Lone Bell Pepper

Isn't it interesting that some plants tend to do better than others, even when they are growing in the same soil? I find this extremely interesting.

This rings true for me. I have several bell pepper plants, but my harvest has been slow and rare. My red bell pepper plant in the front veggie bed has finally fruited... after two months of being dormant.

In May/June, it grew this beautiful red bell pepper. It was small, but still very red and very cute. But before I was able to harvest it, a bug or animal took a big chunk of it. So it was not edible. Finally, the same plant has begun to fruit more peppers.

Below: The new bell

I had given up on the plant. I figured it was dead. And I am very happy to see this new growth. The same plant is also flowering. There are two more flowers that are ready to give birth.

In the backyard, the bell pepper plants look awful. I've harvested two bell peppers from two different plants. Since then, I've seen nothing. Oh well. I wonder what I am doing wrong.

Bell peppers love heat, and it's been pretty hot here. Maybe there is something missing in the soil. I did add more manure to my soil, and that helped the other vegetables, but not the bell peppers.

Next year, I will devote either an entire raised bed or a square foot box to one plant or vegetable. That way, I can make sure that the soil composition is the same, and hopefully they will thrive.

Until next year, I am back to fall planting...

One Failed Garden Down... Another Thriving Garden To Come

Well I guess I wouldn't say that my vegetable garden at Cam's is a failure. I'm just disappointed at how things are turning out. My bell peppers, which had hope for new fruit and were flowering constantly, have started to turn for the worse.

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.

Haircut and sinking deeper into the end… Plus a red bell pepper

I have to write more about the weather. It’s driving me bananas. It rained today . . . for about 30 seconds. And it wasn’t rain, it was sprinkles. Looking outside around lunch time, I saw hope of rain and cooler weather. Unfortunately, my hopes for my plants were dashed. The sun came out a few minutes later.

Funny how Tennessee weather is! I normally love sunny days and Tennessee summers, but ever since I took up gardening, I’m not such a fan of the hot, humid days. My long, black hair could not take all the heat. My head gets way too hot! So I decided to cut about 8 inches off! Now I have shoulder length hair.

(I'm not looking my best, and the lighting is horrible because we were inside a restaurant.)

Enough of my random musings! Thanks to everyone who pointed out that peas are a cool weather vegetable. I probably should have researched that before I decided to plant it. But I’m an impatient gardener who loves to experiment. Sadly, the peas are doing worse today. They are one day away from death.

See for yourselves! (In the first picture, you'll see that I tried to add "plant food/fertilizer" to the soil, hoping it would make a difference.)

In happy news, my red bell pepper in the front is starting to turn red. It’s only palm-size, and I’ve decided that when it gets completely red, I’ll pick it and make one fajita!

Below: The bell pepper last week

Below: The bell pepper gets more color this week (you can see my shadow looming over it)

Even if this year’s crop is a bust, I’ll still have good memories of crisp lettuce and palm-sized bell peppers to remember. Plus, I also harvested spinach a few times. But unfortunately, we waited too long and the plant flowered and then died. Maybe next year we’ll have better luck.

Purple Bell Pepper

Kittens really take up a lot of your time and energy. Luka is a ball of energy, and incredibly needy. Every time I leave the house to go outside, she cries and puts her paws to the window. It's really cute, but at the same time, so tiring! My garden has been neglected for the past weekend because of my little kitten.

But today I was able to leave Luka for a little bit and tend to my "big" baby--my vegetable garden. The purple bell pepper is now almost completely purple. It's kinda strange to think that it was once a tiny little pepper.

Below: The progression of the purple bell.




Now I'm wondering if the bell pepper is ready to be picked or if I should wait and see if it grows any larger? It's a pretty small bell pepper right now.

Replaced Cucumbers, Growing Bell Peppers, and Updated SFG Boxes Photos

Thank you to everyone who commented and gave me advice about the cucumber and squash dilemma. Eleutheros mentioned I should wait a week or so to see if the plants continue to grow. I was planning to listen to his advice… until this afternoon.

Cam and I had business lunch near Mt. Juliet, and Cam suggested we visit some of the nurseries afterwards. So we did, and we ended up doing more than just “looking.”

Above photo: We ended up buying way too much, but we couldn't help ourselves! It's so addicting!

We had never been to any of the fabulous nurseries in Mt. Juliet (a suburb of Nashville), and boy was I shocked at the awesome merchandise and healthy plants we found. I’ll go into more detail about all we bought in a post later this week. But for now, I’m going to focus on the cucumbers that we bought.

We found a package of small cucumber plants that were flowering. They looked so much healthier than the cucumbers we had planted, and I highly doubt our old cucumbers would have ever flowered like the new plants.

Below: The new cucumber plants



I am positive that we will have new cucumbers in the coming weeks (or at least healthy plants that don’t look diseased). I followed my father’s advice and planted the roots deeper than I did last time. After watering, the cucumber plants looked perky and happy. Not like last time when they just flopped over… and stayed flopped over until I decided to pull them all out.


Above: A close-up of the new cucumber plants

I'm pleased to announce that the bell peppers in the SFG boxes are still doing well. I was concerned this weekend because it didn't seem like they were perky, but now that the sunshine is back, they look better than ever! I don't think they're a fan of the cloudy and windy weather. They looked just awful yesterday... The flowers were so droopy; the plant looked sad.

But today, the sun was out and the bell peppers were back in the swing of new growth!

Below: the yellow bell pepper is in the beginning stages of fruiting. Look at the teenie baby bell pepper that's forming!


Below: The green and red bell peppers in the back are also in the midst of flowering and giving birth to tiny peppers. It's really pretty to look at the flower blooms.



Over the weekend, I was getting a little concerned about the purple bell pepper. It was starting to change color on me. Notice the dark spots on the green pepper below.


I had never heard of purple bell pepper before, but I know that with the red bell pepper, it becomes a large green bell pepper before it ever ripens and turns red. I was concerned with this purple bell because it's still somewhat small in size. It's not tiny, but not as large as some of the bell peppers you see at the store. But I guess the purple bell grows differently. It still looks healthy, so I'm not going to be too worried yet. I can't wait to see how it looks as it continues to grow in size.


The front bell pepper is still growing strong. I'm disappointed that it's an only child because the plant isn't flowering and has no hope of flowering.

Below: Front bell pepper (variety: red bell)

The pepper is getting so large that it's making the plant tip over, so I straightened it with a little stick. Hopefully that will keep the plant from falling over into the soil. It also makes the plant look more aesthetically pleasing.


On a final note, I thought I'd post individual photos of each square foot garden box in the back. Each box is growing very nicely and filling out. Cam and I are in talks to build 3 more. I know it's getting late in the summer to continue buying and planting new plants, but it's our first time, and we're experimenting!

Bell Peppers and A Kitty

Cam and I have 4 bell pepper plants. I think these are the varieties that we have: (1) Red Bell Pepper (2) Chocolate Bell Pepper (3) Purple Bell Pepper (4)Yellow Bell.

When we were looking for another red bell pepper to plant, we couldn't find any healthy looking ones, so we settled on the other bell pepper varieties. We chose plants that were flowering, and they happened to be hybrid varieties.

We've never eaten a Chocolate Bell or Purple Bell, but I read that they are sweet and edible (the most important aspect!). I believe that both varieties are green before they turn colorful, but it'll take 70-80 days before they mature. But they are off to a great start.

Below: SFG Box #3: This bell pepper plant should be flowering soon. Its leaves look a little unhealthy, so I'm going to have to observe it and figure out what to do.



The chocolate bell pepper plant next to plant 1 (above) is already fruiting. Two more are on the way. When I look closely inside the flower bloom, I see a tiny hint of green. Its brothers and sisters will be born soon. :-)

Below: Photo # 1 & 2 were taken last weekend.
Photo # 3 was shot on Monday
Photo # 4 was snapped today






There is something neat about seeing the progression of the plants. You care and nurture for these plants with love, and to see them grow stronger each day, it's beautiful. I feel very parental in my garden.

I have lots of hope for the bell pepper plants in the square foot garden boxes in the backyard. I think I will have numerous ripe bell peppers to eat. If I decide to grow okra soon, I may make New Orleans style gumbo with these vegetables.

Now to the front yard: I planted the red bell pepper plant in the front vegetable bed. So far, it's only fruited one bell pepper. There are no additional flowers on the plant. I believe once this pepper turns red, this plant will have merely useless leaves. I'm not sure where I went wrong. Perhaps I should not have planted it in the shade.

When we planted it, we thought the front received full sun. Unfortunately, it only receives partial sun during the day. The lettuce and spinach did well, but I read that leafy vegetables do better in partial shade than other plants.

Oh well. Lesson learned.

Photo # 1: The red bell pepper in early May.
Photo # 2: The red bell pepper today.

The bell pepper has gotten larger, but not extremely large. This is possibly my impatience, but my garden is teaching me to be patient. There's something beautiful in the way God has designed the vegetation on this Earth. Each day brings something new for me to enjoy--a new flower blossom, a plant has hints of fruiting, a plant gets taller, a vine gets longer...

I'm in a contemplative mood tonight.

On a personal note, I may be getting a new kitty soon. If anyone watched Fox 17 News at 9:00 p.m. tonight, you may have seen Cam and my future (hopefully!) kitty.

Check out the news story: http://fox17.com/newsroom/top_stories/vid_1861.shtml

The poor kitten crawled into the wheel well and then into the engine compartment. Here he/she is peeking out. (P.S. Cam is not shown on camera because he shot the entire thing. You can hear him laughing in the background!)



I'm on the top of the list for people to visit the kitten after it's been tested and is given the OK to be adopted. I'm very excited. I think she's a Bombay cat, which are known to be extremely playful and even leash-trainable!

She has nothing to do with the garden, but I'm very excited, so I'd thought I'd share!

Front Yard

In the front yard, Cam's late mother had built a beautiful brick flower bed. We decided we would use it to plant additional vegetables.
In the beginning, we planted spinach, lettuce heads, and a bell pepper plant.
You can see the baby lettuce heads at the top of the photo, and the spinach at the bottom. The sole bell pepper plant is left of the lettuce head, but the sunlight makes it hard to see it. Here are a few close-ups of the plants.


Above: the lone bell pepper plant. Cute, isn't it?


Baby lettuce heads. They look messy and limp...Spinach after it was transplanted.