Kotin's Garden:Post 4 (Pictures Included)

[Kotin]

well its been 2 months now since I began my foray into the world of gardening.. and I must say that it has been just great...

this is one of the best hobbies I have undertaken.. its awesome because I never run out of things I need to do, so it keeps me busy, entertained, and eventually well-fed.

My Strawberries are growing still and getting huge.. I have had to half some of the pots into two pots because they are growing so rapidly..

http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c262/kotin205/100_3830.jpg


http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c262/kotin205/100_3815.jpg


My blackberries and Raspberries are doing incredible.. they have literally exploded these last couple weeks.. the raspberries are already flowering for their first yield..

http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c262/kotin205/100_3818.jpg

http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c262/kotin205/100_3819.jpg


http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c262/kotin205/100_3821.jpg

http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c262/kotin205/100_3831.jpg

here are some close-ups of my raspberries' flowers..

http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c262/kotin205/100_3838.jpg

http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c262/kotin205/100_3811.jpg

http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c262/kotin205/100_3820.jpg

and here are my Cherry Trees, with an upclose on the cherries

http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c262/kotin205/100_3816.jpg


as you can see.. it is going tremendously..


***Subsequent Garden Posts for Purpose of Now/Then Comparison***

http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?t=188574

http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?t=186068

http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?t=184803

[LittleLightShining]

Wow, awesome! Really, really awesome. So are you going to make jams, dry or freeze these babies?

[heavenlyboy34]

Awesome, kotin!! I wish I could garden here, but it's a fuckin desert! :(

[Kotin]

Wow, awesome! Really, really awesome. So are you going to make jams, dry or freeze these babies?

freeze half, and make preserves and jams out of the other half...

[Roxi]

looks great! keep em coming!

[pacelli]

Superb job. So 8 treatments of Protogrow since you started, or have you deviated from the 'every 2 weeks' foliar feeding schedule? I screwed up initially and didn't use a mister to apply it, I just put 8 tspns of it into a watering can! LOL. The next application, next week, will be applied properly.

I also have a master gardener coming out next week to survey my area and give some ideas & suggestions.

Even though I screwed up the initial Protogrow application, I must say, I am totally amazed at how fast everything started growing. Literally the next day, one of my tomato plants grew 6 inches overnight.

Everything is still just starting to come up, with a few exceptions that I started indoors. My cucumbers are starting to come up, and the tomatoes are doing great as well. Even the peppers are starting to show some progress.

I'll try to get some pics up, but nothing I have can compare to your progress under the Texas sun.

Looks great Kotin!

[pacelli]

Awesome, kotin!! I wish I could garden here, but it's a fuckin desert! :(

Best place to do it with the sun-- just use raised beds!

[dannno]

I see you took Michelle Obama's advice on gardening.

I don't think so :rolleyes:

[Kotin]

Superb job. So 8 treatments of Protogrow since you started, or have you deviated from the 'every 2 weeks' foliar feeding schedule? I screwed up initially and didn't use a mister to apply it, I just put 8 tspns of it into a watering can! LOL. The next application, next week, will be applied properly.

I also have a master gardener coming out next week to survey my area and give some ideas & suggestions.

Even though I screwed up the initial Protogrow application, I must say, I am totally amazed at how fast everything started growing. Literally the next day, one of my tomato plants grew 6 inches overnight.

Everything is still just starting to come up, with a few exceptions that I started indoors. My cucumbers are starting to come up, and the tomatoes are doing great as well. Even the peppers are starting to show some progress.

I'll try to get some pics up, but nothing I have can compare to your progress under the Texas sun.

Looks great Kotin!

that proto-grow will be your garden's guardian angel...

[dannno]

that proto-grow will be your garden's guardian angel...

It looks really good, but why is it $40 for a liter?? How many mL do you put in a gallon? Do you use it in your feeding water or just mist?

[Kotin]

It looks really good, but why is it $40 for a liter?? How many mL do you put in a gallon? Do you use it in your feeding water or just mist?
it is a bit expensive but its THE best fertilizer I have ever heard of... and I dont know the precise measurements because I use apple juice bottles, what I do know is I use 4 or 5 spoonfuls per 60 fluid ounces of water.


and it says something about a foiler spray but I apply it directly in the soil...

[Kotin]

You should put banana peel into the soil, it'll make them grow huge!

would u elaborate on that? :)

[heavenlyboy34]

Best place to do it with the sun-- just use raised beds!

Yeah, but the soil sucks here, and the water is fuckin expensive. (plus, it evaporates really quick! Temperatures begin exceeding 100 F in spring, and the excessive heat continues till October! :eek: To my knowledge, there's only one city in the US that's hotter-Bullhead city, or some weird nowheresville down south. :p)

[phill4paul]

Yeah, but the soil sucks here, and the water is fuckin expensive. (plus, it evaporates really quick! Temperatures begin exceeding 100 F in spring, and the excessive heat continues till October! :eek: To my knowledge, there's only one city in the US that's hotter-Bullhead city, or some weird nowheresville down south. :p)

Talk to the Natives. They might know a dance an a prayer.;):D

[MikeStanart]

Yeah, but the soil sucks here, and the water is fuckin expensive. (plus, it evaporates really quick! Temperatures begin exceeding 100 F in spring, and the excessive heat continues till October! :eek: To my knowledge, there's only one city in the US that's hotter-Bullhead city, or some weird nowheresville down south. :p)

Try buring one of those slightly perforated hoses under the ground a few inches. Barrrrreellyy turn it on for like a day until the ground is moist. It will keep your soil nice and moist while minimizing evaporation. Normally when you water your plants, especially in that heat, like 90% of the water will evaporate.

[tangent4ronpaul]

Awesome, kotin!! I wish I could garden here, but it's a fuckin desert! :(

No reason you can't. You might notice kotin has all his plants in containers. So either do that or build raised deep beds and pick up about 20 - 40 pound bags of potting soil and then get into composting.

I have cousins in Tucson AZ that garden. Helped um build compost bins from pallets. Granted, pallets, well, wood for that matter, is scarce and expensive down there, I would guess you might pay a premium for potting soil too - so it would probably be worth a road trip to a more lush area to pick up these items. You might also see if you could find a restaurant, ideally vegetarian or a market and inquire about their organic waste... You would want to use drip irrigation.

-t

[jsteilKS]

I posted my pictures in one of the other posts (the one with the greenhouse).

We just harvested some of our plants this weekend and started our second wave of plants in the greenhouse. So far we have 12 heads of lettuce, 3 Green Bell Peppers, 15 tomatos, 10 roma tomatos, 6 squash, oregano, celantro, some other herbs, 5 carrots, 3 white onions, and 2 spanish yellow onions.

Planted more lettuce, corn, peppers, and thought about planting in the city appeasment behind my yard since they don't take care of it and I end up cutting the tall grass all summer.

[pacelli]

It looks really good, but why is it $40 for a liter?? How many mL do you put in a gallon? Do you use it in your feeding water or just mist?

3 tablespoons of the protogrow per gallon of water. I've got a cheap sprayer, so I foliar feed the garden once a week in the evening once the sun is low in the sky. My heirloom tomato plants are fucking huge, much bigger than last year, and I only get 3-4 hours of direct sun on them per day. A couple neighbors who have been gardening here for decades tell me they've never been able to grow tomatoes in the forest. One of them mentioned that every week, one of my plants is a foot taller than the last week.

I've got huge lettuce too. I might have to stop using the protogrow as often on the lettuce because I can't keep up with eating it as fast as it is growing.

I think a more inexpensive alternative to protogrow would be hoagland's solution (google it). But this year, I'm sticking with protogrow.

[devil21]

would u elaborate on that? :)

Heavy potassium content which flowering plants use very heavily during fruit setting and swelling. Ive never heard of "Protogrow" before, nor have I seen it at any local gardening centers. Ill look around and check it out.* I get great results with a base soil mix of bone meal for N during early vegetation and adding specialized chemical ferts with high P-K during flowering and fruiting. Ive been using beneficial bacteria and fungi with great results too. I forgot about your garden threads Kotin but now that Im reminded I throw up a pic or two of my plot tomorrow.

Btw, Ive seen it highly advised to *not* fruit out raspberries, blackberries, grapes, and blueberries their first growing season. Trim off the fruits and wait until next year to allow fruiting. You'll have much higher yields in the future that way.


*I just looked up Protogrow. Hate to tell you but you can find fish emulsion and kelp supplements plenty cheaper than $40/liter. Protogrow is really nothing special. It definitely does help speed up plant metabolism but that price is pretty steep. Shop around. http://www.biconet.com/soil/liquidFishSeaweed.html