10 minutes later it was 102°F inside. I removed fish aquarium it warmed up to 75° today. Plants are now inside house to stay warm after dark this should make them grow a bit faster. There is 1 Napa cabbage 1/2" tall plant in the garden. Wait & see what happens if we have a mild weather like we use to have plants will be good until January. The past 5 years we have had crazy unusually early cold weather 15°F in Nov then 60° in Dec. I put soil in 2 more plant trays and planted a few more seeds now there are 10 trays = 40 plants.
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TomatoNut95
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Don't worry, I'm sure they'll come up. Ever try turnip greens?

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Gary350
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Do you know when Jalapeno peppers are ripe they get 100s of tiny little cracks, look at the first picture. Take them in the house if you don't eat them soon they turn Red color & red is not as spicy hot as green.

I was talking to my friendly Mexican neighbor that lives in 1 of the new houses behind us, he was telling me how they make several types of, salsa, sauce, spreads, with spicy hot chili peppers. I gave him a 1 gallon basket of, Habanero peppers, Tabasco peppers, Cayenne peppers, Jalapeno peppers. I don't have many Mexican chili peppers yet the plant is loaded there should be about 50 nice 6" long peppers before first frost. Neighbor told me how they make green and red sauce with Mexican chilies. He makes chili sauce & salsa by the gallon with a whole bundle of grocery store cilantro & 1 whole garlic bulb in each gallon.

I bought a foot long bread at the grocery store to make garlic bread for dinner using my home made garlic butter. Bread was good but not as good as grocery store garlic bread. Not sure how grocery store has such a good strong garlic flavor.?
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Gary350
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The only thing growing in the plant trays are, 4 Napa, 1 Kale, 5 red chard. Only thing growing in the cabbage row is, 3 Napa, 2 Kale. 4 more weeks until first frost. We are camping in the mountains 3 days it is going to frost there Fri night.

The basket of okra are drying out in a few more months they will split open then seeds will start falling out on there own.

Red peppers are drying very slow they dry faster if they are sliced. Red Jalapeno will be jalapeno chili powder. Maybe I give the cayenne to the Mexican neighbor.

All the jalapeno pepper plants are loaded with peppers. The Mexican chili plant look like it has about 50 chilies. Habanaro, tabasco, cayenne, plant has too many peppers to count.

I sliced the jalapenos.
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Gary350
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Mother nature does a much better job of growing plants from seeds in the garden soil than I can in plant trays. Cabbage row started out slow but now it is doing better than plant trays even though trays were planted a week sooner. Now I am having second thoughts about growing cabbage. If your constipated eat cabbage. If your not constipated LOOK OUT huge cow pile will shoot out in 1 second like a rocket engine. LOL. Never had this problem before it must be an old age thing, wife has the same problem today we ate the rest of the Savoy cabbage fried in skillet last night. LOL. I will let cabbage row grow just to see how well it does in cold weather. Maybe I can learn exact temperature plants freeze at. Maybe we eat some very good cabbage in smaller amounts. :)
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Gary350
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I have been picking tomatoes early so they ripen in the kitchen to keep bugs from destroying them. Never had bugs this bad in 45 years. We decided to make chili to use up all the ripe tomatoes & peppers piling up in the kitchen before we leave to go camping several days in the mountains, it will be 39°F here tomorrow night and 29 in the mountains. I sliced up all the kitchen tomatoes, peppers, and 12 garlic cloves & 1 large onion. A quart jar of last years tomatoes, 2 kinds of beans, cook 2 hours it turned out good. After dinner we had a quart of chili left to take camping. I sliced some hard bread to eat with chili. This is a terrible year for chick weed the garden keeps getting taken over by chick weed. I have tilled soil several times just to kill chick weed but it comes right back like soil is full of billions of seeds. Garden was a carpet of chick weed last winter with rain & mud ever day there was no way to till soil to kill it.
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That's a good idea about picking the tomatoes early. Do you pick them while green or when they're a little red?

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Gary350
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webmaster wrote:
Fri Oct 16, 2020 10:08 pm
That's a good idea about picking the tomatoes early. Do you pick them while green or when they're a little red?
I watch tomatoes until they loose some of there green color before they turn red then I pick them when they are pale green color. They turn ripe in kitchen in 7 to 10 days. Flavor is as good as if they got fully ripe in the garden.
Last edited by Gary350 on Mon Oct 19, 2020 7:50 am, edited 1 time in total.

Vanisle_BC
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Gary350 wrote:
Sun Oct 18, 2020 7:18 pm
webmaster wrote:
Fri Oct 16, 2020 10:08 pm
That's a good idea about picking the tomatoes early. Do you pick them while green or when they're a little red?
I watch them until they loose some of there green color before they turn red then I pick them when they are pale green color. They turn ripe in kitchen in 7 to 10 days. Flavor is as good as if they got fully ripe in the garden.
We also find they ripen anyway, even picked green without any 'blush.' Our sweet peppers do the same but seem more inclined to rot than the tomatoes. In both cases it's important to store them in something like basketwork with plenty of air circulation, and inspect often.

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Gary350
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1. Cabbage plants are slow to grow in cool weather. About 1/2 the seeds germinated and about 1/2 the plants vanished. There is 1 volunteer potato in the photo I put a marker on it so it can be found easy 6 months from now.

2. Garlic is looking better. About 1/2 of the cloves have grown tops.

3. The largest Mexican chili plant appears to have about 40 peppers the smaller 4 plants only have a few peppers.

4. Small Mexican chili plants have only had 2 months to grow peppers.

5. Basil plant is very large and 1 more volunteer potato plant with a marker.

6. Both jalapeno plants are loaded with about 50 peppers each.

7. 2 more volunteer potato plants with markers. Winter potatoes usually produce about 1 lbs of new potatoes.

8. Chickweed is taking over time to till and kill this stuff.

9. I did a quick 20 minutes till to kill chickweed tomorrow I see if it needs to be tilled again.

I experimented with my new camera it has several settings pics are all 2.1MP. Lower setting is 1.2MP these show up very large size on my computer for some reason so I decided use 2.1mp. 1.2MP pics look very good maybe computer setting should be changed so it looks better? The 2.1MP pics load slower than 6.0MP that is strange? There is another number 2.1MP (16:9) what does that mean?
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Gary350
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Plant trays have been dumped and the few plants in the trays were transplanted to empty spots in the 1st row. More new plants have come up now the whole row is full with 36 plants.

I made a 2nd row with 15 cauliflower & 11 broccoli. There are 4 Broccoli in the 1st row so that makes 15 broccoli total. Weather is going to be in the 80s for 5 days maybe new seeds will germinate.

It was 81 degrees today, sun is too low & trees are too tall there was NO direct sun on these plants all day. That means there will be no sun on plants for 4 months sun will continue to do down until Dec 22. Sun will not be above trees until about March 1. I can not have a green house with no sun. Everything I read says cabbage and all cabbage related plants need full sun all day. I think I wasted my time planting these. Oh well wait & see what happens.

I am ready to dig sweet potatoes so garden is finished for the year.
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