365 days ago, this was my garden:
This is my garden today:
Yikes.
I don’t know what I’m doing wrong. Maybe I put the tomatoes in too late? We had a really cold spring with many nights on the border of frost, and I was afraid putting them in would kill them. But they haven’t grown much, and several are dying on me, in the ground. I’ve compost-teaed and watered faithfully — at least, as faithfully as I have every other year.
I’m so disappointed. I don’t know what’s to account for the problems. Everything else (hello weeds!) seem to be growing just fine.
If you look at last year’s garden post, you’ll see I had many big plans — plans for cucumbers and blackberries and lettuces. How did I do?
2010
- Berries: None ever fruited, not the strawberries, and certainly not any of the bush berries.(Poor Logan Echollsberries.)
- Cucumbers: They grew nicely, but they were really sour. Even the neighbor kid (aged 4) who loves cucumbers, wouldn’t touch them. Maybe they weren’t ripe yet?
- Hot peppers: grew fine in the pots. We used these lots.
- Sweet peppers: Did not grow fine in the pots. I’m trying them in the ground this year.
- Mystery plants that came up in the garden: They were tomatoes. And they were awesome.
- In fact, all my tomatoes last year were amazing. I was the envy of all my neighbors, not to mention my inlaws. I had sungold grapes out the wazoo and tons of stoplight cherries and a bunch of slicing tomatoes.
- Lettuce: Not doing this again. If you don’t pick them when the leaves are babies, they get big and bitter and unwieldy. And I am not quick enough on the draw for that.
- Basil: All grew great. We had so much basil last summer.
- Oregano: The one in the pot died, but that’s okay, because the one in my garden came back in a major way (it’s about 1/6 of my current garden).
- Cilantro: NOT a pot plant. Now I know.
- Mint: Don’t even ask. I’m the only person on the planet who can kill mint.
- Zucchinis: Wow. I got about a dozen zucchinis the size of my arm last summer. We got sick of eating them, and then they (conveniently) died.
- Yellow squash: Died before we got any.
- Rosemary: Died. Not a pot plant, I think.
- Sage: Shaded out by the zucchinis.
So, what am I planning on this year?
Tomatoes, and plenty of them! I think, buoyed by the enormous success we had last year, I got a little cocky on my tomato planting. I planted seven (more sungolds, natch, and 3 different kinds of slicing tomato, plus a “chocolate cherry” that sounded fun). In addition, TEN tomato plants came up. So even if htey don’t grow to the heights they did last year, I should have plenty of tomatoes.
The oregano came up from last year, and I planted a bunch more basil. I also planted a bunch more strawberries, but they haven’t been doing anything yet. I put some regular mint and some chocolate mint in the ground, and so far, they haven’t died — the regular mint even looks like it’s growing. The Chocolate mint has definitely sent out shooters, but there isn’t enough to do anything with.
I planted a jalapeno and I have some sweet peppers i plan to put in the ground elsewhere to prevent cross pollination.
I planted one squash plant. My neighbor is going to have enough zucchini for us all.
But I don’t know what to think about my skimpy tomatoes this year. The ground might be underfertilized. I forget the eggshell/tums trick Dragonfly told me about. Bummer. But I didn’t need it last year. I don’t know. Keep your fingers crossed some of these tomatoes come up!
June 6th, 2011 at 12:38 pm
Are the leaves discolored or mottled? Two of my three plants are doing great, but only now starting to fruit. The third fruited, but it’s stunted with signs of bacterial canker or early blight. Here in CA, we had a cold spring, followed by a heat wave, followed by more cold.
I love this site for diagnosing issues:
http://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/publications/tomatoproblemsolver/
[Reply]
June 6th, 2011 at 1:02 pm
Hi, Aryn! Wow, that website is the best!
None of the leaves are discolored — they LOOK fine, just very tiny compared to all my neighbors and last year. They are nice and healthy leaf and stem-wise, and are starting to blossom and even fruit. They are just so small. Last yea I was picking tomatoes off my roof. Now Rio can see over them.
We had the same weird weather here.
[Reply]
June 6th, 2011 at 1:54 pm
i gave a potted rosemary plant shaped like a Christmas tree as a gift to a friend a year ago and she has had to re-pot it at least twice now. Of course, that could be the Florida climate more than anything else. I’ve got a rosemary wall mostly growing from clippings starting to grow around my pool. Supposedly rosemary is a mosquito deterrent.
[Reply]
June 14th, 2011 at 12:04 pm
Good luck on the tomatoes!
We just started our own little garden in my best friend’s backyard…we’re all going to share everything. Apparently it’s all growing well, but, like you, we were afraid to put anything in too early because of the weather. I would give those tomatoes a few more weeks…
Also, we are trying to do cilantro from seed…apparently it didn’t go well last year.
[Reply]
June 14th, 2011 at 4:55 pm
[...] Well, after my pathetic garden post from last week, I redoubled my efforts and I think I may have turned it around. My garden (sans [...]