I Just Can't Catch a Break With the Garden.

[jdmidwest]

Rain, mud, cloudy days. Late Frost.

My garden is a mess. Its been rainy for the last 3 days.

My squash have squash bugs on them that like to dust like turkeys in Sevin Dust and still multiply.

My tomato plants are 5' high and don't have a leaf on them for the first two feet. They are just trying to set tomatoes on them.

My pole beans are under attack from Jap Beetles from vineyard across the way. They are just starting to bloom. The bush beans are broke over by the pounding rain.

Today, my cucumber plants have been hit by a fungus or virus and have turned yellow in one day. They were just starting to produce. This is a new twist, I have never had a problem with cucumbers other than dry weather or bugs.

Okra is foundering. My garden, the okra is still only 6" high. It looks better in the other garden, about knee high, but it had an earlier start.

I walked over to check the other garden at the neighbors to find 20 Canada geese in it. They had pulled up about 2 rows of my second planting of corn and stomped it into the mud. What corn that came up in the first planting is tosseled out at about knee high, no ears.

Good thing we have a farmer's market close by.

[Quillback]

I feel your pain. I have plenty of green tomatoes, but not a red one yet. Cucumbers are doing pretty good, made up 8 jars of pickles last week.

Squash has been OK, but the squash bugs have shown up in force here also, won't be long before they destroy the plants.

[tho1mas]

Bad year except for early stuff.

Oh well - just 6 weeks till time to start the fall plantings.

[BilletHead]

Bummer JD,

Take care of the geese early goose season I feel for all of you guys. All that work and not much to reap. I guess I got pretty lucky this season. In early and producing. Suppose raised beds is helping too keeping most everything a bit less wet. Only had to water twice. Did suffer from the fungus on a few tomato plants. Celebrity mostly. Did not seem to hinder the Black Krim's. I actually have one of each in the same tub and the krim is doing great and the celebrity has withered to about nothing. One think about the krims though is cracking and splitting. Some of the tomatoes in the big bed are over five foot high. Generally when they have tops like this there is not much on the bottom but these are loaded all the way. Then there is the squash, no problem with the bugs yet but they look good but have had very few squash. Some of them grow real well and rot on the end of grow well and then swell as they grow out looking like an elongated pear type shape. The bed they are in has the least dirt depth so maybe they are staying too wet? Peppers are still going bonkers. I picked one today that is a long sweet pepper. It had to be a foot or longer. I ate the whole thing right there next to the plant. Sweet like the little ones you buy in the bag at the store. I swear I could hear the other ones on the plant screaming at what they had just witnessed Bought more sausage to stuff more cubanells to be covered with cheese and cooked in the smoker. Cannot get enough of those things. It is one of the tastiest dishes I have ever tasted.

I almost feel bad about posting pictures but will anyway. Kind of like big fish photos. " Pictures or it didn't happen ! "

BilletHead

[jdmidwest]

Found a recipe for killing the powdery mildew on the cuc's, milk and baking soda. Of course, shortly after I applied this afternoon it fell another flood.

Most of my ailments are attributed to the extreme wetness we are suffering from. Not large amounts of rain, but some every day ranging from a tenth to a inch or better each time.

Up side, the bees have alot of forage still. Normally they are starting to hit the dearth of dryness by now. But they are still balls to the wall busting in and out of the hive packing in nectar. I am going to check supers this weekend and probably add some more. New 4 frame honey extractor on the way, be here tomorrow. I may hit a 20 gallon harvest this year. But the humidity will have to drop some so they can dry out honey enough to cap it.

[Seth]

we picked pur first yellow squash and cherry tomato this evening. We should be loaded up with zucchini and ellow squash soon. We have a mess of bush beans ready to pick. some of our heirlom tomato plants are loaded and look good while others look like crap. Something must me missing from the one bed because the plants have a lot of yellow and dying leaves down low.

Hopefully the warm up next week will help things out.

[Gavin]

Planted late this year . No harvest yet but the plants are starting to take off. Should have a bunch in 3-4 weeks.

[jdmidwest]

Yeah, 3 1/2 more inches of rain last night and today.

I stopped at local feed store to pick up some seed for fall. I walked up to counter and the gal asked if I had found everything. I said "No, could not find the rice". She looked at me puzzled and said they have never carried rice. I laughed and said "what else do you have that will grow in 3 inches of water and mud".

Rivers are all out of banks around here. I am flooded out of the farm, can't get into the bees to pull supers this weekend unless it runs down.