Where Are The Maters?

Oh, they're there. Still producing but really hurting from weeks of 100+ highs. First they were smallish, but basically normal bells. Then they started to look like "cherry" bells. Since late July they have essentially been misshapen "jumbo" grape bells. They taste ok and are pretty juicy but the skin is a little tough and wherever the skin is exposed to direct sun, lesions invariably develop.
I'll post pics soon.

The heat is on...

On the street!

And on my plants, too. Lots of heat. Way too much heat. 100+ degree heat for multiple days in a row. This is causing my peppers to grow more slowly and to do so in a deformed sort of way. Most recent peppers are lucky to make it to baseball size before they start to turn colors. Plus if any side of a pepper faces up to the sky, it gets a nice lesion burned into it.

But I soldier on.

My strawberries are actually taking off, vegetation wise, but not blooming.

Bearing Fruit

Literally. At least the pepper is doing well. After the winds of March broke the main-stem of my tomato plant, I had just the 2 strawberries and the pepper. The strawberries are vegetating ok, but are not doing any fruiting.

The pepper on the other hand is doing nicely. See the pics:

These have grown a bit since the 19th. I'll post more pepper pictures later next week.

Tragedy Redux

This time we had some 35+ MPH winds and my pepper plant took the brunt. And was the worse for wear.

I ended up removing the top lid altogether, inserting a slim stake in the bag, near the center metal pole and then tying off the main stalks to a combination of the stake and the metal pole. So far, it has weathered some subsequent 20-30 MPH winds pretty well.

Pics with some decent sized green bells forthcoming in a subsequent post.

TRAGEDY BEFALLS ME!

Well, when I arrived home from work I noticed my tomato plant looked a little odd. When I left it this morning a lot of the outer branches and leaves had grown up, over and onto the lid of the planter. This afternoon? Not so much:

I apologize for the the close-up nature of the shot. It would make more sense if I had been further away, but I was pretty put-out at this point and was not contemplating shot composition. All of the branches that are going out and down were up on top of the planter this morning.

The main stem split down the middle. The location was about 2" from the white sponge holder so about 100% of the plant was, and would be, affected. Having had this happen last season, and about a month into it, like last year, I knew that none of the tomatoes would grow right. Here's a closeup of the break:

You can see the split right in the center of the picture. The branches are pointing up, here, because I am holding them up with my other hand. We think maybe a small bird landed on it. It was not particularly windy today and had survived some previous 20-30 mph windy days.

So I cut off the plant and threw it away. Now there is less competition for the Bell Peppers and strawberries. At least until they get large enough to bear fruit. Then I suppose I'll run into the same breakage issues. :( Very disappointing.

4 weeks later, things are happenin'

Well, on Friday the 25th it will be 1 month since I planted. I'll upload more photos on Friday or Saturday.

At any rate, I currently have 4 green tomatoes and my larger strawberry plant has its first bloom. The bell pepper plant hasn't been doing much though it appears healthy. The tomato plant is growing up over the top of the planter and is making it difficult to safely remote the plastic top for watering. I suppose I don't *have* to have it on there. I suppose it helps with keep out birds and retaining moisture. The tiny strawberry plant has quite a few leaves now but no blooms yet.

Here We Go Again!

Not content to produce a handful of 3/4 sized tomatoes, I have decided to go at it again. However, this time around, I have made a few (meaningful I hope) changes:

• Changed my hanging planter model.
• Planted about 5 weeks earlier.
• Opted for an indeterminate "grape" sized tomato variety.
• Also planted green bell and 2 different strawberry varieties.

Now, the bullet-points in more detail:

DIFFERENT PLANTER MODEL

Last season, I had the classic hanging bag that I hung under the eave at the back of the house. There were a number of problems with that. First, it was in the shade for all but about 3 hours so it did not get cool morning sun. It got a little of the hot later-day sun. Second, hanging it so high up made it inconvenient to water.
This year, I stayed with Topsy Turvy but I opted for the Tomato Tree model. Its still a bag, but the plants go in sideways and it hangs on a 5' tall pole that has legs at the bottom.

 I am hopeful that being able to get it out into the sun earlier in the day and improved ease of watering will help. I am a little concerned about the sideways planting but we'll see how it goes. In the picture, you are looking straight at the tomato plant.

EARLIER PLANTING

Last year I didn't get around to planting until early April. This year I planted on the 25th of February. In Central Texas, by March 15th, we're pretty much out of freeze danger. I chose to take a bit of a chance by planting in late Feb. We hit 38 or so the other night with no ill effects. Forecast is for a few more mid-upper 30's lows but no freezes. Yet.

SMALLER TOMATOES

Since I am planting on the side, and not hanging (which worked quite well last year), I opted for smaller tomatoes. I seriously thought about some 2" patio plants but since everyone at the house likes the cherry and grape tomatoes I thought I'd give those a try. Its convenient to toss some in a salad instead of having to slice or chop them up.

CULTURAL DIVERSITY

I wanted to try my hand at bell peppers so I opted for the standard green variety. I also wanted to try growing Strawberries. I bought a nice Quinalt plant and had a Chandler that my daughter had picked up from a nursery tour back in November. I kept the Chandler too near a window back when we had like 4 straight nights of sub 20 degree lows and all of the branches and leaves died off. The core appeared to be still green, so I figured I'd stick it in the Topsy Turvy also and see how it responded. Here's all there was when I planted it:

At about "12:00" you see just the smallest hint of some leaves. The entire sewn in green portal is about as big around as a baseball. Also know that about 2 days after taking this picture (from Feb 25th) I was adjusting the plant and pulled off those leaves! So I was back to nothing but roots and a core stalk. Would it produce leaves? Would it finally breathe its last? I'll have some more pictures up this weekend and we'll all see.

This time around I planted with Miracle Gro Moisture Control Potting Mix and Medina Hasta Gro liquid fertilizer. Its nitrogen is on the low end of fertilizer options. The plants, other than the Chandler strawberry) were from Bonnie Plants and were purchased at a local Home Depot.