Green Fingers and Toes

Not quite, but I did decide to revive this blog again so that I could chronicle my latest attempt at urban gardening.  A few weeks ago, I wrote about it on my BBW blog, and although I tweeted a few pics today, I know most people are not all that interested in whether my tomatoes have blight or how well (or poorly) I staked them.

Another great thing is that my cell phone has a camera and I can upload pics this time around.  A few years ago there were cell phone cameras, but I was still using my already obsolete crackberry that had everything but a camera...and I am not sure if I even had a digital camera yet.  Anyhoo onto the pics:

This is the Marian tomato plant, recently repotted. No fruit yet.

The trio of pepper plants. The outer two were smaller than the middle when first purchased.

This will turn red at some point. First full fruit from the pepper plants.

The early Early Girls, recently caged. Repotted two weeks ago w/out any fruit.

Look closely to get a glimpse of the Juliets. Also were repotted just two weeks ago w/out fruit.

I'm feeling pretty good about their progress given that I started very late.  I bought these already started from the Home Depot back in June right before Father's Day.  I waited a week to repot most of the plants and then immediately fertilized them with the fish/seaweed liquid fertilizer.  I learned my lesson from my first time attempting tomatoes, so I fertilized them early to prevent the bottom rot.

There has been a lot of rain this week, so literally overnight, the two plants in my backyard (the Early Girls and the Juliets) spread like crazy.  I bought the tomato cages for them today after another quick dash of fertilizer this morning.

My peppers are growing well (at least the smaller ones are), but the middle plant has sprouted its first fruit, so that is encouraging as well.  My brother suggested that I separate them so that the outer plants share the same container and the middle one gets its own, but I will wait and see how things develop over the next couple of days.

I just got around to re-potting the Marian tomatoes last weekend, so I will have to see how it does.  I only had the two very large pots, so this one had to go into a smaller 12" pot.  However, I am experimenting with it by keeping it in the front yard where there is less sun (maybe about 6 hours versus 8 hours in the back yard).  I want to keep it there so that I can visually keep track of its water intake, which has been a little more than half a gallon a day.

I had a fourth tomato plant, and off the top of my head I cannot remember what it was called...but it does not matter since I gave it to my parents.  I re-potted it right before Father's Day and it already had some fruit on it.  My parents went on vacation for a week and left it in the care of my brother, who watered everyday as I instructed.  I fertilized it once while they were gone, which was about 10 days ago.  Today, I noted that a few of the fruits are already turning red! 

I am not sure if this is due to the fertilizer or the age of the plants since I bought them already started.  I am going to guess that the plants were probably started at the nursery in April or early May.  Next year I will start them myself from seed (fingers crossed) so that I can better track their growth. 

And one last word about starting plants from seed--so far the herbs are not doing much.  I planted them the same day I repotted the Marian tomatoes, and of course I did it all wrong from failing to wet the soil before sowing the seeds to keeping them wet and not letting them dry out.  Not sure that the rain did anything but futher swish them around in the pot.  My hope is that something will sprout (the mint and/or the basil), although I do not remember if the mint ever grew last time.  We shall see.

OK, more pics and updates next week.