Wet and cold year, . Got the final few passes done tonight with the tiller. Drip tape causes a few early issues that I've learned. You have to get tubing laid under plant before it gets too big, but you have to be tilled before you lay any tubing.
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Happy with this one after burning half the vine tips in July when I thought I lost the plant. It held a nice shape all year and brought in some colour late in the year. A bit heavy also which is always a bonus.
I'll never miss vine pruning and burying, but I would miss "loading day" and talking to the growers at the weighoff. Congratulations to Jim and Kelsey and to all who weighed fruit this year.
The zinnias are still putting out colour. These flowers are under rated. The bees and butterflies love them this time of year. The hairy vetch in the background is thick and full. I think I'll till it under in the spring.
Good luck to all the growers weighing fruit these next two weekends.
I've been trying to blow this one up all year but I can't even get the skin to crack. If I had to look back on this plant I guess I'd call it slow and steady, with an emphasis on slow. Just happy to have one to pick this season as things looked pretty dire mid July. Decent color and nice shape so I'll take that and run.
Getting near the end of the line. I haven't done any spraying in 2 months and the leaves show it. Day 98 today. This thing thumps like a boulder but I've proven in the past that I have no idea what's heavy and what's light. I don't have that Joel Jarvis touch of the Pumpkin Whisperer.
Well I hope you consider this your year off because I'm running low on those good Hoelke seeds lol
Just can't find the right camera angle to make this fruit look big. Took this photo last week. I rolled the tape up for the year. Im done measuring, too depressing.
The best part about having zinnias in the garden is that when you're late from being in the garden too long, you can chop a handful off and score bonus points when you get home late.
The zinnias have started to really bloom now. I got these in late when I ripped out a couple plants. They looks great. I have some hairy vetch growing in the background and some random tomatoes that came in with last falls leaf compost.
The 118 long gourd is 100". I think this one was pollinated august 10th so there should be about 12-14 days left of growing. 107 Kline in the background.
quick overhead video of my plant. Hope this works..
Long gourds are starting to move. DAY 'not sure' and the 118 Nieuwenhoff is about 65". The 107 Kline in the background is a little younger and approaching 4 feet.
Darker green with a nice pattern on the 118. Much lighter solid colour on the Kline. Both gourds crossed with each other.
These things are fun to watch grow at this stage in the game. I'm guessing they'd like some warmer nights, but don't we all.
That's good Theresa. Hope to see one of Jims at a weighoff if I get to one, or pictures of the two at the end of the season. Good luck Jim.
Our plants are behind due to wet weather, but the 2 jim says are growing the best are Holkes.
You grow nice plants Ryan we need you back next year !
Day 52. 326 OTT.
Finally all grown into the plot. I have only one secondary still growing that I'm going to turn 90 degrees to fill in the last bare area.
We'll see if I can get some decent gains but it's way too late.
Stump view.
Almost have filled the garden. Finally. About 6-7 more secondaries to dead head. Nothing worth talking about for fruit growth yet.
I talked my parents into growing long gourds. Hoping to have to dig a hole later in the year.
Day 40 was yesterday. Only 1500 more pounds to get to 2k.
No, I barely pumped the sprayer so fluid only dropped out and didn't spray wide under pressure. It's just the new growth, it so sensitive. I needed to stay away from it by 3 feet and didn't.
Did you use a funnel over the nozzle? That helps keep the spray localized.
Here's a shot of some of the vines that got sprayed with round-up but I had to keep, since I was short on good vines. These vines have grown maybe 15 feet since they had their tip sprayed and they continue to grow the same crazy blotchy leaf pattern that the Round-Up did to the one leaf that it hit. The power of this stuff is crazy, how it can change an entire vine with a mist on a leaf a month ago. I thought the vines would "grow out" of the chemical burn, but they never do. The vines grow the same speed as healthy vines, but just have some crazy patterned leaves.
You'd think a guy who has killed his entire garden twice in 4 years wouldn't be surprised by the power of this spray, but I am.
I've managed to re-hab a plant back to life after being sprayed by round-up. In the end, my lack of burying and pruning this year saved me. I didn't get back to clean this patch for a week after pulling the other two plants. By then some secondaries had grown out enough to see that they were alive and well. I had to use a lot of strange vine patterns, but I pretty much have a plant back. It is behind however since I lost a good 10 days on my vines after dead heading them.
There must have been a slight East breeze when I sprayed round up because the right side of this plant lost almost all secondaries, the left side maybe a third. I have mostly third stage growth on the right side and even some fourth stage growth. Some vines are actually forked (doubled) to fill in dead spots.
Since this year was dealt the set-back, I wanted to try something different by trying to have all the plant behind the fruit. You can see that I still have 17 secondaries running up the garden. Nothing to the outside, they were all curved to go parallel with the main vine. I'll walk in along the main vine this year instead of along a secondary from the outside of the patch. I still have a good 8-12 feet to grow secondaries before they reach and fill the 1200 square feet. Of course, the fruit growth is slow. This is my first Day 30 under 300 pounds in a while. It's to be expected as it's just an experiment to see the late season growth that I get. I believe I'm too far out of the perfect pruning point, but I want to see how this does. I have only dead headed the first secondary on each side, all others are running and growing. In a perfect world, I'd probably dead head the first 4 to 8 and then fork the others up the garden. Like I said, this will be a test. I don't think it's the best way to go, but I also don't think stopping all vine growth at pollination on a puny plant is the way to go either, like some say.
This plant in the 2066 Geddes which has my good friend the 1625 Gantner on both sides of the parents. Plus, this one looks round and orange, so there's that.
Another change this year is that I'm using up all of the growing supp
lies in my shed, ha. I figure my vine burying mix has 5 times the materials in it. I'm sick of looking at half full bags and pails of product, so this year they're all gone. That alone may end my season, but I'm going down swingin'.
Congrats on the addition to your family Ryan, relax and enjoy your baby and your summer, your 1803 is the best plant and fruit I have growing and it was put in patch 10 days after the others
That's a sad sight Ryan. No one likes to see another grower lose their plants. I guess your pumpkin time has turned into Daddy Duties. Hope to see you back in the game next season.
All the best to you & your family.
Cheers,
Jane & Phil
Plant clean-up is fairly quick, but having to tear down the drip tubing system after only installing it a month ago really sucks.
However it also stunted the vine tips. I should have just stayed inside the mature plant, as those first three leaves are so fragile, even the scent of round up will end them.
Oh well, it actually feels like a relief to pack it in and pull the plants. Good luck to everyone this season. Hope it starts to dry up for everyone.
I moved two years ago to about 20km away from where I grow.
Anyway I went back to the patch after a week since I sprayed the round up and the round up did a nice job of killing the weeds under the mature leaf canopy.
why did you leave that nice place of yours ..! Dont let them down , they need you !
nice plants anyway
Congrats Ryan. I'm sure you'll get caught up & show up at the weigh offs with something impressive. We wish you & your family all the best.
congrats Ryan. behind this year but your new little helper gets big enough to get into the patch should cut your work in half!
Huge congrats Ryan...going out on a limb and say that monday is going down as the best 'weigh-in' of the year🚼...congrats again!
What a difference a couple of weeks make. We had a baby on Monday and things have been pretty much on house lockdown and no sleep. All is good now but having the patch 10 miles from home will be the end of it. I went there for the first time in a week and everything is out of control. Luckily it's rained, because I haven't once watered through the drip tape. No feeding and no sprays all . I used to spray 5 times a week and feed everyday.
I just walked away lol. There's way too many weeds and I have some shriveled up pollinations that opened this week. No idea why I get so many weeds, im uessing it was from the topsoil that was trucked in years ago to make the patch. The worst part is that these weeds are ready to a seed. Ive vine buried only one day all year so that also looks to be roughly 12 wheel barrows behind which i dont look forward to doing since i cant reach into the plant.
So what I'm going to do is round up the entire patch and hope for the best. I do remember killing all of my vine tips in I think it was 014 with round up. I use a blast should around the tips and have not had any problems in the past couple years. I hear that some US growers go right into their mature vines and spray below the leaves. This sounds deadly but I'm going to try this and see.
If they die they die. I don't have the time to hand weed 2500 feet and I can't stand looking at the weeds, so I'm strappin' on the round up backpack. Wish me luck.
I'll post in a week, of either a weed free garden or a nuclear blast site.
I always wanted to grow zinnias as a cover crop. This may be the year.
The garden always looks great with a fresh till and the drip tape down. That's why I always take a picture. In a week it will be fully green with weeds.
I've got 2 or 3 plots now tilled and drip tape down. Plants were flagging in the sun as it's the first heat they've seen in a long while. Can't really mist or water as the ground is soaked.
Largest plant is the 1803 and it's a little over 11 feet now. Growing very slowly with the cold nights. +4 For a low tonight. Need some warm nights to get growing.
i soaked the seeds on april 8th. Shooting for a large plant pollination around June 20-25. Ive always had July pollinations
Plants look great Ryan...that 'sweater' must be high end cashmere...its working!😊
I hear you there Ryan. I'm hoping to finally till the patch after today. Wow. Plants are looking awesome. When did you start them, 1st of April?