Mid-April Update

Mid-April has brought some very nice weather, mostly in the mid-70s to lower 80s for highs. The garden is ahead of normal schedule due to the extremely mild winter we had.   Here's what been going on since my update earlier this month.

Here is my Jumbo Pink Banana squash, with my 8-yr old son.  There are 3 plants there,in 3 hills, and they have been producing many flowers, both male and female.  There are about 4 tiny squash that seem to be forming... one seems like its swelling pretty well but the others I am not so sure about. Last year in the fall, I had so many that just withered and never grew, so I really hope these set well and get going. 

Here is another view, with the banana squash in the front of the picture. Behind it you can see a tall patch of snap peas.  They snap peas are blooming like crazy, and hopefully I'll be picking a bunch soon. Unfortunately a big part of the lower parts of the plants have gotten powdery mildew badly.  The spider mites have not hit them as I have typically see, but instead its been the powdery mildew.  I wonder if these plants just weaken a lot as they start producing, and naturally just succumb to pestilence.

I have two spaghetti squash plants growing, one plant has gotten pretty big, but the other is still pretty small.  The large plant has been blooming for a couple of weeks now, but it was all females at first. When some males started appearing, I started hand-pollinating, and one squash has set and is growing.  

I have two cherry tomato plants, and they are doing very well.  They are close to outgrowing their cages,and a few tomatoes have started growing. I'll mention about the heavy mulching I have done, with the leaves.  Most of the picture show the heavy leaf mulch, and it has been very effective at preventing weeds. But the drawback is that it has prevented some volunteer plants I have enjoyed such as the German Chamomile, and a few others, that normally have come up by themselves.


The onions and garlic are still growing. I have checked the onions, and I still don't see any bulbs forming yet.  But the plants look healthy and are doing well. In the middle of the picture is a single yellow squash plant. I sowed about 6 seeds but only one came out.  In the right is the spaghetti squash, and on the left, and in many other pictures, you can see some blooming spinach plants, being kept around for seeds to keep.

Here is another view of the garden. You can see the peas again, and on the bottom you see some turnip plants, a red mustard plant, and some cilantro that is in full bloom, plus a cabbage head.

There are still a few cabbages around, but they are riddles with some holes, mostly from slugs.  I have not seen too many caterpillars, because the wasps have been controlling them. Speaking of beneficial, the lady bugs got an early start too, and they have kept the aphids under control.  The picture also shows on the left the golden acorn squash.  There have been tons of females and most have died due to lack of pollination, But a few have set recently because some male flower have started appearing too.

April 1st Update

Today is April 1st, and the garden is doing very well.  We finished off winter with very mild weather.  It was probably the mildest winter that I remember.   Our last hard freeze was in early January, and we had barely had 1 frost in early  March, where I had to lay out a tarp to protect some plants. 

Squash

In my post from late February I talked about planting some squash plants in pots for a very early start. I had planted spaghetti squash, golden acorn squash, and jumbo pink banana squash.  I had transplanted them to bigger pots, and then around the first week of March, I put them in the ground.

Jumbo Pink Banana Squash

I put in 2 banana squash plants, and later direct seeded 1 more.   I planted 2 of the spaghetti squash plants and gave 3 plants to my sister, which we planted in her yard.  I also put in all the golden acorn squash.

The banana squash are doing very well.  I have mulched the area like crazy with lot of leaves as you can see.  They already have flowers developing, and the vines are running.  

Golden Acorn Squash

The golden acorn squash came from some seeds from a store bought squash.  So I was not sure if they would fruit true to seed.  Surprisingly these are not vining, but are growing more like zucchini!  They are even developing some female flower which look like they will open soon.  Unfortunately there are no male flowers, so they wont be able to develop.  They plants are still fairly small though, so I am surprised they are doing this!

Below is a picture of one of the female flowers. You can see how the plant seems to be a busy variety. 

Female flower that looks close to opening 

spaghetti squash

One of my spaghetti squash plants is doing very well and vining, also with some soon opening flowers.   The other one looks like it will be a runt of a plant.  Shown the big plant, shown growing next to some lettuce that is bolting soon, and some cabbage, and garlic.  

Tomatoes

After transplanting to bigger pots, I put my cherry tomatoes into the ground in mid-March.  Here they are today. I got 4 good plants, and gave the two other ones to my sister.  They are starting to have some blooms.  Next to them you can see some of the spinach that is bolting.  The spinach was awesome this year. I have frozen a bunch of it because we had so much.  I am hoping to let a bunch of it go to seed so I can collect seeds for this fall.  

cherry tomatoes

variety of onions: red,yellow, white, planted from onion sets

 Onions and Garlic

My onions and garlic are also doing very well.  My onions are pretty dense... hopefully not too much so.  I dont see any bulbs forming yet, but the plants look very healthy. As you can see I have the whole garden area very heavily mulched with leaves.  So weeds have not been a problem.  This winter I would go around the neighborhood with my truck and pick up bagged leaves for this purpose.  

And here are my garlic plants. They also look very well.   

garlic

 Cool Weather Crops

 There is a mixture of the cool as well as warm weather stuff growing now.  I still have a few heads of cabbage growing.  Once again, the cabbage was great this late winter.  Probably harvested about 12 heads at least, and have three in the fridge.  The red mustard shown below is also doing very well.  My red mustard I had planted in the front flower beds have gotten powdery mildew and aren't looking as nice.

The peas I had mentioned in the previous post are doing very well.  Here they are shown in the back.  There are some flowers blooming, and a few pods have started.  The plant are about 5ft tall now.
These are shown growing behind another spinach patch.  In front of that is a small turnip patch.

Early 2017

I might have called this post "Late Winter 2017" but the weather has been so warm here lately that the word "winter" doesn't even come to mind. I heard that the last freeze we had here was Jan 8th!  We did have frost last week one morning, but otherwise its been lows in the 50s and highs in the 70s on average.  I read that a lot of the South is experiencing and extremely warm winter this year, and many trees are budding already.

I meant to do a final post last year, but forgot to. One of the disappointments was the Jumbo Pink Banana Squash.  It never had enough time to produce.  By the time the weather cooled enough, the plant was in a lot of shade, and it had two growing, but not enough time to mature.  I think the problem was the very warm fall.
The sugar pie pumpkins did come through at the end, and I had at least 15 pumpkins.

Early Starts for Warm Weather Plants

Well, since we are having extremely mild temperatures, I'm planning on getting a very early start this year with some warm weather plants. In those yellow pots (Dickey's BBQ cups with holes punched underneath) I have planted three Jumbo Pink Banana Squash, around 6 Spaghetti Squash, and 5 Golden Acorn squash (saved from a store bought squash a number of years ago, I just hadn't had a chance to plant it).  I plant to give 3 Spaghetti squash plants to my sister, and keep 2.  I will keep them in pots (and move them to bigger pots) probably until early March( if mild weather continues), and then put them in the ground.  Then I'll have covers handy if we get frost or a late freeze.  Same thing with my tomatoes.  I also have some Cherry Tomatoes going in those small jiffy peat pots.  In the meantime I have to monitor the weather,and bring them in on cold nights.

Cool Weather Plants

I have lots of cooler weather crops growing now.  The picture above also shows some Bibb lettuce, and some Spinach.  I had built a makeshift hot-frame in early January, and seeded them,  They got off a to good start, but with the warm weather I keep the glass off.  Also in the back, is some garlic.  I also planted it in early January.  

In last year's final post I had shown some cabbage I had started in pots. I put them in the ground shortly afterwards, and they have done very well. Its the "Flat Dutch" variety.  I've only had to cover them twice, in mid December and early Jan. when we had some temps in the teens.

Cabbage picked early Feb.

 We've picked about 4 good heads now, and there are about 8 more developing.

some remaining cabbage,with onions in the back

I also started some onion sets in the end of January, and those are coming up now.  Its a variety of red, yellow, and white onions.  

One of my favorite cold weather crops in Spinach. I have 3 small beds growing now.  One was shown above.  They do great in the winter here in North Texas, because they are very cold tolerant.

In the picture below is one of my patches. with some pea plants behind them that recently sprouted. Those I started from seed at the end of December,and had them in small pots until their secondary leaves came out.

spinach, with peas behind them

And below is a small patch that my daughter Elizabeth had started back at the end of October.  It also includes some lettuce and cilantro.

Below are some more plants:  Some turnips (which have big roots now that are ready to pick) and a few red mustard.  I actually have a bigger patch of red mustard in my front yard, which are very pretty and I am treating them as ornamental plants (that are edible too!)

I'm starting to see aphids on the turnips though. :(

Oct 1st Update

The first day of October was a very pretty sunny day, with temps in the low 80s.  September ended with some stubborn heat, where we actually hit 100 again in the 3rd week of September, but then the last week we got a nice cool front and some good rain too.  As has been the past few years, but big thing going on in the garden ( and literally BIG) are the pumpkins and winter squash.  In the past posts I had mentioned the sugar pie pumpkins, jack-o-lantern pumpkins, and the jumbo pink banana squash plants I had going.

The sugar pie pumpkins have run into and gone through the banana squash, and both type of plants are not growing across into the area where the round zucchini squash are, and overtaking the remnants of the cherry tomatoes (which are still producing some tomatoes, but the vines look pretty sickly), and overtaking the basil bushes too.  I'm concerned about my peppers too, but have managed to keep the vines from covering them so far.

Pink banana squash in the middle, with pole beans in the background.

huge area of sugar pie pumpkin vines

The production so far has actually been a bit disappointing. I only have 2 sugar pie pumpkins growing. One is almost full size and just starting to get some orange coloring.  The other set about a week ago, and grew right outside the fence.  I have the fence to keep out the dogs from getting in there and trampling stuff.

Unfortunately I had many promising looking female blossoms a few weeks ago but they all shriveled and died, even though I had pollinated them.  This morning I had a fresh new batch of female blossoms:

I pollinated three this morning, and probably a couple more tomorrow morning should be opening.

I think tomorrow I'll have my first banana squash female blossom open up. Here is what it looked like today:

banana squash blossom almost opened

The jack-o-lanterns still have not had any fruit set. I've had a couple good looking blossoms that I pollinated, but they died.  The vines are still growing though, and there still might be enough time for some, but most probably its too late for Halloween, but still out to be nice fall decorations if we get any.  

jack-o-lantern vines, with bottle gourd in the background, as well as purple morning glory vines.

Squash Vine Borers

To give a report on SVB activity... They are still around, but its not much of them.  Towards the 2nd half of September the egg laying slowed down quite a bit. Sometimes days will go by without any eggs found, but then more appear. The past few days I've picked a few off the sugar pies, but have found none on the jack-o-lanterns or banana squash, although I have not been looking very thoroughly, mainly because the vines are so thick I can hardly get in there without damaging anything.  I am still trying to dig in and cover the main vine tips whenever possible.  

The older sections of the sugar pie vines are starting to yellow, and I have found a few damaged vines, with SVB frass, but those have been mainly secondary vines which I did not cover.

I did find some extensive SVB damage on my round zucchini plants though.  I ended up extracting some large larva, pulling out some helplessly damaged portions of the plant, and covering up the existing parts of the plant after the surgery I had to do.  Some portions are still alive, and are producing a couple squashes.

Aphid Status

The aphids have pretty much been defeated by the lady bugs and other natural predators. I still see a few around but they are held in check by lots of ladybugs and larva that are around,so its not really a concern.

Other Vegetables

Since the aphid infestation has been brought under control, the okra are really doing well now.  These 4 plants are now about 7 ft tall and producing more than we need.  And I get to enjoy their beautiful blooms!

Okra blossoms

 The pole beans are doing very well.  I saw my first flower open this past few days.  I just hope my makeshift trellis doesn't break apart as the plants keep growing.

pole beans

 I also have some other fall plants that I intend to grow in pots until some space clears out in the main garden area.  Below I have some cabbage, red mustard, and even a few ornamental cabbages for my front flower bed.  I also have a couple pots of sweet pea plants.  I also have some spinach seedlings too, as well as lettuce. Maybe as some of the pumpkin vines die off I'll be able to find somewhere to plant these guys.

Early September

Its been fairly hot the past couple of weeks, but actually not as hot as it has been in past years in early September.  August ended wet and mild, and then its been mostly in the low to mid 90s since.  The past few days has seen highs around 96 or so, but this morning, we had a front come through, and it brought some rain, and then cooler temperatures, in the mid-80s today.  

Pests

Just like last year, the aphids started getting pretty bad towards the second half of the summer.  They started mostly around the okra and the bottle gourds (a.k.a birdhouse gourd), and got really bad on both.  I've taken the approach mostly of waiting until the predatory pest populations build up.  That's what happened last year, and eventually most of the aphids were gone when the ladybugs, lacewings, and hover fly (their larva) populations built up and brought them under control.   I have sprayed some soap solution in some severely infested areas, but that has barely had an effect.

Ladybug feasting on aphids

Bottle gourds seem to be very susceptible to aphid infestations 

The cucumber beetles surprisingly have not been bad this summer.  I do see a few here and there, but its much less than last year.  And no signs of squash bugs either.  The squash vine borers (SVB) are definitely around.  I have killed about 4 moths the past two weeks, on the weekend when I am around during the day.  Every day I pick off a handful of eggs from squash/pumpkin vines.   

Pumpkins/Squash

In my last update, I had talked about my pumpkins and squash that were growing,  Except for the Round Zucchini, I had them all under cover to protect them from SVB.  All these outgrow their covers, and are now out in the open.

The Jack-o-lanterns I uncovered about 4 days ago, and started covering exposed vines with dirt and mulch, to help protect them against SVB eggs getting laid on them, and to encourage more root formation.  The older part of the vine has been hit pretty had by the aphids, probably because the plants are right next to the bottle gourds.  Lots of male flowers, and a few females have shown up but have all died before they had a chance to grow bigger and open.  I think its probably the heat we have had.  Also the plants are still not as vigorous as are the sugar pie pumpkins,  which are growing like gangbusters!  

Jack-o-lantern pumpkin plants.

 This morning I uncovered the Jumbo Pink Banana Squash plants.  They are growing pretty fast now and have huge, beautiful leaves.  Like the pumpkins, I covered up the exposed vines with dirt and mulch.  It will definitely be interesting (and crazy!) when these start spreading over to the other side, and run into the round zucchini and jack-o-lanterns.  Its going to be a huge squash jungle in the garden.

Banana squash, with Sugar Pie Pumpkins in the background

The Sugar Pie pumpkin plants are HUGE.  They have taken over their whole area, and are moving into where the Banana squash are growing.  Its going to be very tough to get in there, and take care of the vines, help pollinate flowers, and check for SVB. There are some female flowers that have appeared but they have all shriveled, probably due to the heat. There are a couple that look like they might open in the next few days.

Sugar Pie Pumpkin plants

Wow its been a struggle with the Round Zucchini!  I think planting them in the heat of the summer was not a good idea.  I should have waited another month before planting them. The plants are all very long semi-bush vines.  I have not seen any signs of SVB damage, but I did do some pre-emptive injections with BT in the main vines.  The big problem has been the onslaught of aphids. They have cause the new leaves to be small and curled up.  They have attacked the blossom very badly.  I do see predatory insect populations building though.  And the other problem has been that almost all of the female flowers have either shriveled and died while still very small, or if they have gotten big enough, they have gotten eaten by rats, or have died shortly after I pollinated them.  I did get one to grow, and that one I have let to "ripen" so that I can use it for seeds, (because I am out of seeds for these) and use it for a decoration I guess.  It looks like a small yellow pumpkin.  So I am not sure whats going to happen with these.  I'm not sure if they will get to produce much before they succumb to SVB, and powdery mildew eventually.. or they might get overrun by the pumpkins and banana squash.

Okra in the back, and Round Zucchini in the front.

Okra, Beans, Peppers

The okra started blooming and producing despite the heavy aphid infestation.  I've picked about 10 pods now, and there are plenty of flowers coming up, although those are heavily covered by aphids, which I sprayed this morning with soapy water to see if that helps. (See picture above).

The Kentucky wonder pole beans are doing very well.  They are now training up on the old cucumber trellis, and I bet by next weekend I will have to grow the trellis more to accommodate their growth.   They are about 5.5 feet high now.

Pole beans

 The sweet bell peppers are doing well too.  The plants have not grown very tall, but they are producing flowers now, and I did see a small pepper forming now. That area is about to get overrun by the banana squash, so I am hoping they get a bit taller so they can stand out above the vines.

bell peppers (excuse the finger in the shot)

Late August Update

Almost the end of August here in North Texas.  After a typically hot mid August, the temps have been a lot more pleasant lately and we've had some rain, so everything is green.  

Okra

The okra plants are pretty big now, almost 5 feet tall.   I see flower heads starting to form now too.

The problem is that some of the plants have gotten hit pretty hard by aphids. There are thousand and thousands of aphids on some of the newer leaves and forming flower heads. I've started spraying with some soapy water to try and knock their population down a bit.  I am really hoping the beneficial bugs get established soon too.  Unfortunately I have not seen any ladybugs around.

Aphids attacking the okra

The aphid infestation happens almost every time I've grown okra.  They don't kill the plants but limit the prodiction, and slows them down.  Usually with some spraying of water, or some soapy water I can bring down their population.

Squash/Pumpkins

The round zucchini has been a disappointment so far.  The vines have been very dense with leaves,and they have toppled over, and many of the older leaves have gotten damaged, and have died.  So parts of the plants look ugly.  I've had to set out rat traps to kill the rats that have been eating my female flowers.  I've killed 4 so far!  Since my last update I have hand pollinated 2 flowers, but they both have shriveled and died.  Many others have withered while still small.  On top of all that, powdery mildew has tried to rear its ugly head, but I've beaten it back with some potassium bicarbonate that I've sprayed on it.
I've picked off a few squash vine borer eggs, but actually haven't seen that many.  The plant is so thick with leaf stalks that I don't think its feasible to find and pick all the eggs.  So my plan is to inject with BT at the first signs of frass, and hopefully I get some fruit to set before the SVBs start killing the plant.

round zucchini has grown very dense

round zucchini sprawling on ground.

My pumpkins are coming along pretty well.  I still have them all covered with netting so I don't have to worry about bugs, especially the borers (SVB).
Here are the jack-o-lanterns.  They are starting to vine out now, and growing pretty quickly.  The one tiny female flower has died, but some of the first male flower are about to open. Hopefully I can keep these covered for a few more weeks and then remove the covers, and start burying vines.

Jack-o-lanterns under netting

My Jumbo Pink Banana squash came up too.  All 4 seeds did, and I put the cover that was formerly on the jack-o-lanterns on these plants.

Jumbo Pink Banana Squash 

Here are my sugar pie pumpkins.  I didn't get around to thinning them out. I hate doing that, but I know I should.  So there are probably 7 or 8 plants there, with 4 seeming to be going very strong.  I still have them under cover, but have debated taking off the covers.  I just feel lazy and dont want to spend the effort checking them for eggs and covering the vines with dirt.  But they are about to overgrow the netting so I will have to soon.

sugar pie pumpkins.

I still don't see any flowers about to open on these.  They seem to be just focused on vining out.

Some other stuff growing

Here is my trellis/arbor from last year.  The volunteer birdhouse gourd, and the volunteer morning glories are doing very well and starting to grow up on it.

 Most of the gourd vines are actually on the ground.  They are growing very fast, and rooting along the ground too. I've picked some young immature gourds, because they are edible.  They actually taste very good, almost a nutty type taste. I made an Indian-style curry with them last week and it was very good! I think they are called "lauki" in India.  Google it, and you'll see many recipes and drinks and other stuff people make with these.

The calabash, bottle gourd, or white-flowered gourd.  This variety produces gourds that can be used for bird-houses and other decorations

Here are my sweet bell pepper plants.  They seem to be doing pretty well.  I see some flower heads forming.  Some are starting to lean over so I had to put a few small stakes to hold them up

sweet bell pepper plants

And here are my young Kentucky wonder pole beans.  They are looking good.  I have that fence to keep out small dog out, since I sprinkled some slug/snail bait close to them.  Slugs really like the seedlings. These are growing by the trellis I had made for the cucumbers earlier this year.