Gardening Questions
Last night I spent a good part of the evening drawing up my garden plan. I got out all my books and all my seeds and tried to put something together a bit different than last year.
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| Most people work at the table I chose the love seat..lol |
Okay so this is what I need to figure out.
How much room do sweet potatoes take up? I was able to find some yesterday even though I am pretty sure they are yams and everything I have read says that yams and sweet potatoes are not the same thing...who knows maybe they were all wrong...lol
Has anyone successfully grown spaghetti squash on trellises? What do you do when they start to get too big?
Do butternut squash take up a lot of room? Should I bother planting acorn squash?
Can you grow tomatoes and cucumbers next to each other? I haven’t seen anything that says no, but nothing that says yes either...lol
Is it safe to plant tomatoes in the same area that had blight 2 years ago?
Is it worth it to try and grow artichokes from seed or am I better off trying to find already started plants at the greenhouse
I also have a portion of the garden that nothing grows in. The trees leave it in it the shade most of the day, it’s usually wet and the chick weed loves that area. I have tried planting a few different things there in the past, but nothing really takes. Any suggestions?
So basically I have A LOT of questions that I still need to find answers for..LOL
In other news I went out and bought some more seed starting containers, soil, 6 tier a storage rack and growing bulbs. I still have to find the light fixtures that will hold the bulbs now. You would think if you sell the bulbs you would sell the fixtures that use that size bulbs.....but no. We hit three stores yesterday and will try the little store in town today. I would like to get things started tomorrow at the latest so we may be borrowing my mother in laws fire starters instead! Not that they really start fires, but they are old
Wish me luck!
Of course, a lot of this is just a matter of opinion...I'm no expert, so some might disagree, but I'll give it a shot:
ReplyDeleteHas anyone successfully grown spaghetti squash on trellises? What do you do when they start to get too big? I haven't, but some use nylon knee highs or some similar form of sling to cradle the squash, tying them to the trellis. I've had fairly large butternut squash just hang from my fence with no support and no problem, the stems are really strong.
Do butternut squash take up a lot of room? Should I bother planting acorn squash? Some varieties of butternuts do take a lot of room. I plant Waltham, which sprawl everywhere, but they are so prolific I feel they are worth the space. I tried Butterbush last year, and they were good and didn't take up so much room, but we didn't get very many squash from the plants. I'm going back to the Waltham this year, but I'm also thinking of trying Delicata as a possible replacement for the space hog butternut.
Can you grow tomatoes and cucumbers next to each other? I haven’t seen anything that says no, but nothing that says yes either...lol Of course! It's not like they are going to cross or anything.
Is it safe to plant tomatoes in the same area that had blight 2 years ago? I wouldn't.
I also have a portion of the garden that nothing grows in. The trees leave it in it the shade most of the day, it’s usually wet and the chick weed loves that area. I have tried planting a few different things there in the past, but nothing really takes. Any suggestions? Lettuce? Parsley. Or anything from this list: http://www.motherearthnews.com/shade-tolerant-vegetables-zm0z11zsto.aspx
I think that Granny answered everything!! I have grown Spaghetti Squash on a fence and am planning to grow some on a trellis this year at the plots. I will just sling them up when they get bigger.
ReplyDeleteI too think that Granny has many of your questions covered - I would add one or two comments:
ReplyDeleteYam and sweet potato definitely different! We've not got the weather to grow either, so I'll be interested to see how you get on.
I'd grow acorn/onion squash instead of butternuts - but then the former suit our summers here rather than the latter; your climate is different of course.
And yes - all the squash I've grown take up masses of room. I once made the mistake of planting 4 in a bed 20' by 4' thinking I could twirl the vines round and round. No way! They went mad and took over the world!
And I was going to suggest lettuce for your shaded area - and maybe pak choi too?
We have no problems with tomatoes and cucs next to each other. We started artichokes from seeds last year. This year the plants already look marvelous and we're anxious to see how and if they produce this year. Good Luck to you!
ReplyDeleteGranny has answered a lot already, but I'm going to disagree with her on one point. If you are talking late blight, the spores don't overwinter here and certainly won't where you live. So late blight is fine. Early blight is another story.
ReplyDeleteSweet potatoes and yams are different. But what we call yams in the supermarket are often really sweet potatoes. I'm growing them for the first time ever and I'm trying to figure out how far apart I want to plant them.
Wow, I'm impressed...then again, planting even tomatoes intimidates me!
ReplyDeleteI like to trellis my Cucs! I don't put them beside my Toms, but then again I baby the Toms because of everything I plant (brown thumb here) They are what we use the most of! We are using the tiller today to plant our GIANT (6x4 LOL) garden today!!
ReplyDeletePlant the sweet potatoes about 2 ft. apart. This may seem close but I got about 30 lbs. from mine last year. Good luck!! I'm rootin for ya!! (Pun intended)
ReplyDeleteWell here is my penny worth.
ReplyDeleteTomatoes and cucumbers together.
No problem I have been doing it for more years than I care to remember.
The dreaded blight.
You should be safe.
It can over winter in mild conditions, but the most important factor is to grow tomatoes as far away from potatoes as possible, because that's where it usually spreads from. As I love my tomatoes so much, I have stopped growing potatoes.
I haven't read through everyones comments so some of these answers may be repeats.
ReplyDeleteYes, butternut sprawl quite a bit, and you need to make sure they have the room to sprawl from the base so that they can dry and not stay wet - otherwise a kind of rot spreads through the leaves. If you're worried about space, try the three sisters approach. Plant corn, peas/beans and butternut in the same mound (one plant of each) the corn geows up, the butternut out, and the peas/beans climb up the corn and fertilise the soil making a better butternut crop.
Potatoes and tomoatos are in the same group of plant. You should rotate where they are planted and not grow either in the space you have grown either one in the last two years - so it should be a three year cycle. And this is without considering blight, so not sure what you do once that's raised it's head, maybe the three year cycle is enough for it.
For your shade patch, try cucumbers. They prefer the shade, especially at the hottest part of the day, and grow a lot better if you can keep their soil wet.