Category Archives: Main Roof

Posts about plants on the main roof

Post organic anti mite application status

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A sample curled leave taken from Celebrity tomato in caged position two.  No hard showers given since application of organic anti-mite oils.  I noticed that curled leaves in all tomatoes now have distinct brown spots which seems to indicate that this solution might have had some effect.  No mites seen today.  Saw one teeny little black beetle and hopefully that wasn’t something.  Did a hard prune today but it was much lighter than the past two prunes.  Also fertilized tonight.  We have another 100F day tomorrow and then the cold front hits.  Harvested two little tomatoes not even worth mentioning.  Some tomatoes are cracked which means I might be watering too much.  I’m not concerned about that.

Overall, with all I know now that I didn’t know last year at this time, so far so good.  The Big Boy tomatoes have good second growth and lots of second growth flowers on all eight.  We’ll see where everything is at tomorrow.  One day at a time…

Update 8/5: Skipped watering on 8/4 evening because it rained somewhat.  Heavy cucumber harvest today.  Cucumber in the cages lost two main branches which at first glance looked like they were broken but upon further inspection did not see anything broken.  Not sure as to the cause but after cutting noticed white fur around base of branches which could mean something else nasty eating my plants.  Pruned and sprayed again.  Saw mites in curled leaved sections hidden away in groups.  They weren’t moving fast but they were there.  Big Boys are having most difficulty while Celebrities might be OK (knock on wood).  Even though the Big Boys grew much higher than the Celebrities, the branches being cut out of them leave their base barren.  They are getting second growth and flowers butthe mites seem relentless.  Perhaps if I had started treatment earlier this wouldn’t have been as big a problem because the plants are so big now it’s difficult getting around to all the infected branches.  The couple of decent sized tomatoes are nice and round and no BER but some over watered cracking.  They cut up well and taste good.  A lot of big ones from the Big Boys should be coming in a couple of days.

Tomato Patch Status

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Here’s a pic of all 14 caged positions taken at an angle.  The big pink flowers are Cleome which draw the bees which theoretically should help the tomato plants.  In the foreground to the left is the debris clump Lost Island from last season.  Debris clumps are piles of old plant carcasses and roots that have been tossed onto the roof and left to support anything that can grow in that environment.  The debris clumps have sufferred this year from drought conditions but plant life still recovers in them.  More on them later.

Update on tomatoes: Lots of strong second growth but mites are getting higher and higher.  May need to do another hard prune in a few days.  Giving them two hard showers tonight.  Heading to Home Depot for that Neem organic stuff tomorrow.  Although this is frustrating, I think my actions might have some effect.  Compared to last year’s photos, the tomatoes look much better this year at this date.

Update 8/1:  Didn’t get Neem but got some bottle containing a bunch of oils claiming to be organic.  Gave tomatoes another hard shower and applied about 1/2 a bottle of that spray on all 8.  Pulled a few samples and saw some mites but not many.  Still lots of curled leaves and it seems relentless.  Even though the plants are growing well it seems as if the mites might eventually win.  Hopefully this spray has some effect.  Will water everything later tonight.  In a few days we’ll hit the date when everything really went south last year.  The green tomatoes look good however.  Nice and round and no BER (knock on wood).  May have to do another hard prune soon.  Probably should fertilize too.  Will fertilize tonight.

Caged positions 7 and 8

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Caged position 7 (left) two eggplants and caged position 8 (right) Big Boy tomato.  For some reason, these two positions sitting right next to each other in the middle of the row represent the largest of their kind.  The two eggplants are the largest I have ever seen growing on this rooftop.  The Big Boy is the largest tomato so far but I had never grown this type before.  This Big Boy is the biggest of all four that have been planted in this row.  It is clear that three eggplants per 20 gallon container is too much.

Overall tomato status update:  Hard showers are a daily occurance for tomatoes, cukes, and eggplants.  After the second hard pruning I have not seen any mites even though some leaves are curled.  Pulled another stunted BER tomato from a Big Boy but it looked like a reject.  No BER on Celebrity so far (knock on wood).  Lots of green.  First real harvest should be sometime this week or next.  The tomatoes did a hard fail right after the first week of August last year (see archives).  So far so good this year.  Zeem application may not be necessary but having a bottle in storage might prove useful for later and certainly next year.

Spider Mites!

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Caged positions 9 and 10 taken on 7/19.  As mentioned in the previously dated post, caged position 10 sufferred from the same blight like condition as what happened the last bunch of years.

Today I cut out curled leave sections of all tomatoes and found spider mites on every tomato.  It has been spider mites that have been killing my tomato plants.  I pruned all the real bad branches off of all tomato plants today and gave them a hard shower as recommended by some sites including this one.  Now that I know what this is I might be able to thwart it.  Will look into that Neem oil at Home Depot.  There are home remedies but I’m not at the stage where I can experiment with that.

Update: The bad eggplant is behind the Cleome in caged position 9.  This eggplant seems to have recovered from its spider mite infestation.

Update 7/22: The tomatoes look better.  Some curled leaves.  Checked for mites and found some and perhaps some eggs but not as many as yesterday.  Gave them and eggplants another hard shower.  All the eggplants seem infested as well.  In hindsight I feel kind of stupid for not realizing this over the past 6 or 7 years of crop failure.  Mixing eggplants into the tomatoes and seeing them suffer first was a major clue.  Plus, this little blog thingy which no one reads has perhaps helped me gather my thoughts so that this year, I actually did some investigation and observation — because I wanted to enter it in this log book.   Still haven’t gotten to harvest yet but I feel optimistic.

Note: I had a decent crop in 2006 when I grew a six tomatoes on north wall.  I don’t recall any sudden failure.  I need to figure out the source of the spider mites.  NE and SE corners do not show mites.  Cucumbers are affected as well which could explain the Cucumber failure last season.

Update 7./26: Skipped watering main roof.  Rained last night early morning and everything still seems soggy up there.  Gave tomatoes hard shower however.  Big Boy in caged position 7 is the biggest.  Caged position 10, the tomato that showed first signs of distress and the one that produced 3 small BER red tomatoes, produced a small red tomato with very little BER.  This is good compared to previous years.  Though not scientific, my casual observation indicates that the number of green tomatoes is lower than previous years but none show distress and no BER (knock on wood).  There is second growth so we’ll see what kind of harvest this crop brings.  Any harvest will be an improvement from the last bunch of years.

Update 7/27: Heavily pruned tonight.  Lots of mites but less than and slower than when first spotted.  Caged positions got a hard shower.  Might have to get the Zeem and a spray bottle from Home Depot.  I’ll try and get some pics up soon.