Gardening and Plant Thread

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Stupid fucking blackbirds have been ruining my vft by uprooting it. It would look much better now if they hadn't done it. Anyone knows how to keep those fuckers away?
 
Sick tomato plants in May - pretty impressive. I think this is not the usual summer type of blight (Phytophthora infestans), but rather Septoria lycopersici, which I've never seen on them before. Almost certainly due to unusually cool weather - which I'm fine with, but they aren't. Not trying to heal the plants at this point, just replacing them and hoping for a bit of sun. Only my Russian tomatoes are completely unaffected. 🇷🇺
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Berries are doing good.
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@Null
Don't use Miracle Gro its overpriced, look into mixing your own potting soil and check out local garden centers they'll sell bagged compost/mixes a lot cheaper than what you'll find online. Mixing your own potting soil will save you a lot of money, will give you more control over what goes into your soil and will help you develop an understanding of what a healthy soil needs.
If you can't mix your own soil look locally and look at other soil mixes other than Miracle Gro, I can get a 2 cubic foot bag of good (no name)potting mix for about $10 which is 6 times the amount of one of those little bags your looking at online, I don't know how much soil is where your currently living but unless its on a small island it shouldn't be anywhere near $60 for a 2 cubic ft bag.
You might also want to look into rectangular pots as round pots will take up more space and have gaps, you can also get away with using smaller pots, I've grown peppers in 12in diameter pots (19L) before, just make sure you use good soil and keep the plants watered and fed. Gardening isn't an exact science, there are plenty of different methods to go about growing different plants. Youtube is a surprisingly good resource for info for beginner gardeners just make sure like any project you use multiple source because some of those gardeners are dumbasses.
 
OOf @Null welcome to gardening.

But I'll second what @Honored guest said - avoid Miracle Gro if you can. I think in an apartment mixing your own might be a bit of a hassle, but certainly don't buy 10L bags. You should be able to buy 25-30kg bags of premium stuff for around $10/bag. I don't know what the brands are in Europe (you're best going local), but Espoma is the go to in the US.

Food for thought, you could probably get away with a 30cm width pot. I grew my jalapenos in 25cm pots last year and they had no problems at all. From memory my 25cm pots took about half a bag of soil, so 15kg or so (but I also mix in some compost and manure).

Make sure your balcony is sturdy, coz you're looking at adding 1.5 Amberlynns on there...

ALSO... WELL DONE!!! Your banana peppers are looking amazing. I didn't wanna say it early on but chillies can be really fucking tricky to germinate and get to a good state for transplanting. And yours are looking healthy as fuck.

ETA: Don't buy houseplant mix if you can! You want a general all purpose premium potting mix, or a vegetable garden/raised bed mix. Houseplants have different nutritional needs, so that soil is likely formulated differently.
 
Crex Crex said:
View attachment 2200387
Stupid fucking blackbirds have been ruining my vft by uprooting it. It would look much better now if they hadn't done it. Anyone knows how to keep those fuckers away?
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Bigger fly traps.

I used to have one of those, btw. Until the first time it actually caught a fly and I had to listen to that fly's frantic buzzing for around an hour as it tried to get free until it settled down to a sporadic rattle and finally died around two hours in. Or at least gave into despair and exhaustion.


EDIT: While I'm posting I should probably ask advice. I'm not into gardening right now but might be able to towards the end of the year. What's good to plant in the autumn. Decorative and food-y answers both looked for.
 
Overly Serious said:
EDIT: While I'm posting I should probably ask advice. I'm not into gardening right now but might be able to towards the end of the year. What's good to plant in the autumn. Decorative and food-y answers both looked for.
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Depends on what growing zone your in, but in general short season/cold weather crops are good to start in the fall things like carrots, beets, radish , and leafy greens are what I would grow, though you might want to pick up a couple packs of seeds now, as I've had trouble finding seeds in the fall. Chrysanthemums (mums) are also popular in the fall, and you shouldn't have to much trouble finding them in stores in the fall. If you have mild winters they'll come back but if you have more harsh winters you might want to dig them up and put them in your garage before it gets to cold.
 
Honored guest said:
Depends on what growing zone your in, but in general short season/cold weather crops are good to start in the fall things like carrots, beets, radish , and leafy greens are what I would grow, though you might want to pick up a couple packs of seeds now, as I've had trouble finding seeds in the fall. Chrysanthemums (mums) are also popular in the fall, and you shouldn't have to much trouble finding them in stores in the fall. If you have mild winters they'll come back but if you have more harsh winters you might want to dig them up and put them in your garage before it gets to cold.
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UK. So can have cold winters but not insane US / Canada winters. If I luck out, I might have a greenhouse and can put a heater in it. But not definite.

Leafy greens sounds good. I need to eat more salad. I like carrots, too. So root vegetables... I'm guessing I can get some parsnips in as well. Thanks.


Sped Xing said:
Venus blackbird traps? :?
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My dumbass left half a bag of blood and bonemeal accessible and my piece of shit dog had a fucking whale of a time. He's fine. But damn dogs are gross.
 
This year's battle with the slugs has begun in earnest. I hate those slimy fuckers with a passion, but won't use toxic pellets since a lot of wildlife passes through my garden. It's a shame so many of the organic deterrents are useless.
 
This year I finally got around to planting my kitchen garden. Until now I've mostly just been working on garden aesthetics, a row of tulips and wildfires by that fence, some bushes over here, etc. I have a nice little rectangular bed of soil against my garage that until now was filled with Ivy. After many grueling days of pulling those shitvines up and making sure to weed out every root, I was able to till treat and hydrate the soil, and get planting. 12 hot red pepper plants, 4 green pepper plants, 6 tomato plants, and a row of i dont even know how many carrots for my dog. That's on top of the big strawberry patch I setup last year, and my apple trees. Thinking about adding scattered peanut plants around my garden for the squirrels, but that's a future project.

The red peppers are great, I planted some last year in the flowerbed. Just hop outside in the morning, let my dog bark at squirrels, and pick a pepper to chop up and put in my breakfast salad. You have not lived the true comfy life until you become a homeowner with a garden and a dog.
 
Null said:
Two had some root shock yesterday but they already look better today.
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Ya, that'll happen. It's amazing how quickly they can bounce back. Keep them warm and watered, they'll be fine. If any of the leaves start yellowing in the next couple of days snip them off, it helps push the energy back into the root system (which is where you want it at the moment - it'll go back to pumping out growth once the roots have settled).

I've never grown banana peppers, but I assume they're similar to most other sweet/large peppers. With peppers like this the first set of fruit might not be super impressive (like 3 or 4 chillies per plant, and like maybe 1 big one and the rest scrawny). Let them grow out, then harvest them and use them (you can do a test batch of your pickle!). After that first fruit set, the plant seems to go into overdrive... Like it really knows what it has to do now. And then you'll be getting a fully loaded plant of fruit every 3-4 weeks over the season. Probably about 3 full harvests if you're lucky (and if you keep feeding them obvi). That's gonna be more peppers than you know what to do with, but that's the fun part.
 
Sweet peppers are great because they're so versatile. Cooked or raw, in a salad, a casserole, by themselves, in a chunky salsa-- it's not hard to find a place for them. They're like nature's onions.
 
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