The Plant Thread

[Taffeta]

Oh dear. O.o. Cat acid. Not good o.O.



I put nepeta in my hanging basket. It's trailing, so I'm now hoping that the local cats don't come and pay it a visit. Last thing I want is a cat swinging from the basket over the porch...lol


I forgot to mention in my post yesterday but I also bought some radish seedlings at the garden centre! I have grown radishes before, but this is a bit of an experiment. Dad has some tomato plants but we usually do much better with fruit than veg.

My gooseberry plant usually produces a lot of fruit but not this year, it's had both sawfly and caterpillars, the latter of which ate the only fruit it had managed to produce. I've repotted it and am keeping tabs on it and I think the infestations are done, but it means it won't fruit this year. Hopefully the others will pick up the slack.

We have raspberry canes and Dad bought a bunch of new ones to add to the old ones, which are doing fine, so I suspect we may get a lot of those this year. We've already been pulling rhubarb, and the apple tree had a lot of blossoms. THe only trouble is trying to get to those before the birds do. They like apples...

[BlackCurtains]

Raspberry... canes? Is that like a bush? One of my best friends growing up had raspberry bushes in the backyard. His mom would give us a big bowl and we'd sit and pick them. When the bowl was full she'd wash them and give us some and we'd sit and eat them on the gazebo It's a nice memory.

[Taffeta]

Raspberry... canes? Is that like a bush? One of my best friends growing up had raspberry bushes in the backyard. His mom would give us a big bowl and we'd sit and pick them. When the bowl was full she'd wash them and give us some and we'd sit and eat them on the gazebo It's a nice memory.

Yeah, kind of. They sell them as long sticks which sprout leaves in the spring/summer and flower. So they're basically tall long plants instead of a bush. They're usually trained up the fence on wires as they grow pretty tall, but don't branch out as much as a strawberry plant or gooseberry bush might.

[Ponyfan]

Here's this week's pics of the plants.  The strawberry seeds from the grow kit aren't doing well at all. Also, Mint 1 is a year old. It's grown a lot since. 


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Mint 1


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Mint 2


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lavender


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strawberry plant

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strawberry seeds. 

I think I killed what little chance they had to grow,   I was trying to water them yesterday because the growing stuff was dry and ending up drowning them.   


Ponyfan

[Lady Frostbite]

All my tomato seeds sprouted and are healthy little plants! I'm going to repot them now; I thought I had two seeds in per dimp, but one had three seedlings out so yay!

[Ponyfan]

I found a colony of bugs living in Mint 2's pot.  I think they might be whiteflies?  They're living under all of the healthy leaves.  There's a lot of them, they started swarming a little when I disturbed them.  Does anyone know why my mint would have whiteflies? I've tried to take good care of it.



Ponyfan

[Beldarna]

So this is my growing pallet that the landlord has given me as a residential. The one next to it belongs to a friend who's also a neighbour.

It has grown pretty wild with weeds so i cleaned it up and will probably sow today or tomorrow.

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Look at that chive! I put the seeds in last year and it was supposed to be a one season kind, but it's alive and very well this year as well! The brown in the middle is my not so dead mint. It's both peppermint and moroccan mint.


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I moved the mint from the center to the upper corner a long with my strawberry plant and chives. The plan is to grow radishes, kale, beetroot and two kinds of lettuce. Last year I only got one beetroot so I hope for more luck this year. I also grew zuccini and got so many I still have some in the freezer so I opt out of that one this year as well.

[Ponyfan]

Here's this week's pics of the plants along with the aloe my mom got today.

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Mint 1


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Mint 2

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lavender


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I read that you're supposed to cut off strawberry runners for the first year of the plant's life to keep it healthy.  Does anyone know if that's true? I don't want to harm a plant just because something said too. For some reason the strawberry is near the edge of the pot instead of the center. It was like that when I bought it.

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aloe



Beldarna, I like you're growing pallet.


Ponyfan

[BlackCurtains]

Wow, mint two looks huge!

[Beldarna]

Wow! Those mints looks amazing!

About the strawberry, you want it to spend the energy on growing the main plant, not sending out little runners. I had runners allover the pallet that I cut off when I cleared it. It was mayham, mint roots under the dirt and strawberry above it, lol.

[Heart Of Midnight]

Beldarna,your growing pallet looks good and your plan for what plants you are going to put in sounds good! My chives are still alive too, but mine is an adult plant bought in the vegetable department at the store and I put it in the soil last summer. I've never tried growing these from seed. I usually buy all the herbs from the vegetable department in the store and put them in my "plant box" to grow. Chocolate mint and parsley also seem to be alive. I have yet to start cleaning up the weeds and dead plant parts.

Ponyfan, wonderful mints!


(I've been following this thread for a long time, but I haven't bothered to write anything because I'm not such an enthusiastic gardener.. )

[Taffeta]

I'm glad the mints are doing so well, Ponyfan!!

I agree with Beldarna on the strawberry.

I came back from my trip yesterday to find a lot of my summer plants are now in flower It was a sunny weekend all over so that's helped I think.

I'll get the spider plants outside today or tomorrow. I think all risk of frost is done for this year now *hopefully*.

[Ponyfan]

Thank you everyone.  I'm glad the mints are thriving too, despite the mistakes I made in the beginning especially with Mint 1.

I've noticed a lot of bugs on the mints in the potting soil of Mint 2.    I've been using the dish soap spray on them.  It seems to help a little, but there are still a bunch of them.  They aren't on the other plants yet.

Here's this week's pics of the plants.

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Mint 1


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Mint 2

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lavender

The lavender is about to bloom.


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strawberry

I cut the 2 long runners off the plant today. 

Edit: Here's mom's aloe.

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I also made plant ID sticks using craft sticks, but I haven't put them in the pots yet.


Ponyfan

[Taffeta]

So long as the bugs aren't damaging the plant, it may be worth just keeping an eye on it if the dish soap isn't working. They look in decent shape, but it's not for sure whether any other chemicals might impact the plant unless you are sure what the bugs are. (And also if you want to use any of the mint in other things, like cooking or drying to scent clothing).

We have some tomato plants that Dad bought - he actually got a replacement tray sent out as the first got caught in the post over easter and were in poor shape when they arrived. BUT we have managed to save almost all of the original tray. I am especially proud of two little tomato plants which arrived in terrible shape but have beaten the odds to start to grow.

One of them was basically shrivelled and had one half dead leaf when it arrived. It now is about fifteen centimetres tall, with six or seven branches and lots of new leaves. That one I had in my greenhouse so I could keep an eye on it, and it seemed to do the trick.

The other was a bit more unusual in that it arrived with a completely collapsed stem. The leaves didn't shrivel and die, but they were lying across the soil because the stem was too weak and floppy to hold it up. I repotted it deep in a new pot so that most of the bad stem was covered and only a tiny bit of the stem came up through the soil. Since then it's been out on the staging with some of the other plants and it's gradually learned to stand upright. It's now about six centimetres tall, with three leaves and it is definitely vertical.

The friends of these tomato plants are already around a foot high and they are probably the ones that will produce the fruit. BUT to me the rescues are much more rewarding, since most people would just have composted the poor critters.

I like a challenge

[invaderhorizongreen]

they are happy and making baby plants, while thriving on neglect.

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