Raised Bed Gardening

[Radar67]

I'm having luck with 2 tablespoons of dish soap to a gallon of water, poured over the ant bed after you stir it up a bit. A gallon per bed, three treatments over a period of a few days. Ants are gone, not run off, killed. Soap solution is also a good natural pesticide for many bugs on your plants, like aphids. ;)

Oh, when it rains, you get bubbles and suds.  :D

[Mooseherder]

Sounds like it is worth a shot.  They're so bad this year I even have a mound right were my usual parking spot to get out of my car place is.
Gotta be careful in the morning for my feets. :D

[SwampDonkey]

Don's out to make hard workers out of us gardeners yet.  Now he's suggesting you southerners work a lot harder than us northerners. Some of us northerners that got transplanted are asked to work even harder. :D :D :D

[Mooseherder]

The Ants were all over the Mule Team Borax/Sugar blend in each bed tonight.
I hope they have a tummy ache and croak.
If they survive the Mule Team, I may be responsible for altering their DNA makeup.
The new ants will have a "B" on their bodies for Borax proof. :D
Thinned out a carrot while down there. ;D

[DanG]

You're doing a great job of thinning.  That one is really thin! ;D

[SwampDonkey]

How much juice will that yield? ;D

[Mooseherder]

How much juice will that yield? ;D

About a nickels worth. :D

[zopi]

How much juice will that yield? ;D

About a nickels worth. :D

Buck ought five, if it's organic....

[Mooseherder]

Initial results on the Mule Team Borax/Sugar concoction look promising SD. 8)

Saw some dead ants in the dish tonight and less activity in the beds.

Also tried Radar's Soapy Water on six super duty Fire Ant mounds that are in the yard.  They didn't like it.
The survivors are getting washed again tomorrow.

Some Lima Beans posed for a picture.  They were good. ;D

[zopi]

Lost my peas..but everything else is good to go...planted them too late..

i'm never buying another troybilt tiller...nothing but trouble...didn't someone say awhile back that the big hondas were good tillers?

[Radar67]

Lost my peas...planted them too late..

Zopi, how is that? You can plant peas 10 weeks before your first frost and still get a crop. You should be able to plant peas every week up until that 10 week before mark.  ???

[Don K]

I bought a tiller last fall after doing some online research and had the preconceived notion I had to have a Troybilt.. I bought a Cub Cadet RT 65 instead.  ;D I'm not knocking Troybilt, I think the older models are great and tough, but a few dealers that sold both models recommended the Cub. What I like about it is the RT, Reversible tines, The tines will turn both directions. Counter rotating for tearing up new ground and forward rotation for final smoothing and row weeding. After trying the forward rotation in slightly turfy ground I discovered that Troybilt has mislead me all these years with their commercials. In less than finely tilled soils the thing will run away from you. The tiller set me back 700 coin but was slightly cheaper than a comparable Troybilt and I am well satisfied.

Don

[zopi]

Lost my peas...planted them too late..

Zopi, how is that? You can plant peas 10 weeks before your first frost and still get a crop. You should be able to plant peas every week up until that 10 week before mark.  ???

WEll..that's the wife's opinion...I think they either drowned in all this rain or got too hot..she believes they should have gone in the middle of march...

I don't like peas anyway... :D

[zopi]

I bought a tiller last fall after doing some online research and had the preconceived notion I had to have a Troybilt.. I bought a Cub Cadet RT 65 instead.  ;D I'm not knocking Troybilt, I think the older models are great and tough, but a few dealers that sold both models recommended the Cub. What I like about it is the RT, Reversible tines, The tines will turn both directions. Counter rotating for tearing up new ground and forward rotation for final smoothing and row weeding. After trying the forward rotation in slightly turfy ground I discovered that Troybilt has mislead me all these years with their commercials. In less than finely tilled soils the thing will run away from you. The tiller set me back 700 coin but was slightly cheaper than a comparable Troybilt and I am well satisfied.

Don

I was looking at one the other day...seems like a nice tiller..

I may hold out and try to find an old troy bilt horse and drop a white tank honda on it...I had one that was built back when they built them like farmall tractors..THAT was a good tiller...I built a blade for the front of it that would
grade the driveway pretty well..

[SwampDonkey]

Except for my peas and spinach and some rutabagas, the other stuff dried up and blew away in the wind. Need to keep the stuff hosed so the seedlings can get established. Been bone dry air and wind behind it.  Oh well, I'll plant another crop next weekend and water it to death. ;D

Can't really take full credit for the Borax and I can't even remember from whom I got the idea, but it was someplace on this Forum. Although, I did do some Googling on my own as well. ;)

[zopi]

Ok, so I finally got the drive belts for the big tiller...it's a 5.5 horse troy bilt that I had repowered with a white tank honda...I re-engineered the drive mechansim with a shim
and hammer whack here and there and it seems to be working (crossed fingers) in reliable fashion...good thing, the ground here is absolutely sodden..I opened up the walkways about three inches down to help the water come out of the ground...it's drying nicely..

I obtained some japanese eggplant this morning..hopefully I will get to make japanese eggplant Parmesan.. :D


Thanks for the reminder about soap and water above...got rid of some crawlies I had in a couple tomatoes and potatoes nicely.....Dawn, Takes Bugs...Out of your way....

[Mooseherder]

The Peas seem to like the grid system made out of twine.  Most have wrapped themselves around and are alot better looking than the first planting.









Here is the first Tomato. ;D

[zopi]

my peas choked...the ones that were still coming seemed to drown in these heavy rains...

I've got a pepper, a tomato, and a little sprig of broccoli..and the little girls have been eating the baby radishes right along...

[SwampDonkey]

Those guy wires are a good idea to keep the peas off the ground. If not they tend to stay damp in rainy summers and get mold on the leaves. That seem to be what happens here at least. My father used to grow 100 acres of peas and McCain Produce had their own pea combines to harvest them. No one grows peas here now because it attracts a potato disease called Rhizoctonia which infects the roots and tubers.

[zopi]

Found out today why the peas drowned....most of the atlantic ocean is in my backyard right now and the pea patch ain't draining...been out on the rain a bit teaching the low spots to run..

[Scuba_Dave]

My plants are just starting to get going
I hardly have anything out in the main garden yet
Still in the greenhouse & the sunroom
We had threat of a frost the other night - down to 36
I had a fire going to warm it up in the house

Only 7x10, I also use plastic jugs out in the garden as little greenhouses

[Mooseherder]

We had some major wind and rain storm today that damaged alot of my Tomato plants.

[CLL]

Don't have a raised bed garden ,but its on a knoll. Just replanted the corn for second time and will be doing beans tomorrow, along with okra and GRITS. Rain 2-4 inches at a time and the corn and beans had life jackets on

[SwampDonkey]

I got tomato plants 3 feet tall, dad started in his basement in his sun room. They have blossoms already. I'll bury most of the stems when I plant them. Too early, yet the leaves are pretty much all out on the trees here on the ridge. Except oak, basswood , butternut and ash, they are slow pokes. The sugar maples are way ahead and done flowering. ;D

[Mooseherder]

The Jalapeno plants have produced some nice hot peppers.
They are Hot! smiley_bucktooth
My Son-in-law ate some off the plant right before he left here last night and the heat really got to him while he was on the road.  He had to put his mouth in front of the A/C vent until he could stop and get something to drink. :D
His friends had been given some because they supposedly liked hot.  They called and said Man, They're hot.
I cooked a Pasta Dish tonight and used half of one diced fine.  Didn't really notice it much in the dish.
I'm not real crazy for hot and wish I had planted Red and Green Peppers instead.  I saved seed from both red and green peppers and planted the red tonight in a Bed.  The Red pepper I bought last week was from Canada.  The one I bought today was from Holland.









Anyone ever grow Peppers from the Store bought peppers?
An observation from the last two weeks of saving seeds.  There is almost twice as many seeds in a Green Pepper over a Red Pepper.