Garden Update - fungicide

My bush goliath plant that is in the topsy turvy is doing TERRIBLY. This pisses me off since it was my healthiest plant on planting day. It has one tomato and yellow wilting leaves. I'm certain that the stem/roots are rotting inside the planter. The thing does NOT drain water very well.

I got an update from seacoast local over the weekend stating that blight has been reported in Connecticut and is likely to make its way up the seacoast at some point. Blight is a fungal disease that effects different species of plants. Last year's tomato crops all over New England fell to late blight - including ours and my uncle's. With all the rain we've been having, my uncle suggested that I start fungicide on the plants soon, as he already had. It made me think that maybe my bush goliath has a fungus. So off I went to Mahoney's to see what I can get that would help prevent the blight while remaining as true as possible to my "organic" mission.

I ended up with a liquid copper fungicide spray made by Bonide. It supposedly helps control a bunch of different diseases on all kinds of plants. I sprayed all the plants this morning before I watered - both tops and undersides of the leaves. I'm particularly concerned for my heirloom plants (which have not been bio-engineered to withstand disease). One of my heirloom plants has grown as tall as my shoulders! It has a bunch of flowers and I can only hope & pray that I'm doing the right things to keep it productive through August.

All in all, my little garden is looking great. I haven't seen any signs of pests except for the occasional holes in a leaf. Judging from the amount of buds on the hot pepper plants, it looks as though we're going to have a ton of hot peppers. The strawberry plant has begun flowering again (albeit only 4 flowers). As soon as those are pollinated I'm pulling it in the house to keep the berries from the chipmunks. And my herbs are doing GREAT. I have a bunch of parsley and basil stored in the freezer already. I have a bunch of basil in a cup of water on my counter and I gave away a bunch of basil this weekend. FYI - the garlic scape pesto is WICKED strong, so I'm going to add basil to it tonight to help cut the sharpness. I'm ready to chop some chives for a baked potato this week. mmmmm

Garden Update

All this beautiful weather has me itching to get these plants in the ground. They're really starting to sprout up in their little peat pots - so much so that I'm worried that they've outgrown the pots. I'm not crazy enough to re-pot them and let them acclimate for another few weeks and THEN put them in the ground.

I bought clear plastic to put over the bed to help heat up the soil... I haven't done that yet. I don't know if I will. I should take out a thermometer and go find out how warm/cold the soil is. I guess optimum soil temperature for transplanting is between 65 - 85 degrees. I did, however, decide that I'm going to use weed screen to help reduce the amount of weeding I'll have to do. I bought a roll of that and some landscape pins to hold it down. I went to the garden center to buy compost (to add to each hole), mulch (to cover the weed screen), and fish/seaweed fertilizer during lunch today. Hopefully, now, all my financial investing is be done - well, except for the fish heads - which I'm kinda being wishy-washy about calling the fish market and asking them about them. I literally spent over $175 on stuff to start this garden. Hopefully I can get some free fish heads.

I dug out all the old herbs from the herb garden container (except the tarragon, which is growing quite nicely) and added some organic container soil to it. I'll probably plant the basil and parsley tomorrow night after work. I hope Mahoney's has garlic chives in stock. I really want to try growing those again. They were SOOOO yummy. This year, I'm more concerned about the usefulness of my herbs rather than the exotic-ness, beauty and variety that turned into a big forest last year. Who knows? I'm looking forward to tomato/potato salad, and will splurge on some fresh mozzarella to have with my heirlooms and basil...

Where the heck are the bees? I need bees to pollinate my strawberry plants!! They're blooming and I need bees!!! Maybe I should put the pot up on the deck rail for better access... Ah well, I guess strawberry plants "come back" every year, so if they don't produce fruit this (their first) year, then I'll have to be patient *sigh* take care of them over the winter, and wait for next year.

I don't know where my camera is...but when I find it, I'll take more pics of the garden in progress!