2023 Gardening Thread

[eradicator]

FYI, that huge greenery right in the middle of the greenhouse is lettuce that she started directly in bags... Just haven't put it outside yet, but I bet shes cut a 55 gallon drum full off those 2 bags! It just keeps going nutz! Dang shame there's no good way to store (freeze) it. Flavor is so much more robust than what you buy in the store! It's like a whole different food group!

It all ends up the same in the end Mr. Salt, you're peppers and tomatoes will be just fine.

[SaltwaterSlick]

Man, I hope so! Wife had 4 bags with Bok Choy in them in the greenhouse sitting beside the lettuce... I put them out this morning, added the water emitters to the bags, and by this afternoon all 4 bags had wilted down!! I mean it happened quick!! Guess that direct sun is not good for mature plants either if they haven't been exposed to it over time. I put them back in the greenhouse and gave them a good watering... Will check in the morning to see if they recover...

[Killer]

What type tomatoes everyone planting this year?
I’m going Better Boy, Early Girl and Cherokee Purple
I need to get a couple cherry tomatoes and I am done. Unless another freeze hits.
Never saw any Celebrity plants this year usually plant a few.

[Geezy Rider]

What type tomatoes everyone planting this year?
I’m going Better Boy, Early Girl and Cherokee Purple
I need to get a couple cherry tomatoes and I am done. Unless another freeze hits.
Never saw any Celebrity plants this year usually plant a few.

I’ve got some Cherokee Purple and some black Krim. I’m thinking about going down to the feed store and see what they’ve got In cherry tomatoes.

[SaltwaterSlick]

For those who asked, I will post pics of the components of the watering system I use and explain how I assembled and operate mine. Again, there are MANY ways to rig up an easy watering system for your garden. This is just how I did it, and it works very well, plus easy to assemble and operate.


I started by buying a "kit" off Amazon for "Drip Irrigation". It came with a sack full of little plastic fittings that are barbed and designed to be force fit onto 1/4" plastic tubing (spaghetti tubing). This isn't a bad way to get started. What I found however is that only a few components are really needed but in high quantities if you have a very large watering system... As I posted yesterday, we have over 150 grow bags, 20 something wicking tubs with blackberries and a lemon tree in them, and 2 in-ground garden plots that I used drip tape to water...


For the drip irrigation system, I purchased some bulk rolls of 1/2" black plastic tubing specifically designed for drip systems. I used 4 different fittings and a valve. That's it for the 1/2" pieces... I used tees, elbows, couplings and end plugs. I used small 1/2" drip system ball valves. The 1/2" tubing can be a bear to force onto the barbs of the fittings and valves. The little purple "Rain Bird" installation tool for 1/2" fittings is a lifesaver. It has a snap in recess that is designed to be used with Rain Bird branded fittings. I HIGHLY recommend using Rain Bird branded fittings purchased direct from and shipped by Amazon only. There are other sellers that "claim" to be selling "Rain Bird" fittings, but they are NOT and sometimes they're poor quality and don't even fit very well. (Please learn from my mistake!)





















I have 3 main circuits for the drip system. One feeds/waters the blackberry plants in wicking tubs. One feeds/waters the grow bags in the same plot as the blackberry plants. Actually, this is one big system that I can isolate from one another with valves. The third system is a stand-alone system for the main bag garden. (I will address the in-ground garden later in this post.)








The very first fitting in the main lines is a filter/regulator assembly. These fittings are not rated for full city water pressure (or my well pressure). Therefore that white fitting you see in the pic is a pressure regulator for the whole system. It maintains 25 psi pressure on the system max. One end is where you screw a water hose (unless you hard plumb it with PVC or other hard piping). The other end, you will need an adapter fitting that is 1/2" drip main line back to a female water hose fitting. It screws onto the outlet end of the filter/regulator assembly. (BTW, the regulator can go on either end of the filter assembly. It IS rated for full city water pressure. I chose to put it after/downstream of the filter, because it does not have a swivel fitting for the hose and the filter assembly does. This makes connecting/disconnecting the hose much easier having the swivel hose fitting on the outboard end.


The next thing you will need is a piece of 1/2" tubing to run as a main line. If you have branches that need to be placed on multiple rows, you will have to break the 1/2" main line and install a tee to facilitate the branch(es). The 1/2" line is not very flexible so if you will be turning any corners with it, you will need elbows.


The way I designed my system, I can open all valves and water everything in the plots at once. However, the berries for instance only need water every 2 weeks or so but the bags must be watered every other day to every 3rd day. At each branch, right after the tee, I installed a valve so that I can turn off/isolate every branch in the plots. There is a pic showing the general layout of that big plot that uses one filter/regulator assembly for both the berries and bags. Notice the little green-handled ball valves in each line. I can turn 'em all on or any one or two of the branches as needed.


For the emitter lines, I used the 1/4" tubing and barbed fittings to stab into the main line wherever needed. I used the "Rain Bird" branded perforating/cutting tool to make the holes for the tubing. The little 1/4" barbed fittings with the angled tip seem to work the best. However they are still somewhat difficult to force onto the tubing. I found that using a pair on pliers (needle nose) to hold the barbed fitting and carefully forcing the tubing onto the barb of one end worked pretty well.



To get the line length right, I'd perforate the main line next to the bag (or wicking tub), install a barbed connector, then put the connector on the 1/4" tubing and run it to where I wanted it. I marked it, then used the "Rain Bird" cutter portion of the tool to cut the tubing.



In the end of the tubing I put in a pressure compensated emitter to help regulate the flow of water to each individual plant/bag. These emitters are widely available in various flow ratings. I chose 2 gallon/hour for all my emitters. Last year I used 1 GPH emitters, and they were just too slow and too easily clogged. The 2 GPH emitters are a happy medium that have worked very well for me.



Once the emitter is installed on the tube, I used little stakes that will accept multiple sizes of tubes and staked the emitter down near the center of the bag. In the case of wicking tubs, I just cut the 1/4" feed lines long enough to drop the emitter down into the watering pipe for the tubs. It is not staked. It is just hanging inside the fill pipe. So far this method has worked without incident.


If you mess up and punch a hole in the main line where you do not want one (and believe me, you WILL mess up!), another fitting you will want to be sure and have on hand is a "goof-plug". It is a little blind plug that can be used to plug off unwanted holes punched. I re-used main lines from our garden last year, and our bags are totally rearranged and in different spacing and quantities than last year. I simply pulled out the 1/4" barbed fittings from the main lines, installed a good plug, then punched new holes where I wanted them. The goof-plugs I got will plug a 1/4" or 5/16" hole (used in drip tape for the in-ground garden plots).



All you do is install all your main lines, then put in one of the 1/4" drip emitters for each plant/bag/bed, etc. that you want to water on each row.



I have one emitter in each 10 gallon grow bag, one emitter in each of the wicking tubs, and in the strawberry raised beds that are 2' wide by 8' long, I have 5 emitters equally spaced in them. Have one round strawberry raised bed (Little Kiddy Pool), and it has 4 or 5 emitters that give the whole round surface area good coverage.


For the in-ground plots, I used the basic Hoss Tools 8 mil drip tape system. (next year I will use 15 mil drip tape). This is similar to the drip irrigation system described above except instead of little 1/4" lines to each plant, the main line is perforated and a length of drip tape is connected to it and run the entire length of the garden row. This drip tape has emitters made into the flat hose (in my case, they are every 12"). The tape I use emits 0.4 gallons/hour per 10 feet of row length. What that means is that each 40 foot row in my garden consumes 1.6 gallons/minute of water.








To install this system, it starts out much like the drip system in that from a filter/regulator assembly (This regulator is 12 PSI). Simply stretch out the main line, (in this case the Hoss system used 5/8" tubing) along one end of the plot. To maintain as equal flow as possible, I put my water supply connection in the middle of the plot. for instance, I have 2 plots that are 13 rows wide and they're 40 feet long. I have 26 drip tapes with the main line splitting the plots in half.


To bury the drip tape, I use a Hoss High Arch Wheel Hoe and "plow" a furrow the length of the garden for each row you want. Hoss makes a drip tape laying system, but I didn't think I needed it since I don't have that much tape to lay in my plots. Lay a drip tape in each furrow and connect it to the main line with a "row start" fitting. In my case, I used "row starts with valve" so I can turn of each row of drip tape as needed. On the other end of the drip tape, it is terminated by a "row end" fitting. It is a small flat plastic buckle of sorts that the drip tape is passed through, then folded over a couple times and pulled back tight. This shuts off the end of the drip tape.


After all drip tapes are installed and before they are buried, turn on the water and check for proper operation of the system. Be especially careful that the emitters on the drip tape are facing up. Once the system checks out OK, the drip tape is ready to be covered. I use my wheel hoe set in the "hilling" position and run down the drip tape straddling it. This covers the drip tape and makes a little raised row so you can plant right on top of the drip tape. The other cool thing is for some things like greens and peas, you can actually plant in the little furrow the hilling process leaves on each side of the row when the drip tape is buried. This will give you a double row that can be water/fed by one row of drip tape... We did green beans, Purple hull peas, beets, lettuce, and cucumbers this way. This way for the plants such as green beans and cukes, once they are up and growing, the trellis can be installed between the rows (just to one side or the other of the drip tape).



Most of our fertilization is done through the drip systems (both in-ground and bags) by using water soluble fertilizer and an injection system. This puts the nutrients right at the roots of the plants, takes less fertilizer, and prevents fertilizer from helping grow weeds that are in the middles between the rows... For in-ground plots, one side of ours is almost all corn and the other side is peas, beans, beets, okra and a few other things... The corn requires different fertilization rates and types than the peas for instance, so I have that row start with a valve on it so I can turn on only the rows I want to fertilize when I'm injecting corn-specific fertilizer. For this I use a Hoss Tools Fertilizer injector system that I connect to the drip systems where the hose is connected.





Last year, I used timers to turn on/off the water on a regular schedule, but so far this year, I have not used any timers. I just turn on the water for a while, then turn it off, switch to the next plot as necessary and water that one... I have tested my systems and I can water that big system that has all the berries and bags as well as the raised beds for the strawberries, oh and a lemon tree and 2 blueberry bushes all at one time if need be. The emitters hold a constant pressure so it waters very evenly. If I turn off the blackberry circuit (which I do most of the time since the blackberries only need water about every 2 weeks or so), I can water both grow bag garden plots at the same time... Right now, that's 155 bags!! We can water the whole bag garden while we are eating dinner... go out and turn on the water, eat dinner, then come back out and check everything for moisture... shut it off, DONE!!



The one thing to remember if you're planting by direct seeding, until you get your plants up and growing where they have a root system, you will likely need to water from overhead. Once the plants start to grow, the drip irrigation system should give your plants all the water they need. Now drip tape for in-ground garden plots is all the water your seeds, new start transplants, or mature plants will ever need from day one.


Hope this is helpful... sorry to be so long-winded, but... well, anyway, Good luck all with your gardens!!

[dhall1414]

^^^ we need an admin to turn that post into a sticky or something.

[Muskles]

Great info there Mr Charlie! Thank you for taking the time to do that. Gonna have to remember post #200.

[Killer]

Wow

[rtp]

Charlie, now that’s a garden!!!!! Your family and friends must enjoy it as well. [emoji3]

I always feel like a kid waiting on the end of the school year to arrive in regards to that day of first harvest. Just counting down the days!


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[Mr. Public]

What type tomatoes everyone planting this year?
I’m going Better Boy, Early Girl and Cherokee Purple
I need to get a couple cherry tomatoes and I am done. Unless another freeze hits.
Never saw any Celebrity plants this year usually plant a few.

Tomato Plants:
Lemon Boy, Amana Orange, Cherokee Purple, Bobcat, Brandywine, Marianna’s Dream, Yellow Pear & red cherry tomato, Porkchop, and some type of blue tomato my neighbor gave me. A couple others I forgot the names of.

Plus okra, a variety of peppers and 3 types of squash and cucumbers & basil. Haven’t planted any zucchini this year.

Start most all from seeds I ordered.


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[SaltwaterSlick]

Noticed this morning that we have a few peas (top pick purple hull) coming up, and quite a few squash plants that my wife direct seeded in some bags... No corn up yet. It's always exciting to see the stuff you plant start to grow!

[Chronotrigger]

My little backyard garden strip

So last year I lost the battle to vine borers
. They got every type of squash and cucumber I planted. Any advice?

[Fordnandez]

Got my little garden planted over the weekend. (4) Roma, (2) Sho****o peppers, (2) Jalepeno and (2) banana pepper. Got a new soaker hose fitted up and the timer is supposed to be delivered this morning. Any suggestions on the fequency and duration I should set the timer? I was thinking 3 days a week at 20 minutes a day? Also was thinking 4 days a week at 15 minutes a day. I know that isnt a big difference in overall watering time and I am probably just thinking about this too much..........

[SaltwaterSlick]

Well, we put the okra transplants in the ground yesterday. Planted a few test peppers to see how they fare in full sun... ain't been much sun tho..



Down to 4 trays of transplants... Gonna do my best to STOP adding bags!!! Here's the layout now... even have 9 bags of marigolds to scatter out among the rest of 'em.





The in-ground garden is pretty much complete with the exception we will probably plant cucumbers in a week or so. Have first planting of them coming up now, but wanted to try succession planting them this year. We will succession plant squash too.








Looks like we got a real good stand/germination of the corn and so far the net has kept the crows at bay. The purple hull peas are up and thriving. Our first time at trying the double row planting for them. We are getting lettuce from the in-ground garden too. It appears that the double row planting for it, beets an even the dill-weed we planed works well.


The berries are coming along very nicely... even have a red one or two...






Broke up a new patch this afternoon. A small patch that we will try our hand at melons, probably just cantaloupes, but watermelons aren't out of the question... Bride started some cantaloupes in a tray yesterday.





If all this stuff makes, we are gonna be busy come harvest time!! Sure is fun watching stuff grow though!

[txtimetravler]

^whats the name of those berries?


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