Garden Rambling - Specifically, Tomatoes
May. 10th, 2010 08:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bluesgardenDug 39 holes, planted 34 tomatoes, and pounded in 34 stakes today. One plant that was otherwise good managed to snap off as I was carrying it over to be planted (Blue = Not a Happy Camper), while the remaining difference of 4 plants were Purple Russians that were growing practically in circles and I simply didn't have the patience to deal with after... uh, 6 hours in the garden, I believe it was.
I took pictures! Which didn't really turn out! Grr.
Just now realized that the back of my right hand and both my forearms are sunburnt. Ouch. Only one cut from unidentified garden debris (glass or sharp stone probably - I'm pretty sure there aren't too many teeth in there despite the one I found today, still attached to a fragment of jaw bone) but it's on the tip of the finger that I use to click my primary mouse button. *eyeroll*
I have a lead on some tomato plants that need a new home, so I may pick up 6 fill-ins for the empty spots (I was already one shy of the 40 available spaces when I was digging the holes, although there are 23 in the greenhouse promised to D's aunt and another for his grandmother). Did I mention I dug 39 holes that were 1 1/2 to 2 feet deep? Clay soil is evil, just so we're clear on that. On the other hand, I was able to entertain myself contemplating two people digging a perfectly rectangular, straight sided hole that's 6 feet deep in the space of a couple of hours. Television and its unintentional comedy!
(After a few hours in the sun, I'm pretty easily entertained.)
Most of the tomatoes transplanted quite well and were displaying little transplant shock the last time I checked. I didn't water them in because a) the ground was almost too soft/wet to work in this morning as it was and b) there's now actually a 100% chance of rain forecast for tomorrow. With new rainfall amounts between 3/4 and 1 inch. Yeah, that'll cover the watering just fine. Thankfully, so far it looks much lower for Wednesday and Thursday, which will hopefully allow the ground to drain a bit.
As far as amendments went, I ended up using roughly 1/2 cup of Tomato-tone (fertilizer), 1/2 cup of hardwood ashes (for extra potassium), 1/4 to 1/2 cup of egg shells (for a smidge extra calcium), and a scoop (2 cups?) of aged horse manure in each planting hole, along with two layers of 1/4 to 1/2 cup garden gypsum (calcium and breaking up the clay over time) as I was filling in withthat damned clay soil for 1/2 to 1 cup total gypsum.
Have I mentioned that I have no idea what I'm doing lately? I was so not prepared for the tomatoes to grow as large as they did this year - from the containers available to the late clue-in about fertilizer to trimming to a lack of in-pot staking. As much grief as the Purple Russians gave me, I can't really write them off completely without trying them again next year. I did plant one, most of it buried and it's squirrelly, curved top lopped off. I like to call this the 'Let's See if It Lives!' experiment. I've got one more (Opalka maybe?) with a seriously stressed stem - it split length ways sometime this morning before planting, which may well let in rot and/or disease and/or something bad. Um. I'm not really sure why I planted it anyway, but there you go. My train of thought at the time seems to employ some fuzzy logic in retrospect.
I'll just... stop rambling now. Have I mentioned I was in the sun for a while today? *wanders off*
I took pictures! Which didn't really turn out! Grr.
Just now realized that the back of my right hand and both my forearms are sunburnt. Ouch. Only one cut from unidentified garden debris (glass or sharp stone probably - I'm pretty sure there aren't too many teeth in there despite the one I found today, still attached to a fragment of jaw bone) but it's on the tip of the finger that I use to click my primary mouse button. *eyeroll*
I have a lead on some tomato plants that need a new home, so I may pick up 6 fill-ins for the empty spots (I was already one shy of the 40 available spaces when I was digging the holes, although there are 23 in the greenhouse promised to D's aunt and another for his grandmother). Did I mention I dug 39 holes that were 1 1/2 to 2 feet deep? Clay soil is evil, just so we're clear on that. On the other hand, I was able to entertain myself contemplating two people digging a perfectly rectangular, straight sided hole that's 6 feet deep in the space of a couple of hours. Television and its unintentional comedy!
(After a few hours in the sun, I'm pretty easily entertained.)
Most of the tomatoes transplanted quite well and were displaying little transplant shock the last time I checked. I didn't water them in because a) the ground was almost too soft/wet to work in this morning as it was and b) there's now actually a 100% chance of rain forecast for tomorrow. With new rainfall amounts between 3/4 and 1 inch. Yeah, that'll cover the watering just fine. Thankfully, so far it looks much lower for Wednesday and Thursday, which will hopefully allow the ground to drain a bit.
As far as amendments went, I ended up using roughly 1/2 cup of Tomato-tone (fertilizer), 1/2 cup of hardwood ashes (for extra potassium), 1/4 to 1/2 cup of egg shells (for a smidge extra calcium), and a scoop (2 cups?) of aged horse manure in each planting hole, along with two layers of 1/4 to 1/2 cup garden gypsum (calcium and breaking up the clay over time) as I was filling in with
Have I mentioned that I have no idea what I'm doing lately? I was so not prepared for the tomatoes to grow as large as they did this year - from the containers available to the late clue-in about fertilizer to trimming to a lack of in-pot staking. As much grief as the Purple Russians gave me, I can't really write them off completely without trying them again next year. I did plant one, most of it buried and it's squirrelly, curved top lopped off. I like to call this the 'Let's See if It Lives!' experiment. I've got one more (Opalka maybe?) with a seriously stressed stem - it split length ways sometime this morning before planting, which may well let in rot and/or disease and/or something bad. Um. I'm not really sure why I planted it anyway, but there you go. My train of thought at the time seems to employ some fuzzy logic in retrospect.
I'll just... stop rambling now. Have I mentioned I was in the sun for a while today? *wanders off*
