The Professor called me last night to tell me she was back in town, to share with me some interpersonal drama I’m still laughing about, and to try to get a sense of just how big the crap in my garden is.
She has been in my garden. As you recall, her weeding efforts among the pumpkins were so thorough some of the pumpkins now write love letters to her.
But she said that she just could not get a sense from the pictures, because the pictures made it look like some of the leaves were bigger than her hand.
And I said, “Yes.”
Folks, it’s unreal. And this weekend when I take pictures, I will stick a hand in the frame or something so that you can get a sense of how ridiculous everything is.
I mean, seriously, are tomatos supposed to reach your tits? I kind of imagined them as a thigh-high plant.
I don’t know if the mushroom compost is just that good or if my backyard is magic, but it tickles the crap out of me.
Filed under: Gardening
Yes tomato plants get very tall, sometimes 6-8 feet.
Pumpkins are so fun to grow. I love their giant leaves. They are so beastly they look like a plant that might grab you and drag you away!
Depends on how low your tits hang, I guess.
Yeah, tomatoes get tall. That’s why it’s recommended to top them off.
if you don’t stake them or cage them, then they won’t even get to your kneecaps, much less higher than that (assuming only moderate saggage). But they’ll grow right out of the tops of the cages.
Thanks to the header for this entry, I now have “Woodstock” stuck in my head.
Just so you know, B.
The Missus, good to see you! And six to eight feet?! Are you kidding?
And the pumpkins totally look like they’re about to get up and start taking hostages.
Jim, I staked them and they’ve pulled the stakes out of the ground and are now just a giant mess. I’m hoping the Professor can help me get things straightened out.
Andy, sorry about that.
I’m still laughing at myself too, when I am not shaking my fist in the air or contemplating the depths of my relationship (well, communication) inadequacies.
You tell the pumpkins I’m coming back to see them very soon, that I have missed them (and their neighbors) so in the last few weeks. But don’t tell them how much I want to find the largest leaf, pick it, and take naughty pictures of us with only the large leaf to cover our naked bodies. Unless you think they would approve. I just think that would be a better measure than just a hand to judge their size.
Ha, I am all for naked pumpkin picture taking, but I feel like it’s necessary to point out that those guys are scratchy and pokey.
Still, sometimes you have to suffer for art…
I”m beginning to think the mushroom compost IS that good. I have a friend that uses it and it’s like the plants in her garden are on steroids.
On a side note, my moulin rouge sunflower’s first bloom was spotted today. Yay! Didn’t I give you some of those seed? did anything come of them?
As I understand it, an indeterminate variety of tomato plant (which most are) just keeps growing until something kills it. Usually the weather.
As another side note, my squashes are putting out blossom after blossom but they all either dry up and fall off or get mushy and fall off without setting any squashes for me. Now, this has been my history with squashes, going back to when I gardened in St. Louis many years ago. So I haven’t tried growing them here until this year. This year, inflated by
hubrismy success with other veggies, I tried again. But noooooooo. They won’t produce for me. So what am I doing wrong?nm,
Have you tried, you know, doing it by hand? I know that sometimes I fall into thinking that only the pollination that arises spontaneously, naturally, is the best. Sometimes though, the hot summer stretches on and a cucurbit starts to feel a little itchy, a little pensive, like the thing it needs isn’t ever going to come. Sometimes, you have to go into the garden and take a little blossom with your fingers and help it along some.
Seriously though, try pollinating by hand.
Dianne, that comment made me really, really…. want.. to garden, I think.
Well, I’ve got a potted tomato arriving via yoga buddy this afternoon. If it starts looking a little sad I know what to do.
Whew! All this talk of posing naked among the pumpkins and now pollinating by hand? Well, it just reminds me why this is the best blog every.
Beth, I am still faced with the fact that the only things I’ve grown from seed that have bloomed are the morning glory and the marigolds.
Ahem. I have flowers on those tomatoes you started for me. They’re blooms.
Dianne, how does one pollinate a squash by hand? Will it work if I just sit by the squashes and talk dirty to them?
B… hmmm, weird on stuff from seed with you — & I recall you said your transplant of cilantro sucked too — mine, growing like gangbusters. The only thing I can figure is that I have a ton of worms in my soil and that’s what is their saving grace…
It’s all voodoo
Essentially, you manually move the pollen from one flower to one or more others. You could do it clinically, with a Q-tip or somesuch, or you could do it like my grandpa used to: pick a new flower and take it around to the other open flowers, rubbing the stamens together so the pollen transfers.
So do I pollinate the flowers using a flower from the same plant, or do I use a flower from one plant to pollinate the others?
I guess that depends on whether you’re attempting to cross-pollinate and create your own variety, or whether you want to keep your fruits true to the seed. I’m gonna guess the latter, and if true, then you want to use a flower from the same plant or at least a different plant of the same variety. If you’re thinking about giving Burpee’s a run for their money, you could try your hand at directive cross-pollination and use flowers from different varieties, just to see what results.
Here’s the deal though: cucurbits cross-pollinate easily. If you have two varieties growing closely together, they will probably cross. They don’t even need to be that similar. We have a crenshaw melon in the back that tastes strangely like cucumber. Pollen is promiscuous.
I have zucchini and yellow squash back there. I’ll try the hand-pollination, but they don’t seem interested in pollinating each other any more than themselves.
You know, if this works I’m gonna be kicking myself for all the years of no squash….
So, this is something important I forgot to specify yesterday:
You need to use a male flower to pollinate the female flowers on your plant. All this talk of self-pollination and I forget, you know, the actual gene transfer part of the act.
So, the male flower is identified by it’s very phallic, single anther, and by the absence of a bulbous “pre-fruit” at the base of the flower. It looks like this:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/glittertrash/3007332821/
The female flower is identified by curvy and whorly pistils, and by the presence of the bulb at the base of the flower that will become the fruit (if ur doin it rite). It looks like this:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/assertagirl/23902540/
So, fish and bicycles aside, actual squash requires the male and female of the species. Sorry about the oversight.