Below: A few weeks ago, this little brown knob (where my finger is) used to be green, and it looked like it would be growing into another bell pepper. Now it's about to die.
Below: And this baby bell is very dried out, and I don't think it's going to grow any bigger.
I blame it on the rain--lack of rain, that is. It did rain over the weekend (Friday and Saturday), so that helps. I don't know if my soil is turning bad or if I need to add something to it, but my plants are not liking whatever I'm doing. The tomatoes are fine, but the bell peppers don't look so hot.The soil isn't the mix that Mel Bartholomew (founder of Square Foot Garden and author of SFG books) recommends, but his mix seemed to be too expensive to buy. So Cam and I mixed Miracle Grow Organic Gardening Soil and topped it with Organic Top Soil. We bought it at Lowe's and Home Depot.
I am seriously going to look into a soil test kit. Cam wants to send the soil off to get tested, but I don't have the patience. I'll let you know what we decide. In the meanwhile, I need to figure out how to get rid of the bugs, aphids and slugs that keep eating my lettuce. Urg.
Onto to the second topic of this post: a thriving garden. My parents' raised bed garden seems to be doing very well. I'm growing corn in one of the raised bed. My dad has been working this soil for 10 years, and it's amazing. He adds more manure and top soil every year, and it's been productive.
I decided to try corn again. It is failing at Cam's house, but at my parent's house, it's actually thriving. I planted seeds in two rows, and the leaves are green and continue to grow at a brisk pace.
Below: Two rows of healthy corn.
I'm very optimistic this time. Corn is hard to grow, but I just want one ear of corn to eat. Just one.
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