Friday
Sep262008
Plea for gardening advice
Friday, September 26, 2008 at 8:39AM 
I planted this baby carrot from seed in late spring. It somehow survived the Evil Squirrel Excavations of May and the Great Groundhog Scourges of July and August. I carefully watered and weeded around it, showered it in encouragement and nurturing thoughts. I was encouraged by the healthy-looking leaves above ground and decided to harvest it before the frost.
I know it's supposed to be a baby carrot, but this looks more like an embryo carrot. I SO do not have a green thumb.
No wonder the groundhogs and squirrels left it alone; it wasn't worth their time! They were probably laughing their guts out.
I've never had a particularly green thumb. I also planted a tomato plant from seed. Like its baby carrot counterpart, my tomato plant seemed to flourish. Yet I've only managed to harvest four (4) baby tomatoes so far, while my neighbour's baby tomatoes are practically jumping off the vines because they're so heavily laden with fruit.
I'm not quite sure what I'm doing wrong. One possible problem is that I'm using planters. Another theory is that the plants know that they're just going to get dug up and eaten by the neighbourhood groundhog, so what's the point anyway? But that doesn't explain why my neighbour's vegetables are doing so well and mine aren't.
Gardening advice welcome!
Reader Comments (11)
My carrots came out much the same, for the most part. I pulled up the one with the healthiest-looking leaves, and it looked just like yours above! Eventually, I got tired of waiting for them, pulled the lot up, and got enough for a single helping. Hardly worth the effort...
My little yellow cherry tomato plant, though, has been cropping fairly steadily - I had enough to take a bowlful to the house-filk a couple of weeks ago. Mind you - I did take it on holiday with me! If I'd left it behind it would probably not have got enough water from rain, and would have died. As it was, it nearly got flooded instead, standing on Mum's back yard, because we had so much rain in Wales!!!
Oh dear, that picture of your carrot made me laugh. I'm sorry, but it did.
I'm *not* a gardening expert, but here's my two cents. Even my parents, who have a huge, huge garden, never plant carrots. I'm not sure, but I think they need a sandier soil to grow. I'll never attempt them. This isn't really advice, is it?
As for your tomatoes... you must plant seeds indoors in early spring. If you plant them outside in May, the plants won't be mature enough to bring a full crop. I tend to buy young plants because I'm too lazy to start the seeds myself. I rarely have success with tomatoes in planters. Planters require more water, but keep in mind that tomatoes may not want as much water as other plants. I find that cherry tomatoes do better in planters. Also, tomatoes want as much sun as possible.
Try green beans next year. I had lots of success with mine in a big planter. You can plant the seeds outside in spring and they’ll be fine. Buy the bush variety, of course, not the kind that grow tall. The squirrels and raccoons left mine alone. (They had a nice meal of my grapes, though.)
Marion: Thanks for the commiseration; it's a comfort knowing I'm not the only one. :-)
Luisa: Thanks for the advice. I'm not going to attempt carrots in a planter again. Good point about the tomatoes -- I think next year I may just opt for young plants instead; that way I get a headstart! And I think I will try green beans. Any particular type?
We had the same problem with our carrots. One thought is that we just need to be more patient - and most underground veggies can survive later into the winter than above-grounds because the soil holds heat a bit longer.
I'm thinking, though, that our soil is just not right for in-ground veggies, since our full-size onions didn't do so well, either (the green onions did great). Our radishes all came out so woody as to be inedible.
The peas shriveled up as soon as it started to get hot, the lima beans never came on at the same time enough to make a meal of, and the eggplant were pretty puny - we'll probably forgo those next year, though Brenda wants to do peas again and just plant them earlier. The squash, tomatoes, green beans, and cucumbers did fantastic.
We're going to get a soil sample and send it off to the Extension Service for analysis so we have an idea of what would grow best - we don't want to put anything more than compost/horse poo/mulch into it so it makes sense to figure out what will grow well rather than try to fight it. Does Ontario have the equivalent of the County Extension Service, which helps farmers and gardeners with questions like this?
Mostly I can't wait until next year when the strawberries and rhubarb are strong.
If you want to feel like a successful gardener, try growing cucumbers or zucchini squash. They grow easily and produce abundant fruit.
My carrots are similar (maybe a bit bigger) -- but think of the mystery in not knowing how big each individual carrot will be! The kids love pulling them up "to see" and swear they taste better than carrots from the store. They have decided we will definitely grow more next year.
I heard recently that carrots should be left in the ground until the first frost to improve their taste...not sure if it's true.
We had yellow cherry tomatoes too and they were the most prolific we've ever had.
You are obviously meant to be a Zucchini person. Zucchini will grow for anyone. :) You will quickly master the art of Zucchini cooking: fried zucchini, broiled zucchini, baked zucchini, zucchini casserole, zucchini with mushrooms, zucchini with cheese and toast... Your neighbors will start to avoid you after you have given them 20 pounds of zucchini and told them that" there's plenty more where that came from!!" Your sister will look at you pityingly and your father will ruefully shake his head. Jeff, on the other hand, will sigh with resignation and gently suggest "next year, let's just try some carrots..."
Beckett, John: courgettes/zucchini ... not necessarily. I had a wild success with mine the first year I tried them, which was fine as I love them, so I had them for nearly every meal (er, not breakfast...), made them into soup, froze them... Then I tried them a few years ago, and almost before they'd got a couple of leaves up, the slugs and snails had THE LOT. They never even got as far as flowering. :-( And yes, I started them in pots. Oddly enough, the same has happened with beans - first few years I've had so many I couldn't use them all, then suddenly they all get eaten/blighted. The blackberry has been reasonably prolific, but - I blame global warming (or maybe squirrels...) - it seems to ripen earlier every year, and these days I miss out on the best crops because I'm on holiday! So far, the raspberry canes are doing well though - and I get two crops a year off them, which is a Good Thing.
Bill: The soil I planted the carrots in was potting soil from the nursery. But I like your idea of testing the soil in general, since we do plan to plant more vegetables directly in the garden next year.
Wow, sounds like you guys planted a ton of stuff!
John: Cucumbers and zucchini, eh? I think I might try those next year.
Andrea: Maybe I should try yellow cherry tomatoes next year instead of red! Glad your kids like your garden carrots. :-)
Beckett: John recommended zucchini, too! And I love zucchini. I could never get tired of zucchini, so sounds as if I definitely have to try growing some next year!
Marion: That's interesting...I didn't know that "courgettes" was another term for zucchini.
Remember, we had lots of rain and very little sun this summer. Therefore, zucchini, cucumbers, squash and other succulents did very well if you did not plant from seed directly into the ground. Plants like tomotoes, carrots and other in ground veggies need those hot sunny days to get going in our short growing season. Also, if you are growing in pots, you need to remember to fertilize every 3 - 4 weeks. There are plant specific fertiziers for tomatoes, tubers, and other veggies. I also watered my pots every day it did not rain in July and August.
Bill Sutton was asking about soil sampling in Ontario. There are definitely companies that do this and I've included one below. It does help a lot to determine what grows best on your property. No point in trying to grow stuff that just wasn't meant to be grown there. We've sure learned that through trial and error. Never had much luck with growing anything in planters other than herbs.
The company is based in Stratford, Ontario but do residential soil sampling all over Ontario and Quebec. Website: http://www.stratfordagri.ca//view.php?Residential_Services
Or call 1-800-323-9089 and ask for Jim Hazlewood.