A Month Makes a Huge Difference

Speaking of growing like crazy, let me remind you how my plants looked on that first day when I brought them home (July 29):

Now look at how big they are a month later! (Aug. 28) 

This process has been so amazing.  They all grow at different rates and go through different life cycles, but every little bud that pops up and every baby fruit that starts growing is equally exciting!  Growing on a smaller scale like this, where I can go out a couple times every day and closely examine every single plant, has been especially amazing, too, because I get to see how fast they change from each hour of the day.  I go out in the morning, and sometimes I spend half an hour picking caterpillars off my tomato plants, trying to spare the little spiders that have made webs there.  I can't even keep up with all the jalapenos popping up!  I go out midday sometimes and find that my zucchini plant is super-droopy, so I give it a little bit more water, and within minutes, all the stems and leaves have popped back up and look happy again (despite its sick spots).  I can see all the little holes from the caterpillars and aphids, and I see the harmless little ants crawling all over the place, but every single plant has been producing fruit - though few have matured enough to pick yet.  The only thing I've been able to pick so far is the jalapeno plant.  I made the mistake of trying a bite of one of the fresh jalapenos, though.  I crunched down only once and had to immediately spit it out!  From one bite, that I didn't even chew or swallow, my mouth burned for half an hour.  Fresh jalapenos are no joke.

Besides the helpful little spiders, the only other insects I like seeing out near my plants are the bumblebees!  Look at his cute little fuzzy body!

Except the other thing with a cute little fuzzy body (my dog Paisley), got curious about what I was taking a picture of, so she ran over and stuck her face right on the bumblebee!  Luckily she didn't get stung, but she did freak it out and it flew away.  She's not the best gardening helper.  Here's that little stinker "helping" with my plants:

And one more just for laughs:

Bell Peppers Galore!

My zucchini may be deteriorating, but my bell peppers are thriving!  I've got 5 or 6 big bell peppers on one of my plants and almost 10 little bell peppers on the other plant!  They're growing crazy-fast, too!  Check this out.  Here's one of the bell peppers on Aug. 27:

Here's that same bell pepper 2 days later (Aug. 29):

And here's that bell pepper this morning (Aug. 31):

It's growing a warp-speed!  All 5 or 6 bell peppers on that plant are about that same size.  Here's another:

And another:

They're 1 1/2 to 2 inches long now!  I'm hoping they get as big as the ones in the grocery store because then I can make some awesome stuffed bell peppers!  They're sooo good baked, and if I'm able to do it from this batch, I'll try to post the recipe.  Either way, these baby bell peppers are super cute and I'm super excited.

Oh, Zucchini... how you disappoint me...

When I first got my plants a month ago, I was the most excited about the zucchini.  I love zucchini and it's one of my go-to additions to a lot of the meals I make.  So being able to grow my own seemed so amazing!  However, this excitement brought much disappointment.  My zucchini plant has been deteriorating over the past couple weeks and almost every leaf has now been taken over by a powdery mildew and it is literally covered in little white spots.

Many of the leaves in the back have turned yellow and I've had to trim them off, and the rest are quickly being taken over by these sick spots.  This wouldn't be so bad if I was at least still getting healthy zucchini.  But every time I get a female flower that produces at beautiful little baby zucchini, the blossom refuses to open and it shrivels up and dies.  I've been hesitant to just rip it open and pollinate it myself.  I thought that forcing it open would damage it, but I guess at this point, there's not much to lose.  I don't want to just junk the entire plant yet, especially since it's not infecting any of my other plants.  I have a couple good baby zucchinis still waiting to be pollinated, so I guess I'll get up early tomorrow and see if I can pull those female blossoms open a bit and keep them from shriveling up yet again.  Oh, zucchini... why must you be so delicious to eat yet so difficult to grow?

The War on Worms and More Excitement

My plants are growing like crazy!  In the past 5 days, almost 10 baby Roma tomatoes have popped up on one of my plants!  My 2 Romas that have been growing for the past 3 weeks are getting quite impressive, but neither of them have started turning red.  Here's one of them:

I've had a hard time finding the flowering time for the kinds of plants I'm growing - all I can find is the maturation time of the whole plant.  What I really want to know is how long it takes for a single fruit to mature.  From the plant log that I've been keeping, I can tell that it takes between 2 and 3 weeks for a jalapeno fruit to mature.  The first two jalapenos that grew were first logged on Aug. 2 and were picked on Aug. 21.  The third jalapeno was first logged on Aug. 6 and was picked this morning, Aug. 22.  All three are about 2 inches long, but I haven't taste-tested them yet.  In the same amount of time, my two oldest Roma tomatoes have gotten very big, but they're obviously not mature enough to pick yet.  The internet is good for a lot of stuff, but it won't tell me how much longer I have to wait on my tomatoes!

At least a fruit has finally popped up on my Cherry tomato plant!  But more exciting than the Cherry tomato is my Bell Pepper plant!  I finally have Bell Peppers!  I counted 3 this morning, but there could be more.  Just like the Roma tomatoes, they pop up so fast and so tiny that they're hard to spot and keep track of.  Look at how cute the Bell Pepper is!

What I love about this picture is that it shows the entire life cycle so far of the Bell Peppers.  You can see the tiny bud in the middle, then a bud slightly larger and lighter in color as the leaves turn to petals, then the white open flower, and finally the adorable Bell Pepper fruit!  I'm not sure if they're going to get as big as the ones I see in the grocery store, but that would be amazing!  Either way, my dog loves Bell Peppers, so hopefully we'll get to taste them in a few weeks.

But back to the Romas - The War on Worms is still underway!  Here's a picture of the enemy:

It's weapon is that big black spike on its butt, but it obviously doesn't know how to use it because it's pretty harmless.  I picked at least a dozen of these evil worms off my Roma plants yesterday.  My neighbors probably thought I was crazy because I was out there screaming at those dumb worms!  After I couldn't find any more worms, I went back inside and did some research.  Apparently these are Green Horned Caterpillars or Tomato Hornworms because they're specialized eaters.  They attack tomatoes, peppers, potatoes, and maybe a couple other veggies.  I've found a couple on my other plants, but they're mainly just on the two Roma plants.  Then there's a completely different kind of caterpillar on my Cherry tomato plant.  They better watch out for me, though, cuz it's on!

We're Under Attack!

Everything is falling apart now!  I don't know how it all turned around in just a couple days, but there is a definite problem with the plants.  I first noticed my zucchini leaves were getting lighter in color and there were some little fuzzy white spots on them.  This is what it looks like:

You can clearly see the healthy leaf on the right, and the lighter, fuzzy leaves on the left.  I did some research and as far as I can tell, it's some kind of powdery mildew that is caused by the "honeydew" left over from aphids.  I haven't been able to see any aphids, but I've spotted some little fly-looking things that I think are adult aphids.  That's culprit 1.  Culprit 2 is the tiny, black ants I've seen crawling around my zucchini plant, but I don't think they're really messing with my plants.  I actually think ants (and spiders) help control the aphids.  Culprit 3 is the worms.  The damn worms!  They got in my marigolds, too!  I had to cut off a bunch of marigold blossoms, but I moved them over near my veggie plants because I've heard that they can help deter aphids also.  Here's Culprit 3:

It looks cute, but it's NOT cute - it's evil!  Evil worm!  My tomato plants are also looking really eaten up.  I mean REALLY eaten up:

The top half of the tomato plant looks fine, but a lot of the lower leaves are like little leaf skeletons now!  And I found some little black dots.  Is it aphid poop?  Worm poop?  Just dirt?  Either way, I want it to get off my plants.  Here's what it looks like:

The Roma tomatoes are fine as far as I can tell, but my zucchini - my original, beautiful, baby zucchini!!! - has shriveled up and died!  I'm so sad.  I can hardly even post the picture, it makes me so sad.  Here's my poor baby zucchini:

But luckily, the other zucchini is getting bigger, darker, and more beautiful!  It's hiding behind all the other stems and leaves, but you can tell it's still healthy:

My jalapenos are right next to the zucchini, but they're not showing any signs of worm or aphid damage.  In fact, one of the baby jalapenos is getting really big!

So it's not all bad, but my zucchini and tomato plants are definitely worrying me.  I'm hoping the homemade insecticide we made last night will help.  We sprayed the board and the ropes the planters are hanging on and the underside of the zucchini and tomato leaves, so I'm hoping it'll work.  Or it's gonna be war!

The plants know what they're doing, even if I don't

I went out this morning to water my plants and made some surprising discoveries.  For one thing, I noticed that a ton of tiny, new buds had sprouted on my jalapeno plant!  They're very little and cute, and I'm excited that I'm going to get a bunch of jalapenos growing soon!

Here's a better picture of the 2 main jalapenos that I've already posted about:

So the jalapenos sprouting were a good discovery, but I was really surprised when the biggest bell pepper bud I've been watching turned into a flower!  I definitely thought it was a baby bell pepper, but really it was a beautiful flower!

The discovery of this flower has shown me that I still have a lot to learn about the growth stages of these vegetables.  One stage that I did know about ahead of time has to do with my zucchini plant.  The amazing golden blossom that I got up early to take pictures of just a couple days ago has fallen off the plant!  I read from a couple sources that one day you walk out to check on your zucchini plant and it looks like someone has snuck into your garden and snipped all your blossoms clean off the stem!  It really does look like that, too.

It was hard for my camera to focus on the stem, but you can definitely see how clean of a "cut" there is on the stem where the golden blossom used to be.  I expect more of this in the next few days since I have at least a couple more flowers that have gotten to the golden stage.  I also read that it is normal for there to be a bunch more male flowers than female flowers on a zucchini plant, so here's my single zucchini:

It looks just like an itty bitty version of the kind I see in the grocery store!  I reeeeeally want more to start growing!  I LOVE zucchini (the child in me is disgusted at that thought, but the adult in me has grown to love zucchini and squash) and I can't wait to eat these awesome veggies that I've grown!  Hurry up, plants!  So I have a bunch of little buds and a bunch of little flowers on all of my plants, but few have actually started to fruit.  I guess I just need to do a little more research and be patient.  But I know one thing for sure: The plants know what they're doing, even if I don't.

Flowers Before Fruit

On the other side of the porch, I have my original attempt at gardening: my flowers!

I have orange and yellow zinnias - one of the orange zinnias pictured here:

Here are the marigolds:

Here's a jalapeno flower:

 And a Roma tomato flower just popped up:

Veggies get upgraded

Now that my plants are growing and competing for space and sunlight, I decided to give them an upgrade.  I went to Lowes yesterday and bought a new shelf bracket, some screws, and a 10-foot board.  It was verrry interesting getting a 10-foot board home in my tiny Honda Civic.  They look sooo much better all spaced out, though!  Here's the setup now:

They're all in the same order.  Zucchini on the left, then the jalapenos, the 2 bell peppers, the 2 Roma tomatoes, and the cherry tomato on the right side.  The zucchini is gettin' SERIOUS.  I set my alarm for 7 this morning so I could go out and see the flower open and it was bigger and more beautiful than I expected!

That was definitely worth waking up early!  I went right back to bed after I got these pictures, though.  :)

The flower is beautiful for sure, but I'm concerned that I only see one female flower.  I see tons of skinny little stems, but only one thick stem that will obviously turn into a zucchini.  Here it is:

What am I going to do with only ONE zucchini?!  I hope more start growing...

The jalapenos are growing like crazy, though:

And here's one of the Roma tomatoes.  You can also see the weird "pimples" on the stalk, but I'm assuming that's normal.  I think I read that those are new roots trying to sprout.

Some of the plants aren't showing any signs of fruit yet, but there are some more little flowers and buds popping up.  But the zucchini is a confusing and mysterious plant.

I got some plants!

I've had my plants for just over a week now.  So far I haven't killed them.  Success!  Here come the pictures...

My 8 plants, from left to right: Yellow Squash (not in second picture), Zucchini, Jalapeno, 2 Green Bell Peppers, 2 Roma Tomatoes, and Cherry Tomatoes.

This is what my plants looked like right after we hung them up outside.  The lens was a little foggy because it was so humid outside... or maybe the world was so excited that I got some plants that my camera automatically gave the picture a heavenly glow.  Either way.

This is what my plants look like today.  It's been just over a week and they're so much bigger!  We took down the squash hanger and spread the remaining 7 hangers out a bit.

On Thursday, August 2, I noticed these baby jalapenos:

A few days later:

And today:

And here's a little jalapeno flower:

Baby bell pepper:

Baby Roma tomato:

 Zucchini plant with male and female flowers:

So those are my plants so far!