Monthly Archives: August 2012

Caged Position 4 Big Boy

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This is about the worst tomato so far with caged position 11, another Big Boy, being a close second.  This pic taken on 8/28.  Although it looks barren there still is healthy growth and second wave tomatoes.  The last harvest (8/29) was 7 good over two days and it looks like things are slowing down.   This might be the dividing line between first and second harvest.  Second harvest looks very probable but mites still present.

Update 9/2: Tiny two tomato harvest today which is first since 8/29 so the lull continues.

Tomato Second Growth

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Second growth on a Big Boy.  These tomatoes are over my head.  Had a decent harvest today but mostly scrub tomatoes, a couple good enough for slicing but most will be used for canning since they grew funny.  Some nice round green ones will be ready in a couple of days.  The 95F heat today is making the tomatoes ripen on the vine funny so I have started pulling them earlier to let them ripen inside.  The mites are still all over all plants.  The tomatoes are growing up as fast as the mites are eating from the bottom.   Hopefully next year I’ll be able to thwart the mites before they can establish a population.  Even at the height of these tomatoes you can see some dead foilage, victim of mites.

Boiling Water Bath Canning

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Boiling Water Bath Canning – Including Jams, Jellies, and Pickled Products – Home – Virginia Cooperative Extension.

The people at Virginia Tech keep improving their sites.  Over the years when searching for gardening information somehow one of their sites always had the answer.  The above link is a useful reference for anyone interested in canning.

Update 8/25:  Forgot to water last night.  Everything was very dry at 1pm.  Canned 1 quart tomatoes using above method which cleared out all tomatoes.  From the looks of the plants I’m going to bringing in a huge haul of tomatoes tonight when I go up there.  Second growth tomatoes on the Big Boys are on branches well over my head (>6 feet).

More Harvest Porn

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Today’s tomato harvest of 16, six of which came from a Celebrity in caged position 6. They’re all nice and round and no BER but they do have cracking on the stem side from overwatering. I waited 3 days since I last harvested so the average production is around 1/2 tomato per plant per day. Looking at the state of the plants this will continue for awhile. There is a second wave growth and more flowers. I found some mites on curled leaves and did some pruning. Some parts of the tomato plant are yellowing and wearing out from general age but there is lots of new growth. We’ll see how long this lasts. I’ll probably unload most of this haul onto the neighbors.

Update 8/23:  More mites seen more pruning but tomatoes are producing.  Pulled another haul as big as shown in the above picture today — maybe more.  Ended up giving all those tomatoes picked on 8/20 away and now am backed up again.  All the plants have second growth and lots of tomatoes are turning red.  I have the canning jars I just need the motivation to boil the water and follow the process.  I can however, no matter what happens from here on out, declare that the tomato crop has been successful.  I also think 8 plants are enough.  Celebrities are a keeper next year as they have always been, even in the worst of times, consistent and fighters to the end even when faced with death.  I am pondering whether to replace the Big Boys with Brandywines, the tomato with the pink fruit, for next year now that I know what has been killing them the last bunch of years.  I’ll think about this.  Still lots of time for next year and unlike the last bunch of years, I should be harvesting through September.

Veranda level status

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A view of the veranda shade in morning light taken from the west facing door.  Not much interesting on the veranda worth photographing.  Will write more analysis later but in general, morning glories look thin.  I don’t see any Heavenly Blues or Moonflowers even though I saw many sprout but it’s still perhaps early.   I like this shot of the shade; a prototype using a discarded king sized sheet pinned together with sewing needles and clothing pins.  When all the kinks get worked out I plan to learn how to use a sewing machine and make something proper.

Harvest Time

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Here’s a pic of today’s harvest.  I picked a lot of eggplants because I have been lax at picking them the last couple of weeks.  Although I don’t have numerical data, it seems like I’m producing the same number of eggplants with 8 plants as in previous years with double that many planted.  This year I went from 3 to 2 eggplants per large container and a couple of singles that have gotten rather large.  Tomatoes are still doing OK which is far better than the situation last year.

Tomato Status

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Caged positions 7 (left, Big Boy) and 8 (right, Celebrity).  Today was cool and rained all day giving the tomato plants cold showers.  Second growth on all plants seem strong.  As can be seen from this picture, the Big Boy in position 7 has had its lower branches either pruned by me or shriveled up by the spider mites.  The Celebrity on the right seems in much better shape albeit somewhat smaller.  Harvested four decent tomatoes yesterday and four today — some coming from Big Boys for the first time.  Tomatoes are somewhat cracked from overwatering but no BER.  BER hasn’t been a problem which is a first for me growing tomatoes on the main roof.  It appears (knock on wood) that there might be a second wave harvest this year which would be a first since (by my imperfect recollection) 2006.  The curled leaves are fewer.  I did, however, see single mites on some leaves but they were moving slowly and perhaps not reproducing fast enough to keep pace with the growth of the plants.  The hard water showers might be working.   Things are definitely looking good with respect to tomato plants and for the first time in many many years, I was able to give away tomatoes.  It’s possible that I may have to get out the canning gear as well (which is a lot of work).

Update 8/15:  Rained somewhat last night so skipped watering.  Checked mid day today and had to do an emergency water on main roof.  Temps got to 87F here.  Tomatoes took it well but the eggplants wilted quite a lot.  So far so good.  Second growth small set green tomatoes on mostly Celebrities but some Big Boys and lots of flowers for a third harvest.  Here is one of the tomatoes taken on 8/15/2011.

NE Corner Main Roof Status

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This corner has a collapsed box that I decided to let be this year because of the large population of volunteer snapdragons from last season.   The box contains 8 habeneros, 2 cucumbers, 1 eggplant, and 1 Cleome that I planted.  In the bottom left corner is part of the pineapple mint container which is on its third or fourth year.  Next season I’ll have to replace this box and since it supports edibles I can’t use treated wood.  This pine box painted with white polyurethane paint was built for the 2007 season so it has lasted only 6 years — which might not be so bad.  The treated wood boxes on the veranda level are on their 11th year and show no signs of wear.  I need to figure out a way to line the inside of these large box containers with some kind of plastic to protect the wood from soil moisture without introducing nasty chemicals that can get into edible plants.

Here’s the box in 2007 on SE wall main roof.

New veranda suspension structure

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Overhead view of my new veranda shading system.  The blue structure uses suspension to support the weight of the shade.  In this picture the shade is completely upright.  It can be lowered as the sun moves across the sky.  This picture was taken in early morning light and notice the shadow cast by me and the shade.  The shade’s shadow goes onto the deck fence across the alley.  The last suspended structure I built here was based on squares which turned into parallelegrams over the years.  This structure is based on triangles which should be much more durable over time.   Holding a shading system is only one purpose for this structure.  Also, the shown shade is just a prototype using an old king sized sheet.  When all the kinks get worked out I plan on sewing something proper using nicer and perhaps more colorful fabrics.

Click here to see a pic of the old suspension project taken in 2005.

Update:  After furthur analysis apparently that shade on the deck fence across the alley is from the south parapit wall.  I put this pic up because it showed the angle of the sun at a certain time and at a certain date.  I’ll get a better picture that shows how the entire thing works up soon.

Update (8/13): Just have to mention for future Mark:  Mark took this picture because he thought the shade cast the shadow across the alley.  The purpose of being diligent taking pictures even when the light is rather harsh is to analyze these things further without the vagueness of memory.  Knowing how the sun rotates and casts shadows is an important architectural problem/solution that must be dealt with.

Logbook Entry: Mites update

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Today (8/6)  found more mites in all tomato plants when picking curled leaves.  The organic spray is not working so the only thing left for this year is to keep blasting hard water showers at the plants each evening and perhaps during the day.  Perhaps had I known about mites at the beginning of the season I could have used the spray when the plants were smaller with less leaves to worry about.  Now it’s too late.  Compared to last season however the tomatoes still have a fighting chance.  The Big Boys are struggling however.  Also harvested 4 decent sized tomatoes, all Celebrities.

Update 8/9: Temps dropped.  Now 66F here at 5pm.  Only hard showered tomatoes last night (8/8) and skipped watering everything else on main roof.  Harvested four tomatoes yesterday.  Some cracking but no big deal.  No BER.  Harvested only from Celebrities but the Big Boys look like they’ll start giving up red ones.  Flicked giant catepillar off the roof who was eating the top branches off of a Big Boy.  Mites are few so the hard showers seem to be working.  Will get a pic up soon but the Celebrities look like they have recovered from the mites while the Big Boys keep losing branches to my pruning.  Overall it’s 8/9 and although a couple Big Boys might not make it, the buffer system seems to have worked by keeping them isolated.  Morning glories on NW corner veranda level seem weaker compared to last year.  Must investigate possible causes.

Update again 8/9:  Now I went and checked the plants looking on the backside of the leaves where most of the mites hang out after reading these articles.  Pruned heavily.  Mostly Big Boys but some Celebrities.  My overall observation is that the Celebrities seem to have tolerated the mites better although I’m pruning curled leaves mercilessly now.  It’s raining.  I’m debating whether or not to spray the oil.  May as well use up the rest of the bottle.