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Gary350
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Re: Tennessee 2021 Garden

A month ago I bought a grocery store cabbage, I cut off all the leaves then put rooting powder on the core and planted it in the garden. Core has grown leaves and keeps growing larger. This is a terrible place for it to be planted in wood mulch with no soil & no fertilizer. Has anyone else done this? Will it grown leaves only or will it grow another head? I have no clue what to expect?

7:15 am it was 28°F in the carrot bed. 12 noon it was 94°F with 1 sheet of glass. After glass was removed it was 47°F in the bed. I did not work on this today except to water the seeds.
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I did not even know you could do this. It still looks great even in less than ideal conditions.

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imafan26 wrote:
Sun Nov 14, 2021 11:21 pm
I did not even know you could do this. It still looks great even in less than ideal conditions.
I have done this with carrots tops & onion bottoms in the past. Carrots grow tops that are very good in salads, soup, sandwiches. Onions grow tops that can be eaten, they also grow seeds when weather gets hotter.

I grew a grocery store broccoli & cauliflower about 25 years ago but can't remember exactly what I did. Bottom end is often too hard to eat so I cut it off then planted it in the garden. I may have left a tiny amount of broccoli & cauliflower on the stump? They grew about 24" tall with several small broccoli & small small cauliflower on the stems. About 1 meal for 1 person.

I bought several 250 onion seed packs on ebay $1.59 each free postage. I will plant seeds in 1 gallon pots to grow plants to eat all winter. I keep pots inside the house until seeds germinate then put them outside to get sun every day then bring them in the house at night.

I have a 300 seed pack of walla walla onions coming soon $2 free postage. I will plant these in a 1 gallon flower pot Feb 15 in the house then transplant to garden April 1st.

I have no potting soil I hope Lowe's or garden store still has some in stock.
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@Gary350 this close Dec you’re better off ordering online to (ship to store and ) pick up to buy gardening supplies. The store will be decorated and stocked for the holidays.

There is a youtube that has been posting with this type experiment — broccoli, cabbage, etc. 100+ days with full sized harvest, onion bottom 200+ days …if thumbnails are to be believed — I didn’t watch them. They do root so maybe?

Coincidentally I just started trying to root some runty cabbages I culled after eating most of the available edible leaves a couple of weeks ago in my Winter Aquaponic Garden project (along with lemon balm, smallest pineapple offset, etc)

I’ve had onion bottoms trimmed to about onion set size root, grow all winter indoors, then bulb up in time for summer harvest.

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This morning I have an onion bottom that I can plant, it is the wrong time of the year but I will plant it anyway just to see what happens. Warmer weather April to July it will grow seeds in 4 months here. Our cold winter weather will probably kill it.

We also have a red onion that is growing a top it needs to be eaten very soon or it will rot. We could eat all the outer rings then plant the center but it is too cold now. Green house would be nice for this. Onions grow good in AZ all winter 65°F every day & 35°F at night.
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That's really cool I need to try that. Maybe an organic produce though, I don't want GMO stuff in my garden. Has anybody done this with celery?

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TomatoNut95 wrote:
Mon Nov 15, 2021 10:12 am
That's really cool I need to try that. Maybe an organic produce though, I don't want GMO stuff in my garden. Has anybody done this with celery?
CELERY, that is a GOOD idea, wife has a new celery in the refrigerator. It may be gmo from the store but it will be organic growing in my garden. I wonder if I can grow celery here, wow this will be great if it works.

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This is my tomato crop laying on the soil. So far so good there are a few ripe tomatoes & leaving them here is better than the refrigerator.

I temporary planted onion end here for now. Maybe I start putting several things under the fish aquarium. Fallen tree limb punched a 1" hole in bottom of aquarium.

Very cloudy & over cast at 10 am carrot bed is 44°F. Glass holds in the moisture if sun makes it too hot it works best to cover glass with cardboard or rags.

Pac choy & roman lettuce are very large. Cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower are growing. There is no way to eat this fast enough.
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It all looks great. I have had onions and celery sprout before. I did not keep either one since the onion was the wrong kind and it is too hot here for celery to thrive most of the year. I grow bunching onions, they last for at least a couple of years, maybe more.

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imafan26 wrote:
Mon Nov 15, 2021 1:03 pm
It all looks great. I have had onions and celery sprout before. I did not keep either one since the onion was the wrong kind and it is too hot here for celery to thrive most of the year. I grow bunching onions, they last for at least a couple of years, maybe more.
Try Walla Walla onions, I found several people at farmers market that grow them, they do good in our hot weather before temperatures are over 95°F. I was told to plant seeds inside the house Feb 15, then transplant outside March 20, then harvest 4" diameter onions June 15, onions are a 4 month crop. Here is Ebay link to 300 seeds for $2.59 free postage.

At 12 noon onion bed was 90°F, I put a roll out bamboo shade on it. I hope it cools down to 70°F or less. I might need to remove glass for 10 minutes to dump all the heat.

1 hour later 53°F outside & 68°F in onion bed, perfect or a while.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/284014122168
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I found the “regrow from” video list — obviously some things like garlic and potato, ginger etc. are basically normal growing methods, but others are interesting experiments even if it would be faster to just grow from seeds —

:arrow: https://youtube.com/c/%E3%81%AE%E3%82%8 ... 3%E3%81%94

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An interesting site, but the regrown cabbage video I watched was very small ('cute') and seemed to take at least 6 months to grow. Might be fun to do but growing from seed makes more sense?

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Yep. Noticed that, too.

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Gary350 wrote:
Mon Nov 15, 2021 10:42 am
TomatoNut95 wrote:
Mon Nov 15, 2021 10:12 am
That's really cool I need to try that. Maybe an organic produce though, I don't want GMO stuff in my garden. Has anybody done this with celery?
CELERY, that is a GOOD idea, wife has a new celery in the refrigerator. It may be gmo from the store but it will be organic growing in my garden. I wonder if I can grow celery here, wow this will be great if it works.
Let me know if it works! However, I don't think a GMO plant will turn organic. If a plant is already bred to be GMO I can't see it turning organic later. Plus any seed you save from a GMO plant will carry on the GMO genes.

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They don’t sell many gmo (genetically modified) vegetables/produce in grocery stores. Are you thinking of conventionally grown vs. organically grown with difference in the type of pesticides and fungicides, herbicides?

Organic certification is supposed to exclude gmo but not all (many) non-organically grown are gmo.

And I agree that once conventionally grown produce has spent several months being re-grown organically, a good portion of non-organic chemicals could metabolize out of the system.

ETA… about that celery, I did find this. Much of the sciency stuff went over my head, but some of the plain language were interesting “food for thought”. I attached a relevant excerpt below:

Content Comparison of Organic and Conventional Celery | Gavin Publishers
Regarding GMO there is no evidence that celery is genetically engineered to modify its DNA to fight insects or to repel chemical insecticides. USDA has realized and removed unnecessary regulations on farmers that produce conventional celery so that their profitability exceeds their production cost. In both cases, celery is safe from GMOs but the health risk comes from the overuse of pesticides to protect the celery stocks from being attacked by organisms.
More than 95% of animals that are used for meat and dairy products consume GMO foods like corn and the resulting manure from these animals are used in organic farming. It is reasonable to assume the manure that comes from the GMO fed animals will have modified bacteria, antibiotics, and growth hormones in their compost.
Citation: Abebe M, Akinlabi AA, Mackey CD, Miller RR, Musenge P, et al. (2021) Content Comparison of Organic and Conventional Celery. Educ Res Appl 5: 180. DOI: 10.29011/2575-7032.100180

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applestar wrote:
Mon Nov 15, 2021 3:27 pm
I found the “regrow from” video list — obviously some things like garlic and potato, ginger etc. are basically normal growing methods, but others are interesting experiments even if it would be faster to just grow from seeds —

:arrow: https://youtube.com/c/%E3%81%AE%E3%82%8 ... 3%E3%81%94
Thank you for that link, I have been having fun for several hours watching videos. Cabbage will grow a small head maybe a longer grow season head would grow larger. I think I watched about 15 videos.

I might grow rice just for the fun of it.

I have never grown those red sweet potatoes they are yellow inside like squash. I am surprised they did not allow vine roots to grow more potatoes. If mother plant grows 15 lbs of potatoes satellite potatoes on the vines will often be another 15 lbs of potatoes. They ate stems but not the leaves? Leaves are good.

It was interesting to see where the small oriental corn comes from.

There white potato crop was about 2 times more than they planted.

When I get time I want to see if Sprouts sells red sweet potatoes we need to eat 1 to decide if I grow some this year. We need to buy Yukon gold potatoes again to see if we like them, they were not good when we tried them a few years ago.

I have 10 empty garden rows this year I need a few more things to grow.

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applestar wrote:
Mon Nov 15, 2021 7:07 pm
They don’t sell many gmo (genetically modified) vegetables/produce in grocery stores. Are you thinking of conventionally grown vs. organically grown with difference in the type of pesticides and fungicides, herbicides?

Organic certification is supposed to exclude gmo but not all (many) non-organically grown are gmo.

And I agree that once conventionally grown produce has spent several months being re-grown organically, a good portion of non-organic chemicals could metabolize out of the system.

ETA… about that celery, I did find this. Much of the sciency stuff went over my head, but some of the plain language were interesting “food for thought”. I attached a relevant excerpt below:

Content Comparison of Organic and Conventional Celery | Gavin Publishers
Regarding GMO there is no evidence that celery is genetically engineered to modify its DNA to fight insects or to repel chemical insecticides. USDA has realized and removed unnecessary regulations on farmers that produce conventional celery so that their profitability exceeds their production cost. In both cases, celery is safe from GMOs but the health risk comes from the overuse of pesticides to protect the celery stocks from being attacked by organisms.
More than 95% of animals that are used for meat and dairy products consume GMO foods like corn and the resulting manure from these animals are used in organic farming. It is reasonable to assume the manure that comes from the GMO fed animals will have modified bacteria, antibiotics, and growth hormones in their compost.
Citation: Abebe M, Akinlabi AA, Mackey CD, Miller RR, Musenge P, et al. (2021) Content Comparison of Organic and Conventional Celery. Educ Res Appl 5: 180. DOI: 10.29011/2575-7032.100180
I kinda assumed that produce like corn squash peppers and stuff sold like in Krogers and Wal-Mart were GMO grown. Corn is usually bad about being GMO unless otherwise stated. Even Baker Creek talks about how harder and harder it gets for them to grow out their non GMO corn seeds without them being infected by GMO pollen from surrounding growers.

@Gary, if you do try rice and it works I want to know exactly how you managed it because I myself wish I could grow rice but don't you need swampy places to do it in? Paddies, that is?

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TomatoNut95
[/quote]@Gary, if you do try rice and it works I want to know exactly how you managed it because I myself wish I could grow rice but don't you need swampy places to do it in? Paddies, that is?
[/quote]

Click the link. They sprout rice in a bowl of water then transplant it to a small flower pot. After plants grow larger transplant to a bucket of mud. They grew 4 plants in 4 buckets of mud then harvested 1 cup of rice. It looks easy. You will starve to death with 4 plants.

I buy Jasmine rice at the store that comes from places like, Korea, Vietnam or China. I don't eat brown rice or short grain rice I don't like the flavor.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wqu2WeZlv2E

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We went to Sprouts grocery store today in search of a Red skin color sweet potato & I found 1. They usually have 6 or 7 different skin color sweet potatoes but only 4 colors today. This store is over priced but somethings I find things to buy, $4 per loaf sour dough bread is good & I don't have to make it. Orange sweet potatoes are 88 cents lb at Walmart & $3.99 lb at Sprouts but wait it is Organic that makes it worth 4 1/2 times more. LOL. I bought a white color sweet potato a few years ago & grew some in the garden they were good. We have never eaten purple skin or yellow skin sweet potatoes. I saw a video that showed cooked red skin sweet potatoes are bright yellow inside like squash, if they taste good I will be sprouting a Red skin sweet potatoes inside the house about Feb 31th. Wife will cook the sweet potato sometime soon.
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I like the dark purplish red skin ones that are yellow inside. They cook up dry and fluffy like baked russet potatoes and are very sweet. I just compared with Red/Brown skin/orange flesh one again — I think this one was Garnet Red (or Jewel) — and found it to be watery and bland. Store restriction let me buy only buy ONE Red Purple skin/mottled light purple flesh sweet potato — this one was not as dry as yellow flesh and more sticky, but also sweet but not as sweet as yellow flesh… but definitely more sweet than Garnet Red (or Jewel).

It’s possible these haven’t been cured sufficiently though.

I’m currently trying to verify if it’s true that unlike regular potatoes which needs to start cooking in hot temperature or brought up to high temperature quickly or they end up crunchy even after full cooking time, sweet potatoes get sweeter if cooked from cold to SLOWLY building up to temp. Supposed to turn out very well if steamed with 1 cup of water in rice cooker, insta pot, or slow cooker.

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Actually, I found that sweet potatoes get mushy if they are boiled in a lot of water. I usually use only a small amount of water about 1/2 inch in the pot and simmer them slowly. Larger potatoes are harder to cook evenly so I like the skinnier ones better. I do have to check the pot to make sure the water has not totally boiled off, turn the potato, and to check if it is done. Baking can make sweet potatoes drier and supposedly it loses more nutrients that way. It is harder to cook them in the microwave too because they are denser than regular potatoes. Steaming sounds good, I have never tried it.

For sweet potatoes that are thick in the middle and thinner on the ends, it is hard to cook them evenly. Those I would cut up into strips and make sweet potato oven fries, or I give them away so they become someone else's problem.

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We baked the sweet potato for dinner about 45 minutes. Sliced it in 1/2 baked it face down on aluminum foil with butter. After it was bakes it looks white color with a slightly green tint. It is very pasty like eating modeling clay & taste about like model clay. Salt & pepper is not helpful. I suggested we buy another red potatoes and cook it a different way buy wife said, that was terrible how you going to make that taste better, if I cook a sweet potato casserole with brown sugar & butter it will still taste bad. I think if is needs sugar & butter to make it better we don't need it.
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After a week of no sun we have sun today. It was 41°F this morning, it warmed up to 42°F. This 25 mph wind is freezing cold at the gas station it takes 7 minutes to fill the tank. Gas is $2.86 per gallon. It is 85°F inside the solar carrot bed. No seeds have germinated yet. I worry solar bed with turn to mold & mildew being closed up with no fresh air inside. Maybe 85°F will prevent mildew.
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With these season extension projects, venting when too hot is just as important since it will affect how well the plants cope with the extreme cold.

I’m using an automatic foundation vent installed near bottom of my hoop house (“Sunflower House”) door that opens at around 70°F and closes at around 40°F. I got the idea from them being used for cold frames kind of like yours. (Actually I got one intending to build a cold frame to try it out, but never got around to building one — you make it sound so easy LOL)

If automated is not an issue, you could simply drill vent holes near top edge of the wooden sides that could be closed with a sliding piece of wood, etc.

… OK — here is the packaging —
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applestar wrote:
Mon Nov 22, 2021 5:41 pm
With these season extension projects, venting when too hot is just as important since it will affect how well the plants cope with the extreme cold.

I’m using an automatic foundation vent installed near bottom of my hoop house (“Sunflower House”) door that opens at around 70°F and closes at around 40°F. I got the idea from them being used for cold frames kind of like yours. (Actually I got one intending to build a cold frame to try it out, but never got around to building one — you make it sound so easy LOL)

If automated is not an issue, you could simply drill vent holes near top edge of the wooden sides that could be closed with a sliding piece of wood, etc.

… OK — here is the packaging —
Lowe's & Home Depot probably sells those automatic vents, I need to go see. This time of the year when sun is low sun produces 200 BTUs of heat per square foot. My hot bed is 6 cu ft = 1200 BTUs it won't take a very big vent to drain away that tiny amount of heat. I opened glass 3" on both ends of the bed temperature dropped 2 degrees per minutes. It will be interesting to learn, if vent opens at 70°F then 35°F air comes in will vent close right away.
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Yesterday evening after it was dark I made bread. I have a new used $1 yard sale bread bread pan 1" wider than that average pan. It made a nice wide loaf of bread. We have a new bread knife wow it works so much better than the old knife.

Breakfast this morning was egg cheese onion omelet, sausage & tabasco sauce on homemade bread.

Garden is doing good everything is growing larger, we are eating pac choy as much as we can. Family is coming today for taco salad made with pac choy & grilled chicken. I pic off pack choy leaves and leave the plants to grow taller & grow more leaves. We have a forest of pac choy. Broccoli & cauliflower are growing but will probably never make large heads, they never do. I found a large roll of plastic in construction site dumpster if I have a WARM green house tunnel over the broccoli & cauliflower we might get heads.

I learned to roll back the bamboo shade about 8" to allow the solar carrot bed to warn up from 41 degrees to 67 degrees yesterday. If I remove bamboo shade bed get 98 degrees. Early tomorrow before crowd starts I will check out auto vents at Lowe's and buy a 3 cu ft bag or peat moss if they have it. I have 12 large Kennecbe potatoes that have gotten soft and loaded with several eyes growing that need to be planted or tossed in the trash. We don't need any more potatoes but I will NOT throw seed potatoes in the trash.
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That’s a nice size bread pan — just like commercial bakery bread.

You mentioned you have a roll of hardware plastic? You could make your own vented plastic by drilling 1/2 inch to 1 inch holes at regular intervals while the plastic is in a tight roll. — ideally, you want the vent holes to be along the top or just along the shoulders of a tunnel.

Hardware plastic is not as clear as agricultural polyethylene but that’s not a big issue unless you only get limited direct sun… also it isn’t UV protected/resistant so doesn’t last much more than one or two seasons, so be sure to pick up and dispose before it starts falling apart (trust me it’s not fun to have pick up itty bitty bits of plastic)

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applestar wrote:
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That’s a nice size bread pan — just like commercial bakery bread.

You mentioned you have a roll of hardware plastic?
We were at Walmart yesterday I looked and found same bread pan 5" x 8.5" x 3" for $7.49. The roll of plastic is white color with large advertising letters, it feels soft like cotton but burns like plastic. It is moisture barrer for houses. First time we have high wind plastic will be gone to the next county, not sure what to use it for yet. NO spell check on win 11 sucks.

Today I found a lost box of Russet seed potatoes lost under a pile of junk. I don't need & don't want any more potatoes but this morning I planted a row of 41 russet potatoes. After I put my tools away I found a box of Kennebec seed potatoes so I planted them too. Most Russet potatoes have 1 eye sprouting, most kennebec have 5 eyes sprouting.

I laid seed potatoes on compacted soil 8" apart and did not forget to fertilize. I seldom remember to fertilize until after I am finished planting. Fertilizer is 5-20-20. I tilled along both sides so I could rake soft soil up over the seed potatoes, it took 1 hr to plant these. I hope seed potatoes are up high enough to stay above spring swamp rain every day there is often 2" of water in the garden for 3 whole months.
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I notice we have volunteer sweet potatoes growing along the edge of our patio where 3 large pots had sweet potatoes growing all summer. Vines must have rooted in the soil an grown tubers now we have vines again. These are nice vines along the patio. We will probably have more vines this spring, summer & fall.
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Yeah sweet potatoes are like that. Taro is like that too. That is why I grow them in pots. They become weeds if they get in the ground.

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What do you think about saved seeds from grocery store watermelons & cantaloupes?

I have planted melon saved seeds in the past they have always done great but who knows what variety they are.
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I have planted seeds from melons. I planted one from a sunrise melon. It grew nicely, but like most melons it took up a lot of space.

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imafan26 wrote:
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I have planted seeds from melons. I planted one from a sunrise melon. It grew nicely, but like most melons it took up a lot of space.
Yes the down side of melons is they take up too much space an we only eat 1 or 2 watermelons per year & maybe 3 or 4 cantaloupes per year. It is always fun to pick the first ripe melon. Melons with seeds are extremely hard to find at the grocery store people are such whimps they only eat melons with no seeds. Last summer after going to several stores for several months I finally found melons with seeds. There is a reason why you never see melon wine in any store it sucks flavor ferments away it tastes like water wine. LOL.

I am going to have 8 empty rows this year I need something to grow? We will probably have 8 rows of Zinnia flowers then after potato harvest 4 more rows of Zinna they after onion & garlic harvest 1 more row of Zinnia. It will be less work for me to leave all the empty rows empty.

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The melon I grew was bought from one of the bigger farms here. They sell to markets, but also have a farm stand. It was a mini melon a little bigger than a baseball, but a perfect size for me. It did have a lot of seeds. I might still have some, but I don't know if they would still be viable since I have kept them for years. I should get rid of the seeds anyway, just because I don't have the space to grow the melons. I have grown sugar baby watermelons which have shorter vines and are relatively seedless. But, I will be lucky to get two melons from it. I would rather grow hyotan squash. It takes up a lot of space too, but it will produce dozens of squash.

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Today I raked pine needles off of the driveway there turned out to be more than I expected. I had several baskets full enough pine needles to cover 2 rows of potatoes 3" deep with pine needles. Dark soil will probably heat up more from the sun than brown pine needles but I hope pine needles will prevent soil from washing away we have 3 months of rain coming. Last years record rain was 47" in 4 months. I have 4 rows of potatoes this is first time I every had 200 saved seed potatoes.
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Location: Zone 6, NJ (3/M)4/E ~ 10/M(11/B)

That’s great! Pine needles are excellent for potato mulch — helps prevent scab disease and repels some pests, helps keep the hilled soil well-draining if mixed in.

I can get some from neighbor’s pine trees overhanging over the fence but nothing like the volume you collected.

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Gary350
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Joined: Mon Mar 23, 2009 1:59 pm
Location: TN. 50 years of gardening experience.

Carrot bed is not doing much only about a dozen plants growing thermometer says 30°F. I will leave glass off carrot bed a few days let mother nature do her thing. Pac Choy & lettuce is growing faster than I can eat it, there are enough greens to make 4000 tacos. I wish I had more pine needles so I raked up 1 trash can compacted tight in few minutes but not sure what to do with it now. There are lots of pine needles on 2 sides of the workshop. I pulled up chickweed in the garlic bed and fertilized garlic with 5-20-20.
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Gary350
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Posts: 7396
Joined: Mon Mar 23, 2009 1:59 pm
Location: TN. 50 years of gardening experience.

I planted another celery this morning & I see the celery I plants a few weeks ago is growing. Cabbage has grown larger. Our wet cool weather is probably good for these plants. 30° at night keeps bugs dead & 60s during the day is probably good too.
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Gary350
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Posts: 7396
Joined: Mon Mar 23, 2009 1:59 pm
Location: TN. 50 years of gardening experience.

Cool wet weather has made all the garden greens grow better and taste better. I pulled the center out of a romaine lettuce plant leaving the other 2/3 of the plant to keep growing. Wash, slice, dice, this is good on everything. I fill breakfast omelet with as much as it will hold. I covered 2 left over meat balls from last night dinner. Great with all Mexican food. Lettuce is even good on peanut jelly sandwiches. With all this good lettuce & pac choy I eat it on every thing. I wonder how good it will be to stir 2 Cups of pac choy into 1 loaf of homemade bread instead of spinach bread. I bought a French bread to make a 16" long Sub sandwich this will make 6 smaller sandwiches.. I want to mix some in with potato salad. I had some on pizza a few nights ago. It is very good stirred into spaghetti sauce. My mother use to put a whole cabbage head in vegetable soup I bet pac choy will be good in soup.
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Gary350
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Posts: 7396
Joined: Mon Mar 23, 2009 1:59 pm
Location: TN. 50 years of gardening experience.

Today I found some of the plant trays to plant onion seeds but can't find the potting soil for these trays. A month ago I was wonder WHY is there a 5 gallon bucket of potting in the workshop, so I dumped it in the carrot bed. Oh no.

Pac Choy is covered with honey bees, I have not seen this many honey bees in 40 years looks like about 45 bees.
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