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let's see your veggie garden {pics} 2021-24

deluxestogie

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Garden20210301_5650_veggieStarts_600.jpg


I just started four 3" pots each of tomatoes, Basque Peppers and Oriental eggplant. Two seeds per pot will be thinned to one per pot later. This rests on a seedling heat mat on a wire shelf in my enclosed back porch. Aiming for mid-May transplanting.

Bob
 

ChinaVoodoo

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When you buy pre started cucumbers at the store, they usually come two or three plants per pot. I used to keep the strongest one and get rid of the rest, then one year I didn't thin them, and I had a really good year. Was that coincidence? Maybe because I did other beneficial things... So I planted two per pot this year from seed in case I didn't get good germination but I'm close to 100%. What do you dudes and ladies do?
 

deluxestogie

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For veggies started from seed indoors (tomato, eggplant, peppers, cukes), I usually drop two seeds into each 3" pot. Once all of them have germinated, I transfer extras to pots that germinated none, and then pluck out and toss the rest--except for my cukes. I'll leave two cukes per pot, if both seeds germinate. (No compelling reason for this cuke choice, other than that I've purchased some that way in the past, and I suspect that cukes don't handle root disturbance all that well. Just a guess.)

Bob
 

skychaser

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I sprout all my cucumbers, melons and squash in germination trays and plant them into 4"pots or oversized 6 packs as soon as they sprout. None of those like having their root disturbed at all. When they go to the field we are very careful not to disturb the roots. You should never try to flare out the roots like with many other plants. It will set them back by two weeks trying to recover.

I seed tomatoes, peppers and tobacco directly into 6 packs. I will put two seeds in a few tomatoes to divide later and make up for any blanks. I usually get 95%+ germ rate on those so I don't need many doubles. Tomatoes are super easy to bare root out and divide later with no losses. Peppers have a much lower germ rate by nature. The federal minimum for selling pepper seed is only 55%. I put two seeds in about 1/2 the pots and divide them later. You can't bare root and manhandle them like tomatoes and tobaccos, but I rarely lose any when dividing them. I have about 25 different peppers for this year.

For tobaccos I put 3-4 seeds in each pot. Some times I get a few more in there due to their tiny size and a shaky hand. I thin them down to 2-3 plants with tiny scissors and then thin or divide them further as needed at about 4 weeks. Tobaccos are like tomatoes and are super easy to bare root out and re-pot with 0 losses.

I have 5868 tomatoes, peppers, poppies and tomatillos started so far. I don't start my tobaccos until the first week of April for planting out around May 25th. Watermelon I start 5 weeks before planting day. Other melons and cucumbers at 4 weeks and squash at 3 weeks. Cucumbers do well planted in blocks of 2-4 plants spaced 2-3 feet apart. Melons go in at 2 plants every 3 feet and squash go in at 2 plants 5' apart.

I am always looking for help with planting at the end of May if anyone is looking for a side job.
 

deluxestogie

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I would post a pic, but my yet to be mowed grass is a bit embarrassing. [The subject would have been just a small rectangle of dirt. Envision dirt.] This morning, I hefted my pickax out to the yard, and dug one 4' x 5' bed for my peas to go into in a couple of days. It was a breeze. That is, the breeze that cooled my overexerted codger body during the 3 rest breaks required to complete the task helped a lot.

I had sprayed that bed with glyphosate 11 days ago, but the weed roots didn't seem to have noticed. Maybe it's the Brazil or UK variants that make those weeds so tenacious.

My plan had been to till two additional 3' x 5' segments of garden today, in preparation for putting in many mini carrots and some baby bok choi. Mañana...tal vez. The older I get, the more stubborn my garden becomes. There's no reasoning with it any more.

Bob
 

deluxestogie

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skychaser

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Have some leftover veggie seed? Wonder how well it may germinate? The table below is from Johnny's Select Seed:

View attachment 35956

Click the link below, to see the other categories of seed.


Bob
Johnnyseeds is a great company and I have bought many things from them over the years. But I strongly disagree with this statement in the link.

"Some seeds can remain viable in storage for several years if stored under optimal conditions—namely low humidity and low temperature (42°F (15°C)). A general formula for success is that the sum of the temperature (°F) and % relative humidity should be less than 100. "

I have never heard of this "formula for success" before. Storing seed at 42f with a humidity of 50% would be terrible! You never want a humidity anywhere near that high. You want it under 10% no matter what the temp is. 5-7% is what I try for. The most important thing in seed storage is to have it dry! Temp comes second and dark is third.

"When retrieving seeds from storage, allow the container to reach room temperature before opening it. This will help prevent condensation from forming on the seeds and inside the container."

True. But you should not reseal the container until it has reached the temp of your storage environment either. If you do, you are sealing in warmer air which will contain more moisture and you will trap that moisture inside.

After my new seed is harvested and thoroughly dried, it goes into my storage room where it sits for another month before sealing the bags. You want your seed dry, dry, dry! My seed never leaves the storage room when I am working with it. It's usually somewhere between 35f and 45f in there. It can be a bit uncomfortable if you are in there for very long. Too bad. Wear a coat. The seeds comfort is more important than mine.
 

deluxestogie

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The thing about tomatoes...

Garden20210424_5690_tomato_500.jpg


That's 4 tomato plants. Big Beef. Tomato stalk will put out prolific roots if in contact with soil. I plant these leggy things by digging a long, shallow trench for each one, laying a plant into each trench (after removing the lower leaves), then burying all but the top few inches of the stalk. The exposed part is then staked. So they develop massive root systems.

My preference for the Big Beef variety is its alphabet soup of disease resistance. (They always...always manage to find some disease to which they are not resistant. But the odds are in my favor.)

Bob
 
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