In this tub, we have tomatoes 'Amish Paste' on the left, and 'Jet Sonic' on the right. In the center I planted some "early bush bean" seeds, and the upper left corner is Italian parsley seed, upper right has purple basil.
There! No screens to protect from wildlife, as I was confident that deer and rabbits wouldn't walk up onto the deck. Will I be sorry?
Well, the late frosts and low temps struck an early blow to the melon, but these tiny leaves gave me hope for a comeback.
Hmmm...still looks pretty sad. So on June 13th, I planted some more melon seeds next to this pouter. I also planted some cypress vine seeds, a 'Volcano' pepper plant, and a "Benary's Giant Lime" zinnia (both were plants I'd started indoors myself.)
By June 21st both tomatoes are very large, but the bush bean in the center never did anything (it was very old seed, and I forgot to use innoculant.) At this point, the 'Jet Sonic' tomato on the right has some curly leaves that bug me and I'm concerned about a blight of some sort.
When July 13th rolled around it just looked too funky, so I pulled it up. The 'Amish Paste' next to it was getting really big anyway, and I didn't want it to "catch anything" (I did trim off some lower branches that looked shrively.) I also planted a NOID seedling ("no ID") in the center where the bean never grew.
Here we are about July 28th, and this little tub looks great!
The green zinnia bloom is getting started-funky!
The whole planter is really growing strong!
Look at those cute melon blooms!
The basil and parsley were harvested several times over the season...
....but melon & company were harvested prematurely! Crap! July 30th the varmints demonstrated that they have no problem walking onto the deck....
....and uprooting my poor melon!
So I stuck it back in the soil and assessed the damage. *Sigh* So much for my pretty green zinnia, and I just don't know if there's enough season left for the melon to make a comeback. We'll see...
About a month later, we have renewed growth....
....tomatoes forming nicely on our 'Amish Paste'....
...lots of them! Very cool temps are keeping them green, though.
Not much color here, although green is nice, and the cypress vine seems happy...
....climbing up my "refrigerator trellis"....
...showing off the delicate blooms.
It even scrambled up the tomato branch when it ran out of trellis!
Here's the NOID plant reaching for the sky. After scouring my seeding notes I've decided this is
coreopsis tinctoria (poor thing set buds yet never got to bloom). I've seen it listed as annual and perennial by various sources though, so I guess I'll find out this spring.
Late September has me feeling hopeful for more green zinnias....
.....very hopeful!
One frost got the tomato looking somewhat droopy....
....but not the melon! All those cute blossoms, too bad my season isn't a month longer! (Not to mention the near-impossibility of a frost-free October.) The zinnia flower got so close, I cut it to bring indoors and enjoy.
Then came a harder frost...
....marking the beginning of the end. I got one tomato ripe enough to eat :(
Ah well, better luck this year! :)
11 comments:
I've mentioned this before, but I like how you integrate annuals in with your veggies to give a little color to the displays. I'm going to do that this year as well! :)
Thank you! Before I began researching companion planting this year, I made up my own "casual version". I've always heard it's a good idea to "mix it up" with veggies to throw off bad bugs. I'm hoping that using more "officially beneficial" combos this year will yield better results. (Along with faster-maturing veggies :)
Boy, does this sound familiar, even using short season seeds and planting early.
Considering where you live Laurel, I'm not surprised! :)
Love the combo washtub/fridge-shelf trellis!
v.
Oh no... were the green ones not even ripe enough for fried green tomatoes? Or is that just a southern thing???
I did want to try fried green tomatoes, but we had a hard freeze before I found my "round tuit" :) This year for sure!
You'll have to try some shorter DTM varieties. I grow Stupice. And I've heard good things about Cosmonaut Volkov.
Awesome Chuck, I bought Stupice to try this year! I never saw 'Cosmonaut Volkov' though, where did you find that one?
May this be the year of tomatoes for you, Lisa! Last year instead of cold striking them down in their prime, it was heat & drought - go for the fried green tomatoes if you get the chance!
Annie at the Transplantable Rose
Thank you Annie! I'm trying to grow super-speedy varieties...but a hot summer would sure throw a different wrench in! (I do suspect that I'll like fried green tomatoes, since I like fried squash and such :)
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