imafan26
Mod
Posts: 13962
Joined: Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:32 am
Location: Hawaii, zone 12a 587 ft elev.

Imafan's 2021 Garden

The new year is here. I got up early this morning and headed down to Lowe's. I got 4 cu ft of Amend ( $25.96. They don't use sewage sludge anymore, just chicken and beef manure), 2 cu ft bag of Sta Green garden soil ($13.98.) It is the first time trying it so I only got one bag, 1 bag of steer manure ($9.98), 2 bags of sluggo ($19.96), a rain guage/thermometer on a stand that was on sale for $2.67 could not pass that up. 3 cu ft peat moss (the bag is smaller than the standard 3.8 cu ft and it was $16. The total after taxes $92.70. Most of this is going to go into the main garden when I harvest (steer manure). I am going to try again to tweak my potting soil recipe to add more of the garden soil to cut down on the peat moss. I still need to get more perlite. Lowe's did not have it. I do have a couple of cu ft of perlite at home so I can start building some of the pots.

A big investment in the future and this is only one bill. Let's see my most productive and expensive crops are eggplant ( $2.99 lb), kale ($249 a bunch) Komatsuna ( priceless, it is only home grown), Cucumber average 11 cucumber per planting ( $2.99 lb), fresh herbs (approx $3 an ounce. Fresh herbs can't be beat for flavor ), green onions ($1.59 non-organic), long shanked tokyo green onions ( $3.99, its the kind I have), hawaiian chili/ super chile $7- $20 lb depending on season. Bitter melon ( $3.99 lb, doesn't matter, bitter melon is a weed), Chard ($3 bunch), sweet potato leaves ( $3 bunch), Lemons $1 each, other citrus I.e. calamondin (good for trade.) Ginger $3 lb,

Crops that are not very productive.

Sweet corn (average 67 ears on 47 plants, my entire garden. Love it fresh from the garden, raw, local cost 2/$1. While I can get a good harvest and I don't waste any corn, it is a heavy feeder of nutrients and takes up a lot of space for low $ return. Snow peas ($4 per bag, about 4-6 oz)- very seasonal crop, need to pick frequently but I do like them so I am on the fence with this one.

Beets ($3 lb), I can grow beets, but my soil at home is not as good for this crop. It has too much nitrogen and I get tops at the expense of the roots. Bell peppers $4 lb. If I could get a decent crop it would be worth it, but I only average 5 peppers on a plant and I struggle to get nice ones. Onion, garlic, potatoes, carrots - All of these things are not easy to grow. I would have to have a large garden space which I don't have to even grow enough for my needs. Southern onions don't keep well, garlic bulbs are small. Potatoes and carrots are cheaper to buy than to grow. Beans ($5 lb). It would be a good thing to grow, I just don't like beans that much. The beans are also the favorites of slugs. I will spend more money on slug bait than the beans are worth. I'll still try to grow some because they don't actually take up a lot of space and they can be grown in pots. Zucchini ($2.50-$3 lb) - I do have to grow parthenocarpic varieties so the seeds are expensive. It takes up a lot of space, the fruit have to be bagged because of fruit flies. It attracts fruit flies that will attack the cucumbers. Have to buy bags, but they are reusable a few times. The plant takes up a lot of space. It can be frozen. This is another one that I am on the fence about. I could recoup the investment, but I don't like zucchini that much. I would rather grow upo that takes up a huge space, but produces more fruit than zucchini. I use upo more than zucchini. Kabocha- another vining crop. I will get 3 pumpkins from 1 vine on average. It gets stung a lot, but it tastes really good. Same with butternut, only a few squash for all the space it takes.

In the end, I will still grow some of the marginal crops if I have the space and especially if I already have seeds. I can also plant another papaya. It does not take much care and papaya are expensive $3 each on average. Seeds are not hard to come by, or I can raid my mother's trees for papaya as well as limes and basil. I think that is an even better Idea, costs me gas to get there and back.

I have emptied out 2 of the 18 gallon pots and started bleaching the smaller ones. Getting rid of the spent soil, is still challenging. I have found more pots infested with soil mealy bugs. The smaller pots of soil, I have trashed. The larger pots I am using for fill in places that I am not planting. Some of the infested plants, I am using hot water treatments. So, far that has been working and I can't see the mealy bugs anymore. The plants that have mealy bugs that are too big to dip, I am using imidicloprid to treat the soil. I can only do that with ornamentals. The edible crops that cannot be soaked but are easy to replace are being dumped and the ones that are harder to find, I am propagating before dumping them. I am trying to propagate the rose cuttings. I still cannot get simplicity to propagate. The ramblers propagate easier and so far one tea rose still has a chance. I would propagate more bay leaves, but I really don't need any more and even though they take 6 months to root and they do command a higher price, I may not have any home for them later. I will try to topiary some of my ornamentals. They take time to develop and hopefully by 2022 the club or the garden will have another sale.

I am soaking an avocado pit and a purple sweet potato for propagation.

So far, I have not seen any bareroot roses at the nursery yet. I don't know if they will be bringing any in. The rose society already got their shipment of roses from Weeks roses. I need to ask them if they are thinking of having a sale this year or if they are going to wait again. 2020 rose sale was cancelled because of covid 19.

imafan26
Mod
Posts: 13962
Joined: Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:32 am
Location: Hawaii, zone 12a 587 ft elev.

Yesterday was the second nice day this year.

I have harvested all of my bok choy and made essentially beef broccoli replacing the broccoli with bok choy.
I found one lettuce in the garden ready to pick. The lettuce has been very small. I think I figured out why. I have Blue Vates Kale on one end of the garden and Lacinato kale on the other. None of the lettuce under the lacinato has lasted two weeks. Besides the bok choy, I have komatsuna, beets, chard, 2 peppers, culantro, green onions, and Thai basil. Also the aloe and Jamaican oregano.

None of the lettuce next to the bok choy got very big. The one lettuce I have is four feet or more from the Kale and about 4 ft from the Komatsuna (mustard.)

Beets and chard are in the same family so they get along. Lettuce and cabbage get along with beets. However, lettuce and cabbage don't get along. The cabbage seem to be suppressing the lettuce. I will have to make another arrangement. The garden is 8x16 ft so there isn't a lot of space for separation and I have brassicas spread out all over the garden. I may have to do some lettuce in pots at least while there is cabbage in the garden.

I usually spread out the kale because they are semi permanent in the garden as they can live more than one year. Usually, I only have one kale plant, so this problem did not come up before because the lettuce was not planted near the kale before.

I just planted some seeds and there are pepper volunteers all over the place. A couple of peppers are dying but they have pods so I will take those seeds and replant them. The chiltepin plant finally is making peppers. It looks like the popolo plant. Popolo is in the pepper family, but it is used to make black dye and medicinally. The birds usually drop it in the yard. I will be able to tell once the berries ripen as the popolo will be black not red. If it is popolo, I can still take it and put it in the medicinal herb garden. I may have to cage this pepper becaue it is just the size that the birds like.

I checked my ginger and it does not look good. The pieces are small and many of them have been in the pot too long and they are shriveling up. I was going to try to harvest them, but I think it will be too much work. I have left them unharvested in the pots for too many years. I am going to get new seed pieces instead. This will be the first time I have bought ginger in years. On the other hand, the galangal is happy, it may need a wider pot.

I am having to clean and bleach my pots because of the mealy bug infestations, so it is slowing down some of my planting. I also have to deal with the contaminated soil. I just experimented with using the hot water treatment to treat the soil. I will see in about 2 weeks if the infestation has cleared. Supposedly mealy bugs will also starve if they have no food. So between the hot water and letting the soil stay fallow for a while, I may be able to treat some of the least compromised soils in small quantities.

The katuk that I hot water treated is looking much happier now. It is in a bigger pot and is growing again. There is no sign of reinfestation.

The weather is cool now in the 70's on most days. It has been raining at night off and on. I had changed my soil mix last summer because it was hard to get media and also because it was so hot. I have more peat moss and less perlite so it is a 60/40 mix instead of 50/50. The MG potting soil mix is different too. It looks like some of the peat moss has been replaced by forest products. It makes for a heavier mix. While it still works in the pots, I have to add perlite to it and it holds water longer. This is a good thing in summer, but complicates things now in the rainy season. I have to change my watering habits. Some pots are too wet to water more than 1-2 times a week. Small pots and pots that have more perlite or cinder have to be watered more. The potbound plants have to be watered daily. Although the orchids don't have a lot of media, some don't have any, they are drying slower in the cooler weather so they don't have to be watered everyday either. It saves water, but it is making it hard for me to water only what needs watering.

I regret feeling sorry for the grass and feeding it in September. The weeds in the grass are forcing me to weed whack it more often than I like. Image does not kill grassy weeds.

Vanisle_BC
Greener Thumb
Posts: 1354
Joined: Mon Apr 13, 2015 9:02 pm
Location: Port Alberni, B.C. Canada, Zone 7 (+?)

@imafan26, what are the details of that hot water treatment? If you posted those I've missed them. Is it good for destroying weed seeds; but might it leach out desirable nutrients?

I grew Lacinato Kale for a time but now have only a curly type. It's an interesting observation you make about the relationship between your lettuce & kale.

Abandoned plants that are stubbornly surviving our winter are two Arugula; one from a 2020 spring sowing and one a flourishing volunteer beside the compost pile. They're very welcome as we enjoy the leaves in salads & sandwiches.

imafan26
Mod
Posts: 13962
Joined: Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:32 am
Location: Hawaii, zone 12a 587 ft elev.

The hot water treatments don't really work on weeds unless you have a 30 cup coffee urn that gets hot enough, and can do small batches because it takes hours to do that. I actually take the soil that is salvageable to the garden. They have a soil sterilizer. I pick it up later, but it will be mixed with other soils from the garden. The link below shows what the soil sterilizer looks like. It requires 220 line and unless you have a lot of soil to sterilize it is an expensive accessory. it is also heavy for one person to lift, although not impossible if it is cool. I sterilized soil in the oven once. I will never do that again.

The heat treatments work for heat treating seeds to reduce seed borne pathogens and for treating the soil mealy bugs. It is used mostly to treat infested houseplants without killing the plant. The water temperature for mealy bugs is 120 degrees for 10 minutes or until the root ball temperature reaches 115 degrees. I left the pot in the hot water for 30 minutes. I heated the water in batches to 125 degrees since it cools by the time I pour it in the bucket. The plants were fine and when I took the plants out of the pot, all the mealy bugs were gone. Even the pot was clean.

Seed treatments are 100 degrees for 10 minutes for seed borne pathogens like bacterial diseases. It may not be enough for viruses.

I have grown lettuce before , so I knew it wasn't because I did not know how to grow lettuce. I made the observation that the surviving lettuce was farthest away from the cabbages. The romaine was actually mixed in with the bok choi and beets. All the lettuce I planted near the kale died in a couple of weeks. Of course, the snails helped with that too. So, I looked it up. Some of the guides said that lettuce was compatible with cabbage, but this one did not. Lettuce though is fine with beets and mustard (even though it is in the cabbage family) which is probably why the komatsuna did not affect it as much.

From: Mother Earth News companion planting guide
Lettuce:
Plant near: beets, carrots, parsnips, radishes, strawberries
Keep away from: cabbage family
Comments: lettuce tenderizes summer radishes.

I also learned the hard way that cucumbers and beets don't like pole beans but sometimes are o.k. with bush beans. The marigolds and long beans did not get on well together either. The snails also went after the beans as well.

I have cleaned out a couple of the big pots, but I won't fill them until the transplants are ready. I do have to set up my fruit fly traps. I have a bitter melon volunteer growing on the ground next to the trellis and I am contemplating whether to keep it or pull it.

I need to plant my sweet potato leaves. I just don't know where to put the pot. These are table sweet potatoes that are grown for their leaves. They don't make tubers. In the tropics, this is like the bitter melon, and NZ spinach, an easy productive crop that can run like crazy.


https://www.motherearthnews.com/organic ... az81mjzraw
https://www.extento.hawaii.edu/kbase/reports/hIlandsc_rootmealyb.htm
https://sustainable-farming.rutgers.edu ... -diseases/
https://www.usgr.com/soil-sterilization ... erilizers/

Arugula is sold year round here, but it is only sweet at this time of the year.

I only planted the carrots because I already had the seed. I was surprised it germinated so well considering it was a couple of years old. Last year, I planted the carrots in January and they weren't big enough until July. In 90 degree weather, they were sweet and bitter at the same time. This time I planted them earlier in a large rubber maid tub. I had to thin out half of the seedlings (painful to have to do that). I also got some potassium nitrate and gave the carrots a side dressing of that because I was told the reason my beet roots are so small is because I need to boost the potassium. To try to cut down on splitting, I am now watering the container less often and watering them till it runs out the drain when I do water. I will have to harvest baby carrots to thin them out more. I have never really successfully grown carrots to full size that wasn't bitter. The Nantes did the best, but it had to be harvested small because it did not mature until it was hot. This is the first time I tried planting carrots in the fall. All this work, is why it is cheaper to buy them at the store.

I thought the cucumber was done and I stopped watering it. It is now flowering, but he leaves are getting old. I am going to start some new ones anyway. This Summer Dance variety has been just as good as Soarer.

Today I planted seeds of Summer Dance (4), Tigress zucchini(1), Shimonita negi (actually it is more like a leek), Aristotle bell pepper(5), Chinese Giant bell pepper(8), and Camaro seeds(2). I have only planted a few seeds so if they don't germinate or survive I will have to start again. I don't need a lot of these and the seeds are expensive so I am willing to do only a few at a time. My day temperatures are warm for January around 70 degrees which is enough for the peppers. The tomatoes will germinate at 50 degrees. The bell peppers don't actually like the cold, but they hate the heat worse. It is still too cold to get good germination on most of the super hots, but since the pepper plants are blooming, the regular to medium hot peppers should be o.k. to plant now.

User avatar
Gary350
Super Green Thumb
Posts: 7396
Joined: Mon Mar 23, 2009 1:59 pm
Location: TN. 50 years of gardening experience.

imafan26 wrote:
Sun Jan 03, 2021 7:45 pm
The new year is here. I got up early this morning and headed down to Lowe's. I got 4 cu ft of Amend ( $25.96. They don't use sewage sludge anymore, just chicken and beef manure), 2 cu ft bag of Sta Green garden soil ($13.98.) It is the first time trying it so I only got one bag, 1 bag of steer manure ($9.98), 2 bags of sluggo ($19.96), a rain guage/thermometer on a stand that was on sale for $2.67 could not pass that up. 3 cu ft peat moss (the bag is smaller than the standard 3.8 cu ft and it was $16. The total after taxes $92.70. Most of this is going to go into the main garden when I harvest (steer manure). I am going to try again to tweak my potting soil recipe to add more of the garden soil to cut down on the peat moss. I still need to get more perlite. Lowe's did not have it. I do have a couple of cu ft of perlite at home so I can start building some of the pots.

A big investment in the future and this is only one bill. Let's see my most productive and expensive crops are eggplant ( $2.99 lb), kale ($249 a bunch) Komatsuna ( priceless, it is only home grown), Cucumber average 11 cucumber per planting ( $2.99 lb), fresh herbs (approx $3 an ounce. Fresh herbs can't be beat for flavor ), green onions ($1.59 non-organic), long shanked tokyo green onions ( $3.99, its the kind I have), hawaiian chili/ super chile $7- $20 lb depending on season. Bitter melon ( $3.99 lb, doesn't matter, bitter melon is a weed), Chard ($3 bunch), sweet potato leaves ( $3 bunch), Lemons $1 each, other citrus I.e. calamondin (good for trade.) Ginger $3 lb,

Crops that are not very productive.

Sweet corn (average 67 ears on 47 plants, my entire garden. Love it fresh from the garden, raw, local cost 2/$1. While I can get a good harvest and I don't waste any corn, it is a heavy feeder of nutrients and takes up a lot of space for low $ return. Snow peas ($4 per bag, about 4-6 oz)- very seasonal crop, need to pick frequently but I do like them so I am on the fence with this one.

Beets ($3 lb), I can grow beets, but my soil at home is not as good for this crop. It has too much nitrogen and I get tops at the expense of the roots. Bell peppers $4 lb. If I could get a decent crop it would be worth it, but I only average 5 peppers on a plant and I struggle to get nice ones. Onion, garlic, potatoes, carrots - All of these things are not easy to grow. I would have to have a large garden space which I don't have to even grow enough for my needs. Southern onions don't keep well, garlic bulbs are small. Potatoes and carrots are cheaper to buy than to grow. Beans ($5 lb). It would be a good thing to grow, I just don't like beans that much. The beans are also the favorites of slugs. I will spend more money on slug bait than the beans are worth. I'll still try to grow some because they don't actually take up a lot of space and they can be grown in pots. Zucchini ($2.50-$3 lb) - I do have to grow parthenocarpic varieties so the seeds are expensive. It takes up a lot of space, the fruit have to be bagged because of fruit flies. It attracts fruit flies that will attack the cucumbers. Have to buy bags, but they are reusable a few times. The plant takes up a lot of space. It can be frozen. This is another one that I am on the fence about. I could recoup the investment, but I don't like zucchini that much. I would rather grow upo that takes up a huge space, but produces more fruit than zucchini. I use upo more than zucchini. Kabocha- another vining crop. I will get 3 pumpkins from 1 vine on average. It gets stung a lot, but it tastes really good. Same with butternut, only a few squash for all the space it takes.

In the end, I will still grow some of the marginal crops if I have the space and especially if I already have seeds. I can also plant another papaya. It does not take much care and papaya are expensive $3 each on average. Seeds are not hard to come by, or I can raid my mother's trees for papaya as well as limes and basil. I think that is an even better Idea, costs me gas to get there and back.

I have emptied out 2 of the 18 gallon pots and started bleaching the smaller ones. Getting rid of the spent soil, is still challenging. I have found more pots infested with soil mealy bugs. The smaller pots of soil, I have trashed. The larger pots I am using for fill in places that I am not planting. Some of the infested plants, I am using hot water treatments. So, far that has been working and I can't see the mealy bugs anymore. The plants that have mealy bugs that are too big to dip, I am using imidicloprid to treat the soil. I can only do that with ornamentals. The edible crops that cannot be soaked but are easy to replace are being dumped and the ones that are harder to find, I am propagating before dumping them. I am trying to propagate the rose cuttings. I still cannot get simplicity to propagate. The ramblers propagate easier and so far one tea rose still has a chance. I would propagate more bay leaves, but I really don't need any more and even though they take 6 months to root and they do command a higher price, I may not have any home for them later. I will try to topiary some of my ornamentals. They take time to develop and hopefully by 2022 the club or the garden will have another sale.

I am soaking an avocado pit and a purple sweet potato for propagation.

So far, I have not seen any bareroot roses at the nursery yet. I don't know if they will be bringing any in. The rose society already got their shipment of roses from Weeks roses. I need to ask them if they are thinking of having a sale this year or if they are going to wait again. 2020 rose sale was cancelled because of covid 19.
Tip for growing sweet green bell peppers. When I lived at the other house in town & my garden was 75% smaller than I have now I tilled 50% peat moss into the soil & 15-15-15 fertilizer & calcium into the soil for 4 pepper plants. Peat moss makes soil very soft so pepper plant roots can grow very long very quick. My 6 ft tall plants produced 30 to 40 very large 4" sweet green bell peppers. Potassium makes lots of blossoms & lots of blossoms makes lots of peppers. Fertilize every week & calcium every week too. Plant them now they will do GOOD if your having 70 degree weather all winter. If your using low grade fertilizer you probably need to fertilize every other day.

Plant, Onion, garlic, potatoes, carrots, in BEDs not rows to save space. Put beds end to end with no walk space between beds except the sides. If you plant onions from seeds now you will have a good crop in a months if you have 70 deg weather all winter. Plant medium size onions 6" apart & large onions 8" apart. Genetic determines onion size, spanish onion is medium, walla walla are large, short day onions. Onions actually need Ammonium Sulfate fertilizer 21-0-0 it has sulfur that plants need. Onions like soft soil.

Plant potatoes in beds too. 1 eye per cutting, 8" between eyes, 3 rows side by side, 8" between rows. Fertilize with 5-20-20. Plant cuttings deep where soil moisture is but only cover cuttings with 1" of soil.

If you have 70 deg all winter plant carrots & garlic now too. When I lived in AZ my gest crops were planted about Dec 1st we had 65 to 70 deg all winter during the day. Plant carrots & garlic in beds to save space. NOT raised beds, just garden soil level bed shape. You can use markers to show the bed shape. 1000 carrot seeds in beds 3'x10'. Garlic bed 3'x10' about 200 garlic cloves.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/ONION-SEEDS-20 ... 2749.l2649

https://www.ebay.com/itm/300-WALLA-WALL ... 2749.l2649

imafan26
Mod
Posts: 13962
Joined: Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:32 am
Location: Hawaii, zone 12a 587 ft elev.

Thanks for the tips Gary. I can grow hot peppers just fine, but the bell peppers have always only gjven me 3-5 good sized peppers and then either disease or pests attack them. the ones that survive produced smaller peppers. The local Kaala bell does grow well, but it is a mini pepper. I did get some potassium nitrate from amazon and it is 26-0-46 NPK. I still have to figure out how much of this I can use in a 1 gallon pot. I may have to start with a pinch since the NPK is so high. Some of the hot peppers need the potassium nitrate to germinate better, and I have so far used it to supplement the carrots. I grow most of the peppers in pots. I may have kept some in pots that were too small too long. They do o.k. in 1 gallon pots for the first peppers, not so good after that. It is a peatlite mix. I do have some bell peppers in the ground now for the first time. Hawaii soils have nematodes and not all of the peppers I have a nematode resistant so that is why most are in pots. I also have high humidity around 80% most of the time so, bacterial diseases are the biggest challenge to keeping peppers healthy. The hot pepper varieties have more disease and nematode resistance so they do the best in the ground and they can handle hotter weather. They still get bacterial spot and I have learned it is just better to pull those plants than to try to save them.

Your "small" garden is bigger than mine. Except for pots, which I literally have hundreds of, my main garden is 8x16 ft oval with stepping stones instead of paths. The carrots are in a rubber maid tub about the size of a 48 quart cooler. I have grown garlic, but I have never really gotten nice bulbs. Onions, I did get a nice harvest but southern onion (Texas granax), don't keep and it is hard to cure them in a humid environment. They took up too much space for 5 months. I could use the ground much more productively growing Asian vegetables, lettuce, kale, and chard with shorter days to harvest and multiple harvests. I have grown tomato beans and cucumbers in the main garden, but I prefer to grow them in the 18 gallon pots just next to the main garden on the permanent trellis. I am going to try to grow sweet potatoes in pots. They like this climate better and the leaves are also edible so more versatile than potatoes. This will be the first time in a long time I have grown sweet potatoes. I stopped growing them because they were full of holes bored by worms. One variety of sweet potatoes that I have is only grown for its leaves and does not make tubers.

Taro, ginger, sweet potatoes, and citrus are in pots deliberately to control their size and for some their spread. Hot peppers are in pots and a few have escaped into the ground. I have some citrus escapees that I will have to cut down if I can't get them out of the ground. I have some ornamental plants as well as most of the orchids are in pots as well. It is why I have to water nearly every day. I have so many pots.

I have to switch gears since there is probably not going to be a plant sale at the garden or at my clubs for a long time. I usually pot things up for the sales and grow vegetables and herbs for the sales of which the proceeds go to the garden (they provided me with media and pots.) I have to now throw away more of the divisions, not make cuttings of things like the bay leaf, and only keep seedlings for myself. It is hard to plant fewer seeds. I am used to planting a lot of seeds and some of them would not make it. Now, I am planting one zucchini, 4 cucumbers,and 2 tomato seeds. If I fail, it is a major fail because I will have to start over, but I also don't want to waste seeds and have more plants that I will have to kill off later. As it is I now have over 30 Thai pepper seedlings I have to pot up. I have to choose the best ones and kill off the rest. The only good part about it is that the seeds are from an existing plant, so the seeds did not cost me anything. I have super chili volunteers. I have to do the same thing, save a few and get rid of the rest.

I have to divide my orchids. I will probably end up with more of them. I don't know where they are going to go either and they are all the same thing. The popcorn orchid has almost filled the 2x8 ft bench master now.
The pots are too big and heavy to hang. The spikes are up, but they won't bloom till April or May.

On the bright side. My planter strips along the driveway are starting to fill out. There are a lot of weeds in them but some of the flower seeds I planted have started to bloom. I have more alyssum and marigolds blooming now. Pruning the gardenia helped to open it up and I did treat it, the hibiscus, and the roses with systemic rose care. The roses have not had issues with black spot despite all the rainy nights and the gardenia sooty mold is getting better. I hosed off the scale from the leaves on the bay leaves. I should have taken pictures. I forgot. It looks better too. I need to put out ant bait. There are white flies on the peppers but they are being managed with water, the peppers are healthy so they are tolerating the nuisance.

Some of the citrus are dropping over ripe fruit. I need to pick them more.

I have plants that need to go into bigger pots. They will take a lot of media and they won't be able to move well since they will be heavy. I have a dolly, but I don't have a lot of level ground. I may need to get a hand truck added to my tool list. There aren't really good pots available either. Most of the new pots are made of very thin materials and don't even have drain holes, so I have to add those myself.

imafan26
Mod
Posts: 13962
Joined: Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:32 am
Location: Hawaii, zone 12a 587 ft elev.

It rained early this morning. It is too late to weed whack now. I did plant compots of koba green onions, garden chives, cilantro. grand rapids lettuce,and red beard onions.

I am trying a new soil mix. I used 1part perlite, 1 part peat moss, 1 part sta green, 1 cup of citrus food 6-4-6 with slow N and micros, 1/4 cup of osmocote. I used the mix to fill my new 18 gallon container and planted a Tigress zucchini. I use a bag (this was a cinder bag), as mulch. It keeps the weeds down, keeps the soil from drying out at the top too fast, and keeps the dirt from splashing back on the zucchini leaves.

The sta green contains forest products, lime, wetting agents and what looks like Apex slow release fertilizer. It is similar to osmocote, but cheaper.

The ingredients in the stay green looked like forest products mixed with peat moss. There was some perlite, but not much so I added perlite to improve drainage and used it to start the seedlings. I was worried at first since the cucumbers came up looking a little yellow, but they opened up with good color and are growing well for this stage. Since the sta green has fertilizer, I won't supplement. My usual seed mix is peat lite with or without osmocote.

This new planting mix looks like I could cut the perlite a bit more. I still used the same starter fertilizer for 18 gallon pots. My general mix is 50/50 peatlite plus about 1/4 cup of osmocote per 5 gallons of mix. I add additional fertilizer for the 18 gallon plants since I usually have heavy feeders like tomatoes, cucumbers, and squash planted in them. I also plant beans in the pots, although they are not heavy feeders, they just get bigger.

The sta green is about $4 cheaper than MG potting soil. MG potting soil, quality seems to be going toward more forest products and less perlite. If this works better, I can cut the cost of the peat moss by subbing some of the sta green which is not intended to be used as a potting soil and cutting some of the perlite since it looks like it can be cut more. Sta green also has the slow release fertilizer, although the NPK is lower than I would like, I may be able to figure out a way to decrease the total amount of starter I am adding. I may not have to add any osmocote to the starter mix and that would still be a saving. So far it looks good, only time will tell if it works and if I can tweak it a bit more.
Attachments
20210117_111910.jpg
20210117_111915.jpg
20210117_112005.jpg
20210117_112124.jpg
20210117_112132.jpg
Tigress zucchini in 18 gallon pot
Tigress zucchini in 18 gallon pot

User avatar
TomatoNut95
Super Green Thumb
Posts: 2069
Joined: Sun May 26, 2019 11:11 am
Location: Texas Zone 8

I used to buy Sta Green. But I turned away from it because the nutritional value was extremely low, and my plants would turn yellow not too much longer after I planted them in it. Not to mention it was full of sticks and bark.

imafan26
Mod
Posts: 13962
Joined: Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:32 am
Location: Hawaii, zone 12a 587 ft elev.

Sta green says that is not intended as a potting mix on the bag, but I looked at the ingredients and it does have good ingredients and it has fertilizer that looks a lot like Apex which is a slow release fertilizer. It is why I mixed the sta green with the peat moss and perlite.

I am using it basically, to cut down on the more expensive peat moss. I added the same amount of fertilizer I would have added for my homemade peat lite mix which is the osmocote and 6-4-6 with micros.

I looked at the pot today. After three days of almost constant rain, it looks good. I have enough perlite in the pot to keep it well drained and the zucchini has a couple of regular leaves now.

I am using a little less than 30% sta green. The sta green is better quality than amend or n rich which contain manures and forest products which do cause me a lot of issues in pots.

So far so good. I will have to give it a few weeks before I judge it a success or not.

It seems like I am adding a lot of fertilizer. I grow big things like cucumbers, squash, tomatoes and beans in 18 gallon pots. A cup of 6-4-6 with micros is not very much considering the low numbers and the fact that is has slow release nitrogen. The osmocote is added to my general potting mix. I still will have to side dress any plant that stays in the 18 gallon pot for more than 60 days on a monthly basis because the plants will deplete the fertilizer for the most part. This is something I have already worked out for my growing conditions.

In a seed starting mix I may or may not have any osmocote since seeds don't need and are sometimes harmed if there is too much nitrogen in the soil.

One of my bell pepper tops broke. The plant is still alive, so it can grow side branches.

I finally got out and weed whacked the weeds in the public side of the front yard. I also did have to water, the ohia and tagetes lucida were beginning to wilt. They need to be in bigger pots.

I just ordered some 20 gallon fabric pots from amazon. They should get here by next week. Hopefully I will have enough soil to plant one or two of them.

My ginger is looking too sad and it is old. I am probably going to start with new rhizomes.

The sweet potato I have soaking in water is sprouting shoots at last.

I lost all of the rose cuttings again, but I was bad, I did not water them every day. and they are in the sun and wind since my bench is cleaned up.

The roses are starting to bud up again, so soon I will have more rose cuttings to experiment with.

So far the lavender did well in the rain. Nothing has turned black so far and the pots actually needed water today.

The flower seeds I planted along the driveway are starting to bloom. There are a lot of weeds in the bed and a couple of tomatoes but they are being camouflaged well.

The next storm system will only bring enhanced showers but more gusty winds in the 30-50 mph range. The surf is back down below warning levels at around 3-7 ft.

I ordered more seeds from Tomato Growers Supply. They changed their website. It has nicer pictures, but I prefer the old site. The growing information is more important to me than the pictures. It took me longer to navigate through the site this time and it looks like they are offering fewer varieties of seeds.

I have started harvesting the Kuroda carrots. The baby carrots are about 5 inches long. I am growing them in a 48 qt rubbermaid storage bin. I gave the carrots some potassium nitrate and I am deep watering them every 2-3 days to encourage the roots to go deeper.

My worm bin had no food left. The worms or whatever is hungry. I just gave them the kitchen scraps from the freezer and perpetual spinach leaves, more newspaper and another egg carton. Hopefully, that will last for a week.

Some of the pots I planted before the rain came have sprouted. I have green onions and chives sprouting. Some of the pots were on the dry side, I'll have to wait and see what will happen to them.

I have to cut the rambler roses again, they are trying to ramble.

User avatar
Gary350
Super Green Thumb
Posts: 7396
Joined: Mon Mar 23, 2009 1:59 pm
Location: TN. 50 years of gardening experience.

I looked up Sta-Green plant food = fertilizer. Is that the only fertilizer you have available to buy where you live?

You should buy fertilizer specific for each plant.

Tomatoes need 5-10-20 with calcium for BER.

Peppers need 10-10-20 with calcium for BER

Corn needs 40-5-5

Onions needs 21-0-0 the first 6 weeks then 0-20-20 the next 3 months.

Beans needs 15-15-15 and calcium

Potatoes need 5-15-30

Melons & cucumbers need 15-15-15 with calcium for BER 100° full sun in dry soft surface soil but moist soil down below .

Sweet potatoes don't seem to care if they ever get fertilizer, 100° Full sun 5 months of drought in good soil they do good.

Look online find out what each plant that you grow needs.

I looked up Sta=Green plant food products I have found nothing that I would buy for my garden because none of the NPK value are correct for things I grow.

When I lived in Arizona good garden fertilizer was almost impossible to buy all the stores sold fertilizer marked for, cactus, palm trees, lawn, etc in 2 lb bags for $5 and 5 lb bags for $15. There were farmers in the area I know they don't buy plant food for 200 acres of corn or onions in tiny 2 lb bags with prices 20 times over priced. It took me a long time to find a farm supply company in AZ that sold fertilizer in 50 lbs bags for $10 each. I could not find calcium in AZ so I bought cement 40 lb for $2 per bag.

Here is the list of Sta-Green NPK products that I found online.

NPK = .05-.04-.03 I can't believe this in legal to sell as fertilizer, maybe this is soil for flower pots?.

1½ lb bags $4.99

5 lb bag $10.99

14 lb bag $14.99

32 lb bag $24.99

41 lb bag $41.99

NPK values

29-0-5

24-8-16

32-0-10

6-4-6

29-0-5

26-0-12

These are all high nitrogen except 6-4-6. I don't want any of those on my tomatoes or peppers.

6-4-6 will be ok for beans but I need to buy $100 worth of that for a 40 ft row of beans but it contains no calcium so you need to add calcium.

Read about calcium it makes fertilizer available for plants. If your soil is low in calcium plants can not use the fertilizer your give them, fertilizer is wasted.

Calcium washes out of my soil from all the rain we get I have to add calcium a little bit every 1 or 2 weeks other wise my fertilizer is worthless. We have lots of rain 250 days of rain every year average.

When I lived in AZ all I could find was small over priced bags of fertilizer the best I could do for a while was to buy 2 or 3 bags of fertilizer then mix them all together to try and get the NPK values each plant needed. I was flying back and forth from AZ to TN to AZ ever several months I put a 40 lb bag of TN farm grade fertilizer in a suit case and took it on the airplane to AZ. LOL

I don't see anything in the Sta-Green plant food list that I would buy expect 6-4-6 for beans but that is too over priced for me, I bought 50 lbs bag of 15-15-15 for $13 a few weeks ago and I have to add calcium when I use it.

Nitrogen is still nitrogen no matter what form it comes in, organic or farm supply store.

Potassium is still potassium no matter how you buy it organic or farm supply store. Potassium promotes blossoms that because vegetables like tomatoes, peppers, squash, etc. If plants have few blossoms then you get few vegetables. It soil is low in potassium blossoms will drop off of the plants or not grow blossoms at all. Roots need potassium to grow, onions, garlic, potatoes, carrots, etc.

I burn anything I can get to get free calcium and free potassium, lumber, trees, limbs, bushes, grass, weeds, sticks.

I chop all my dead plants with the lawn mower then put it back into my soil. I have no compost pile, my whole garden is a compost pile.

imafan26
Mod
Posts: 13962
Joined: Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:32 am
Location: Hawaii, zone 12a 587 ft elev.

I used to buy all kinds of fertilizer, 10-30-10.10-20-20,10-10-10, 8-8-8, 9-12-12, miracle grow, Peters, bulb food, rose food, Miracid (now it has a different name), osmocote, nutracote, sulfate of ammonia, fish emulsion, EM1 (I still have some of this left).

Since I started to test my soil regularly, I don't need all of this. The original soil tests on all of my gardens were so high in phosphorus and my home garden was off the scale at 2100 ppm. I haven't needed to add phosphorus to the main garden for 10 years. My home garden's last phosphorus was 1600 ppm. All the soil test said I needed was about a small amount of nitrogen, and I use sulfate of ammonia for 21-0-0 for that. All the other nutrients were high or very high. I only use the complete fertilizer for pots.

Osmocote for my homemade potting mix and nutracote which is more expensive than osmocote but lasts longer and is not dependent on temperature for release for the orchids. I have a lot of citrus trees and a lot of acid loving plants.

Citrus food is an acidic fertilizer with slow release nitrogen (6-4-6 with micros) low numbers is all I need. It replaces the rose food, and miracid and mostly replaces the water soluble fertilizers which I still have to use occasionally because some orchids are hard to fertilize any other way except with a water soluble fertilizer. I have 13-2-13 which is the orchid special just for that. I don't use the 10-30-10 anymore. I use the 10-20-20 when I have things that require more potassium, but it is high in phosphorus that I don't need. I recently got muriate of potassium just for root crops. It has a NPK of 0-0-60. I literally used a pinch per 2 gallons of water for my carrots. I only did it once.

I added potassium even though my soil test showed that my potassium was in the moderate level on the last test, because I am still getting more tops than roots even with using even less nitrogen on the root crops. I was told I needed more potassium.

Turns out potassium and phosphorus are relatively immobile in the soil. Nitrogen is very mobile, and it is why a little nitrogen goes a long way and gets very fast results. Phosphorus is known to be bound with aluminum in our soil and you actually have to saturate the soil with phosphorus before it becomes available to plants. I used to use super phosphate, and my soil is actually over saturated now. Potassium has the same problem as phosphorus, the total number looks high and soil test measure the total number not what is available on soil tests. My root crops are telling me that the potassium is not available to them so that is why I needed to add more potassium. The citrus food only contains 6% potassium. It isn't enough for the root crops but it is o.k. for the fruits. The 10-20-20 is mainly for papaya and banana which are known to be heavy feeders of phosphorus and potassium.

I still have a backlog of fertilizers I have bought over the years. It took me 4 years to use 20 lbs of sulfate of ammonia. I actually fertilize less now. I don't fertilize weekly anymore and so it takes a long time to use the fertilizers up. Instead of buying so many different specialty fertilizers, I try to buy a few. The citrus fertilizer takes care of pretty much all my acid loving plants gardenia, roses, citrus, azaleas, tropical rhodies, tomato, peppers, cucumbers, and herbs that are in pots. In the ground, I primarily use just sulfate of ammonia and compost which has phosphorus. Osmocote fertilizer for my potting mix and the specialty orchid fertilizers which can also be used on other plants. And I only added the muriate of potash recently because I needed that for the root crops.

The other fertilizers I have are fill ins when I need a general purpose boost, or when I run out of the main fertilizer. I don't buy a lot of them. Most of them I bought a long time ago or I got a good deal on them. I can use some of them as starter fertilizers but I have to use less of the higher numbers or I will have problems with burning. The fast release fertilizers are not as good as slow fertilizers for the potted plants and require small but frequent feedings.

If you are growing mostly one kind of thing like only tomatoes then it is reasonable to use a special fertilizer. I grow at most, intentionally, 3 tomatoes at a time, but I have a lot of citrus trees, more than a dozen in pots. My soil tests tell me I don't need to add phosphorus for a long time and the plants are not showing signs of deficiency. Only the root crops are giving me more tops than roots, so that is the only need I have to address. I have cut the nitrogen I am giving my plants. P.S. nitrogen is not tested for, but nitrogen is volatile in the soil so it always needs to be replaced. I still have lots of leaf production and I still get fruit on my tomatoes and cucumbers so it isn't overboard yet. My plants are still taller than the books say they are so I could cut the nitrogen a bit more.

Good plants do start with good soil. The soil has to have enough organic matter to hold on to nutrients and enough balanced nutrients to support the plants. Too much or too little fertilizer give less than ideal results. This is especially true of synthetic fertilizers. It is easy to create toxic conditions that take a while to fix. Organic takes years to build up good soil and fertility, but requires moving a lot of material every year which is hard for me to do; requires weekly organic fertilizer. This is not practical for me when space is limited and I don't have the luxury of having a fallow space for six months of the year to give the organic components time to mature. I do intensive planting, so there is a lot of demand for nutrients in a small space. A blend of adding compost every time I plant and using measured amounts of synthetic fertilizer, gives me optimum yields.

imafan26
Mod
Posts: 13962
Joined: Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:32 am
Location: Hawaii, zone 12a 587 ft elev.

Planted three of the four roses in the sun breaks between the rain. The last rose will be in a pot since it needs a lot of space. The rain actually softened the clay so it was easier to dig the hole.
I planted:
Angel face - lavender floribunda
Tiffany - pink hybrid Tea
Mr. Lincoln- Red hybrid Tea

All of the roses are fragrant

Gold Medal which is a grandiflora needs more space so I am going to pot it up for now. Walmart brought in roses but there was not a big selection to choose from. But at $8 a rose, it beats paying $50 + shipping. I have had Mr. Lincoln before so I know it is a tall tough rose. I have also had Angel face. It is not the kind of rose I usually like. It does produce more flowers than a HT, but floribundas have weaker necks and this rose does have glossy leaves. I do like its ancestor Sterling Silver. Because it is raining, I have given all the roses a systemic insect and fungal control. It controls black spot and the roses with the new leaves will need extra protection from sucking pests. It won't stop the peach scale, but physical controls (a scrub brush and soapy water), regular feeding and pruning will keep the roses as healthy as possible.

The seedlings of the romaine, cilantro, peppers, and green onions are up. They are growing very slow, but that is probably because of the cold weather. It was 64 degrees last night and it is 71 degrees at noon now. The rain is going to be passing showers today. The cold front from the NE should be coming tomorrow with heavier rain.

Harvesting Kale, Swiss Chard, Perpetual Spinach, citrus, snow peas. I still have carrots to pick when I need them.

imafan26
Mod
Posts: 13962
Joined: Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:32 am
Location: Hawaii, zone 12a 587 ft elev.

The sta green mix with the added perlite did o.k. as a seedling mix. It is cold now and seedlings don't grow fast. It seemed like they needed a boost so I gave it some additional fertilizer and it did better.

A cold front is passing today with heavy rain that started last night. It is clearing now.

User avatar
Gary350
Super Green Thumb
Posts: 7396
Joined: Mon Mar 23, 2009 1:59 pm
Location: TN. 50 years of gardening experience.

imafan26 wrote:
Sat Jan 23, 2021 3:10 pm
I used to buy all kinds of fertilizer, 10-30-10.10-20-20,10-10-10, 8-8-8, 9-12-12, miracle grow, Peters, bulb food, rose food, Miracid (now it has a different name), osmocote, nutracote, sulfate of ammonia, fish emulsion, EM1 (I still have some of this left).

Since I started to test my soil regularly, I don't need all of this. The original soil tests on all of my gardens were so high in phosphorus and my home garden was off the scale at 2100 ppm. I haven't needed to add phosphorus to the main garden for 10 years. My home garden's last phosphorus was 1600 ppm. All the soil test said I needed was about a small amount of nitrogen, and I use sulfate of ammonia for 21-0-0 for that. All the other nutrients were high or very high. I only use the complete fertilizer for pots.

Osmocote for my homemade potting mix and nutracote which is more expensive than osmocote but lasts longer and is not dependent on temperature for release for the orchids. I have a lot of citrus trees and a lot of acid loving plants.

Citrus food is an acidic fertilizer with slow release nitrogen (6-4-6 with micros) low numbers is all I need. It replaces the rose food, and miracid and mostly replaces the water soluble fertilizers which I still have to use occasionally because some orchids are hard to fertilize any other way except with a water soluble fertilizer. I have 13-2-13 which is the orchid special just for that. I don't use the 10-30-10 anymore. I use the 10-20-20 when I have things that require more potassium, but it is high in phosphorus that I don't need. I recently got muriate of potassium just for root crops. It has a NPK of 0-0-60. I literally used a pinch per 2 gallons of water for my carrots. I only did it once.

I added potassium even though my soil test showed that my potassium was in the moderate level on the last test, because I am still getting more tops than roots even with using even less nitrogen on the root crops. I was told I needed more potassium.

Turns out potassium and phosphorus are relatively immobile in the soil. Nitrogen is very mobile, and it is why a little nitrogen goes a long way and gets very fast results. Phosphorus is known to be bound with aluminum in our soil and you actually have to saturate the soil with phosphorus before it becomes available to plants. I used to use super phosphate, and my soil is actually over saturated now. Potassium has the same problem as phosphorus, the total number looks high and soil test measure the total number not what is available on soil tests. My root crops are telling me that the potassium is not available to them so that is why I needed to add more potassium. The citrus food only contains 6% potassium. It isn't enough for the root crops but it is o.k. for the fruits. The 10-20-20 is mainly for papaya and banana which are known to be heavy feeders of phosphorus and potassium.

I still have a backlog of fertilizers I have bought over the years. It took me 4 years to use 20 lbs of sulfate of ammonia. I actually fertilize less now. I don't fertilize weekly anymore and so it takes a long time to use the fertilizers up. Instead of buying so many different specialty fertilizers, I try to buy a few. The citrus fertilizer takes care of pretty much all my acid loving plants gardenia, roses, citrus, azaleas, tropical rhodies, tomato, peppers, cucumbers, and herbs that are in pots. In the ground, I primarily use just sulfate of ammonia and compost which has phosphorus. Osmocote fertilizer for my potting mix and the specialty orchid fertilizers which can also be used on other plants. And I only added the muriate of potash recently because I needed that for the root crops.

The other fertilizers I have are fill ins when I need a general purpose boost, or when I run out of the main fertilizer. I don't buy a lot of them. Most of them I bought a long time ago or I got a good deal on them. I can use some of them as starter fertilizers but I have to use less of the higher numbers or I will have problems with burning. The fast release fertilizers are not as good as slow fertilizers for the potted plants and require small but frequent feedings.

If you are growing mostly one kind of thing like only tomatoes then it is reasonable to use a special fertilizer. I grow at most, intentionally, 3 tomatoes at a time, but I have a lot of citrus trees, more than a dozen in pots. My soil tests tell me I don't need to add phosphorus for a long time and the plants are not showing signs of deficiency. Only the root crops are giving me more tops than roots, so that is the only need I have to address. I have cut the nitrogen I am giving my plants. P.S. nitrogen is not tested for, but nitrogen is volatile in the soil so it always needs to be replaced. I still have lots of leaf production and I still get fruit on my tomatoes and cucumbers so it isn't overboard yet. My plants are still taller than the books say they are so I could cut the nitrogen a bit more.

Good plants do start with good soil. The soil has to have enough organic matter to hold on to nutrients and enough balanced nutrients to support the plants. Too much or too little fertilizer give less than ideal results. This is especially true of synthetic fertilizers. It is easy to create toxic conditions that take a while to fix. Organic takes years to build up good soil and fertility, but requires moving a lot of material every year which is hard for me to do; requires weekly organic fertilizer. This is not practical for me when space is limited and I don't have the luxury of having a fallow space for six months of the year to give the organic components time to mature. I do intensive planting, so there is a lot of demand for nutrients in a small space. A blend of adding compost every time I plant and using measured amounts of synthetic fertilizer, gives me optimum yields.
When I took horticulture class in college I remember how certain nutrients can become locked in the soil so plants can not use them. Add calcium to the soil it will unlock nutrients and make them available for plants to use. That was 50 years ago I don't remember details. Do google search see what you can learn about nutrients locked into the soil.

imafan26
Mod
Posts: 13962
Joined: Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:32 am
Location: Hawaii, zone 12a 587 ft elev.

You are right Gary. My pH is acidic and I did lime two years ago. It is time to do a soil test and see if I have to lime again.

https://www.ctahr.hawaii.edu/huen/hue_soilacidity.htm

User avatar
Gary350
Super Green Thumb
Posts: 7396
Joined: Mon Mar 23, 2009 1:59 pm
Location: TN. 50 years of gardening experience.

imafan26 wrote:
Wed Feb 03, 2021 7:18 pm
You are right Gary. My pH is acidic and I did lime two years ago. It is time to do a soil test and see if I have to lime again.

https://www.ctahr.hawaii.edu/huen/hue_soilacidity.htm


How acid is your soil? Lime will not last in my soil rain washes it away. Have you tried to buy Lime = calcium yet in Hawaii? Hydride Lime in TN is $15 for 50 lb bag at farm supply store. Lime & calcium in AZ was very hard to find 5 lb for $10 but a 60 lb bag of cement was $3 at Lowe's & Home Depot. If you collect several wooden pallets to burn you get free calcium & potassium plus those metal nails & staples in pallets adds iron to your soil.

Buy 99 cent pack of PH paper on EBAY.
Attachments
100_9008.JPG

imafan26
Mod
Posts: 13962
Joined: Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:32 am
Location: Hawaii, zone 12a 587 ft elev.

Two years ago, the pH was 6.0, which was considered a good pH. I did give some lime at that time with dolomite lime even though it was not recommended. I still have dolomite left. My home plot is the only garden that has an acidic pH. The other plots are pH 7.8. I never lime or give them chicken manure. I add compost which is alkaline (it was tested), so that is usually how I keep the pH from getting lower. I plant a lot of crucifers which also tend to make the soil more alkaline. I do have high rainfall and a weathered oxisol.

I haven't tried adding calcium. The soil test did not recommend anything except a little nitrogen. My bell peppers are so short the peppers touch the ground and for the most part they are only about a foot tall.

https://www.uidaho.edu/cals/soil-orders/oxisols

User avatar
Gary350
Super Green Thumb
Posts: 7396
Joined: Mon Mar 23, 2009 1:59 pm
Location: TN. 50 years of gardening experience.

imafan26 wrote:
Thu Feb 04, 2021 3:45 am
Two years ago, the pH was 6.0, which was considered a good pH. I did give some lime at that time with dolomite lime even though it was not recommended. I still have dolomite left. My home plot is the only garden that has an acidic pH. The other plots are pH 7.8. I never lime or give them chicken manure. I add compost which is alkaline (it was tested), so that is usually how I keep the pH from getting lower. I plant a lot of crucifers which also tend to make the soil more alkaline. I do have high rainfall and a weathered oxisol.

I haven't tried adding calcium. The soil test did not recommend anything except a little nitrogen. My bell peppers are so short the peppers touch the ground and for the most part they are only about a foot tall.

https://www.uidaho.edu/cals/soil-orders/oxisols
7.8 PH is high alkaline, you can add grocery store vinegar to lower soil to 6 PH. When I added 10,000. lbs of compost to my whole 35 ft x 60 ft garden my soil changed from 6 PH to 8 PH. I mixed 1 gallon of 5% vinegar with 4 gallons of water to get 1% vinegar then I watered my plants with it every day. My plants were small & turning yellow color the vinegar water fixed my problem in 2 days yellow color was gone. Corn, peppers, tomatoes, beans, did not like high PH. Compost material is naturally high PH. After watering my plants for a week with vinegar water I started watering only once a week and I tested my soil with PH paper once a week to learn what PH the soil is so I know if soil needs more or less vinegar water. Notice PH paper chart shows very high acid is 1 and very high alkaline = Base is 14.

Click the link.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/pH-Paper-Test- ... %3A2334524
Attachments
100_9010.JPG

imafan26
Mod
Posts: 13962
Joined: Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:32 am
Location: Hawaii, zone 12a 587 ft elev.

Thanks Gary. I have tried to change the pH of the other plots and have temporarily been able to do that. I found that whatever the natural pH is, it always wants to go back to it. The other garden will not grow acidic crops well, but it grows everything else. So, I just adjust what I plant in each plot. I cannot grow bell peppers in either plot well.

User avatar
Gary350
Super Green Thumb
Posts: 7396
Joined: Mon Mar 23, 2009 1:59 pm
Location: TN. 50 years of gardening experience.

imafan26 wrote:
Thu Feb 04, 2021 11:16 am
Thanks Gary. I have tried to change the pH of the other plots and have temporarily been able to do that. I found that whatever the natural pH is, it always wants to go back to it. The other garden will not grow acidic crops well, but it grows everything else. So, I just adjust what I plant in each plot. I cannot grow bell peppers in either plot well.
Check the PH of your water. AZ water is 8 PH when I watered the garden it changed the soil to 8 PH. I learned to fill several 5 gallon buckets with water than added about 1/2 cup of vinegar to change water to 6 PH then I could use it to water all my plants. If you have certain plants that need a certain PH then make special water just for them. 6 PH water will make your soil be 6 PH you want.

imafan26
Mod
Posts: 13962
Joined: Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:32 am
Location: Hawaii, zone 12a 587 ft elev.

The water here is about pH 7.1. It is probably more because I use acidic fertilizers. I use sulfate of ammonia and citrus food which is for acidic plants. The phosphorus was 1600 ppm. It is so high, I try to avoid phosphorus as much as possible. Most of the peppers are grown in pots, but maybe I need a different fertilizer for them or add some dolomite to the pots. This fertilizer works with everything else in the pots. Just not the peppers. Hot peppers are fine, but the bell peppers don't do well in pots or in the ground.

imafan26
Mod
Posts: 13962
Joined: Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:32 am
Location: Hawaii, zone 12a 587 ft elev.

It finally warmed up enough to go outside. Now the house is colder than it is outside. I planted the last rose (Gold Medal) in a pot. I also planted the sweet potato slips. 3 out of 4 cucumber seedlings have been eaten by snails. I will find out if the last one will still be standing tomorrow. I planted more Summer Dance cucumbers.

Harvested another Summer Dance Cucumber and 4 snow peas. It is too early to tell, but so far it has been too cold for the mildew to show up. I have already treated the roses so it should protect them from black spot and powdery mildew. The zucchini and one of the Right stuff bell peppers did grow a bit in the last few days. Most of the pepper seedlings I transplanted seem to be o.k. I found some bacterial spot on one leaf and picked it off.

The honohono orchids are losing their leaves. They may bloom early this year. One of the phals has bloomed.

imafan26
Mod
Posts: 13962
Joined: Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:32 am
Location: Hawaii, zone 12a 587 ft elev.

It was a nice day, not too cold. It was green day today. I filled my 2 green cans with trimmings from the shrubs and peppers in the front yard.

The snow peas are producing about 4 peas every 3-4 days. There are 2 zucchini on the one plant that I have. It has not bloomed yet.

I have one phal and one red vanda (no name), in bloom. Another phal is budded up.

I have some baby bok left. The komatsuna, perpetual spinach, beets, and carrots are picking size. Calamondin fruit are dropping. The cardinals are eating the super chile.

The super chilie was yellowing from the white flies so I cut it back to renew it.

The cilantro have bolted, but since the flowers attract beneficials, I am going to let it go to seed at least until I need the space on the bench.

The weeds are back with a vengeance after the rain.

I sprayed with Spectracide weed and grass killer. I did not realize it was not glyphosate. It has diquat. I sprayed mostly the ground, pathways and grass. I also mixed it like glyphosate so it is less than half strength. I will have to respray again. I did find my bottle to round up in the garage.

I have not been able to do much the last few weeks as I ate too much salt for 5 days when I made the 15 bean soup. I retarted a keto diet for now 7 days. I can breathe now, when I get up the stairs and my stamina is a little better. I think I have a bit of keto flu. I am very tired and I have been dizzy after working in the yard for the last couple of days. I have lost 9 lbs, mostly from the diuresis from the diet. I am breaking rules as I count macros as well as calories and salt. I have had problems reaching my targets. I probably have restricted the salt a little too much and I have to increase my fluid intake now to keep up with the water loss. It means that I tire out really fast and it took me all day, going out once and hour until I got tired, to fill the two green cans that normally would take about an hour a can.

User avatar
Gary350
Super Green Thumb
Posts: 7396
Joined: Mon Mar 23, 2009 1:59 pm
Location: TN. 50 years of gardening experience.

imafan26 wrote:
Sat Feb 13, 2021 12:09 am
The cilantro have bolted, but since the flowers attract beneficials, I am going to let it go to seed at least until I need the space on the bench.
I learned something new about cilantro this year. When my cilantro bolts I save the seeds to plant next year. If I grind DRY cilantro seeds to make coriander it taste like ground up dead sticks. If I harvest seeds when they are as green as cilantro leaves coriander has a very good cilantro flavor. Once coriander is sealed tight in a jar in refrigerator it has a very good flavor for about 1 month then flavor is slowly lost. I have not been every successful at saving cilantro leaves yet about 1 month they go bad.

imafan26
Mod
Posts: 13962
Joined: Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:32 am
Location: Hawaii, zone 12a 587 ft elev.

I can save cilantro leaves but it has limited use. You can grind and freeze the leaves in ice cube trays, preserve it in oil (I have preserved it but find little use for the cilantro flavored oil). I have tried cilantro butter, but I don't have a lot of things I can use it on. Then there is pesto which will keep at least a couple of weeks. I use the cilantro mostly as a garnish and the frozen cilantro is not good for that and I don't really use pesto. Cilantro can be used to make recaito, but culantro is usually what I use for that. I can get culantro all year round.

I have planted seeds from my cilantro before. I have never tried to eat them.

This morning I went out to miracle grow the yard. I haven't done that in a while. This time I was more frugal and did not water the plants with miracle grow and targeted the plants and not wide areas. My orchids have not been fertilized in a long time.

I also discovered that the marigolds I planted called bonanza is not that attractive to bees. The bees are visiting the alyssum and cuphea but are ignoring the marigolds. The only reason I planted it was because I could not find crackerjack seeds and the ones I had were too old. It is pretty, just not a good choice for a pollinator garden. Marigolds do act as an aphid trap and it is a dwarf French marigold so it might have some other repellent properties. It is unscented so, I don't know how much help it will be.

All of the roses I planted are doing o.k. I need to water the potted gold medal more. I have been bad about not watering it daily.

imafan26
Mod
Posts: 13962
Joined: Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:32 am
Location: Hawaii, zone 12a 587 ft elev.

It has been raining almost constantly for days. The rain is light to moderate so it is the good kind of rain that has time to soak into the ground, deep water the plants in the yard, and refill the aquifers. It has been very windy. I wish I had a anemometer because it seems like the winds are much stronger than 16-20 mph and I don't live in a valley although, I technically live uphill, I am not at the cliff edge.

The pots have been blown over and the palms are dropping fronds faster than usual. (That's what palms do).
I harvested 3 super chilies, a lemon, a handful of calamandin, and about a half cup of cilantro from the garden. I also harvested the snow peas (about a half cup).

I marinated some beef this morning with the chilies, lemon (I thought it was a lime), calamondin, and cilantro from the garden. I added 5 tablespoons of Mexican seasoning blend, 2 tablespoons of avocado oil, 1 tablespoon of Worcestershire sauce, 1 tablespoon of sweet hot mustard, and because I was using a tough piece of meat. I poked holes all over it and added a tablespoon of sherry to the marinade to help tenderize it. I am going to marinate it for at least 8 hours. If all works out I will harvest some of the bell peppers from the garden and cut up an onion and make fajita lettuce wraps for dinner.

When I get a few more peas, I will cook the snow peas with bacon and coconut aminos (it has less salt than low sodium soy sauce, but more carbs.)

imafan26
Mod
Posts: 13962
Joined: Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:32 am
Location: Hawaii, zone 12a 587 ft elev.

The sun came out today. I found a surprise in the garden a zucchini ready to pick. I weighed in a 431 g. I sauteed it with bacon, onions, and mushrooms and had some of it for dinner.

I finally planted my ginger today in two pots.

imafan26
Mod
Posts: 13962
Joined: Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:32 am
Location: Hawaii, zone 12a 587 ft elev.

It is raining again. I did get out to harvest some things. I had 2 zucchini stung by fruit flies, but I was able to harvest 2 other zucchini from Tigress. This time I remembered to weigh it. 2 zucchini weighed 516 grams. calamondin 1256 g, Kuroda carrots 1309 g, and Chinese peas (snow peas) were collected over 4 days weighed in at 53 grams.
Attachments
Kuroda carrots
Kuroda carrots
Zucchini, calamondin,and snow peas.
Zucchini, calamondin,and snow peas.
close up of Tigress zucchini
close up of Tigress zucchini

User avatar
Dissily Mordentroge
Senior Member
Posts: 137
Joined: Fri Jan 29, 2021 5:36 am

imafan26 wrote:
Tue Mar 09, 2021 1:44 am
It is raining again. I did get out to harvest some things. I had 2 zucchini stung by fruit flies, but I was able to harvest 2 other zucchini from Tigress. This time I remembered to weigh it. 2 zucchini weighed 516 grams. calamondin 1256 g, Kuroda carrots 1309 g, and Chinese peas (snow peas) were collected over 4 days weighed in at 53 grams.
This is the first time I’ve heard of Calamondin. Immediately on viewing your image I wondered if I treated them as I do cumquats how they’d perform.
My usual approach with cumquats is to fill jar with ripe specimens than add 50% bourbon or scotch, 50% honey (warmed to dissolve into the scotch/burbon) then seal for six months. The resulting liqueur is fabulous and the fruit lifts any desert or cake recipe to new levels.

imafan26
Mod
Posts: 13962
Joined: Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:32 am
Location: Hawaii, zone 12a 587 ft elev.

I just got the results of my soil test. I submitted a soil sample on 2/23/21 and got these results on 3/5/21.

normal range for heavy soil = ( )
pH 6.2 ( 5.8-6.2)
P 2388 (25-35)
K 541 (200-300)
Ca 5488 (1500-2500)
Mg 796 (300-400)

The pH is up 0.2 ( I limed 2 years ago), The phosphorus is up higher than it has ever been. Probably from the compost. Ca is higher, probably from the liming and the compost. Mg is about the same.

It would be better if I switched to urea instead of sulfate of ammonia, but I have a hard time using urea because it is twice as strong and easier to burn plants. As usual, all I really need to add is nitrogen. I do add compost every time I redo the garden, and it adds phosphorus and calcium which I can't really control. I could use chicken manure for the nitrogen, which ultimately gives the garden less nitrogen, and more calcium to raise the pH, but it also has a lot of phosphorus which I don't really want. I could lime for the pH even though the calcium is already very high. Nitrogen is not tested on soil tests because it is so volatile. But, looking at my plants, there is already a lot of nitrogen in the garden. I can plant more cabbages in the garden since it does have the effect of mining the soil and raising the pH. There aren't any nutrient deficiencies of the plants in the garden, but I need to feed the citrus trees. Some of them are looking a bit starved in the pots.

Calamondin is called calamansi here because the Filipinos use it a lot to garnish everything from pancit, fish, to add sourness to soup, dipping sauce (sasawan), and calamansi is added to water instead of lemon slices. My calamansi is bigger. Filipinos prefer them much smaller and greener when they are even more sour. I usually pick them riper because I don't like sour things and the fruit has more juice. I have three large trees. Unfortunately all of them have gone to ground and I will have to get them out of the ground and back into their pots or cut them down. They are easy to grow compared to other citrus. They can be grown from seed, but it is better from cuttings since it may take 5 or more years for them to produce from seed. They produce fruit almost continuously in cycles. It has been a warm winter, so it has rarely been fruitless. I have multiple plants in other pots and they are easy to get. It is described as an acidic orange. I have a couple of vandas and epis that are happily entwined in the branches of the calamansi tree.

imafan26
Mod
Posts: 13962
Joined: Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:32 am
Location: Hawaii, zone 12a 587 ft elev.

Torrential rain and flash flood alerts have been going off about every 2 hours. The flash flood alert has been extended to tomorrow. Most of the rain has been falling on the windward side of the island, but it is picking up here as well. Kam Hwy has washed out and there has been some flooding, but so far everyone is safe and hunkered down. The rain did stop briefly so I was able to finally plant my two tomatoes (Camaro). They needed to be planted out a couple of weeks ago. I still have more cilantro and peppers to pot up and I need to find somewhere to put the lettuce. I might be able to have some of the lettuce share the pot with the tomatoes for a while. Unfortunately, the rain may have slowed the bees down a bit, but the fruit flies came out anyway. I had to pick off two young zucchini that have been stung. I bagged the zucchini that have dropped their flowers and I also bagged the cucumbers. I need to get my fruit fly lures up and running.

I finally caved and bought 2 McPhail traps and torula bait on Amazon today. It was very expensive, but shipping at other places were even worse. At least the traps are reusable.

I put the stung fruit down the garbage disposal. I picked off the bad eggplant as well. I don't bag eggplant. They are not attacked by the melon fruit fly and I have a methyl eugenol trap already in place for a couple of weeks now for the oriental fruit fly. Oriental fruit fly does not cause me as much problems as the melon fly. When the rain stops I may spray the protein host plants and cut back the hibiscus and ti again.

I did find one carrot on the ground I dropped yesterday and harvested a small cucumber that was low lying fruit. It was actually sitting on the top of the soil.

User avatar
applestar
Mod
Posts: 30514
Joined: Thu May 01, 2008 7:21 pm
Location: Zone 6, NJ (3/M)4/E ~ 10/M(11/B)

I’m having so much vicarious fun reading about your garden — I realize you are having ups and downs, and probably wouldn’t consider all of these fun. *BUT* So inspiring to be given a glimpse into the rewards I might reap if I would just get my act together and gear up for the gardening season! :-()

User avatar
TomatoNut95
Super Green Thumb
Posts: 2069
Joined: Sun May 26, 2019 11:11 am
Location: Texas Zone 8

@Imafan, just out of curiosity, have you ever grown a hibiscus from seed?
I tried once, and it came up. But it died later on for some reason...

User avatar
applestar
Mod
Posts: 30514
Joined: Thu May 01, 2008 7:21 pm
Location: Zone 6, NJ (3/M)4/E ~ 10/M(11/B)

Hawaii flooding has been on the news with horrific videos — I hope you and yours are OK @imafan :bouncey:

imafan26
Mod
Posts: 13962
Joined: Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:32 am
Location: Hawaii, zone 12a 587 ft elev.

Thank you for thinking about me. I am fine. I stayed home and mostly dry. It is pretty normal here around my house and it has been sunny all morning.

The flooding was mostly on Maui and the Windward side of the Island. Luckily the dam that was over topped was being watched and the keepers alerted civil defense that the dam was near capacity and a mandatory evacuation was ordered. The dam did not collapse it just over topped. Streams and canals also filled up quickly and over ran their banks. The alerts were going off every couple of hours yesterday and it has started up again this afternoon. Homes were flooded, but because of the warnings people who had to evacuate were evacuated. Everyone else was told to stay home and off the roads if they did not need to be there.

The rain here was pretty steady with brief periods of heavy rain, but unlike the other side of the Island it wasn't a torrential downpour. I am at 587 ft and uphill of a drop off to the gully, so usually my lanai will have some minor flooding ( because it is almost the same level as the yard.) I basically stayed home and was very thankful that my roof doesn't leak. Today the Windward side and North shore have heavy rain. They are experiencing continued torrential rain and already have areas that are flooded. They could use a break. The alerts are sounding again because while it has been relatively sunny for most of the day, 77 degrees now, I am still in the potential warning zone and more rain is expected later today. Part of Kam Hwy washed out. Kam Hwy pretty much almost circles the island along the coastline. Part of the road was washed out by hurricane Iniki and it was never repaired. In heavy rain, parts of the road and the low lying areas will always flood and some streams and canals will swell to overflowing. There are usually some rock slides but the roads that are flooded will be closed which can make going home the long way, quite an adventure. People will also have to be smart and stay out of the ocean when there is brown water.

User avatar
TomatoNut95
Super Green Thumb
Posts: 2069
Joined: Sun May 26, 2019 11:11 am
Location: Texas Zone 8

Oh no, I'm so sorry! Glad you're okay!

User avatar
Gary350
Super Green Thumb
Posts: 7396
Joined: Mon Mar 23, 2009 1:59 pm
Location: TN. 50 years of gardening experience.

My soil tests were always confusing to me not knowing exactly what those number mean and Farmer Coop did not know either but there is usually recommendations what needs to be added to the soil. Recommendations are generic not specific for each plant needs. If PH is too high vinegar or Ammonium sulfate will lower it. Calcium is needs for BER in, tomatoes, peppers, squash, cucumbers, melons and this increases PH. 6 PH is good for most plants.

imafan26
Mod
Posts: 13962
Joined: Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:32 am
Location: Hawaii, zone 12a 587 ft elev.

The person who did the soil recommendations retired last year. The University and all of the State had a $4B deficit and every department had to deal with multi year budget cuts. Vacant positions and positions that people retired from are not being filled unless it there is a need. His position was filled but the person who took over also had to take over other responsibilities as well as work with a minimum of staff and money. So my soil test came with raw results and no recommendations. I actually was in contact with an extension agent, but he told me what I already knew. Nothing to add except small amounts of nitrogen preferably urea. It is just hard to use urea and it only comes in large bags. I can use potassium nitrate, but it is harder to get and a little dangerous to keep around. My potassium is high but it is the lowest of all the major elements. pH 6.2 is better. I would have to use a compost that is really alkaline. I am o.k. as a pH of 5.8-7.5 works for most plants. I live in a high rainfall area. I grow mostly acid loving plants.

Today, it is still raining. It was sunny in the morning, but this afternoon the flash flood alerts started again. I got an email from the Garden I volunteer, with a picture of a portion of the garden that is flooded. The garden is 13 ft above sea level and in a basin of sorts. It normally is very dry but when there is heavy rain and high tide, it can stay flooded for weeks.

It has been raining heavy intermittently so the water has been able to drain out with some minor puddling. The lanai will drain out by itself as soon as the heavy rain stops and I have sandbagged the lanai to limit the flooding. There has been some thunder and lightning but not close. In town and on the other side of the island, flooding has closed roads, lightning has downed power lines, there has been some landslides, and the rain has not let up in those areas. The city and State crews were out when the sun came out briefly to clear as much of the debris in the streams out. A few houses and some businesses were flooded out and face the arduous task of cleaning up. So far, my power has stayed on. Amazing! I have underground wiring and when the water gets in those conduits, the power is unstable. The rain is not expected to let up till next week when another high pressure system should come in and help push it out.

I did go out this morning to pick some breakfast. I got some green onions for my omelette and I harvest about 7 pintung long eggplant and a foot long zucchini which was so big it pushed its' way out of the insect netting and got stung by melon flies. I peeled it and cooked it and now I have about 2 lbs of zucchini in my frig and I don't know what I am going to do with it yet.

Yesterday, I was able to plant up my lettuce compots. I planted romaine and grand rapids. I inter cropped with the tomatoes, cucumber, peas, and carrots. I don't know if they will all make it, but I put out slug bait at the same time and today, it looked like they were still all there.

imafan26
Mod
Posts: 13962
Joined: Tue Jan 01, 2013 8:32 am
Location: Hawaii, zone 12a 587 ft elev.

The rain stopped. Today I have to spray fungicide on the plants that need it.

User avatar
applestar
Mod
Posts: 30514
Joined: Thu May 01, 2008 7:21 pm
Location: Zone 6, NJ (3/M)4/E ~ 10/M(11/B)

...never ends... gamba gamba! Image



Return to “Vegetable Garden Progress + Photos & Videos”