This is why I do my veggie gardening at Publix...

(Sorry, but I'm almost glad to know I'm not the only gardener who is inept at the food thing.)

Kate

Yeah, Solstice (Kate)...I'll meet you at Publix! LOL.....

Give me geraniums and lantana any day....growing veggies is frustrating!!!

Now, tomatoes I can grow. Just nothing else...(sigh).

pictures would help a lot... squash is picky here. castorp has great luck with trombone squash (tromboncino). my own tromboncino is growing well, but i got it in late. just now setting fruit. i've had great luck with an ersatz seminole squash that simply appeared in my yard last year. it's growing like mad right now, and finally setting fruit. it's not really a seminole squash, but probably some freak hybrid winter squash from the compost pile. still, it shrugs at disease and i was giving the things away in december. i'll send you seeds if you want.

squash and melons take a while to 'take off' - but once they reach a critical mass, they grow VERY quickly. it's geometric -- 1+1=2, 2+2=4, 4+4=8 etc etc..

yellowing leaves mean: 1) not enough water; 2) iron deficiency (add chelated iron); 3) not enough nitrogen. those are just guesses. a healthy handful of fertilizer and a lot of water fixes most problems...

Here is a link that might be useful: accidental squash

I have trouble with squash too - squash or melon bugs I think. I read somewhere that you should not put melons, squash and cucumbers near each other because the same bugs go after them all. Makes sense but of course, I didn't follow that rule and planted all of them. In addition I planted too much so everything got mixed up together. Oh well, I am learning. I have yanked out the cantalope because that was were my problem started and also most of the squash.

Ill where do you get the trombone squash seeds? I like squash and I would like to try an easy-grow squash. What brand of fertilizer do you use?

Saintpfla, don't give up. It is just a matter of finding out what grows for you. And maybe a little fertilizer would be in order. I have found that organic bone meal worked into the soil really makes a difference quickly. I use Miracle-Gro organic choice bone meal - they carry it at Lowes I think, or was it Home Depot? Then Anita told me about Leso palm and tropical fertilizer. She said she uses it for everything. I use 8-10-8. Don't get it on leaves though because it can burn some stuff. I lost several broms by just throwing it down and it got in the cups. More learning... :( Then there is the free yellow liquid fertilizer - I put about 4 oz in the watering can with water. Again don't get it on leaves, just by roots. Stuff that is easy grow for me is carrots, parsley, beans, dill, lettuce, green pepper, sweet potato, potato (but needs to be sprayed with lemon soap or neem otherwise something eats all the leaves), onions, most herbs, cilantro, garlic, tomato (needs to be sprayed). Peanuts look good so far. That's what comes to mind right now. But I am just starting with veg gardening too.

Ill, I reread your post. If you have some of those freak hybrid disease shrugging winter squash seeds left, I would love a couple if it is not too much trouble. And maybe this should be a separate thread, but I would love to know what veggies you consider easy to grow and when.

stpete,
My zucs didn't make it either. Think it was vine borer.

Peppers are doing great though. If you need a few green and some hots, i've got plenty, including some oriental hot ornamental. tyrone area.

john

Hi Stpete,

I had reservations when you last posted that you were starting a veggie garden now. We live close by so our climate is similar, hot and humid.... We're done with summer squash here, too hard to fight the worms and powdery mildew now due to the heat and humidity (H&H). I've still got some tomatoes and pole beans going but the cukes have gone the same way as the squash, and the peppers aren't looking so good due to the H&H. Start you seed either mid-July or 8/1 with plans to set the plants either 9/15 or 10/1. Growing season here is September through May...opposite of up North. Peppers will grow in the summer IF the plants are mature before the heat sets in, same with the pole beans...your other options for the summer are eggplant and okra. Otherwise, you'll be stuck trying some of these hardy mutants listed above.

Tom

atreelady,
What kind of garlic did you grow? How big did the bulbs get and when did you harvest it? Mine was a disaster this year. I need some guidance on how to get it to grow here in Central Florida.
Michael

Michael, I think Ill, Tony, Treefrog and others could better answer your questions on garlic as I am just learning myself.

Apparently growing garlic can be a big deal but I just got garlic from Publix and planted the bulbs in my raised bed garden. I have no idea what kind of garlic it was. I planted them last fall which I learned later is when you are supposed to plant garlic as they say it needs low temps to bulb up. I have not harvested yet but I am thinking that I will soon. A couple have flowers and some the leaves are starting to get brown. I poked around and they have bulbs, not real big ones though but I don't care. They smell like garlic so they should taste like it.

Sorry I couldn't be of more help. Here are a couple of urls on garlic in addition to the optional link:
http://www.gourmetgarlicgardens.com/growing.htm
http://www.garlic-central.com/when-to-plant-garlic.html

Judy

Here is a link that might be useful: growing garlic

Hi - I confess I gave a little snort when I saw the title & date & locale - relax, it's not you = J

1st - the growing season's pretty much winding down around here. I'm working on some okra & I have plenty of herbs & some well-established peppers & Egyptian onions, but all the other stuff just cannot take the heat/humidity. (Pole beans are done, tomatoes finishing up.)

& box store transplants rarely seem to do as well for me as stuff I start from seed (or buy from local growers) - & variety is key. If you peruse seed catalogs, you'll notice there are more varieties of veggies than you ever imagined. Transplants around here seem to be limited to a very few basic varieties - & not always appropriate for our climate/area.

Have you checked out the UF veggie gardening handbook yet? They have planting dates & suggest some varieties - & there are more than those few.I generally go by the dates for South FL.

As for squash, I've had better luck growing a winter variety & harvesting the young fruits while they're still tender enough to use like Summer Squash.

Oh yeah - you might want to check out the SPTimes archives - the garden writer there has had some good tips. I think a good keyword search on their site might be 'growing tomatoes'...

HTH

Here is a link that might be useful: FL Veggie Gardening Guide

"Have you checked out the UF veggie gardening handbook.... I generally go by the dates for South FL."

I agree with that last statement too. With the lack of frost here our planting dates really follow the South Florida recommendations.

Hello, I am new to this club. I have done my backyard in garden boxes and a stone patio. I am attempting the to learn the square foot gardening method. I have always had zuccinni, more than I can keep up with. But this year something is going desperatly wrong, and I have turned to the web for answers. The zuccinni isn't growing much bigger than my thumb, then shrivels and rots on the vine. This litte pathetic shriveled thing. It is just awful no huge zuccinne the size of baseball bats if you foreget to pick them for a couple of days. No zuccinni at all! Geez what will I put in my freezer this winter?
Any advice would be welcome Four

Nematodes? I could be that your soil contains too many non-beneficial nematodes and will have to be solarized (I'm sure there are other methods too) to reduce the numbers.

Welcome to the forum, Four! I'm not much of a veggie gardener but a few years ago when I was growing tomatoes this same thing happened. When we pulled up the pitiful plants, there were swollen nodules all over the roots indicating nematodes. Some plants are more susceptible than others.

Kate

I have been heads down at work and forgot about this thread (and...my garden for that matter...).

So...here's the update:

Zuc - died

Summer Squash - died

Tomatoes - died

Blue Lake Bush beans - died (did get to eat a few hand fulls...they were very good..); they were fine, then next day literally covered with spider mites. had to pull them before my flowers were killed off too...

Watermelon - flowers, then they shrivel up; lots of leaf miners..but, still alive - so far, at least; do not have high hopes...

Green bell pepper - it's a miracle; I have one pepper growing! I didn't even see it - it was hiding under leaves close to the stem; it's almost big enough to pick - I'm so excited...I can't even tell you!

So...my veggie garden experiment yielded one pepper and a handful of beans. LOL...

What did the early Florida inhabitants eat in the summer? Mosquitoes?

So, what should I do to prep for fall? I must be a massochist....

Do not fret!
You just need to replant. But before you do either buy or get from your library "Vegetable Gardening in Florida," By James. M. Stephens. It saved my sanity.
It talks about all of the variables you face gardening here in Paradise.
According to it you can plant your squash in Sept or October as well as January or Feb. I killed more plants than I ever thought possible until I bought the book. Now the hubby complains about the masses of Collards, beans, okra and tomatoes.
Unfortunately I have yet to master squash.
Good Luck!!!

Thanks....I will order that book from Amazon and get busy reading. I'm not a fan of collards and only like fried okra...but, if I can grow it successfully, I may learn to love both.

Should I buy seedlings or grow from seed?

Honestly- seeds have worked best for me. I start them in small pots and transplant at the correct time. Some of them - like Okra, beans and lettuce, I seed directly into the garden.

I mainly start tomatoes, peppers and eggplant for transplanting.
Some of the seeds that have done exceptionally well for me are:
Amish Paste tomatoes- Heirloom
Cos Romaine Lettuce
Helda Beans
Yard Long Beans (Great for summer)
Danvers Carrots
Roselle
Georgia Southern Collards
North and South Hybrid Okra
Country Fair Cucumbers did ok as did Broccoli raab, Baby Bok Choy and countless herbs.
This year I am adding sweet corn and spinach- so if anyone has a particularly successful strain I would love to hear about it.
Happy Gardening!

Call your extension service office and ask them to send you the vegetable gardening calendar for zone 9b. It sounds like you may have put things in the ground too late. I'm also guessing too much water for the squash. Last year it was hot and dry and I had the more of the giant squash of nightmares. This year, rainy and damp, miserable rotten squash.

If you like eggplant, you can't miss with 'Black Beauty'. We planted this in our raised bed back in March. Everything else is long gone, but this eggplant just keeps going and going. Right now there are at least 15 eggplants on the bush and lots more blossoms. It took a little break and I was about to pull it out with the rest of the veggies, but then it started blooming again and now all these eggplant. I'm still trying to learn to like them, but so far my cooking hasn't produced a winner. Hope my neighbors still like them. lol.

BTW, we also grew this last year and it did great, but I did pull it out when it slowed down.

Ginny
This picture is only showing about half the plant.

Ditto on the black beauty eggplants- I have 4 plants in raised beds and they have been amazing producers! I am on allrecipes.com multiple times a week trying to come up with different stuff. LOL

Happy growing

Naomi

I will definitely keep eggplant in mind this year.

Here's a pic of my one green bell pepper...I'm so proud!

The little garden and my one pepper plant:

Close up of pepper:

I almost feel bad picking it. It's the ONLY one! I'm carefully watching it get bigger...until the time is right.

Here's pics of my watermelon and failing bean-less bush bean plant. It's not doing that great. The 'white stuff' are eggshells as the slugs have been bad this year.

This is the link to the vegetable guide :
http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/vh021
The Extension office simply prints out what is on the edis.ifas.ufl.edu website which you can do at home .
Notice the BIG difference in warm and cool season veggies to plant for your area .
Gardening in Florida is quite a challenge but following this guide at least gives you a fighting chance .

I have been very fortunate this yr so far. I just pulled about 20 yellow pears in for the hubby tonight. We got 2 chocolate peppers off our plant and I saved seeds. The peppers were good with my broiled salmon. I have tons of blooms and small fruits yet still. The rain we have been getting has been really helping...however that can't last for long! And I'm getting ready to plant seeds for toms, peppers, canteloupe, okra, spinach, beets, beans, broccoli, brocoflower, strawberry, and I can't think of what else I got! Oh squash too. The plants I moved to the west side garden are taking very well. I am fertilizing this week in time for the full moon. And don't forget about the beans I got by surprise when the rains first hit on the compost pile!

stpete Don't give up..you'll find what works for you!!

Check out the pics on other post July Gardens!

Happy Gardening!!

Kim

Wow...impressive! I have one green bell pepper....LOL...

What's the fertilizing by the full moon secret? It reminds me of something from the Farmers Almanac.

You got it stpete...thats where I learned it from. I fertilize a couple of days before the full moon....water really well (unless it is raining of course) for the couple of days during the full moon and it seems to really boost my plants growth more so than when I haphazardly gardened. This full moon we are in and progressing thru is no exception. My "Delicious" tomatoes are at least 4 inches taller and fuller than when I put them in the bed about three weeks ago.

BTW just purchased a new tom plant that says it is drought resistant (Sun something)..got it at Wally world today. I'm sure I can find a square foot somewhere to try it out!!

Happy Gardening!
Kim

I have found that when zucchini fruit does not grow beyond the tiny size, it is often due to lack of pollination. Try using a tiny paintbrush to take pollen from the male to the female flowers. The females have the tiny fruit below the flower, the males do not. Worked well for us.

ginibee: You should try two of my favorite eggplant dishes. One is eggplant parmesan. I find this is really good with a vodka sauce instead of just marinara.

If you have any big juicy tomatoes, layer a slice of eggplant, a slice of tomato, some fresh basil, and drizzle with EVOO and Balsamic Vinegar. Pop that in the oven and then spread on toasty bread when it's cooked to the point that it's all soft. YUMMY!

You also should always salt the Eggplant before cooking to diminish the bitterness. Salt both sides and let sit up to 10 min. Then pat the salt off and cook as normal.

Enjoy!