this years garden's yields...?

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WLLady
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this years garden's yields...?

Post by WLLady » Thu Sep 05, 2019 1:11 pm

Hey everyone

it's been the strangest gardening year ever at my place.....however, i'm not complaining.
we've been keeping track of the yields this year, and i have to say i'm pleasantly surprised with some of the crops.

first some things have been abysmal-my parsley never even sprouted. and my onions got eaten twice.....and the lettuce bolted in record time. and the tomato hornworms have been crazy lately (thank goodness for btk!). and my peas....planted 5 times, and NOTHING.

anyways, some things are doing amazing.
sunflowers-mammoth russians are i swear 12 feet tall!
2 huge pumpkins on one skinny little plant
there must be 30 butternut squash out there almost ready to go.
hubbard squash didn't do really well, but there's 5 or so
the tomatoes-already picked 4 bushels of romas, another 4 of fields. the cherry tomatoes tanked this year, but the fields are easily a pound each! way too many for me to use, so i'm giving bushels away to friends and neighbours.
the cabbage is huge and beautiful. carrots are almost ready (have no clue if the carrot maggot got any or not yet). 20 heads of cauliflower. 15 heads of broccoli.
10 brussel sprout plants are huge and still going.
zucchini was crazy, at least 100 pounds, much fed to chickens and made into brownies and gifted to people
at least 80 cucumbers.
beans - put 35 bags to the freezer green and yellow wax beans.
put down a bushel of green and orange peppers to the freezer last night, gave a half bushel to a friend and have another bushel in my kitchen to go tonight.
fortna pumpkins...i haven't counted yet but they're growing through the horse paddock....
lettuce-at least 30 heads, with another 20 coming up
potatoes-planted 15 pounds, 5 pounds of 3 different types. got back at least 50 pounds of each. not a bad return on the investment!
the basil plant is 4 feet tall......um.....
sage is huge, chives everywhere.....i may have to go after my oregano with some nasty stuff to get it to stop spreading.
strawberries were okay....raspberries were crazy, blackberries tanked....
rhubarb was also amazing, and the asparagus season went super long and awesome!
i'm really really happy with the potatoes though, they're perfect, no wireworm damage and no scab this year!!!! yay!

how'd everyone else do?
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kenya
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Re: this years garden's yields...?

Post by kenya » Thu Sep 05, 2019 6:45 pm

My tomatoes have done the best this year, huge and plentyfull the onion nothing.
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Re: this years garden's yields...?

Post by Ontario Chick » Sat Sep 07, 2019 9:26 am

Some interesting results in the garden this year.
Plenty of tomatoes of every variety now, some to us some to chickens.
cucumbers weren't really that happy this year, accept for the "lemon" variety which took over the whole lot.
Harvested one hill of potatoes, average yield, will wait as long as possible to harvest rest.
Actually found 3 pumpkins about the size of cantaloupe, so not much of Jack the lantern material.
Absolutely thrilled with the Brussel sprouts, can't wait to try them to see if they are as good as the ones @Killerbunny grew last year.
Some very happy Butternut Squash, so will try to store some, read up on storing and the suggestion is to wait until the vines die off and let them harden off in the field .......anybody has an experience with that?
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Re: this years garden's yields...?

Post by windwalkingwolf » Sun Sep 08, 2019 1:10 am

Tomatoes have tanked for me, both cherries and slicers...I got blight in July and now I'm just hoping the few survivors ripen before frost. Late planting, late into the ground, and wet once they got in there, followed by super dry, and then super wet again means my tomatoes are not happy this year. Partly my fault.
Peppers and other nightshades (cape gooseberry, ground cherry, eggplant, tomatillo etc.) are similarly late. Lots of fruit but not much ripe yet. Some peppers have some BER so will be paying more attention to rotation and adding calcium for next year. Hot peppers are the exception; for some reason the jalapeno and cayenne are crazy, and huge, and HOT. Yay!!!!
Broccoli has been going crazy--I can barely keep up before it bolts. They are just bananas, pounding out heads and side sprigs willy-nilly. "Munchkin" and "Chief" are just throwing heads at me faster than I can pick them.
Cauliflower is JUST maturing now, but so far it's amazing. Big heads, no mould and few bugs. Worth the wait.
Iceberg lettuce and most spinaches bolted right away soon after planting. 2nd and 3rd plantings same thing. Kaiser lettuce (slow but heat tolerant) is doing great, it loved the brief heat. The heads aren't huge, but at least I have lettuce that isn't bitter or bolting.
Sweet corn is sooo late for me. Just starting to be done now, I planted 5 varieties between middle of May and middle of June, and only one has done reasonably well. Not quite mature yet though, so hoping for frost to hold off. We had our first home-grown sweet corn meal of the year just last night, and while it wasn't the best, at least it was good: we're going to get some (yay!)...and the field corn planted super late across the road didn't pollinate MINE. I f-ing hate tough, starchy, chewy corn. Blecch. So I know the few of my sweet corn I can put up before frost will at least be tasty!
Melons and squash are doing excellent. I have squash vine borer in the pie pumpkins, but they're pretty much done so they're fine. Watermelon vines have crapped out so watermelon are done, ready or not. I haven't tried any yet, but most sound ready. Cantaloupe plants are still going strong, and the melons are huge but not ready to pick yet. Zucchini went bananas as usual. I have zucchini coming out my wazoo and they're still producing. Good thing they're versatile and that the animals love them! Squash borers are getting into them too now, but I have enough.
Beets were almost a total bust :( I planted 3 times, but yield is horrible. Old seed, new seed, didn't seem to matter. They didn't come up or they'd sprout and die, or they'd sprout and just not grow. I'll be looking to buy beets or trade for them :(

Carrots are doing crappy, much the same as my beets. Terrible germination and slow growth. Ive gone out of my way to make nice deep, loose, fertile soil for carrots, but they're not cooperating. All are still tiny and/or scrawny.
Onions are doing fabulously (a first for me, I've never had good luck with onions before), turnips are doing ok. Cabbage is SPECTACULAR, I've already taken a 14 lb head and there's a couple more out there just like that and more working hard on it. The 'Brunswick' cabbage I got from @killerbunny seems to be loving the crappy weather this year and just pounding out really enormous heads for me!
Cucumbers haven't started to die back (much) yet, so for months I've had more than I know what to do with. Luckily the chickens love them. I can only make so much relish. P.S., anybody wants relish cukes, let me know. I've got mountains of them.
Also, I got a couple weird squash plants pop up from macKenzie seeds that were supposed to be Black Beauty zucchini seeds. One plant is producing a yellow and orange striped zucchini-type squash, and the other is clearly some sort of big green acorn squash. Just a heads-up for the other growers out there.
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Re: this years garden's yields...?

Post by TomK » Sun Sep 08, 2019 9:55 pm

Well...for a guy that loves to garden, this year was a bust...I oay this game in my head every year as I tend to things in the garden, if i was a pioneer would i make it throught the winter? this year, the reaounding answer would be, " hell no, I would be dead by Christmas chewing on shoe leather with scurvied gums...I got the garden in late as the soil was just not ready, cold and wet...then when i finally got the planting done, my cousins from Germany showed up for three weeks and my attention was seriously diverted...when they got gone, the weeds had taken over and the deer and rabbits took advantage of my non attention...beets, carrots, chard, zucchini, sunflowers all gone...tomatoes got cropped back...peppers were "topped", I just got them harvested and just enough to make pepper jely and salsa...at last....potatoes were good though, all three varities, yellow and red onions are abundant...we got a great yield on garlic...raspberries are atill yielding...this variety goes til freeze up..i have 23 varieties of tomatoes on the go and I will have enough for our use and seed saving so that at least is a 'whew' moment...boring post holes for a proper femce around the garden this week...I cannot have another year like this in future..I don't hunt, nor like venison very much so that will have to be my project at deterring the varmints...lol...anyway, theres always next year...and to Linda, the 'Blush' tomatoes are wonderful and abundant, thank you and to Kathy, the 'Fortna' pumpkin was highly anticipated but did not survive the critter onslaught...next year maybe?...I am disappointed to say the least.....oh well.. :run:
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Re: this years garden's yields...?

Post by Farrier1987 » Mon Sep 09, 2019 8:01 am

Four onions. Three squash. Some rather tasty volunteer cherry tomatoes. Just like me, kinda pitiful. Back and leg problems didnt let me do the required caretaker duties. There is an old saying that the best fertilizer is the footprints of the gardener. Not enough footprints this year.
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Farrier1987. South of Chatham on Lake Erie. Chickens, goats, horse, garden, dog, cat. Worked all over the world. Know a little bit about a lot of things. No incubator, broody hens.

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Re: this years garden's yields...?

Post by WLLady » Mon Sep 09, 2019 8:27 am

So my fortna didn't come back true....which is apparently not unheard of....they're nice and large and elongated, and i bet there was a butternut squash involved somewhere along the line. I didn't grow butternuts last year, so not sure. anyways, looking forward to opening one up and seeing what it's like inside, they're not ready yet.

i forgot to mention....80+ pounds of plums. the cherry trees all have some spot/blight/something and are dropping leaves like crazy, even with anti-fungal sprays. sigh. i hope they survive...they look horrendous right now. Apples are way early. we have the original spy trees, and they're loaded-and ready. so we are picking and i'll freeze some for pies in the winter. I seriously need to clean out the freezers....running out of room!

haven't checked my raspberries lately, because some genius planted them behind the asparagus, which turned into a veritable impenetrable forest....i'm still kicking myself for that one. i did move some of the plants this spring, but they didn't fare so well, sigh. hopefully the roots come back next year. darned sandy soil!
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Re: this years garden's yields...?

Post by labradors » Mon Sep 09, 2019 8:47 am

Reading through the comments of others makes me feel exhausted! What a lot of stuff some people grow, and what a ton of work!

TomK, sorry about your visitors staying for so long and consequently ruining your garden. I think your fence will really help to keep the critters out next year. So glad that Blush is a big hit. The Dragon's Tongue beans that you gave me did well too :).

My kale did badly. I picked it in the heat and after rain, a no-no apparently, as that causes it to rot. That wouldn't be so bad, but now I cannot grow much else on the same spot for 3 years due to soil contamination :(. Peppers, eggplant, beans, garlic and chard all did well.

Cukes had to be grown under Reemay because of the damned cuke beetle. What a PITA that was! Maybe I will skip them next year.

Tomatoes did very well indeed. Out of 21 varieties, Maglia Rosa, grown in a 3 gallon pot on the deck did the best and tasted amazing. Orange Strawberry was a new-to-me favourite, although this is a huge heart (and I prefer them smaller), the taste is sweet and delicious.

Now the apples, pears and plums are littering the ground and drawing the wildlife. I'm frantically attempting to harvest the good stuff and spent hours canning 6 jars of apples on Saturday. Hardly worth all the effort.
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Re: this years garden's yields...?

Post by Farrier1987 » Mon Sep 09, 2019 12:02 pm

And WLL's 80 lb of plums. I am not sure if that counted the 15 lbs or so I filched. Made excellent jam. Thanks.
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Farrier1987. South of Chatham on Lake Erie. Chickens, goats, horse, garden, dog, cat. Worked all over the world. Know a little bit about a lot of things. No incubator, broody hens.

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Re: this years garden's yields...?

Post by Killerbunny » Mon Sep 09, 2019 3:21 pm

Toms are nuts! I just hope they ripen. I grew Legend and won't again because this is the second year they've had poor flavour compared to my others. Loads of butternut squash all of a sudden but they are green, never grown them before do they turn yellow? Zucchini poor but DH not upset. Pots are scabby and not great but with the weather they are OK. Garlic excellent which was huge surprise. We have a raised bed now for the next lot, thanks @Kbr42 for the low bed suggestion! peas non existent. not sure what happened. Beans only planted a few and they were great. Cabbages going well, brussels not so much.
Thanks to @TomK the cantaloupes have taken off. They have been slow to ripen but have a lovely flavour.
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