2013/2012 Garden: 05/01/2013

Tomato Planting

Date: May 21, 2013

What I used to notch my garden so that I would have my square-foot grid: Twine, tape measurerer, pencil, and a big saw

You can see how the plants started to bend up toward the sun

Dug two trenches - pretty deep because my plants are so leggy

Nice and deep!

What I used to dig

Nutrients I added to the trenches: leaves, bananas, and eggshells

Egg shells: adds calcium - hope this helps with bottom end rot (BER). I got it last year and it's due to lack of calcium

Bananas: adds potasium

Leaves - adds carbon

Put all the ingredients together plus added some of my compost - these plants should be happy :)

How I placed my plants

Close up - you can see how the roots are in front of the plant

Here's where things went bad - while I had my plants lieing on their sides so they could reach upwards, we had a really hard rain storm that beat the tops of several of my plants off. Note to self: Check the rain forecast prior to setting your plants on their sides!....lesson learned.

Poor, poor baby

All planted

Remember all the roots are in front so these plants were bent into an upright position. After a few days, they should naturally straighten out.

This Started off as a Good Idea...

May 19, 2013

Since my plants are so leggy I'm going to trench them. Trenching is when you plant them on their sides then bend the top of the plant up...pretty close to a 90 degree angle.

I'm afraid of snapping their little leggy necks so I'm trying something out I saw on You Tube.

You lay your tomato plants on their side for a couple of days. What happens is they naturally want to reach up toward the sun. By the plants doing this, they are creating their bend. This makes it so I'm not forcing them to be upright when I plant them on their sides.

View looking at the tops. Just remember how these look to compare to the next update.

This is my tomato bed. As you can tell, it doesn't have all of it's dirt yet.

Hardening Off Time

May 10, 2013

Hardening off your plants is probably the worst part about growing your own plants. At least for me it is. My plants are in the basement and I have to carefully carry the trays upstairs then outside and the plants ALWAYS tip over. (That's the negative of using red Solo cups).

I started off putting the plants in the shade until they started to wilt. I did this for several days. Then I gave them morning sun until they wilted then placed them back under the lights. Once they perked up, I placed them in the shade. I did that for 3 or 4 days. Then I started just leaving them outside all day then giving them breaks in the shade if they started to wilt. It wasn't long before they could sit in the sun all day with no ill effects.

This tray has a mixture of sweet basil, purple basil, peppers, and bok choy

Here are my tomatoes - pretty leggy. Lesson learned - I'm pretty sure I kept them on the heat mat too long so they grew taller than they should. Last year I removed the heat mat as soon as they all germinated but this year I was babying them and used it for several weeks longer.