Gardening

I planted a wild cucumber because I think the plant looks nice and pollinators seem to enjoy it. Is the fruit edible at all?

Hey all, I'm curious if anyone has experience planting shallots in the fall to overwinter in New England or a similar climate (6a-6b). I'm in the Boston area so we get cold winters but they're not brutal and I have some friends who grow garlic over winter with great success. I've read that shallots are less hardy than garlic but I don't really have any experience with root vegetables over winter so I have personally no clue!

I'm planning to try growing them in a raised bed and could potentially put row cover on them if that changes things.

We got hit by a pretty big hail storm a couple weeks ago. The leaves on the bottom started to die off. It seems like there’s some healthy leaves toward the top but I’m worried the bottom won’t survive. Is there anything I can do?

I have no idea what they are but I'm just excited to see mushrooms growing in my garden over the past couple days. It pleases me to know my soil is happy and healthy.

This is my first garden and I've decided to use clover as ground cover. It'll take a couple years to determine if it does what I hope it will accomplish. So far I'm quite happy with how things are turning out and am learning so much.

I'm currently and impatiently waiting to try the first cherry tomatoes but the first bunch should be ripe within the next week.

Fall is a great time to plant these foxglove seeds, that’s Digitalis purpurea. DM me your US address and get some free seeds! There’s no catch. I just love sharing seeds

This is a beautiful Lemon Queen sunflower in my backyard. I've planted a whole row, but this one shot up and got an early start, the rest barely have their heads grown.

I'm growing these as part of The Great Sunflower Project, a citizen science effort to track pollinators in the United States. These were chosen for their wide appeal to pollinators, and true to form, there is always at least one sort of insect buddy visiting at any given moment!

They were about to bloom too!

[Image description: a hand holding back pepper foliage, revealing several large long peppers in stages of ripening from light green to red.]

Probably all I'm going to get too, the plant isn't looking good 😭

The flavor of the fully ripe strawberry was incredible.

Most important thing this year was putting wire mesh over the plants so nothing else could grab the food before it was ready to harvest.

This is my first rose, Dublin Bay. This rose bloomed only a month after planting it. Super happy about it even though I should have snipped it to encourage more growing. Ah well.

cross-posted from: https://fernchat.esotericmonkey.com/post/33565

Back in January, I had a small potato from the market that went green, so I decided to quarter it and plant it in this old wicker basket. The soil eventually got heaped up to slightly over halfway. Not too bad!

cross-posted from: https://mander.xyz/post/1230210

Thrilled to pieces to see these bloom for the first time. 😄 I picked up these seeds at my town's local seed swap where they were labeled "Swedish Tall Red". I knew of a few other names for the cultivar but I wasn't expecting the absolute onslaught:

• Dead Viking (coool lol)
• Biskopens gråært
• Bishop’s Grey
• Bishop’s Red
• Swenson's Swedish

I guess people like this plant. Now I'm crossing my fingers and toes that it can set pods and dry in my short season!

[Attempting to figure out cross-posting, and figuring the best place to post stuff like this in general. Apologies if you've seen this a few times!]

For those who don’t know, the Ruth stout method is just laying your seed potatoes on the ground of covering with straw or hay.

I did not water these, and once the plants died back I just raked away the straw and these potatoes were laying on top of the soil, or about an inch deep.

They are tiny because I ended up planting them later than I should have and the heat was too much for them in the middle of summer.

Overall it was a great trial run and I plan to give it another go next year.

This year was my first time growing garlic out on my own (my parents have grown garlic for a few years). I learned a lot this year and I can't wait to plant again in the fall!

I did the cross pollination by hand over the winter and saved the seeds that grew from that pepper.

Then I planted the seeds and grew out 8 F1 plants. This is the first one growing pods thanks to a visit from some local deer which set them back.

Really happy to get such a big harvest while also fighting daily with squash bugs.

My brother brought back some plants that the garden center gave him for free since it was end of season and they were very weak and almost dying.

My dad's not a huge gardener at all but he watched some videos and set up a little station in the yard to plant them and water them. They're looking amazing so far and other than the plant the rabbits decided to dig up and steal (roots and all) they're all much healthier! He says he's gotten about three tomatoes so far and he loves it.

Just posting to share and maybe get some tips on how to grow them easily (since he's busy) and when to know when they're ripe. There are a few different varieties but we're not sure which ones are which and how to tell when they're good to eat! When to fertilize, how to protect when weather gets cold, when to do so, etc.

I bought these cistanthe at a garden shop having a sale on annuals. I didn't know anything about them but loved their colors. After looking them up online and finding out they are succulents, I decided against planting them in the ground and opted for pots. This way I can move them inside/under shelter on rainy/cold days and hopefully they will last more than one season.