How the Tomatoes are Doing: 1st and 2nd Waves.

Well I survived the blight very well. Wettable sulfur is the way to go. Here are some pictures. I fertilized the tomatoes with Miracle Grow and pruned them. I want to see how long I can get them to maintain through September.

This is a 2nd Wave Orange Jubilee.

These are 2 first wave tomatoes. Growing well with green tomatoes and buds.

This is the Sara's Galapagos. Yellowing out. Loaded with fruit.

Grape Juice From My Concord Grapes

The Concord grapes did very well. I must have 100's of bunches. I purchased a $35 juicer. I made grape juice. It was quite easy. Because the Concords have seeds, I had to juice outside. The juicer is 400 watts. Powerful enough for what I wanted but it didn't grind the seeds down. Which is good, I didn't want the seeds. It did however bounce them around and they would shoot out the top each time I added more grapes. I move the project outside since they were bouncing around the kitchen.

Once juiced I brought it to a boil for 5 minutes. I did add honey for fun and a bunch of ice to dilute it and cool it down.

Finally Fall Plantings & My Third Wave of Tomatoes

So not only does the heat of August beat my garden down, it beats me down.

I finally cleared 3 beds and did my Fall planting. Late! but I did it. I went with transplants and went to my local nursery. I didn't like what they had. When I touched the leaf lettuce, I saw white flies. Not the type in my garden but I didn't want to introduce a  new pest. So I passed. I went to Home Depot and Lowes. Their lettuce was bolting. Heat effects transplants more rapidly then plants in the cooler ground. I passed on the lettuce but ended up getting Swiss Chard and  loose leaf head cabbage.

Incidently, I went back to the nursery 2 days after my first visit. The lettuce had bolted and the kales and greens were chewed to sin by critters. I'm glad I passed.

I put in the transplants, planted 4 kinds of radishes, and put in my third wave of tomatoes. They are small. I will be making solar cages for them as October approaches.

Types of Tomato Cages: Support Your Local Tomato Plant

There are lots of ways to support tomato growth. Here is one example of plants growing in my mother's garden.

She does have a wooden stake in there for side support. She is using collapsable orange cages for the main support. You can see them better if you click the images and enlarge them.

Powdery Mildew on Cucumbers: Picture

Powdery mildew often hits cucumbers, zukes and squash. These cucumber leaves (below) look like they have a white powdery dusting on their leaves. That is powdery mildew. As soon as you see it on one leaf it is time to treat the whole plant.

There are lots of treatments. I use wettable sulfur. It creates an environment on the leaves the mildew doesn't like. This year I had 2 small outbreaks of powdery mildew. A quick spray cured the plants. This is the first year I didn't have a large epidemic.