The Old Garden Spot

My first real garden was in the back of my yard, in front of the hedgerow. It got almost full sun, and was only shaded in the hottest part of the afternoon. It got overgrown after many years of non-use, and today, I started to clean it out, thinking it would be nice to use it again.

Problem is, the oak trees grew a lot in the last 8 years. Guess they would, since I had all those plants under them that I had to fertilize. Now the old garden spot is shaded from about noon on, so no good for really growing most veggies. There is one place there on the side of the yard that gets full afternoon sun, but is shaded in the morning. I think that's where I'm going to put my tomatoes in the fall.

This time around, they'll be in pots, because I really don't have time to dig up a place big enough for all those tomato plants.

Today I tried something I've always wanted to try. I stuck eggplant cuttings. Now, I don't know if eggplants will grow from cuttings, but if they will, I'm going to have three more Ichiban's. I have some Ichiban seeds, but that takes so long, and I want some more plants now. The first time I ever grew an Ichiban, it got three feet tall, and lived for 3 years. Anybody ever rooted eggplant cuttings? Just wondering.

I'm thinking of planting some peanuts. I don't know why, just to make me feel more at home, I guess. I remember eating peanuts right out of the field when I was little and spending time at my paternal grandmother's house. She leased her land to a farmer, and he grew corn and peanuts. As children, we weren't much interested in the corn, but the peanuts were like field candy.

I'm doing a lot of strange stuff this year, just experimenting. We'll see how it goes.

Veggie Report

The veggies are coming along. The tomatoes took a hard hit during the freezing weather, but I cut them back, and they're coming back out. The problem is, they have blossom end rot, so I'll have to add some calcium to the soil. I may actually not even mess with those, because it seems my rat is back, and every time one gets ripe, he eats a hole out of it. I may just leave those two for him, and plant some others somewhere else in the yard. That way, he'll have plenty, and won't try eating the others.

I have to get rid of the rat, though, because I planted some other veggies in the same bed. My yellow crookneck squash and okra is coming up, and more beans. The rat doesn't seem to like the eggplant, so it's doing well. Believe it or not, the beans that got hit by frost are coming back out and now have blooms.

I have a lot of tomatoes to plant out. All 10 of the Cherokee Purple seedlings made it. I also have two Husky Cherry Reds, which look like they will be patio size, and can be grown in pots; and 5 of the Black Plum, which I've never tasted, so I'm looking forward to that.

I'll be growing the yellow bell peppers, which are big enough to transplant, in pots, I think. My neighbor gave me a lot of mixed pepper seeds, so I'll plant them and have some nice surprise plants. She said there were red bells, orange bells, cubanelles, and jalapenos all mixed together.

The pineapples have started to grow, and I'm watering them with horse manure tea. They like natural fertilizer best. After I've leached all the tea out of it, I'll add it to the compost pile

My Valencia orange still has a couple dozen oranges on it. The grapefruit next door is still loaded with fruit as well, so I've had a bounty this year. Plus, there is a vacant house down the road that has Honey Mandarin oranges, red grapefruit, and tangelos. The neighbor says the man died, and his family isn't down much, so take all I want. I've been loading up every couple of days. The Honey Mandarins aren't going to be edible much longer, so I've been stuffing myself.

I've hauled a lot of horse manure lately, and have started a lasagna bed in the back. I'll layer horse manure, oak leaves, and kitchen waste in there and plant in the fall, if I'm still here.

I'm still fighting for my house. A long story, but I have still not gotten my insurance money for my kitchen fire, because the mortgage company won't let me have it unless I use some of it to catch up on the payments. I've called legal aid, and will probably be filing bankruptcy to save the house. I'm waiting to hear from them for an appointment.

So I still have no stove. I'm going to call a repairman and see if this one is o.k. to use. It may be that I've been doing without a stove for nothing, but I really didn't have the money to deal with it.

Life goes on, such as it is. I'll probably end up leaving here, although I hate to. I kick myself for not selling and leaving two years ago, when I could have made a bundle on this house. Now it's not worth what I owe on it, and I'm stuck here.

I'm baaaack!

Haven't been doing a lot on the homesteading front lately, because I'm in a financial crisis of my own, and fighting to be able to stay in my house. No sense making it into a homestead if I won't be here, right?

Anyway, I'm starting to plant some veggies. Put out a single squash plant last week, but plan to plant more. Planted some more Blue Lake Bush beans today.

On the tomato front, I have about 10 seedlings of Cherokee Purple Tomatoes that I need to put into bigger pots. Also have two Husky Cherry Red seedlings. They look like pretty compact plants. The Early Girl and Park's Whopper were badly burned in a freeze, but I cut them back, and new growth is sprouting out all over them. Unfortunately, I lost a lot of the green tomatoes, due to the fact that I didn't have time to do anything with them, so they went to the compost pile.

I also have parsley and catnip seeds coming up, but need to plant more catnip, because a few plants got killed by the cold. I have about 6 yellow bell peppers ready to plant out, and a couple of tiny Solo papaya seedlings that I need to put into larger pots.

The pineapple plants are starting to grow now. I went and got free horsemanure last week, so I'll be watering them with manure tea very soon.

I stuck a couple more spinach bush cuttings in the ground to root. The one in the pot is still growing, but I need to take it out and put it in the ground.

The bananas are all doing well, even the baby ice cream bananas, but I will have to move them, because I just noticed that if I leave them there, they'll be blocking the sun onto that vegetable bed.

I'm planning out my herb gardens. I'm going to do knot gardens in different places around the yard, instead of having them all in one place.

I bought seeds for everything I want to grow this summer; okra, eggplant, peppers. I have a sweet potato ready to cut up and put into the ground as soon as it sprouts a little.

I'm still planning on growing the tropical veggies, and have some eddoe (malanga) and taro in the ground at present.

One orange tree and the key lime are blooming, and already have tiny baby fruit. Nothing on the others yet. I'm starting seeds of Honey Mandarin oranges. A neighbor who passed had a tree, which has been supplying me with all I could ever need. They are so yummy! Of course I've been eating grapefruit from the tree next door, which was loaded this year. My valencia still has a few dozen oranges on it that aren't quite ripe enough, so I'll have some next month for sure.

Just picked the last of the starfruit for now. I've been trying to trim the tree back, but had to wait for all the fruit to ripen. The Japanese Plum (loquat) is loaded down. Trimmed off some lower branches, so I'll need a ladder to pick fruit this year.

I'd love to grow chayote, but you have to have a very strong trellis for it, and I don't have one right yet. Maybe next year.

Guess that's all that's going on so far. I'll try to get some pics soon.

Green Bean Bonanza, Sad Tomatoes and more...

Remember those Blue Lake Bush green beans I planted, the ones that had been in the freezer for 12 years? Well, I cooked up a whole pot of them last week. I wish I had taken pics, but I didn't. I actually cooked them at a friend's house, because I had a kitchen fire on Christmas Day and don't have a working stove right now. Yeah, I'm a clutz. I left grease on the stove. Good thing I wasn't cooking a Christmas dinner! There are some upsides to not celebrating Christmas, although, if I'd had a house full of people, maybe the damage wouldn't have been so bad.

Anyway, the beans are putting forth another flush of blooms, and I have some harvesting size now, so I'll be picking them and doing the crock pot thing with them. I expect to get quite a few beans from these plants before I have to replant them.

My tomatoes aren't quite as healthy as my beans. It seems the Early Girl has been hit by a blight, because all the bottom leaves are dying and falling off. The fruits are being eaten by some sort of bugs. I need to spray them, but I hate to use poison. I've been taking cuttings from the plant, but if it has a blight, they won't do well either. Sad.

The lonesome little Japanese Eggplant is loaded with blooms and tiny baby eggplants. One is harvesting size. The sad part of that is, I love fried eggplant, but have no stove. I guess I'll try to boil some water in the microwave and blanch and freeze them. I had good luck with my eggplants living a long time last time I planted them, so hopefully I'll have the same with these.

I cut the tops off of turnips and planted them, but I haven't really watered them a lot, so they're not growing. It was really an experiment to see if I could get turnip greens out of them.

I planted lots of seeds, some I got in trades and some herb seeds I bought. I am really praying the Cherokee Purple tomatoes come up. I've always wanted to taste those, but they are way too expensive at the store. They're heirlooms, so I can save seeds.

I also have some Grape and Cherry tomato seedlings growing. I don't know why I have so many tomatoes, because I don't really even like them!

I really need to get some squash and cucumbers into the ground, but I've been so busy, I haven't had time to prepare the garden spot on the other side of the yard. I'm going to try hard to get that done this week.

I have some volunteer watermelons coming up in the compost pile. I'll probably leave them just to see how it goes.

Guess that's all for now. Happy Homesteading!

Growing Tomatoes in a Sub-Tropical Climate

Homegrown Tomatoes Are Easy in South Florida If You Know How

The most frequently asked question by gardeners when they move to South Florida is "how do you grow tomatoes?" In South Florida, you grow tomatoes primarily in the winter. This is because our growing seasons are reversed from the rest of the country. Read More...