Jim Inman's (jinman) Garden - 2007

[Volfandt]

Great thread, I really enjoy the pic's and knowledge shared. Here's a few pics of my humble little garden. Not visable is a half row of Jack-O-Lanterns growing between the last two rows of Silver Queen. Surprisingly, the zuchini has outgrown the hybrid burpless cuc's 10 fold. I shoulda staked the tom's as they're spreading all over the place, oh well I'use the cages next season

 

[jinman]

So this year we did a 8' electric fence and so far so good
I may have over planted the beds because the plants are all starting to run wild.

We got corn / watermelon / pumpkins / two diff type tomatoes / beans / squash
cucumbers.

Ron, you sure have a nice deer fence. That looks like it should sure work.

Isn't it amazing how plants just grow and take over all available space? I have pumpkin and gourd plants that extend out 20' from the hill where I planted them. I could plant them in raised beds, but I'd still have to leave lots of room around them or let them run up a trellis of some kind.

Your cattle panel trellises look great, but how do you harvest the stuff in the middle? can you see and reach through from the outside? That's the only thing I can see that might be a negative. Everything else looks great and growing like crazy. Nice garden!

 

[jinman]

I shoulda staked the tom's as they're spreading all over the place, oh well I'use the cages next season

You could probably still retrofit some cages, but you'd have to do it carefully. Your tomatoes should be fine in "sprawl" mode if the ground doesn't stay too wet. Even in cages, all this rain in North Texas has my vines starting to show signs of fungus or other disease. I may lose several of the cherry varieties because they seem to be much more susceptible to disease.

Your garden sure shows some dramatic growth in that last picture.

 

[jinman]

I've shown one picture of a "squashkin" and now I have another plant that looks like a "pumpkuash." This one is a perfectly round pumpkin shaped fruit that is bright, bright yellow. I will try to get a picture this morning.

Here is the picture of my "pumpkuash." It's about the size of a bowling ball and as yellow as a squash, but has all the markings of a pumpkin. It seems heavier than a pumpkin too...like it is not hollow. Any ideas?

 

[Volfandt]

Your garden sure shows some dramatic growth in that last picture.

Considering that we're in one of the worst droughts on record it really is dramatic.
I believe we're approx 13" below our avg rainfall for the yr and unfortunately the mid west is getting it all.

This is the 1st yr of this planting in this spot and I worked it up with alot of compost from last yrs grass & leave clippings as well as once everything was about 6" high I put another layer of my compost over the entire plot, I haven't had to fertilize yet but may have to once the pumpkins start.

I have to water it every other evening w/city water. If this was a commercial operation I'd have lost my rear a month ago The cuc's seem to suffer the most as they are the 1st to wilt. Once I give them a good watering they take approx 4 minutes to start fluffing out again.
What I find to be even more dramatic is when we do finally get a good steady rain, the garden responds almost immediately and seems to grow faster than when watered w/city water.

The Kentucky Wonders seemed to take forever to start climbing but now they are reaching out and twisting around everything within reach.

Can't beat the flavor of freshly picked vegi's

 

[tile]

Ron, you sure have a nice deer fence. That looks like it should sure work.

Isn't it amazing how plants just grow and take over all available space? I have pumpkin and gourd plants that extend out 20' from the hill where I planted them. I could plant them in raised beds, but I'd still have to leave lots of room around them or let them run up a trellis of some kind.

Your cattle panel trellises look great, but how do you harvest the stuff in the middle? can you see and reach through from the outside? That's the only thing I can see that might be a negative. Everything else looks great and growing like crazy. Nice garden!

jinman, the pumpkins, squash and watermelon do wander quite a bit. Right now the pumpkins have grown about 6' out of the bed they are planted in. Next season we will definately have a different plan for our beds.

the cattle panels seem to be working nicely so far. The cucumbers have grown up and over them quite nicely. We have planted bush and climbing beans with a few stalks of corn. The climbing beans are grabbing hold of just about everything they can including the cattle panels. The tomatoes are growing quite nicely but have not produced anything yet. Harvesting is quite simple with the cucumbers as we just reach in and pick. I'm guessing the same will be true for the others.

 

[JC-jetro]

Hi guys been looking at all the pics of gardens on here and now would like to post me & my wifes little garden.

We have been in our new house for about 4 yrs now and have did three diff gardens each year and every time the deer eat more then we do :-(

So this year we did a 8' electric fence and so far so good
I may have over planted the beds because the plants are all starting to run wild.

We got corn / watermelon / pumpkins / two diff type tomatoes / beans / squash
cucumbers.

Been fun so far keeps us busy when we are not working on our barn.
Any tips or tricks I am open for info from you guys.

Ron.

Ron,

Your garden looks great. I specially like how you get them pesky warmints out . I like your support system using cattle panels. I have done exactly the same and it works great for cucumbers also. You've done a great job.

JC

 

[schmism]

one thing i love about the midwest is the wild black rasberryies.

Our property has some.... but while working the back fence line and peering into the "natural" area behind us (a 1+ acer of golden rod etc) we notice an ABUNDANCE of rasberryies....

about an hrs worth of picking but i spent more time trying to make a path around the various bushes than i did actually picking. For every one black one we picked there were 15 red ones not yet ripe....

(non resized 56k warning)
http://www.snjschmidt.com/07-09-07/DSC02924.JPG

we were looking up rasberry icecream/sherbert recipies... (we have a hightech ice cream maker we use quite often)

sat harvest... it got to hot for us to spend 45 min picking green beans, we got those sunday morning before it got real hot...
http://www.snjschmidt.com/07-09-07/DSC02923.JPG

We didnt get a pic of them, but hauled in nearly 3lbs of green beens. Most (2.5 lbs) come from one patch, the other kind, isnt setting as well yet. Based on whats left on patch A, and patch B and C.... we need to find a "market" for greenbeans because we are going to have TONS of them....

Julie was absloutly thrilled about our first watermellon... (found it hiding in the weeds sat) bout the size of a softball...

http://www.snjschmidt.com/07-09-07/DSC02926.JPG

 

[JC-jetro]

Ron, you sure have a nice deer fence. That looks like it should sure work.

Your cattle panel trellises look great, but how do you harvest the stuff in the middle? can you see and reach through from the outside? That's the only thing I can see that might be a negative. Everything else looks great and growing like crazy. Nice garden!

Jim,

I do the same trellis that Ron does and plant the cucumber seed along the bottom edges. once you train the vine they climp up with no issues.I never pick anything in the very middle. there is also hardly ever contact between cucumber and the soil. On English long variety they actually grow more straight also. In between I set up my irrigation system with the few pop ups and hose end connection. I connect the garden hose and give t a good soak. I get more sun on the right side (facing West) and the plants are more prolific.


JC

 

[jinman]

one thing i love about the midwest is the wild black rasberryies.

We have a small wild blackberry thicket on our property and my brother has several larger thickets on his place. This last weekend, we took him and his wife a bunch of veggies. He had squeezed blackberries for juice to make jelly and made us some pink limeade using the blackberry juice. RECOMMENDED! YUM!