Tragedy in the Garden

Dismembered Tomato 5.12.14

I have had a number of losses in the community garden since becoming a member. Notably, when you have a plot of land in the middle of a city it is not surprising to see homeless folk, students, as well as furrier vagrants. Yesterday, I went to the garden and discovered that someone had cut most of the branches off from the four tomato plants I put in last week. The cuts appear to be at an angle which makes me fear that these were done by other  gardeners looking to root a "cutting" of the plant.  It sickens me to think that a fellow gardener would do such a thing.

Dismembered Plants 5.12.14

Plot 5.12.14

Tristan Strawberry Flower 5.12.14

Lettuce transplanted 5.12.14

Green tomatos

The tomato plants have gotten much bigger and now have little green tomatos.

Yellow Russian Oxheart Tomato

We harvested these green tomatoes and let them ripen at home.

Almost Empty Garden

Most of the bounty has been collected and the garden is near empty for the year. Here is one of the last harvests of the year ... not much to look at.

8/28 Cucumbers & Green / Yellow tomatos

Wilting Cucumber Plants

My one tomato that grew from seed

Biggest Harvest Yet

We had quite a big harvest today with carrots, lettuce, some green tomatoes and a handful of cucumbers. We decided to pick the tomatoes while they were greenish/yellow to prevent someone else from stealing them. We were very sad to find that someone had broken in to our garden last week and while they did not steal anything (that we could notice) the perpetrator did break half of our fence.

Odd Shaped Cucumbers and Big Green Tomato

Strawberry's flowering for the Second Harvest

Over-ripe Peas

Green Ox-heart tomato (bizzare looking)

Lettuce, carrots, green tomatoes

Garden Update 6/27/12

Lots of green tomatos. Some beans. The strawberries are turning red and critters are eating them up before we have a chance to harvest

Garden Update 6/10/12

It was too hot to work in the garden this weekend, but I did go by to see how things are progressing. The biggest surprise was that one of the tomato plants (only 5 inches tall itself) had a tomato hanging from it. I planted more peas and carrots to replace those eaten by the rabbits, had a small carrot harvest, and found the very first alpine strawberry berry.

Bush Bean Plant Flower

Small Carrot Harvest

Growing Romaine Lettuce

Strawberry Plants with Green Berries

An Old Russian Favorite - Oxheart Tomatoes

Oxheart tomato.

I had ordered 8 oxheart tomato plants from hirts on amazon. I was very surprised to receive the order in just under 3 days. However, I was even more surprised by the condition of these plants. The handful of yellow branches are okay. This size of the plants and condition is not. Six of the plants were only 4 inches tall and already had flowers. The plants were in next to no soil and were very skinny / windy. I can't help but wonder what kind of chemicals / lights were used to have such mistreated plants produce flowers. I will plant these anyway and see what will happen.

Oxheart Tomato Plants Flowering - 4 inches

Oxheart Tomato Plants Flowering - 4 inches

Tomato Update

Tomato Seedlings

It's sad to see how few tomato seedlings I have this year. I had close to 20 "good" seedlings last year. This year I only have 3 Black Triefele seedlings, 2 Black Krim seedlings, and 1 Holland tomato seedling. I tried starting some of last year's cherry tomato seeds but none germinated. Just today I started another variety of tomatoes (zebra) in hopes that these will do better. In hindsight I realize that I have been using potting soil instead of seed starter this year which may be the problem.

Garden Update 7/9/11

Botanical Interests
Sugar Sweetie Flower

My little garden seems to be making progress overall.  The first flowers have appeared on the botanical interests Sugar Sweetie tomato plants. The Renee's Garden superbush plant has grown significantly but has not had any open flowers.  My blueberry bush has a few green blueberries. The raspberry bush has grown and become more green, but no fruit thus far.



Alpine Strawberries - first
Renee's Garden

 Alpine strawberries - I can now see many tiny little berries (still green) developing from the little white flowers. The planter from last year has also sprouted its first flowers.

Two weeks ago I planted some Zinnia Cut and Come Again flowers by Botanical Interests and these are growing at a surprisingly fast pace.



First Blueberries (very few)

 Today I also planted some Romaine Lettuce. I ordered the seeds from Amazon and while it was supposed to be by Botanical Interests, the package said Todd's Seeds. I thought this was odd and planted the seeds regardless.

There's Root!



Organic Sugar Sweetie Tomatoes

 after 7 days.

Super Bush Seeds

I was very excited to see that my little organic sugar sweetie tomatoes, after spending 7 days in a moist warm paper towel, had roots! Without counting to get a more exact number, I would say that nearly 90% of these seeds were growing a good size root. The root length varies from 3/4's  to 5/4's of an inch. I was very impressed with this turnout, especially considering that I have another 30 seeds in a baggie that I have not taken out yet. This is particularly impressive compared to the new bag of Renee's Garden Super Bush seeds that I just received, which only contained about 40 seeds. Nonetheless, I have layed out the Super Bush tomato seeds on a different paper towel and put it in a plastic bag in a warm spot. 

I also set some cat grass out to germinate. My little ones should be happy to get this nice combination of rye, oats, barley, and wheat. They seem to just love eating plants. Just this week they did a number on my fresh cut daffodils!