Finally set out the Early Girl tomato plant Just Me gave me. I had two different sized totes so drilled a few drain holes in the red one for good drainage and placed it in the larger blue tote for it to act as the drain pan like on any planter. Unfortunately it is too large to be inside here and I think the reason the first tomato plant is doing so good in front of the east window (Now it is loaded with tomatoes) is because of the humidity and usual cooling from the swamp cooler. Horn worms are another problem down here (and in a lot of other places) as they like to have destroyed my neighbor's tomatoes last summer and they probably can't get in here to do the same. I'm almost out of the quarter inch mesh I like to cover outside plants with to keep critters and birds from getting to them so probably need to get another roll of it because those things will screw up tomato plants as well as other plants. I placed the plant on the east side of the trailer so it will get morning sun, but be shaded from the HOT afternoon and evening sun. My 8 foot wooden fence took care of that back in Plano.
BTW I used about 50% peat moss mixed with about 50 potting soil that Just Me also gave me and about 10% miracle grow potting soil.
Cool - your own type of wicking bed. Nice of Just Me :-)
ReplyDeleteThat's the same technique I use, but with different sized yogurt containers when the plants are smaller. Someone posted a video of two boys who made a system from 5 gal buckets that had a pipe to the lower bucket for water.
ReplyDeleteWonder why the hornworms are so bad in the desert? You'd think there would be fewer of them.
Dani, I didn't have a clue what that was called. Just have always come up with something to go under no matter what ever totes I used to plant in. Coming up with something for the big rectangular ones wasn't real easy.
ReplyDeletejicky, I didn't think there would even be any horn worms down here, but then my neighbor had to pull a bunch off of his plants it was evident that there are plenty down here. Hopefully with it being so dry down here this year that won't be the case? I never had a problem with them in Plano and that would be one place I'd expect they would be bad.
All I know about hornworms is that they're hard to see on a plant, and they're voracious, and they're the larvae of hummingbird moths......so if you see those big fluttery moths, they're the culprit.
ReplyDeleteJudith, I haven't seen any of the big moths up here. All I see here is the small ones that drive me crazy just like the flies do.
ReplyDeleteIt's Hot ..tall cool glass, ice....Mojito would sure be nice....
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