Winter planting

It's Planting Time!!

Last year my garden was generally lacking in all ways, I think because I was just getting back into substituting and there was just a general craziness in my home so I felt no desire to work on my garden.

In our new and wonderful 2012 I am feeling much more proactive and interested in getting my garden going so here we go!
Some time last year I found a growing kit at a thrift shop so I decided to use that for my starters. If you are planting indoors for the first time and are low on money you can make your own growing kit by using egg cartons (thats what I did last year) and just add in a regular potting mix or one that is geared towards new plants. I like the kit because each little disc of dirt has netting to keep it together, also it comes with a lid. My sister did some of her own plants and then her cats ate them because there was no lid. If you are making your own you could just put some plastic wrap over that top. It helps to keep all the moisture in so you don't have to worry about watering them.

Plants:
A couple years back I purchased a container of small heirloom tomatoes at trader joes. It had probably 5 varieties of small tomatoes in it so I cut them open, squished the seeds out onto a paper towel, let them dry, and folded the paper towel up, placed it in an envelope, and wrote a description of the tomato on the outside. I have used these seeds now for two years and they have worked beautifully. Saved me a ton of money because seeds can get pretty expensive and here I was able to try out 5 different plants for 3 dollars.

The ones that seem to do best here are the yellow pear and the small cherry. So I planted mostly those. I tried out some flowers but they don't seem to want to come up. Then I am doing some herbs that I love, dill, basil, and cilantro.

With the discs, you soak them in warm water until they puff up to about an inch and a half. Place your seeds just below the surface of the dirt and then put your lid on and wait. It is that simple. I put colored toothpicks in mine so I would know whether it was a tomato, flower, or herb. It only took about 5 days for them to sprout. I waited an extra week before I took the lid off to see if my flowers were going to sprout but it doesn't look like they are going to.

I like to let them get a little bigger and then I'll thin out the extra sprouts, sometimes I transfer those extra sprouts into the discs that didn't sprout. I'll keep them inside, I can transfer them to yogurt containers when they get bigger, and then plant them outside around the end of march.

If you are growing tomatoes in a desert climate like Las Vegas, I'd recommend a book at the local library. The author grew tomatoes here in vegas for like 15 years and then she wrote this little binder book just about growing them here and how to do it. She recommends that once you plant them, you don't fertilize them until they give you some tomatoes otherwise all that fertilizer will be used to make the plant bigger. I definitely understood that my first year of tomatoes. My bushes got HUGE but with no fruit. So this year I will follow her advice. Good luck with your planting and let me know if you have any questions.

Tomatoes!!!

Last year I grew my own tomato plants, then I almost killed them, and then they came back at the end of the year. This year I bought some plants from the nursery and I put them in containers so I could move them around.

I also tried something new because usually my tomato plants get  huge and take a while to get tomatoes going so I read a book on growing tomatoes in las vegas and it said to limit the amount of water and fertilizer until the plant produces fruit so the plant produces faster and doesn't put as much work into growing. So that's what I did and voila I now have tomatoes growing and my plants aren't huge.

Garden Monday Success!!!

Finally......


The Fruits of my Labors!!!!

Mind you, they're not very big fruit but BOY HOWDY are they tasty!

This is the absolute best thing about gardening, it is like magic. You plant this little stick in the ground and then you get these tasty bits to eat and if you have never had a tomato fresh off the vine,

Oh My Gosh!!! So freckin' tasty!

You wouldn't think that warm tomatoes are yummy but yeah, warmed by the sun and juicy. MMMmmmmmmmmmm.

Plus I love that these are bite size so you just pop them in, a little bit of sunshine in your mouth.

Sooooooo if you don't have a garden, next year.....Get One!!!

It doesn't have to be big, heck it could be one plant, but if you are growing something you can eat then that is a garden. 

Happy Gardening!!

Garden Monday-Watch out for this guy!!!!

The Infamous Green Horned Caterpillar

Yeah, so these are the guys you have to watch out for on your tomato plants. They are tricky too because if they know you are near they stick out like that and try to look like a branch. If you see a bunch of bare branches then you know you have one because boy, do they strip them.

So I caught this guy before I went on vacation for the weekend, I thought there was a little too much damage to be done by just one guy, but this was the only one I could find.

Then I come back from my trip, look out my window and like half my plant is bare and 

THIS GUY was having a Buffet!!

Yeah, so he had a real nice time eating my plant all weekend.

Here is my husband, doing the honors. I hate grabbing them when they are this big because they will wiggle like crazy. So we just trimmed off his branch and threw him over the wall! 

Sayanara Sucker!!!

So keep an eye out for these guys, luckily once you get rid of them the plant will bounce back.

Happy Gardening!

Gardening Monday-Tomatoes!!!!

Tomatoes can be grown pretty much anywhere.
They are a versatile plant and who doesn't love fresh tomatoes? (actually I know a couple people but I won't mention names) Have you tasted a fresh, just picked from the vine, warm in the sun tomato? They are Amazing! I was never a big tomato fan until I grew my own and then I was converted to the tomato Lovers of America!

This year I was all ambitious and I grew tomato plants from seeds. It's really not that hard but you have to start early. Next year I'll start in January so they will be ready for spring.

I used heirloom tomatoes from Trader Joes. I bought a small variety pack and saved some after I ate most of them :) then I squished out the seeds onto paper towels, labeled them with a description and stuck them in envelopes. Now you can't do that with any tomato because many tomatoes are hybrids and they won't reproduce. You have to get Heirloom Tomatoes.


Growing
The more sun you give your tomatoes, the better they will do. My tomatoes only get sun in the afternoon so they don't produce tomatoes until July. My friend's tomatoes get sun all day so she gets tomatoes in June.
All you do is plant them in some good dirt, whether in a pot, a planter, upside down, or in the ground it doesn't matter, water, and fertilize once a month. I recommend you put a tomato cage around them so your plant doesn't fall over when it gets big.

One thing. Keep an eye out for green horn caterpillars. They come from white moths, so if you see a white moth in your garden shoo it away. Also if you see white stuff on the stem of your plant, rub it off, that is the moth eggs. Those caterpillars will strip a branch bare in a day. If you find one, just pull him off and throw him in your neighbor's yard :) that's what I do. Because if you just stick them somewhere else they will find their way back.

If you think you have a caterpillar here are a couple things to find the little bugger.

1. check underneath the branches. They are tricky, they eat from the bottom so you don't see them from the top.

2. Spray water on the plant, the little guys will start wiggling around like crazy.

3. When you find one, be sure to get a good grip on them, if it is a big one he'll almost scare you in how hard he holds onto that branch.

Have fun growing your tomatoes, try a couple different varieties. Here in Las Vegas the yellow pear and the cherry tomatoes do wonderfully and I like them because they produce a lot and you can just pop them in your mouth for a snack.

Have you tried planting tomatoes? Did you have any problems? I'd love to hear from everybody so drop me a note. Thanks!! and happy Gardening.