Here's a site with lots of information about a variety of plant diseases and how to control them!
http://www.greenharvest.com.au/pestcontrol/fungal_info.html
A few tidbits:
We should not have planted the beans after June 15, as they are more susceptible to rust when planted late. Who knew? Next year we'll plant earlier!
As we remove the diseased plants, we need to take ALL the infected plant parts and get them away from the garden. They should NOT go into the compost, as that might allow the spores to spread. I'm going to burn the ones we pulled today.
There are many different strains of rust, each affecting only one type or family of plants, so our crop rotation plan will help us control the problem. We just have to plant something totally unrelated to beans in that plot for the next year or two.
Saturday, August 15, 2009
Breakfast meeting
What a lovely, cool morning for mid August! Several gardeners met over breakfast at the garden to discuss the garden's progress and make plans for fall and winter. Afterward, we pulled lots of weeds!
Current state of the gardens:
The tomato plants are loaded with little green tomatoes, the beautiful sweet potato vines are trying to take over the whole northeast corner, and the zucchini and summer squash plants are looking good. A small test-dig yielded a handful of mid-size sweet potatoes. Yum!! The cabbages are getting huge, but they are being eaten by bugs of some sort. There is some lettuce that can be harvested. One plot of bush beans has developed rust, but the plants are loaded with small beans. We decided to pull the plants on the west edge of the bed, since they are closest to the other plot of beans, and we don't want the rust to spread. We'll give the rest of the rusty beans another week to grow, then pull those up and harvest what we can.
The Three Sisters garden has mixed progress. The corn was looking good, but some local varmints (raccoons, we think) ate our harvest! The beans aren't doing very well, but the squash (pumpkins, right?) are beautiful, with huge leaves and brilliant yellow blossoms.
The herb garden has been weeded and there is a surviving basil plant, but not much else. We should have mulched!!
Fall/winter plans:
We are planning a work day for Saturday, October 3 from 9 a.m. to noon. Everyone who can help will be most welcome!
We will harvest the sweet potatoes that day. There is a curing process required so that they will keep, but it's worth the trouble!
We also need newspaper, manure, and straw to put on the beds. We want to put newspapers around the outside perimeter of the garden to keep down the overgrowth of grass. They will need something on top of them - any ideas?
Exciting idea:
One of our lead gardeners is replacing all the windows in her house, and has offered the old windows for building a greenhouse! This would allow us to start seeds much earlier, and get a real jump on the gardening in the spring. I've offered to help plan the building, but I welcome help and suggestions, especially if there's anyone who has actually done a similar project!! We have several offers of help with the actual building, but many hands make light work, so let us know if you want to get in on the fun.
Research needed:
1. In the interest of improving our soil more quickly, we have decided to enlist the help of our church family in a composting project. What would be the best type of compost container(s) behind or beside the church, if we can get the congregation to bring their 'compostables' each week?
2. How can we organically and safely discourage the raccoons???
3. We need safe, organic methods for keeping the bugs from eating the cabbage.
4. Do we need to do anything to the rust-infested bean bed to prevent spreading and/or recurrence?
Current state of the gardens:
The tomato plants are loaded with little green tomatoes, the beautiful sweet potato vines are trying to take over the whole northeast corner, and the zucchini and summer squash plants are looking good. A small test-dig yielded a handful of mid-size sweet potatoes. Yum!! The cabbages are getting huge, but they are being eaten by bugs of some sort. There is some lettuce that can be harvested. One plot of bush beans has developed rust, but the plants are loaded with small beans. We decided to pull the plants on the west edge of the bed, since they are closest to the other plot of beans, and we don't want the rust to spread. We'll give the rest of the rusty beans another week to grow, then pull those up and harvest what we can.
The Three Sisters garden has mixed progress. The corn was looking good, but some local varmints (raccoons, we think) ate our harvest! The beans aren't doing very well, but the squash (pumpkins, right?) are beautiful, with huge leaves and brilliant yellow blossoms.
The herb garden has been weeded and there is a surviving basil plant, but not much else. We should have mulched!!
Fall/winter plans:
We are planning a work day for Saturday, October 3 from 9 a.m. to noon. Everyone who can help will be most welcome!
We will harvest the sweet potatoes that day. There is a curing process required so that they will keep, but it's worth the trouble!
We also need newspaper, manure, and straw to put on the beds. We want to put newspapers around the outside perimeter of the garden to keep down the overgrowth of grass. They will need something on top of them - any ideas?
Exciting idea:
One of our lead gardeners is replacing all the windows in her house, and has offered the old windows for building a greenhouse! This would allow us to start seeds much earlier, and get a real jump on the gardening in the spring. I've offered to help plan the building, but I welcome help and suggestions, especially if there's anyone who has actually done a similar project!! We have several offers of help with the actual building, but many hands make light work, so let us know if you want to get in on the fun.
Research needed:
1. In the interest of improving our soil more quickly, we have decided to enlist the help of our church family in a composting project. What would be the best type of compost container(s) behind or beside the church, if we can get the congregation to bring their 'compostables' each week?
2. How can we organically and safely discourage the raccoons???
3. We need safe, organic methods for keeping the bugs from eating the cabbage.
4. Do we need to do anything to the rust-infested bean bed to prevent spreading and/or recurrence?
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