2024 gardens

[Boar]

My matters and peppers are doing awseom!

[LPS]

Nice crop.   

[glenn57]

My matters and peppers are doing awseom!

just dont use a ladder near them and fall on them........ok bud!!!!!!!!!

[glenn57]

Nice crop.   

yea........wonder what kinda peppers those are????

[Boar]

What? Those are habenaro peppers

[Dotch]

I was happy to see that my cuke seeds germinated during the week I was gone. The pumpkins and squash not so much. My tomatoes look awful. Peppers are ok for the most part. Rows were largely washed out. The deer braved the mud to ravage the beets.overall the garden is the worst I've ever had.

Garden is looking grim here this season. While the late start didn't help matters, neither did 12+" of rain in June. There is water running thru the sweet corn and string bean patches. About half the string beans emerged on both varieties. 7 of the 16 hills of cukes I planted have emerged plants in them altho I have some of each variety. All the hills of pumpkins have emerged & 7 out of 8 hills of squash have plants in them. I'll probably stab some more of each variety in tomorrow morning just to say I did something. Every hill of gourds has something in them as do nearly all the Jack Be Little miniature pumpkins. Floral-wise it's OK. Cannas are coming on quickly. Found only one 4 o'clock so far however. A fair chance of rain tomorrow nite with lite coverage, .10" or less then & coming back again Thurs. nite into Fri. with another half to 3/4".     

[LPS]

What? Those are habenaro peppers

Hope noone steals them. 

[Dotch]

Stabbed in additional cukes in hills where there were none this a.m. Soil that was grayed off last nite was damp on the surface again & in places, still downright muddy. Only one hill of 4 on the zucchini has anything in it so will stab a few more of those in too.

Looks like we will likely be supplying friends with veggies again. The 4-H kid's family said yesterday their garden is completely underwater. They will likely have little or nothing. Our squash looks good. Tomatoes & peppers look OK but need heat and sun consistently. With 7 hills of cukes established, we should have some to spare but no guarantees. They also like them so hence the additional seeding. Will make another strategic string bean planting hopefully around the 4th where I intended to plant sunflowers perhaps. Hoping the water quits running across the lower part of the garden & more string beans emerge there. Again, no guarantees.   

[roony]

No grey spots on the topsoil around here. You must not have had much rain there. 

[Dotch]

Ya only 7.18" since June 16th & 12.29" for the month. Normal for the month of June at the SROC is 5.38". Garden is on a south facing slope so it plays the same game as a lot of the fields are. Can look dry on top by late afternoon but by morning, it's all dark again. There's no way to tell where it's too wet & where you'd better not drive other than where water is standing. Guy that works for me found that out the hard way Thursday afternoon when he drove the Ranger out scouting some bean fields. Got thru a couple of them OK & then it started raining. The soil surface quickly was all dark again and down he went. 

[roony]

You always get less flooding. I sure hope neither of us get dumped on today.

[Gunner55]

They closed the bridge on Main Street back home as the Cedar is so high that they're afraid some debris going over the dam could hit the bridge. The good news is that it's expected to crest this afternoon sometime. Heard they had 15" last week here..........................https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/railroad-bridge-between-south-dakota-and-iowa-collapses-among-midwe

[glenn57]

i still have a few mater plants looking kinda ill, but the rest of it is moving along quite well. i cant keep up with my spinach and lettuse!!!!! may have to donate it before it gets bitter.

[roony]

Ya only 7.18" since June 16th & 12.29" for the month. Normal for the month of June at the SROC is 5.38". Garden is on a south facing slope so it plays the same game as a lot of the fields are. Can look dry on top by late afternoon but by morning, it's all dark again. There's no way to tell where it's too wet & where you'd better not drive other than where water is standing. Guy that works for me found that out the hard way Thursday afternoon when he drove the Ranger out scouting some bean fields. Got thru a couple of them OK & then it started raining. The soil surface quickly was all dark again and down he went.

Did he determine that it was too wet to spray?

[Dotch]

Ya been counseling guys this a.m. who are waiting for it to get dry enough for ground rigs. Possible towards the end of the week. Unfortunately there are a few that are getting antsy and talking about getting an aerial applicator. Nothing against them but it's tough for them to do the job a ground rig will, especially with herbicides. The volume of carrier required is lower and some aerial apps like to cheat on water. One of the products, glufosinate, needs 10 gpa for aerial application. I'd be surprised if they use more than 5 gpa and it won't work worth a crap. The other issue becomes drift. Spraying glyphosate & 2,4-D (Enlist) through a plane is risky at best, especially if water volume is reduced. Could drift off site & raise hob with grandma's petunias. That could result in a visit from the nice folks at the MN Dept. of Ag. Nothing good could come from that.

[glenn57]

my first planting of green beans only 1/2 of it came up........so another row just went in!!!!!!

[roony]

Ya been counseling guys this a.m. who are waiting for it to get dry enough for ground rigs. Possible towards the end of the week. Unfortunately there are a few that are getting antsy and talking about getting an aerial applicator. Nothing against them but it's tough for them to do the job a ground rig will, especially with herbicides. The volume of carrier required is lower and some aerial apps like to cheat on water. One of the products, glufosinate, needs 10 gpa for aerial application. I'd be surprised if they use more than 5 gpa and it won't work worth a crap. The other issue becomes drift. Spraying glyphosate & 2,4-D (Enlist) through a plane is risky at best, especially if water volume is reduced. Could drift off site & raise hob with grandma's petunias. That could result in a visit from the nice folks at the MN Dept. of Ag. Nothing good could come from that.

Very good analysis

[glenn57]

last night i did a walk around the garden to do an inspecttion....man what a difference some sun and dry weather made!!!!!!!!

[glenn57]

last night i seen that my cukes were kinda wimpy, took my little scratcher i use for weeding the garden, its kinda dry???? i thought really  gave them a drink with miracle grow and this morning there all good!!!!!!

[Dotch]

Looks like the 4 o'clock seeds are awakening. Have several that poked thru yesterday. All the hills of gourds are occupied and all but one of the Jack Be Little pumpkin hills are there.

Sounds like the itch to spray things with a plane has waned a tad. Should help keep area gardens safe. One of the products being talked about, Enlist, isn't labeled for aerial application. The other one, glufosinate, works half-fast with a ground rig so can just about imagine how it will work aerially.  Ah, patience, grasshopper...



   

[KEN W]

Picking 2 pails full every other day. Grandma started making strawberry jelly last night. Grandkids love this. Plus strawberry pie and shortcakes.

[roony]

When we were in the Marcell area last week the wild strawberries were ripening. Small but tasty.

[glenn57]

  fresh off the vine strawberries don't last long enough around here to get that far!

[KEN W]

I have five 25 foot rows. So they last long enough to make jelly and freeze some for shakes.3 different varieties so they don't all come at once.

[Dotch]

Garden is ugly but still interesting to look at. Some of the peppers don't look so swift after last week's & now this week's dousings. Lower leaves dropping & dark circular spots on the remining leaves on some. Without the weather doing a 180 pretty quick, that probably won't end well. 'Maters appear to be marking time. Sweet corn looks OK considering part of it is still in standing water. The partial rows of string beans that are up & alive are also in water or saturated soil. The bright spots so far are the squash, pumpkins, & gourds. Can see the squash & pumpkins from the road now when you drive up. Some of the cukes I stabbed in Monday a.m. were poking thru already in 3 hills yesterday. Really could've done w/o this last rain tho. Hoping some things can be planted in early July yet but not optimistic at this point. Maybe glenn will mail me some of his rutabeggars...  

[Leech~~]

I think there are a few Farmer folks on this page it sounds like.
Random question. Any idea what the farmers may have to pay the little yellow plane guy to spray their tatoer fields up by Little Falls to Brainerd?  Been watching them for years. 

[roony]

Because they don't do it for nothing.

[Dotch]

I think there are a few Farmer folks on this page it sounds like.
Random question. Any idea what the farmers may have to pay the little yellow plane guy to spray their tatoer fields up by Little Falls to Brainerd?  Been watching them for years. 

Not sure what the potato guys have to pay but the going rate just for the aerial application, not including chemical, is usually in that $8 - $15 per acre range here, depending on a few factors. In the case of the canning companies where they contract a sizeable acreage annually, they may get a better rate. As far as chemical costs on those spuds, it's a high dollar crop with high dollar input costs, considering all the insecticides, fungicides and desiccants they toss at it. The cost for chemical with all the fixings on each pass could easily range from $15 - $30/acre. Sometimes they can combine products to save a pass.