Saturday, June 26, 2010

June Update: Solanaceae Crops


My Solanaceae crops begin in Bed 2 with All Blue potatoes on the far left. Then I have a whole row of Yukon Gold Potatoes in Bed 7. At the far back of the garden with the raspberries & rhubarb, I have another small section of Irish Cobbler potatoes. All the potatoes are starting to bloom, and have been hilled twice. I've never grown potatoes before and am surprised how tall they are. Here is the row of Yukon Gold. IN bed 4, I have a variety of hot and sweet peppers. I planted from a hot pepper mix, as well a some Habeneros. I bought some sweet bell peppers and started some Chocolate peppers. A few of the peppers are showing signs of buds. Also in the bed are eggplants which look a little worse for the wear from the slugs. Finally I have a lot of pineapple tomatillos from Daphne. I heard that tomatillos need support so I have stakes and cages by the ready. However, I noticed today the first bloom on a few plants, so maybe these are more of a short variety. Time will tell. I also have three small sweet potato vines that I started myself. However they don't seem to be doing much.

Finally in bed 10 are my Tomatoes, about 50 of them. I've let the ones at the end get out of control because these are my early tomatoes. I want more early tomatoes. There are two Sweet Cheslea Cherry Tomatoes and two Green zebra tomatoes in that jungle. So far there is one green zebra growing and a handful of green cherry tomatoes.
The rest of the tomatoes are getting more strict treatment. I'm pinching out all the suckers and training them around the twine that goes from a stake to the frame.So far they are doing quite well. I'm sure the warm weather has helped. My other varieties include Amish Paste, Market Miracle, Heirloom mix, Red Zebra, Purple Calabash, and Purple Cherry from China. The Amish Paste and Market Miracle are setting buds that are close to blooming.

3 comments:

mac said...

Nice garden and thanks for the tour.
50 tomato plants will keep you very busy comes harvesting time.

Daphne Gould said...

The pineapple tomatillos can be short if you don't cage them. They are happy enough to sprawl all over the ground and take up space instead. Last year they tried to take over the eggplants that were about two feet away. I kept having to hack them back to keep them under control. This year I caged my tomatillos so I wouldn't have to worry about where they wandered to.

Anonymous said...

I can hardly believe this is your first year in that garden, it looks great! I've got Amish Paste and Green Zebra growing, too, I can hardly wait until they are ready. Are you going to can tomatoes/tomato sauce?