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DGBAMA first grow

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DGBAMA

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This week's pix updates.

Despite the horrible weather all three patches are still growing. Have a couple plants that might be lost but I have a few with leaves at near 16" now.

Hill and Garden patches have been in the ground 3 weeks. Flowerbed patch is a week behind at 2 weeks, with the late started VA Gold.

Hill patch:
IMG_20130707_131321_878.jpg

Garden patch (the one that drowned)
IMG_20130707_162248_428.jpg

Flowerbed Patch:
IMG_20130708_071419_977.jpg

A couple notes for myself.......The Yayladag has been a really hard start. lost over 50% of the original 24. Mostly in the drowned garden patch. Replanted those that were left to the hill patch, down to 11 total.

Replanted the garden patch vacated row with some of the backup turkish izmir which are now doing well.
 

DGBAMA

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Started mounding extra dirt around all my plants this weekend. The izmir in the hill patch were excessively leggy and just looked horrible. so a week ago I trimmed the ugly lower leaves and placed a shovelfull of dirt around the bases of about 12 of them (before it started raining). Just days later, the ones that had been "mounded" looked twice as good as the ones that hadn't. Darker color, thicke stems, bigger, etc.

the "mounded" ones:
IMG_20130707_114534_463.jpg

the "un-mounded" ones (except for the two at the bottom left of the photo)
IMG_20130707_114543_938.jpg

Conclusion: I will attempt to keep soil mounded up to the first set of leaves on all of them. The "mounded" ones easily grew an extra 2" vs the ones without dirt.
 

springheal

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What intrigues me in the pictures is how closely they are planted. What's your average distance between them? Or are you intending to thin them out to the hardiest ones later?
 

Knucklehead

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DG - the plants are taking off. The mounded dirt really made a difference. I knew you were going to mess around and talk me into more work. :) Workhorse has been recommending the same thing. You guys are killing me.
 

leverhead

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DG - the plants are taking off. The mounded dirt really made a difference. I knew you were going to mess around and talk me into more work. :) Workhorse has been recommending the same thing. You guys are killing me.

Becoming intimate with your hoe has a little different meaning here.
 

DGBAMA

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What intrigues me in the pictures is how closely they are planted. What's your average distance between them? Or are you intending to thin them out to the hardiest ones later?

All except the Izmir (the one in the mounding pics) are on 24" spacing. The Izmir doesnt need as much space so I put thm in a triple row, 14-16" staggered.
 

DGBAMA

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Leaf ripening?

I have pulled a bunch of just plain dead/dying lower leaves this year, but I have a couple on a single Silver River that are different.........It should not be time yet and none of the other plants have leaves that look this way.

IMG_20130713_103049_578.jpg

IMG_20130713_103100_602.jpg
 

AmaxB

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Yeah Man your on the way!
As 1 or 2 others have said they look a little close to one another not knocking ya looks great. Just thinking of suckering, bug checks and all that.
 

DGBAMA

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Yeah Man your on the way!
As 1 or 2 others have said they look a little close to one another not knocking ya looks great. Just thinking of suckering, bug checks and all that.

Yep, things are definitely going to get tight. and my 2 ft plant spacing looked sooo big when I first put them in the ground. However if they get big enough that I cant walk through I will consider my first attempt a success.

Just tryin' to do the best I can with the space I have. Would love to have room for 3-4 feet of walking room between the rows and now seeing some of the larger varieties could probably utilize 2.5-3ft between plants.
 

Brown Thumb

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The black plastic will cause that
It gets hot and burns the leaves if they lay in it
 

DGBAMA

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The black plastic will cause that
It gets hot and burns the leaves if they lay in it

Thanks, I have already removed a bunch of small leaves that were "burnt" by the fabric. I know what you mean. These are different. no direct contact; and they have both yellowing & texture.
 

springheal

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The supposed burning issue needs to be considered further.

The fiber ground cover is perfect as it allows the plant/roots/soil to breath, suppress weed growth and allow moisture in to the roots (not that is so important with all the wet weather?).

Brown Thumb mentioned plastic which I see you are not using which is great. Plastic will not allow any of the above mentioned (except suppress weed growth). Plastic can virtually cook the soil with the extreme temperature build up if exposed to the direct sun all day. In the end, the soil will go stale, exposed to sun or not. Soil must be allowed to breath.

I don't believe you have a burning issue at all, just natural growth which will vary at times.

Your end result is all that matters and you will be in for a great crop.

Oh, grgfinney said your's are overcrowded. Often being ruthless and thinning out will actually give you a larger/healthier crop than not thinning at all. Like most plants, they need their space.
 
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