Speaking of the weather and gardening, I bought my tomato plants yesterday. Last year, I tried raising tomatoes from seeds I’d saved the year before that, and it was a disaster. This year, I have returned to the old ways: I went to the feed-and-seed store and bought the biggest honkin’ Better Boys they had! I might have tomatoes by the first of next week, if the weather holds.
115 responses to “Throwing Up the Towel”
Sure you will. Good luck. Home grown tomatoes are the best by far.
I had started tomatoes from seeds for years from tomatoes that came from my grandfather in Italy….until one year I got a little restless and planted too early and a spring frost got them….
Still have weeks to go before I can even start thinking about planting my garden….Mr J, will you share a tomato????
We have a cat with kidney issues who has to go to the vet to get fluids every couple of weeks. We almost always take along copies of cat-related cartoons, usually A&J or Rhymes with Orange. Today’s retro will definitely be going!
Never plant above ground vegetables before May 10th!
Never grow any veggie that you can buy at a farmers market. Support your local economy.
Mindy every climate is different. In Michigan it is often Memorial Day. I usually put mine in around Mother’s Day. In the last 5 years of tomato growing, I’ve had 2 horrible years. 2 moderate years and one bumper crop years. But I don’t work hard enough to cultivate a bumper crop. I need to water more often.
Good morning, Villagers! Paul, that is sad. My boss’ husband visited his ol family place, found a rosebush browing beside a ruined shack, dug it up and replanted it in our bed and it blooms every year. It is not a hybrid tea, more like the roses you see on old English paintings. It smells wonderful and is red on the outside and white near the center.
Ruth Anne, thanks for warning me about “Rhymes With Orange” 😀
Anyone know anything about propagating rhododendrons? We’ve had a beautiful one that is over twenty years old and looks like it is nearing the end of its life. It would nice if I could take some cutting and grow a new generation, but my knowledge of gardening is about limit to “dig hole, plant bulb”.
Up in New England here we Symply do not plant until after Memorial Day…
@Ruth Anne/Lilyblack,
Almosr wore my “If you say gullible slowly it sounds like oranges” Tshirt to the concert tonight, but I decided to go with the “What I Really Need Are Minions” one instead.
Are the people in the Eastern Ukrainian town of Donetsk crazy? Hasn’t the world already tried this once? Someone lose their Fargone mind? FYI,
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2014/04/17/jews-ordered-to-register-in-east-ukraine/7816951
Lilyblack – Rhymes with Orange is only occasionally about cats; usually it’s just the quirks of life. I was introduced to it here in the Village. Take a chance and try it! rhymeswithorange.com
We usually wait until Memorial Day for our garden. Our meteorologists recommend waiting until Mother’s Day. We want instant gratification and buy plants from our local nursery rather than use seeds.
I always plant my tomatoes April 1. They’re doing wonderful so far. Got a few small
fruits already. I get my plants from a wonderful nursery in Pasadena. They always
have all the varieties I want. Mostly heirlooms. They all taste a bit different than
one another and all great. Kellogg’s Breakfast is my favorite. They’re more expensive
to buy, but I bring in plumeria cuttings and trade them for my plants. Been doing that
for 5 years now.
Blinky – try this forum. I hang out on the tomato forum, but there’s one for you too!
I’ve learned tons from the folks there.
http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/azalea/
I quit gardening when mother nature quit supplying rainwater for the garden. It’s just too expensive to water vegetables with municipal water and we only get rain for 4-6 weeks of the year anymore.
I sure do miss it, though! I always grew ‘maters, and most everything else, from seed. I’d start flats indoors in mid-late March and transplant at about 4 weeks, heavily mulching and ready to protect the plants from the inevitable May freezes.
I know much about propagating rhododendrons…except they lived down the road and had 12 kids at last count.
Symply:
Antisemitism is rampant in Europe, especially Eastern, and has been, on and off, for two millennia. The Holocaust was its worst manifestation, but Hitler didn’t invent it, he fed on it.
Interesting article on one current aspect of it in Hungary in the 11 Nov. ’13 New Yorker, p.28-35.
Tom-
Thanks! I’ll poke around and see if there are any helpful suggestions.
As the rest of the world issues meaningless threats of “consequences”, dithers, yawns or averts its eyes, Ukraine slides slowly into the New USSR (Union of Silently Swallowed Republics).
Blinky – you’re welcome. If you don’t see what you’re looking for there (I’d be surprised
if you don’t find something), just post a question. It’s a very friendly place, kinda like here.
Blinky, when my wife and I were gardening, she found some starter compound in a garden store. You take your cutting, wet the end and dip it in the starter. Then plant in a pot and let it get a good start, then transplant. I can’t remember the name of the stuff, but it worked very well.
Here you go Blinky, this is not the stuff, but instructions how to root cuttings: http://www.ehow.com/how_4514195_root-cuttings-rooting-powder.html
I planted my tomatoes from seed in January, then transplanted into “Earthbox” self-watering containers. I should have tomatoes by this time next Month. I can hardly wait for the first bacon and homemade tomato sandwich of the year!
According to Putin, Ukraine is again “New Russia”… which name Catherine the Great had given it. His rationale for reclaiming it is that many ethnic Russians live there and are being “abused” by the Ukraine government. Hitler used the same reasoning for liberating several neighboring countries in the 1930s.
On a happier note, as a dog lover and cat tolerator, I pass along this Pepsi commercial:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V8XvtW7sGe8
Symply not a great recording and certainly my visual is fuzzy but here is Jonathan Edwards and Tom Snow doing Shanty at Mechanic’s Hall in Worcester with the famous organ in the backround…BTW Dickens read a Christmas Carol from this same Fargone stage years back!
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10202829233525181
If the link does not work someone let me know!
David – maybe Rootone? It’s good stuff. I use it on my plumeria cuttings.
https://i.chzbgr.com/maxW500/8150789888/hAE781D7D/