www.byzcath.org Forums General Discussions Town Hall Any gardeners here?

I planted tomato and squash seeds in pots and put them in the unheated greenhouse. Im going to believe it wont freeze in there again.
Anyone know if planting pole beans with sunflowers would work out all right? Im thinking the sunflowers would be perfect poles. I did learn not to grow the sunflowers too close to the fence. The flowers can disappear.
I went to store and bought seeds. Of course I have enough now for a small farm rather than a 40 square foot area.
It is neat having the vegetables amid the flowers as well as using edible flowers. I had some neat salads with chard, nasturtiums, pansies, and petunias garnished with cherry tomatos. Unfortunately the bees loved the catmint so much they failed to pollinate my squash so I had a very small yield.

I harvested the first stalks of rhubarb this week and made strawberry/rhubarb pie. It was exquisite!

Dwight, I'm not sure about the timing of your bean/sunflower combo. Usually our beans are fairly well done by the time the sunflower stalks would be large enough to hold up bean plants. We've found tall bamboo stakes at our local Big Lots store that were inexpensive and could be lashed together teepee/tripod style to create a bean support.

Barbara

Anyone have advice about transplanting your peat pots in the yard ? I've got lot's of stuff growing inside, but when I planted two Mammoth Sunflowers (only about 5 inches high) they didn't do too well. One looks like it died, but the other appears to be recovering. I've heard about transplant shock, but don't know how to avoid it.

The sunflowers seed themselves here in Butte. I have so far had great luck moving them where I want them, but I havent moved any quite that tall. Next time try filling the hole with water and then planting. It sounds like transplant shock to me, but I havent encountered any problems moving the very small seedlings. We might actually get snow through the weekend so it is fortunate I never got my zucchini seeds planted. At last I seem to have lettuce and chard peaking from the ground. No sweet peas have shown themselves as yet though.

Lawrence:

I hope you didn't transplant them this early. If your weather is like ours here this week, I'd be in shock, too. It's been way too cold to put plants out overnight: high 30s overnight.

BOB

Well I have lettuce and swiss chard germinating at last, still no sweet peas though. First hint of sunshine in 5 days.