Weather & Conditions
Partly cloudy warm July day with a low of 75°F and a high of 91°F. Average humidity was around 67%, but early morning it was in the low 90% range. No wonder I started feeling it mid‑morning.
Planting & Transplanting
Today I planted six more Big Beef tomatoes in Rudy’s Radish Ranch, or RRR. Just so you understand this garden: Rudy is out for a hip replacement, and I’m making sure his plot is being worked because if it wasn’t, he could lose it. He has been with the gardens for over fifteen years, and I think he enjoys getting his fresh produce boxes at least twice a week.
We also decided to put a fence around his garden for the rabbits. I saw the rabbit again, and I’m pretty sure he thinks I’m his caretaker now — he didn’t budge when I found him eating clover near the Shasta daisies. At this point there are three ways to get him out. Leaving the gates open hasn’t worked, so that leaves trapping or shooting. I don’t own a gun, so that’s out. I think James the tiller tinkerer might have a trap. I guess the other option is that he becomes my pet. Rabbit poo is good for the garden, no?
Getting back to RRR, Rudy does not like weeds — who does? — and his solution is commercial‑grade landscape fabric. When we thought we could work together, he let me open the holes for the plants. It was ridiculous: his tomatoes had maybe a four‑inch opening to squeeze the plant into. The same scenario applied to peppers, squash, and cucumbers, only smaller. Everything was so buttoned up it wasn’t funny. He had to use liquid fertilizer because there was no soil surface for anything to be scratched in.
We were supposed to be garden partners, but I should have realized early on that his style wasn’t mine. Yes, he let me open up all the holes and amend them over the last year and again this year. But last season he bailed out on the planting and watering. So this year, when he said he plans to be back next year, I told him that’s fine — he can have his garden back, because I’ll be working only my two and a quarter plots. That quarter plot is the area Rudy never gardens. And when he comes back, he’ll add yet another layer of landscape fabric. I found at least four layers when I opened the holes.
After two years of working Rudy’s plots, the holes now have such a good crumb that all I need is my hand tiller. I can dig the holes with my hands, they’re so loose. The remaining holes are ones that haven’t been used for tomatoes yet and had a winter cover crop. Here is a photo of the planting hole. As you can see, my tomatoes are small — they were started the day I got home, June 11, so about five weeks old. That’s actually a good size because they handle transplanting and heat better when they’re small. I watered them in with Superthrive.
Watering & Care
Next I sprayed the perimeter of my Armenian and India cucumbers to keep Peter Rabbit from nibbling more of them.
I am not happy with the raised bed I planted basil and Lilliput zinnias in, as the whole bed is filled with weeds. I spied two basil plants, one Thai and the other either Sweet Italian or Genovese. It is hard to tell these two apart. Anyway, I dug them up and planted one in the Back 40 near a new tomato plant and the other in the Pickle Patch with the tomatoes. I also started transferring some of the Lilliput to the space with the marigold I transplanted. They were a little droopy when I finally got to them with water.
It takes me an hour to water the entire three gardens. I water at the base with a steady but not really hard stream, and I use my phone to time each plant. For example, the June tomato transplants get one minute, and established eggplants get forty‑five seconds, and so forth. By this time I needed to cool down, and I decided to jump into Pretty Blue (Tacoma truck) and run the AC on full blast going to the learning plot to water and check the mounds.
No new germination, but I have to say I really screwed up with just scattering the dill. It worked so nicely in my garden, but here I tilled up weeds, and guess what — besides dill I have a lot of weeds. I will have to deal with that later, if at all.
Pests & Problems
I forgot to mention a couple of things I observed my tomatoes are looking good since I trimmed off the septoria or early blight. The tomatillos are looking a wee better, but one of my first big beef in the Pickle Patch has died and on closer inspection it might be a cutworm. I will know tomorrow when I replant with a different variety and put a toilet paper roll shield around the stem. I will take a photo tomorrow.
Also, while watering I found these eggs on the squash plants and decided to try the duct tape method for removing them. It worked great!
Full Circle
I plant, nurture, harvest, and share. Today’s squash, cucumbers, and okra went to my son, and his wife said she trusts my veggies — no Cyclospora worries here. And tomorrow it all begins again, just like that old commercial: time to make the doughnuts.