Anyone into gardening here?

[xrljoel]

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Rabbits are eating my landscape plants this year as unlike last year the snow isn't high enough to cover them.
Would a couple wraps of netting do the trick

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I have also put out cracked corn thinking if I feed them they'll leave the plants alone but no luck.

Rabbits will chew through the plastic mesh easily, likely just for fun.

The cracked corn can attract rats, so be aware.

There's a product available called Critter Ridder at Home Hardware that is a mixture of a variety of black and white peppers mixed with some sort of light oil and sand. Rodents HATE it because the pepper plugs up their sinuses, the sand is an inert carrier and the oil acts as a sticker to make it last a while.

Obviously rain will wash it away, and even in ideal conditions it only lasts about 30 days, but that will be enough as once the rabbits experience it they won't go back there for a while.

The little buggers chew lots of stuff down to the ground around my house but it grows back acceptably for me. Where the damage isn't acceptable is when they girdle (eat the bark all the way around) something larger. In that case I wrap the stem in 1/4" or 1/2" wire mesh.

 

[AllistonGT]

Local fox is doing a great job with rabbit population control. Without a carnivore there numbers get out of hand around here.

 

[JC99]

Picked up a new addition to my weird plant collection today. In the last few years I've seen more and more of these crop up for sale in nurseries/garden centres etc. They are actually surprisingly easy to grow if you take care of their needs. This one is the biggest one I have, the pitchers are 6” long on this one.

 

[sburns]

Picked up a new addition to my weird plant collection today. In the last few years I've seen more and more of these crop up for sale in nurseries/garden centres etc. They are actually surprisingly easy to grow if you take care of their needs. This one is the biggest one I have, the pitchers are 6” long on this one.

View attachment 77930

I still haven't found that winter cactus. I think I need to expand my search. Is your's still alive?

 

[Gary]

On Feb 25 I planted 24 tomato seeds in egg cartons. Thirteen are up so far......

 

[nobbie48]

I'm eyeing my crab apple tree and thinking about spraying it for insects. Without spraying the cull rate is about 50% but I've never sprayed it.

A brief read up says spray before buds open to kill off pests that over wintered but leave it alone when it's flowering to avoid killing bees, Once the fruit appears give it another shot. I make jelly as a hobby.

I should give it a pruning in a week or two.

 

[JC99]

I still haven't found that winter cactus. I think I need to expand my search. Is your's still alive?

Yes. Usually comes back bigger every year. I think the damn rabbit in the garden gnawed on some of it but it did ok last year.

If you get out this way anytime I could see if I could take off a paddle for you to plant up. Depends what it looks like from under the snow we still have.

 

[Shaman]

Two of our three house gardens. This year I'm planning to expand considerably. The garden not picture generates so many tomatoes that we can't can enough, eat enough and give away enough, we still had to compost some. These two generated some hot peppers and a watermelon that was not tasty at all, so that was a fail.

 

[GreyGhost]

Two of our three house gardens. This year I'm planning to expand considerably. The garden not picture generates so many tomatoes that we can't can enough, eat enough and give away enough, we still had to compost some. These two generated some hot peppers and a watermelon that was not tasty at all, so that was a fail.

View attachment 77941

Compost tomatoes? Sacrilege. Tomatoes become sauce with almost no effort.

 

[Shaman]

Compost tomatoes? Sacrilege. Tomatoes become sauce with almost no effort.

We made 48 cans for ourselves. K eats tomatoes with just salt and pepper. We still couldn't give enough away. I'd estimate we got two full bushels.

 

[nobbie48]

Two of our three house gardens. This year I'm planning to expand considerably. The garden not picture generates so many tomatoes that we can't can enough, eat enough and give away enough, we still had to compost some. These two generated some hot peppers and a watermelon that was not tasty at all, so that was a fail.

View attachment 77941

The curse of tomatoes, all at once then nothing but plastic ones.

 

[JC99]

The curse of tomatoes, all at once then nothing but plastic ones.

There’s some super early varieties. We are trying a few this year. Early Girl has always been OK but variety is always good to have. Cherry tomatoes ripen early and fruit until late too. It's the big beefsteak ones you need to wait for.

 

[Sunday Rider]

There’s some super early varieties. We are trying a few this year. Early Girl has always been OK but variety is always good to have. Cherry tomatoes ripen early and fruit until late too. It's the big beefsteak ones you need to wait for.

Variety is key. Cherry and grape tomatoes go all season. Romas come at once near end of season. Beefstake variety come mid to late and go for some time. I bring in all green tomatoes before the frost and they gradually ripen until October, a few go bad but not many. Last year I tried some heirloom tomato seeds they were huge.

 

[xrljoel]

I'm eyeing my crab apple tree and thinking about spraying it for insects. Without spraying the cull rate is about 50% but I've never sprayed it.

A brief read up says spray before buds open to kill off pests that over wintered but leave it alone when it's flowering to avoid killing bees, Once the fruit appears give it another shot. I make jelly as a hobby.

I should give it a pruning in a week or two.

You can prune it now. You can also spray it anytime now with a dormant spray kit, which has horticultural oil (insecticide) and lime sulphur (fungicide).

While you might kill some bees by spraying it when it's in bloom you WILL destroy most of the blooms and eliminate almost all fruit production.

 

[JC99]

Variety is key. Cherry and grape tomatoes go all season. Romas come at once near end of season. Beefstake variety come mid to late and go for some time. I bring in all green tomatoes before the frost and they gradually ripen until October, a few go bad but not many. Last year I tried some heirloom tomato seeds they were huge.

We plant Brandywine every year, it’s an Amish heirloom variety I think. Big beefsteak style and very tasty. Our favourites recently have been the purple tomatoes like Black Krim because they taste amazing. I got some Chocolate Cherry seeds for this year to try, these are a dark cherry style.

 

[JC99]

Anyone have any experience with permanent/semi permanent greenhouses? Things like Canopia or Planta with 6-10mm double walled rigid poly panels? We have a cheapie small greenhouse with a plastic cover which is great but always wanted a proper greenhouse that I can put grow lights and a heater into for off season/overwintering stuff.

 

[Dirty Frank]

Anyone have any experience with permanent/semi permanent greenhouses? Things like Canopia or Planta with 6-10mm double walled rigid poly panels? We have a cheapie small greenhouse with a plastic cover which is great but always wanted a proper greenhouse that I can put grow lights and a heater into for off season/overwintering stuff.

What is you question or concern?

 

[JC99]

What is you question or concern?

How much do you have to spend for a decent one really. For a given size they range from $500 up to $3k.

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