Flops of 2009 - Page 2

[journeymom]

The regular tomatoes, the green beans, cucumbers and zucchini were all flops.

But I'm not being too hard on myself. This is a 'learning year', as I haven't grown any veggies in 7 years.

The cherry tomatoes were prolific and delicious.

[GISDiva]

Shallots. Very few came up from seed and those that did are still very, very small. It was my first year growing them, shall have to research this winter...

The broccoli plants grew huge, but strangely tall and are just now finally putting out small heads, all the energy went into the leaves I guess.

Peppers did not do so well, it was just not hot enough this year. We had a strange summer here in WI.

[SuburbanHippie]

Originally Posted by GISDiva

Peppers did not do so well, it was just not hot enough this year. We had a strange summer here in WI.

We sure did! My jalapenos are flowering now. In September. Fabulous.

This was my second year with the strawberries. Two years of taking up space and no berries. This is the second time this has happened to me (last time it was 2 years and no berries too). Perhaps it is the soil after all!

[georgia]

My tomatoes went boots up

[Talula Fairie]

Originally Posted by georgia

My tomatoes went boots up

Awwww

[babygrant]

ALL of my garden flopped. I bought some "aged" cow/horse/sheep manure, planted my garden at the end of May, had a breast reduction a few days later, our foundation of our house collapsed a couple days after that which cut off our water. We had TONS of weeds from the manure, I couldn't get down to pull any weeds because of the surgery I had, and we had no water because we had to get our water shut off because of our foundation collapse! So every single one of my plants died. Oh well, there's always next year!

[onthemove]

this was a great year for us but my biggest flop was the tomato peppers and jack o lantern pumpkins. We did get some but all the peppers got aphids this year and slowed production considerably. Only one pathetic looking jack pumpkin I think this is because the spring was so hot and dry and they just didn't get enough water while they were germinating.

[annekevdbroek]

I had a community garden plot. Despite being reassured that it was full sun, it was actually at best 1/2 sun and had trees over hanging the plot. Many seeds did not germinate at all. The most disappointing were cuecumbers, which I could not get to grow at all. (I've had a vegetable garden for 5 years now, this year was horrible.). I got tomatoes and they produced well until the blight hit. Pumpkin never did anything, bird house gourds rotted on the vine, bugs desimated the beans...

[Quirky]

Tomatoes -- I can really only count this as a half-flop, as I did end up getting quite a few tomatoes, but I had something like 40 plants all raised from seed -- and I got blight in a major way. I put HOURS of work into pruning the blighted parts back and that kept them limping along but I would have had enough to can (rather than just enough for several batches of soup for the freezer) if we hadn't had such a cold, wet summer and then the blight.

Peppers. Again from seed. Shouldn't have bothered -- out of something like 8 pepper plants I got ONE ripe pepper that hadn't rotted.

Carrots were weird and tiny -- maybe I didn't thin them enough?

Zucchini and squash gave me some yield but certainly not gangbusters.

Kale and chard....I have to say this was user error. I planted too much. They've pretty much gotten bolted and bug-eaten because I was getting SO many greens from my CSA that I couldn't keep up with eating them. I couldn't even give enough away to keep up.

Green beans did pretty well but putting a second crop in was a waste of time.

I really just ran out of time and energy in the last month or so.....I need to get in there and do some serious work if I have any hope of a fall/winter crop!

[kcstar]

Flops:
The sunflowers grew tall... and drooped, and got covered in bugs. We ended up chopping them down. I think I'll stick to the Kid Stuff and Teddy Bear versions next year.

The corn is still only 1 ft tall, and yellow now. Maybe I'll pull them up when I finish weeding the pathways.

The cucumbers never grew, and I don't see any of the pole beans or peas. I tried to do a "three sisters" SFG, and may have been too ambitious / overcrowded.

I lost track of what plants were what, so the Cosmos is on the West side of my bird garden, and the Zinnias are to the North (had to peek around the sunflowers while they were there). We got some Bachelor's buttons, but not a lot. I have tons of seeds, so maybe I'll do better next year.

I got a handful of cherry tomatoes from my plant, but I think it's dying now. We got one pepper from the bell pepper plant. I'm hoping I'll still get an eggplant or two from that.
But the seedling tomatoes I got from a coworker are still about 2 inches tall.

I got three raspberries off my brand new bush. Hope to get more next year.

I keep buying plants and then letting them dry out before planting them. It looks like the ornamental salvias out front have are recovering. The white ones never stopped flowering, now the pink one is starting to bloom. Maybe the blue ones will bloom soon too. And I think the asters I planted in back will survive to shine next year.

Successes:
Tons of basil. We're freezing a lot. It's flowered again, and this time I haven't cut the flowers off yet. Some of my seedlings are doing well enough, but I think they're overcrowded and want to start another plot for them.

This was my first year with strawberries, and I got some good ones. I've got several plants starting from runners just about now.

I got three watermelons so far (one picked too early, one has been PERFECT, the third is on the vine but seems about ready), and about three or four yellow squash. Still don't know if I'll get pumpkins or winter squash, I've seen flowers most of the summer.

The single marigold plant I put in front of the raspberry bush is doing BEAUTIFULLY. The two in the tomato/eggplant/pepper bed are doing okay, maybe a little crowded. I'm thinking of transferring one over to the other half of the raspberry bed.

The pineapple sage has gotten huge, and is flowering again now! I am going to have to rearrange that bed.

The lavender flowers are growing taller in competition (I should probably move the plant out front, it's getting crowded by the pineapple sage).

I have bergamot and bee balm, and they're still there, but they're backwards. The tall one shouldn't be south of the short one. And they're getting crowded by the pineapple sage.

Don't know yet:
I just started my cauliflower / lettuce / spinach / kale winter crop this weekend. I'm zone 7b, so if I stay on top of things I might get three seasons in next year.

I've gotten nothing from the blackberry volunteers this year, DH has been mowing them down. I need to get the bed filled so I can transfer some over.

[georgia]

Originally Posted by Talula Fairie

Awwww

Thank you for the commiseration I was really sad. I have big plans for next year!

[mumm]

Originally Posted by georgia

I have big plans for next year!

That is what makes gardening so great! It is never too early to start planning for next year.

[Toolip]

Things went pretty well considering the tremendous neglect. I can't really blame the plants but my flops were....

Cucumbers: because I never watered them
Onions: bolted and didn't bulb. The ones that were doing GREAT, the skunks "harvested" for me
Summer squash: just didn't produce, usually does great.
Beans: actually, they did just great but I didn't get around to harvesting them until they were huge and dry.
Carrots: MAJOR flop, I blame them. They just wouldn't germinate.

Success (despite my neglect)
Cilantro: had it for months
Tomatillos so many....
Volunteer pumpkins: first time ever!
Garlic: first time I'd ever grown it-so fun
Fruit trees: great year for them.
Beets: they are huge!

[sunnylady303]

This was a weird gardening year for us - our biggest garden ever but we were gone the entire month of July getting medical treatment for our daughter 1500 miles away so...

FLOPS:
broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage - we cannot grow this. Either cabbage worms or they just don't produce. Grrr....

tomatoes - they were looking terrific before we left but while we were gone they all toppled their cages and we returned to a tomato jungle of rotting tomatoes and waaay out of control plants.

peppers - too cool for them

strawberries - weeds took over while we were gone and the whole patch may be a goner

asian greens - this was our first year trying these in the spring. they bolted overnight. definitely fall plants.

basil - my plants never got big and they flowered really early

SUCCESS

potatoes - oh my gosh we have SO many potatoes in like 7 varieties

corn - did really well except for the heirloom variety we tried

carrots - despite the weeds taking over, we got good yields

Can't wait til next year when we will hopefully be around the whole summer!

[Ianthe]

Most everything the deer got to. They ate the tops of the tomato plants.

None of our melons lasted.

No carrots or onions. The weeds got to them too quick and killed them off.

Only one of our yellow summer squash survived.

Next year (if we are still here), I will make sure the fence is finished (to try to keep the deer out), and do planter boxes to control the weeds.

[laohaire]

I planted very, very few things since this was my first foray into gardening.

1) Onions - never germinated. Sigh.

2) Radishes - germinated and grew into some plant I cannot identify, but are not radishes. Looks like peas maybe except the peas were miniscule and hard. Absolutely inedible. Obviously the seeds were mislabelled. Sigh.

3) Tomatoes - bought starts from a greenhouse in May. Plants did not grow in any way, shape or form until August, when 2 of the 4 plants did suddenly triple in height. However, one of those plants yielded NOTHING, and the other eventually yielded three tomatoes that were still small, hard and green when the first hard frost hit the other night. Sigh.

So my garden yielded BUBKIS.

Thankfully I am a member of a CSA.

[Talula Fairie]

ok so upon reflection, none of my larger variety tomato plants produced big tomatoes, they only proudced small hard ones that never ripened. The cherry tomato plants went crazy tho. Next time, for my container garden I will stick to cherry tomatoes.

[columbusmomma]

My cukes,watermellon,and cantalope all sucked