Update on Broccoli and Brussels Sprouts

The broccoli and Brussels sprouts are finally gaining some size. At one time the leaves had darkened and started falling off even after being in the ground for a month. David from Dave's Square Foot Garden mentioned that his plants did that when they were root bound. I have to wonder if our terrible flea beetle infestation had put the plants behind because their larva are soil dwelling and feed on roots as well as feeding on the brassicas' leaves.

I treated the garden with beneficial nematodes on June 9th, and I think they must be impacting the flea beetle population. Normally I was squishing at least 5 flea beetles on each eggplant but today I only found a couple beetles in the whole eggplant bed.

There's 6 different varieties of broccoli so lots of variation in growth and leaf patterns. Their beds are the shadiest right next to the car port, soon to be covered deck and barbecue area.

The brassica beds have become catch all beds. I've been planting lots of basil and more Asian greens amongst the broccoli and Brussels sprouts. The frilly leaved Mizuna and spoon shaped Tatsoi were really ate up by flea beetles but they're finally recovering.

I've never had Brussels sprouts do so well. I'm so happy. Brassicas really do like their feet wet, I guess watering everyday is actually a necessity.

I really hope we'll be harvesting Brussels sprouts this winter. It's my husband's favorite vegetable, right up there with broccoli. Fingers crossed!

Lots of bloggers have been talking about starting their winter vegetables. I just finished planting the summer garden, I'm really not ready to start more seedlings. So many decisions to make. What to start and when to start? Lettuce, kale, cabbage, broccoli, carrots, turnips, spinach, fennel. Oh my.

Hmmm. Bush beans will finish by the end of July so carrots can start going in at that point. The current broccoli bed gets no sun whatsoever in the fall/winter months. Maybe brassica seedlings can go in beneath the pepper plants while they're finishing up in September.

Tomato, Broccoli and Brussels Sprout Seedlings Planted in the Garden

A tomato plant nipped at the stem, most likely by birds.

The tomatoes, broccoli, and Brussels sprout were planted in the garden on May 5th and 6th. And immediately birds and animals started doing their thing. So far I've lost 17 plants: one Brussel sprout, 6 tomatoes, and 10 broccoli. Maybe it's a good thing I started so many plants from seed to begin with.

These are the 3 tomato beds. In the back I hung aluminum pans from the bamboo trellises in an effort to ward off critters with noise and reflected light.  But yet the devastation continued.

A broccoli bed on the right and Brussels sprout bed on the left. I've been replacing the plants as they get destroyed and today I went and bought a bunch of pinwheels and stuck them around the beds. If this doesn't help, they'll have to be covered with Agribon row cover till the plants are big enough to withstand larger animals.

The 21 broccoli plants were spaced 2 feet apart (0.6 meters). I was reading a garden forum and they talked about spacing broccoli a foot apart which resulted in more main heads but little side shoot production. I might try that for fall planting and see how that goes.

21 Brussels sprouts also got planted with the same two foot spacing. Online they were saying sprouts need to be spaced 3 feet apart which sounds like a lot to me. I just can't imagine them needing more space than broccoli plants.

There are 6 rows of tomatoes with plants 18 inches apart within each row and rows are 2 feet apart. I did a major goof, after planting half of the first bed I realized I'd forgotten to add crushed eggshells and coffee grounds to the planting holes. So those tomatoes weren't amended. I'll also be top dressing with epsom salt.

I was talking to a friend who actually farms on shared family farm. Last week every single one of his tomato plants were eaten down to the nub by deer. He had to replant them all. And then he strung up an electric fence.

Tomato Varieties and Pepper Germination Issues

 Tomato Seedlings

Broccoli, Brussels sprout, and very sparsely germinated pepper seedlings.

I haven't been blogging as of late because our little one is finally letting us do things like reading. Since it has been years since I've read a book, I have been devouring them these last couple months. Oh how I missed you, books!!

So blogging and seed starting has definitely taken a back seat to my shameful insatiable consuming bookish needs. At least the seedlings are still getting watered everyday.

The peppers haven't been germinating. I started them in a peat moss based seed starting medium and that always seems to give me problems, but at least 5 varieties managed to germinate out of 11 types that were seeded. Usually I use coconut coir to start peppers and those hard to start seeds like asparagus.

Peppers and eggplant were seeded March 14th. Tomatoes and Italian eggplants were seeded April 2nd.

Below are lists of varieties that have sprouted which I will try to keep updated.

Pepper varieties:

Aji Lemon Drop

Corno Rosso

Carmagna Rosso
Fish Pepper

Jimmy Nardello

Joe E. Parker
Numex Big Jim
Santa Fe
Serrano

Eggplant varieties:
Aswad
Cambodian Green Giant
Tonda Bianca Sfumata di Rosa
Thai Long Purple
Violetta Lunga

I went ahead and re-seeded pepper and eggplant varieties that haven't germinated yet, so fingers crossed.

Tomato varieties:

Abe Lincoln

Ananas Noire
Aunt Ruby's German Green
Hill Billy Flame
Big Rainbow
Big Zebra
Black Brandywine

Black Krim

Black Prince

Black Tula
Box Car Willie

Brandywine
Break O Day

Celebrity (F1 hybrid)

Cherokee Purple

Chocolate Stripes

Cosmonaut Volkov
Cour di Bue
Fat Cherry
Sun Gold
Black Cherry
Dark Brandywine
Delicious
Djena Lee's Golden Girl

Golden Siberia

Goldie

Granny Cantrell

Henderson Pink Ponderosa

Homestead

Jersey Giant
Jubilee

Kelloggs Breakfast

Lilac Giant

Mexico

Money Maker

Mortgage Lifter

Pantano Romensco
Paul Robeson
Pilcer Vesy
Pink Berkley Tie Dye
Pink Oxheart

Prudens Purple

Red Pear

San Marzano Redorta

Valencia
Yellow Brandywine

Broccoli Heading Up

I noticed on Monday a single Waltham broccoli plant is just starting to form florets. So exciting. But I'm a little worried that it's forming the head too early, maybe similar to bolting. It's the first time we have ever grown broccoli and it has been fun seeing the plants get huge. They rival tomatoes in their speed of growth and size.

I'm growing two other types as well Summer Purple Sprouting and Di Cicco. All the broccoli were started at the same time on April 4th but Waltham is noticeably larger than the other two varieties with Di Cicco being the smallest. The broccoli plants are spaced about 2 to 2.5 feet apart.

The plants are starting to look like they need some supports, they are definitely leaning out to reach the light. Sorry about the weeds. I've been running over to water the garden in the hundred degree weather every few days but the garden really needs a good hoeing.

The hybrid Zephyr squash is starting to form female blossoms. None of my zucchini or yellow crookneck and yellow straightneck squash germinated. Besides the Zephyr squash it looks like we will be having lots of pattypan and Lemon squash.

Broccoli and Brussels Sprout Update

Brawny Brussels sprout

Brussels sprouts in the bush bean bed.

Waltham broccoli

Summer Purple Sprouting Broccoli

Di Cicco broccoli

Broccoli and leek bed.

Forgive me but I’ve never grown broccoli or Brussels sprouts before so there are going to be lots of updates on these plants throughout the year. My partner says he’s looking forward to the brocooli and Brussels sprouts the most. So funny. I think Brussels sprouts are his favorite vegetable.

The Brussels sprouts are still young and darling. They were planted out today in the bush bean bed, along with a couple tiny Siam Queen basil, Shishito pepper, and eggplant seedlings that decided to germinate. Hopefully the Brussels sprouts were started late enough they will mature in the cold of early winter. We have a fairly long growing season with the first frost usually in the beginning of November. The varieties are Catskills and Brawny but I'm not sure how many were planted because I stopped counting after 14 Brawny plants.

The broccoli is doing well, getting ever bigger. I didn’t realize Summer Purple Sprouting broccoli was an overwintering variety (I do a lot of seed trading with a gardening buddy). The broccoli is actually planted closest to the house and since the garden is on the north side, that bed gets the most shade.

A golden retriever was walking through the alley while my husband was working on the house. He said the dog had a really sheepish look on his face, he glanced at my husband and looked away with a very guilty expression. So my husband thinks that’s the big dog that has been walking through the garden breaking broccoli leaves and squishing newly emerged seedlings like summer squash and zucchini and leaving tell tale signs like doggy footprints. Also something has also been digging up my pole beans and leaving little holes, I’m thinking it’s the incredibly fat squirrel that I see hanging around the perimeter of the garden. So fat. It reminds me of the squirrels out west.

Broccoli was started from seed on April 4th and Brussels sprouts were started on May 4th.

Garden Tilled, Go!

50 tomato plants out of 23 varieties were planted in three rows, the Prudens Purple plant perished in a terrible accident. Plants were seeded just 42 days prior.

A row of tomatoes sharing a bed with 15 eggplants. Eggplants take a couple weeks to germinate but they size up quickly once they get their true leaves.

Sweet peppers and the mildly hot Poblano pepper.

Di Cicco, Waltham, and Summer Purple broccoli. Di Cicco are the smallest plants of the three varieties. Leeks will be sharing the broccoli bed.

In the middle are 3 beds seeded with bush green beans, bush limas, Purple Hull Pinkeye summer peas, and summer squash.

The empty bed next to the tomatoes will have a trellis for cucumbers, pole beans, luffa, bitter melon, Delicata squash, and Papaya squash.

The garden is finally tilled on May 4th! Yayyyyy! And now the planting and watching things grow.

A few people raise rabbits around here, so rabbit manure is available for free if you shovel it yourself or $5 per 50 pound bag. And our city provides mulch for $5 a truckload and compost for $15 a truckload. A truckload ranges between 1000-2000 pounds depending on who is working the front end loader, but they're usually a bit more generous with the more expensive compost.

The new garden space was amended with 500 pounds of composted rabbit poop, and it will be mulched with 2000 pounds of compost.

On May 7th the tomatoes, eggplants, and peppers were planted out. And then on May 8th the broccoli was planted out, and the bush beans and Pinkeye Purple Hull peas and summer squash were seeded. It started raining while I was planting the broccoli bed and then proceeded to rain for 3 days. Hopefully the beans don't end up rotting in the ground.

The leeks still need to be planted in the broccoli bed, and the last bed still needs to be trellised and seeded. Then the whole garden can be mulched. The flea beetles are already starting to decimate the eggplant leaves, so I dusted them with food grade diatomaceous earth since it's going to be dry the next few days.

We were going to till and plant the old garden space, but there's just too many other things going on. There won't be a big stand of corn, and no winter squash or melons. And I ended up giving away a few dozen plants to coworkers and friends.

Caterpillars Eating the Broccoli and Cabbage

Broccoli or cabbage plant well chewed on.

On closer inspection two caterpillars on the small inner leaves can be seen eating the broccoli.

All the broccoli or cabbage in my garden are mystery plants given to me by a fellow gardener. They are mystery plants because my friend was unsure whether they were broccoli or cabbage seedlings because they had long ago lost their labels back when they were started by seed. This one looks more like a broccoli plant to me since it is upright and tall, at this stage cabbage leaves probably would have started folding in on each other.

Yesterday I picked off a giant caterpillar which was chewing on a large outer leaf, and today I found two smaller caterpillars eating away at the inner leaves of the same broccoli plant. There have been little white moths fluttering around the garden who may or may not be the source of the caterpillars. Either way they are easily squished by gloved fingers or a gardening trowel.

It is amazing how much damage one or two caterpillars can do to a single plant in just a couple days. The other brassica plants are undamaged. For now.