Chiles Continue to Grow

Now that the planting is done, my garden has settled into a quiet, growing phase. As I was out watering my raised bed this morning, I noted that the plants are all getting bigger and stronger. So far, the spacing is working well and I have not had to stake any of the peppers, although I suspect that I will have to do so with the bells later in the growing season. The deeper soil level of this year's raised bed seems to be having the desired effect. The plants are more stable and able to hold their weight instead of tipping over. Last year, I had trouble with most of my chiles not being able to hold their pods off the ground and I suspected it was the scant 6" of soil in the bed that was the culprit. This year, I have 10" of soil in the beds.

My two cherry bomb chiles are now of a size that I felt it was safe to remove the cutworm barriers and allow them their freedom. I still have six barriers in place around the smaller hot chile plants. They tend to grow very slowly and are still only a few inches tall. Of the six, only the scotch bonnet seems to be putting on any real height, but all the chiles are putting forth new leaves and gaining height. It is simply that these peppers are slow growers. I'm told that they will not produce chiles until 110 to 120 days after transplanting. However, once they reach maturity, I should get a year or two of production from them. Now that my new bed is in place, I might be able to successfully overwinter my more rare chile plants. I'll wait and see how it goes.

Millionaire Japanese Eggplant Planted

I've never grown eggplant before, but I've always wanted to try one. Even though it is not really a "salsa" type plant, I picked up a single eggplant at the nursery today and placed it into the bed along side the two tomato plants. Supposedly it needs 36" of space and plenty of sun. We'll see how it goes. I suppose that eggplant can go into a "salsa" of some kind!

I also planted a third pepperoncini plant in my pepper bed, replacing the pepper that I lost a week or so ago. I like that I'm growing fewer varieties, but more plants this year. Of the peppers that I love the most, I should have plenty to put up as pickles or to freeze for use throughout the year. As I planted the pepperoncini, I noticed that a couple of earthworms came up with the soil. This is a most welcome sign in my garden. I'm not sure how the worms managed to get in there through the mesh and weed barrier, but I won't complain. They will make the soil all the richer for my vegetables.

Football in the Pepper Bed

As my Spring busy season kicks in and I'm away from my garden due to business, it is always such a pleasure to return home and stroll by my vegetable beds and see the progress my plants are making. All of my peppers are growing larger and fuller. One of the hungarian wax plants even has a tiny pod on it. I have not purchased the canning equipment that I wanted to use to make pickled peppers this summer, but seeing that little pod reminds me that I need to start shopping for jars, lids and a canner.

I was dismayed to discover a nerf football resting in the middle of my pepper plants. I simply threw it back over the fence so that the child that lost it might recover his ball, but I'm starting to wonder if I will be losing pods to flying objects this year. I hope not. All of the peppers that are planted on that end of the bed are impossible to find locally except via garden club sales in the early spring. They are the bells that I purchased at the Pepper sale at the Fullerton Arboretum last March.

Peppers Grow in the Sunshine

Spring has finally arrived here in my little garden behind the white picket fence. There is still more rain than usual for this time of year, but everyone has agreed that the tide has turned and the sunny days are starting to far outnumber the rainy ones. All of my salsa garden plants are thriving out in the garden. So far, all of the peppers that I planted last week are doing well inside their cutworm barriers. They are getting a little taller and putting out new leaves with little sign of insect damage to the leaves.

I feel that removing that three feet of planting space and tacking it onto the other end of the raised bed was a good move on my part. All of the peppers are getting more sunshine throughout the day. That one section simply was too close to the juniper tree and was so shady that even weeds were having trouble getting established there! My two tomato plants are faring well in the second raised bed. So far, the two plants are alone since my husband hasn't choosen to plant anything there. I'm not sure what will end up in the second bed, but I wouldn't mind starting more vegetables over there before the summer heat is upon us. It would be a shame to waste what little garden space we have.

Planting While the Sun Shines

Normally, I don't put transplants into my raised bed until they have gained enough size to combat cutworms and other pests, but due to the pending rain tomorrow and my busy work schedule next week, I decided to risk it and planted the six chile plants that I purchased at Green Scene last weekend. Each one got a cutworm barrier around it and a good watering. I am pleased that the entire length of my bed is planted this year and I am confident that all the plants will get enough sun to produce well despite being in the narrow strip between two houses. Well...except for one spot where I had lost the garden salsa plant. If I have time, I'll try and get that replacement pepper plant this week and pop it into the bed too. Hopefully my little specialty peppers will survive and produce. I'm looking forward to my first homegrown scotch bonnet!

I also planted the two tomato plants I had purchased a few weeks ago. I decided to not add to the soil level in the other bed. There is a good six to eight inches there of wonderful composted soil. I'm sure that between the better sun exposure and good earth that they will produce a bumper crop.

I planted a few more things after I got the chile garden done, flowers and vines. I do love to grow flowers and surround my patio with color. It is one of the pleasures of having a yard in Southern California.

Loss of a Garden Salsa Plant

I went out to check on the new chile plants that I have not planted in the raised bed, when I discovered that there had been an attack in the garden. Four of my chile plants have been chewed by an animal of some kind and one of the peppers was smashed as if something had landed on it and thus broken the stem. I decided to remove the broken garden salsa plant since it only had a single leaf left. Most of the plant lay like a dead soldier beside the stem. The break looked fresh, it couldn't have happened more than an hour or two ago. The others are damaged, but I hope that they will recover. Did a neighbor kid throw a ball over the fence into my garden? Did a cat land there and then claw at the plants around it? Is it a rabbit or mole? There are no tracks in the bed and no ball...this looks too big to be the work of cutworms. It is a mystery as to what caused this.

I don't have time today, but I will buy a replacement pepper for the space. I'll get a third pepperoncini since my husband likes them and I only planted two plants this year. I'm curious about the garden salsa chile, but one plant is enough to test it. I have plenty of fresnos and hungarian wax peppers to make salsa with after all.

I've also removed a few of the cutworm barriers from my chile plants. They are getting enough size so that they can stand up to a cutworm attack. The little cups just came up out of the ground and over the plant without a problem. I should be able to reuse the plastic cups for many years to come. That pleases me. They are not expensive devices, but I would like to keep the costs down as much as possible in my chile growing hobby.

Green Scene

I returned to the Fullerton Arboretum for their annual Green Scene Garden Show. It costs $6 to get in, but if you are looking for unusual plants for your garden, it is the place to go and worth the price. Most of the booths were of garden clubs looking for new members that were raising money by selling herbs, heirloom tomatos and chile pepper plants. There was a booth with a ceramic artist selling pots, cups and bowls, two booths selling african baskets and hats, a booth of cement garden art and a greyhound rescue. It was a much smaller show than last year with less diversity among the vendors. Attendance was lower due to the rain clouds that threatened overhead. Still, there were plenty of little red wagons being drawn by happy women who were buying plants in glee.

I was able to find the final six chile plants that I wanted for my garden and at a lower price than the nurseries are charging for their regular chile plants. Thankfully, the garden club had cardboard boxes available to take your plants away with since I had forgotten to bring a market bag and it was a long walk back to the car. I bought two cherry bomb hybrids, a kung pao, a red scotch bonnet, a chocolate habanero (i'm hoping it is a congo black) and a bulgarian carrot. I'm glad I went early to the event, because the more rare chiles were already getting low at the booth. Most of the chiles that I purchased today will be new to my garden. This is going to be a fun growing season for me.