Plant Growth Environment

Another week has passed, and my garden is clinging to life. My vegetables aren't looking particularly strong at the moment, but I'll get back to that in a moment. First, an update on what we discussed in lecture this week.

In class, we primarily focused on climate factors that affect crop growth. These factors include temperature, precipitation, humidity, light, and wind. Here in Florida, the extreme conditions impact the types of plants we can grow and how we grow them. North Florida is part of climate zone's 8 and 9, which designates that the average annual minimum temperature is between 10 and 30 degrees F. Gainesville in particular has a frost free period of 221 days. These facts all point to the fact that Florida is hot. Really hot. Really, uncomfortably, unbearably hot (not to mention, humid). These conditions dictate when our planting season occurs in Florida, which is quite different from much of the country. To protect crops from the heat, we avoid growing in the hot season and use other techniques such as shade cloths to control the temperature around them.

So this week in the garden, we started as we always do: weeding. As always, this is an incredibly enjoyable weekly experience. Hunched over and crouched in the dirt, tearing out invasive plant species in the stunningly beautiful Florida sunshine (those of you failing to detect my facetious tone, see the underlined text above).

After weeding, I reseeded one of my zucchini plants that failed to sprout. It is still to hot to plant some of our vegetables such as the lettuce, so most of the remaining time was spent fertilizing my existing plants and treating them with pesticides. To fertilize, I dug out a shallow channel surrounding each plant and sprinkled in some fertilizer. The image below shows one of my tomato plants getting the treatment.

Tomato plant being fertilized

As you can see from my next picture, my young tomato plants are in need of some nutrients. They aren't looking great right now, but I'm hoping I'll be able to help them make a comeback.

Wilting tomato plants

As I mentioned, I've been treating my plants with pesticides to combat the various insects attempting to destroy my garden. Among the culprits are caterpillars and whiteflies, the latter of which seem to be swarming around all of my plants. The images below show some evidence of of these pests on my plants, and what I'm using to keep them away.

Bean leaf showing insect damage

Thuricide, to combat caterpillars

Plant Improvement

This week in class, we discussed the history of plants and plant improvement. One of the topics that was largely discussed was hybrid plants. A hybrid plant is the genetic crossing of two pure plant lines that each exhibit uniquely favorable characteristics with the goal of creating a plant that has all or most of the combined characteristics. While this may require a lot of work and extra funds to accomplish, the quality of the resulting plant and its yield are often worth the effort. An important point is that the seeds of these hybrids can not be saved for the following season, because they will not grow plants true to the qualities of the hybrid.

Now for an update on my garden! This week was spent mostly weeding, but I was able to plant a few more vegetables, including basil, cucumber,  and scallions. All of these vegetables were planted by seed, so there's not much to show yet, but here is a little cucumber plant just breaking through the soil:

Cucumber sprouting

The cucumbers were planted each a foot apart, while the basil was planted about two seeds per foot, and the scallions were crammed in every few inches.

As for my vegetables planted two weeks ago, the bean varieties have all broken ground and are coming in nicely!

Bean varieties

I also sprayed all of my visible plants with an organic pesticide designed to keep caterpillars away. This should help protect my tomato and pepper plants as they continue to take root. Take a look at how they are progressing:

Tomatoes

Anaheim Joe Parker Peppers

Seeds vs. Transplants

This week I started my vegetable garden by planting some seeds and transplants in my beds. Before I get to which plants I added, I want to discuss the pros and cons of seeding and direct sowing. The table below shows some advantages and disadvantages to each method.

In my garden this week, I used transplants for my tomatoes, peppers, and eggplant. I also planted seeds for my beans, carrots, squash, and zucchini. There will be more to come next week!

Check out the pictures below of my (very premature) garden.

Tomato transplants

Carrot and bean plant bed

Peppers (near) and tomatoes (far)

Garden Plot Plan

Here is the basic layout of my garden!