Mixing it up with various things.

 Nothing to report from my garden. Tiny, tiny zucchini starting but no flowers on the males as yet to collect pollen. Still haven't fixed the first zucchini, will likely do that tonight. Two #tomatoes and lots of peppers. Guess I need to make some salsa.

Itty bitty #zucchini upper right

Almost ready! A few more days!

I'm learning a lot from just three plants and applying science. Most definitely will be amending much heavier when these are done and using more muscle to work the beds deeper and wider. When I water the tomato and pepper the organic matter that was originally in there is gradually moving to the surface and puddling. I'm glad I put the sticks in to keep the water and that around the plants.

Oh and the weed/purslane bed apparently was weeded a little. Some of the grass was pulled out and also discovered a few days ago that the hose had sprung a leak. I hope it wasn't my use of the nozzle that stressed it. 

Gee did she get a hint?

Serious leak

I didn't see any evidence of more whitefly or thrips on the tomato or the lemon bush. Though that is looking seriously in need of some food which it likely won't be getting. Wish I had kept that fertilizer now.

A few more pictures from Disneyland that are worth noting as I went through them again. 

Kumquat tree

Yep, it's in a pot in the small ice cream parlor patio area. I was waiting and looked over my shoulder seeing the fruit and thought, 'could it be?'. Scratched the small orange fruit and sure enough it's a kumquat. The fruit look a little stunted as they are in the shade but I'm sure that they swap them out at some point. 

How did I know it was a kumquat other than the fruit and leaves? I discovered years ago from someone else that if you take your thumbnail and run it along the skin, don't have to scratch just mark it and then smell, you will know what kind of fruit it is and what it's going to taste like. Seriously! It is 100% accurate, specially on oranges. But don't go into the store and stand there marking up all the fruit, kind of rude really and like I said, don't scratch it seriously, just bruise it running your nail along the skin in a line.

This is a wonderful little window area in the line for Rise of the Resistance. I saw the planting from the outside but didn't know how the line went so when we came on this I had to take a picture. Again succulent/drought tolerant plantings and I couldn't stand for long due to the line moving quickly.

Not gardenia.

The flowering bush is familiar but can't remember what it is. I think it has '--onia' in the name so hang on while I try and ID it. I was sort of close, Cordia boissieri, 'Mexican olive'. Has nothing to do with olives and is not even close to being that and is actually in the borage family. I may have seen it as a young plant when I worked at the nursery. Yep and you guessed it, drought tolerant from southern Texas into Mexico.

Just so many interesting plants and not all were dry landscape but a majority of them were. One thing that was lacking for many reasons was lawn areas. Smaller places yes but very well bordered by hedges or roped off. No lounging on the grass for sure in Disneyland. The lushest area was the Jungle Cruise really and a lot of those trees and shrubs were very well established. Oh and the plantings around the Haunted Mansion where I found this wonderful tree.

'Weeping Mulberry'

Yep.. because it was Haunted Mansion, a Weeping Mulberry. The flower stalk in front of it is from a 'Bear's Breeches' botanically, Acanthus mollis. What does that have to do with macabre plantings? Acanthus is derived from the latin for 'thorny' the larger leaf variety has some thorny sepals on the flower stalk but there is also a variety that has leaves that look more like a thistle leaf.

Not at Disney but at home, noticed this wonderful specimen of Bird of Paradise, sprouting another flower from the flower.

 

All the years I worked and studied I had no clue that they could do that until I saw that at the nursery one day and it still boggled my mind. 

So that's all from the garden today. Hope to have another fresh tomato in a day or two and maybe some salad or stir fry with the #zucchini.

Back to the garden!

I have been so distracted by Disneyland I haven't had a chance to post pictures from Friday. Another zucchini failed due to missing pollination as well as the little grasshopper is still around and causing mischief.

So I'm pretty sure those tiny holes are from the little guy and again,  not going to worry about it simply because at this stage the damage is tolerable. You can also see the leaves are taking on the mature greyish markings on the leaves. The left bush is getting male and female but the right one is still all males. Hmmph.

Looks like it's been munching on the tomato as well.

The speckling on the leaf I believe is spider mites and/or thrips, sadly I didn't get a chance to use my magnifier on it but phones are so good I can zoom in on it and verify the damage but see no bugs at this point. Also saw evidence of giant whitefly surprisingly. Which I apparently forgot to get a picture of, needless to say I removed the offending leaf and a few others in pruning and stomped on them with great vigor. That is a bug that is worse than aphids to eradicate. I will have to look at the giant bird of paradise and the lemon to see if there's evidence of them there as well.

So as to the whitefly issue, they are difficult to control with just a spray because when you hit them with anything like that, the adults scatter being fliers. It does help to minimize populations by spraying the bushes every day or so but with thousands of eggs being laid at a time, you have to really be on top of it to keep it under control. There are systemic insecticides that last for a year that do help and are not passed through to the fruit but I usually reserve those for bushes and trees as the tomato will be gone in another month or two and it's not worth the money to use it on annuals.

A lesson on culling

 So when you have clusters of tomatoes in a home garden, depending on the variety, you can keep them like this and eventually have three different sized tomatoes, if they all survive, or you can cull the two smaller ones (pick them off) and then more energy will go into the larger tomato. This also reduces your harvest numbers but considering it is only me and my guy and I only eat tomatoes on salad and sandwiches (if they're really good I will just cut it and put salt and pepper on it) I can afford to reduce the number of fruit I will have. Also consider the weight of mature fruit on the branch. If you have a smaller branch and a lot of fruit you will lose all of the fruit if the branch breaks. It is a common practice on fruit trees and with vegetables is does very well for larger tomatoes. Peppers are not cluster fruiting nor are melons and squash. Tomatoes are pretty unique in that way and if you are growing cherry tomatoes, get a fence or trellis because those suckers take off and reach for the sky. Those are meant to cluster fruit but despite what we have seen in the stores and photos they don't all ripen at the same time. I want to know what variety stores get of the 'tomatoes on the vine' clusters and wonder if they are treated with gas in order to get them to all get to size and ripen at the same time. That is not how they normally grow.

Oh in the process of watering the day before yesterday I shook the plant and one of the tomatoes fell off. Smaller than the others that I picked but it would have gotten full size... sadness and dismay.  I shook it to get the water off and maybe shake some pollen also and heard a ::thump:: on the ground. Looked on the other side of the plant and there it was dangit. Smaller than the palm of my hand so all I can think is that it may have been against the cage and hit it. 

I should probably use the tomatoes and zucchini soon and the bowlful of jalapeños as well. Haven't checked the peppers on the flavor and still trying to figure out how to get larger fruit. I'm leaving them on as long as possible but then notice one or two changing color despite their size and have to pick them. Sigh. Research goes on!

Next up, another post about the plantings at Disneyland as well as garden update.

 

 

 

Disneyland plants!

 So I wasn't able to take as many pictures as I wanted since it was 92° and about 76% humidity by midday and did not want to stop very much unless there was a breeze and shade.

Let's start with the walk in. Normally there would be a tram from the parking structure to the entrance but this being still mostly lock down they weren't running. Lonnnng walk but was able to see a lot of the plantings. Given it is Southern CA and we have a water shortage every year they go with low water/drought tolerant plants as much as possible.

Lion's Tail in the background, Lemon Scented Eucalyptus trees and I have forgotten what the light green plants are. They are not aloes, nor New Zealand Flax, closer related to agave. Succulents everywhere and the dark green grass spike plants are Mexican Grass Trees I believe. The grey green bush on the far right is an opuntia of some sort.

This area is usually a roadway only so having plants that are tough and yet still pretty is what they were going for. The entire lane behind us was lined with Eucalyptus of two kinds and provided some shade. Rocks of course need no maintenance and adds interest to the landscaping.

More daylight shot (my sweetie looking fine)

Gardenia Thunbergia

I took a picture of the gardenia tree growing at Walter Andersen's and was shocked and very pleased to see that they had planted some along the street here. This is outside the Main Street City Hall (where you get information and lost parents). Pentas are planted underneath it and as I said some beds are seasonal to always be in color. If I get a chance to go in the winter/Fall it will be different flowers underneath.

Kalanchoe baharensis

 

One of the things succulents are good for is looking wierd/futuristic/fantasy. Normally the tree has more leaves on it but you can see they've got it trimmed up and looks rather other worldly in Tomorrorwland. Star Tours is to the right of that where the umbrella is standing. Again, to save water and maintenance they put in a lot of succulents.

Pond side planting

I am trying to remember what the tree is on the far right, thinking that one in the foreground on the right was a pecan but they wouldn't put one near a pond. Doing some searches since the name was escaping, it is a Chinese Pistache. Ornamental Pistachio and the leaves change color in the fall. Possibly a Montezuma Cypress behind it or another one that I can't remember. In the foreground are Indian Hawthorn, and another drought tolerant plant and Texas Sage 'Silver Cloud'. My tree and plant ID skills are woefully degrading lately and I'm rather frustrated by it.

'Pet Cemetery' Planting

This is a lovely example of taking plants with meanings and interest to put into a themed garden. There's Lamb's Ears in the back, 'Carpet Bugle' in Mahogany in front of that, the reddish plant in front of the statue is another dark leaved variety of Heuchura 'Palace Purple' and Black Mondo Grass in front, but can you see what they did? Darker plants toward the front and lighter to the back. Darker colors because it's a cemetery and it's Haunted Mansion but also it gives depth to the small bed. They really go all out in the fall/winter when Nightmare Before Christmas theme get set. Those plantings look fairly new so I'd say those are set for the upcoming season.

Fruiting Pomegranate, Tomorrowland

 

One thing that is consistent now with Tomorrowland around the restaurant is putting in edible plants. I didn't get a chance to take a picture of the planting toward the entrance which had lettuces and other plants in an ornamental arrangement. This is one of three fruiting pomegranates at the edges of the patio area. Judging from the size of the trunk and my memory, those have been there for at least a dozen years if not more. If they are still there, around the corner toward Buzz Lightyears Blasters is a small grove of citrus trees. Again, too many people, too hot and will get pictures another time. Leave it to say it's one of my favorite landscaping areas. They even had tomatoes growing in one of the beds years ago!

Another seasonal planting

This is the planting around the central hub in front of the castle with the statue of Walt and Mickey. My all time favorite spot in the park. Pentas, salvia of various types framed in a boxwood hedge. Pink and purple theme as you can see. Short in front, tall in back with a small strip of grass between the railing where I was standing and the planting.

When you have a park this big and an army of people tending to just the landscaping and have to put costs and conservation at the top, low water is the way to go. You can have a lost maintenance and beautiful flowering garden without using a lot of water either. They try to use as few deciduous trees as possible for maintenance on the main walkways so it doesn't look messy. The one tree I didn't get a picture of is a wonderfully majestic Montezuma Cypress behind Thunder Mountain. There was also a Curly Willow that you don't see planted much. It's typically used for the twisted branches in floral arrangements.

Curly Willow

I had a blast and was very tired at the end of the day. I was there with my sweetie for his birthday so I didn't want to take up time getting pictures of plants. I have a few more pictures but will leave that for another post.

Success and partial failure #smallgardens#zucchini

 I didn't get a chance to water at all Tuesday night unfortunately and yesterday due to being at Disneyland (Amazing fun!) everything was parched and partly wilting BUT:

Success!

Two tomatoes!

I mentioned that #zucchini grow very quickly? When the flower gets pollinated it is already an infant. In three days you get a full size fruit! That was almost a day late picking. There's another flower that's not open yet behind it and hope to get out there this evening to check on it. There was the tomato pictured and another on the right side that was also ready and of course, more peppers.

I now believe the cracking is due to sun burn and uneven watering. When I was putting the tomatoes in the fridge though, discovered an issue:

Blossom end rot.

It is still edible, just cut that part out. So not so perfect fruit but I grew it and that's an accomplishment!

I tried to take pictures of the plants and landscapes at Disneyland but it was hot, I was with someone and usually we were in line somewhere so it was difficult. I will be making a separate post about that trip next time. Yay! I ar grdnr!

First tomato was ready!

 

Color was good so grabbed it and it was slightly soft and with one tug it came off! If you have to fight to pull fruit off it may not be ready. #tomato#smallgarden@greendinigardenguru

Good size tomato!

Second one in the background still on the bush. The cracking is from a variety of factors I suspect, inconsistent watering and likely a bit on the overripe state. Don't care, it's a gorgeous fruit that I grew! We will see how it tastes once it cools in the fridge for a bit. Other tomatoes and picked a handful of peppers as well. Despite being on the small size they were starting to color, though it's hard to tell in pictures. Had to adjust the picture to show other details.

Other details on the peppers are the brown corky stripes which is another sign of uneven watering and age of the fruit. Salsa here we come! Fresh tomato is going to be eaten with salad, too lazy and don't trust my cooking with a fresh one yet.

Since I forgot what I was going to add to my previous post, just going to move forward and show the #zucchini may well have taken!

Pollinated flower on the left

Almost all boys.

In the bright sun I couldn't see there was a small female at the back of the second bush on the right. Have to go back out and see if I can pollinate that little one as well. Flower is already closed up though so may be too late. I also fertilized with the last of what I had in the small bag, going to spring for some dry Gro Power on my next visit to the nursery. Don't have a good watering can and I prefer dry, already covered that.

It figures that the male flowers are fully open before the females are even ready. Might have to get a little collection jar and a paintbrush at the craft store today. Cotton swabs! Why didn't I think of that before? Anyway.

Something else that people sometimes panic about are perfectly normal plant things that a lot of other garden experts with videos and such rarely cover.

Cracking stem at base.

Again due to my inconsistent watering and the age of the plant, this happens. The stem is still very healthy and actually has some fruit on it up at the top. Unless this increases and totally splits, there's nothing wrong with this. I have a huge plant and stress will happen. I'm glad I have a cage around it. There's a garden on another street we drive by occasionally and that man's tomatoes are on a trellis, hardly any leaves yet but a good dozen tomatoes all ready to pick. It's bare all they way to the top and the vines are about four maybe five feet tall. Facing south with no trees or fence to block the sun so it's a perfect spot for them.

Since the wall behind my bed is not my wall and there are other things that need to happen before I can set that up, can't do a trellis. Might do some peas on a trellis after the tomato and pepper are done and keep it in the cultivated part of the bed.

Oh and there was a sign of someone leaving a calling card in the garden, luckily it got the hint and didn't do anything in the bed with all the sticks in there.

 

After I pushed dirt into the scrape

 

Feral cats are so uncivilized, leaving the little divot with pee just out there without covering up (yes I know that's what they do). My cat smelled it and immediately balked and was making all kinds of growling noises. He hates going in the garden because of that. Should have watered it down but you can see how dry and dusty that soil is. it would bead up an run off, don't need a muddy spot just because of that.

The inconsistent watering is totally on me because I forgot a day or two and they got exceedingly dry. My next day for watering is Wednesday but I'm going to Disneyland so may have to water tomorrow as well just a bit in order for them to stay cozy for a whole day. 

Watering is the number one cause of 99% of the plant problems out there. Either too much or too little, inconsistent or improper watering. The other 1% is soil and sun exposure issues. That's it. Food, not really an issue, I've seen plenty of plants thriving and no one feeds them (ahem... weeds... mint).

It's one of the reasons why people buy succulents and cacti but even those cannot survive without some water. I know, I almost killed some by not watering them for a year. Yes.. a year in a tiny pot, mostly shade and no water. They looked pathetic by the time I had to move so just tossed them, it's okay to throw out plants that you've killed. Own that guilt, everyone makes mistakes and you have to move on. LOL!

So, mulch, mulch, mulch! Listen to me.. haven't mulched a bit but if you have the money and ability do it! I preach what needs to be done but doesn't necessarily mean I can do it myself. I think the sticks helped a little for the larger bed but it's still not enough.  Will try and do better next time, promise.

 

Really looking forward to taking pictures at Disneyland, besides the obvious ones of all the rides and stuff. When my kids were younger and we went to the zoo my daughter complained, 'you take more pictures of the plants than the animals'. Yeah and? What's your point? Everyone takes pictures of the animals. I'm a plant geek!

 

Okay getting last things done before the trip and need to run some errands. Keep on digging!

Flower sex is good! #greendinigardenguru

 Walking the cat this morning and checked plants. Tomato is looking fantastic! and the flower was mostly open on the zucchini, checked other male flowers and was able to pollinate! The ants love the nectar in the flowers as well.

Male flower with ants

Male flower with central pistil/stamen

Female flower with stigma/ovaries

 

 

 

Most people have never encountered individual male and female flowers. Most flowers have both parts and anyone who has at least done high school biology knows what it looks like. This shows a very different look to the parts and I'm hoping that I was successful. The female flower was partly curled which means it was open overnight. I  might have to go in the evening and harvest pollen and find my paintbrush to do some plant inseminating. I actually was able to harvest two male flowers, you can barely see the pollen at the base inside the flower on the right.

More later in an edit, need to go do some errands right now, stay tuned for further developments!

#zucchini#smallgardens

Busy with other things but tomato is looking good!

 It is definitely getting ripe, still no sign of blossom end rot. Yay!

This also shows to an extent just how far over the cage is leaning. I haven't been able to go find a good stake to tie it to so had to improvise with what was on hand.

That'll do in a pinch

And the zucchini has about three female flowers but they're all closed and the male flowers are too. Fail fail fail!

Just can't catch a break with these plants

 

The fruit on the farthest bottom left is the oldest, flower is already browning, those big male flowers are all done and the females haven't even gotten open yet.The other plant is all males so far, just so dang frustrating!

Watered today and that one plant that I said didn't look like grass.... bad on me, I have no idea if any of the cilantro is growing given how hot it is despite the seeds being more shaded, can't keep them damp enough.

I was messaged by a former coworker who has had a house for years and has a garden that includes 12 tomato plants in six different varieties in a 16 ft bed. Yeah he knows his stuff. A customer told him 'you don't know anything about gardening'. His reply, 'What's a cucamelon?' and walked away. 

Much like any other service industry we get our share of customers that come in for help and then tell us we don't know what we're talking about. I had one lady almost my age how said, 'I've been gardening longer than you've been alive'. Being on the job I couldn't give her the whole piece of what I wanted to say but told her I had twenty years experience and she waved her hand and said 'you don't know anything'.

Insulting and frustrating but I just walked away because my time wasn't worth the effort to prove myself. You have to choose your battles and go help someone who actually appreciates your knowledge and expertise and makes a point of letting the bosses know. You do what works for you and if someone else says otherwise, be polite. Take their advice and maybe, possibly say thank you I might try that instead. 

Also I would get one customer interrupt me giving advice to someone and they'd bust in and say, 'oh this is what worked for me' and hijack the whole conversation. At that point I just walk away. Go ahead and tell them some home remedy or how they spent more money on something that worked or whatever.

We all have something that works for us but it was drilled into my head that 'In California the label is the law'. That means you don't have instructions on a bottle of dish soap on how to use it as an insecticide because that's not it's purpose. It's a game of 'Telephone'. Someone sees a product called 'Insecticidal Soap' and thinks 'hey I have liquid soap at home, I'll just dilute it down and it's the same thing right?' Wrong. The actual ingredient is 'potassium salts of fatty acids', think about those words. It is the base chemical chain for old fashioned lard and salt/ash soap. Not the new modern liquid soaps with all kinds of other chemicals in them. Doing my research I just discovered this on wikipedia:

 

"Insecticidal soap is most effective if it is dissolved in soft water, since the fatty acids in soap tend to precipitate in hard water, thereby reducing the effectivity.^"

So this means that it is using a softened water base and if you get it as a concentrate  you need to  use softened water or it won't work as well. Potassium based soaps are typically liquid or soft soaps but again it does not mean they are good for your plants. Do your homework and make sure what you're using is not going to damage your plants. One of the side effects of using the wrong product is what is called 'phytotoxicity', in other words, sun poisoning. Not going to go into details but it explains why some people would come in and say 'I used this product this way and my plants look burned' well did you read the label? Did you use a home remedy? There ya go.

This is all I have for now. I also have a mosquito under my desk that is biting my knees and lower legs. No idea how to get rid of it since I never use bug spray. 

Hey! I have some liquid soap! I can dilute that down and spray them!