GA: Oh no!!! A 2nd zuke lost! (presumably borer, but not pulling it quite yet) --> NOT the borer

Egads!!! The most productive plant has wilted!  This makes a second plant lost!  I'll leave it for a few days to finish ripening what it has.  I didn't check the stem closely because whatever (but will check it out when I pull it to see if it's SVB).

--> Update on August 1st 2025:  Pulled it today after harvesting its last two zucchinis.  There were some squash bugs on it, and found at least one or two borers in leaves/stems, but the main stem seemed clear of borers.  So, I'm guessing it died of some type of disease transmitted by the squash bugs and/or cucumber beetles, rather than SVB.

WTH, garlic -- cloves in the stem!?!

Wow, I've never had this happen -- many of the garlics have a place in the stem where new garlic "cloves"?? are popping out.  I noticed this a few weeks ago.  Today I pulled on of them -- it actually does have a garlic bulb at the bottom -- pretty small though.  I think this was one of the "regular" cloves I planted last fall.

Also, a few days ago I pulled one of the fallen-over plants -- it wasn't a bulb but instead a massive clove.  I think this was an elephant one.  It never bulbed, I guess the original clove just swelled up.  It wasn't the best garlic but it was edible.

Where are the scapes?!?!? Garlic not looking very healthy

Oh no!  Why do only 2 of the garlics planted last fall (bought from Ritchie's, so good stuff) have scapes, and those scapes didn't even look normal?  And the leaves of all the garlic looks -- just not great.  It's all been covered for quite a while.

The missed garlic from last year, that sprouted this year, all have beautiful scapes that I harvested today.

Well, que sera sera!

Mystery: A bunch of outside zinnias gradually died -- piddly roots!

The tray of zinnias that has been going outside during the day and coming inside at night had been looking good (definitely behind the indoor zinnias but that's to be expected).  But then, over the past week or so, they've been dying!  When I pluck them out, they have almost zero roots.  I wonder if it's something with my mix -- maybe too much or too little lime or something like that?  

Looks like a few shorts will survive -- hopefully....

Tuberous begonia update: NOT eggs after all I don't think

I unbagged the pot a couple of days ago (keeping it in the kitchen) -- what looked like eggs no longer look like anything.  I'm guessing it was some type of fungus maybe?  But everything looks decent now.  Will leave downstairs in the kitchen though for a while longer, just in case.

OH NONONONONO!!!!! EGGS ON TOP OF THE TUBEROUSO BEGONIA SOIL!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?

OMG!!!!!!!!!!!!

Today I happened to notice what looks like hundreds of small white eggs throughout on top of the soil of the tuberous begonia!!!!! WTF!??!?  This has never happened before.  I can only guess that if these are in fact eggs, some critter came in with the bulb when I brought in inside in the fall, and despite being in a paper bag with no water or anything for several months, somehow the critter survived and laid all these eggs!?!?!?   Maybe if there's only one, the eggs won't be viable?  Wow, what a mystery.

So I immediately took the pot downstairs and double-bagged it to make sure everything stays inside.  Will see if anything emerges from the "eggs"....   I sure hope these aren't critters because if so, obviously I'll have to toss the whole thing, and TB has been around for quite a few years, has been a nice tradition.

Not seeing sign of any eggs etc. on anything else.... fingers crossed.

~~~~~~  See updated posted Feb 12th:  Doesn't look like they were eggs after all... (fingers crossed)

Ok seriously -- where are all the cucumber beetles and japanese beetles!?!

I only ever saw the one cucumber beetle (relocated) -- nothing since!

Have seen one japanese beetle and a couple that looked like that but not quite.  

They should be going crazy by now...  

(I haven't kaolined anything at all this year.)

Even flea beetles were a non-issue this year.

Not that I'm complaining though!

Basil started rotting in the fridge after only a day or two!?!?

So weird.  A couple of days ago I harvested some basil; didn't wash it, just put it into a plastic container in the fridge.  Then today when I went to use it, several leaves had turned black / rot-y.  Most of it was fine, so I tossed the bad ones (and won't return them to the yard).  Not sure why this happened -- the plants in the garden look fine.

Who's eating the beans!? & Kentucky Wonder Wax round ?? sowed

Hmmm, while some of the pole beans are looking healthy and undisturbed, several have been nibbled and even beheaded all together.  Could it be birds?  Not seeing any squirrels around.

So, today sowed some Kentucky Wonder Wax to fill in some gaps.  Pre-soaked for a day.

Hardly any beets sprouted!!! Sowed round 2 beets. Carrots more sprouted but sowed round 2 carrots too.

What the heck!  Why such low germination, especially for the beets?!?  My only guess is they cooked under the plastic on the hot sunny days a while ago.  Both kinds of sowed beets were equally low germination.  So, poked in some round 2 beets today, mishmash of the two kinds.

For filling in the carrots (in the bed, not the container that I sowed more recently), I had no patience to carefully poke so many new holes, so I just scattered the rest of the bolero seed package over top.

Watered them all in.

Lots of white fuzz growth on the newest potted-ups! I'm not worried though, will "leave" it be.

The previous seedings had some white fuzz but not much at all; but the ones I potted up the other day, holy moly lots of white fuzz on top now!  Given this is my home-made mix I'm not worried, will let it be.

Oh no!!! 3 of the 4 fall broccoli plants have been killed! (they were still skinny)

Noticed about a week ago that one of the four piracicabas that I direct-seeded a while ago had floundered, didn't think too much as 3 were still left.  Well!  Today I noticed 2 more have died!!  The stem was sliced clean through, about 1.5 inches above soil level.  Cutworm maybe!?  (As they've been always under floating row cover.)

Bummer.  One is still there... for now.  I won't bother doing anything about this, will just see if this one makes it.  But in future years, I should avoid direct seeding broccoli in favour of waiting until plants are good and sturdy before putting in the ground.

The bought basil is getting blighty-looking spots on some leaves (not downy mildew)

Just a few leaves affected so far, otherwise the basil plants look good still.

Haven't seen any of these spots on my home-started basil (Prospera) yet.

No sign of downy mildew on any of the basils yet.

Swiss chard in west bed looks diseased or something (central bed chard is fine)

Weird, noticed today while checking the west chard for leaf miner damage, that although I didn't see any miner damage, all of the leaves over there look.... not great.  Kind of peppery/spotty, like maybe some kind of disease?  Which is weird, because chard has always been a fantastic year-long producer for me, other than leaf miner damage.

Anyway, will "leaf" it all alone and see what happens.

Mystery fly [Aha: lygus] has been hanging around potato/pea/zucchini area

Reminiscent of a minute pirate bug, but definitely different. Has a small white "V" in the middle of the back, and then each side of the "lower back" area has a 3/4 "O" on the side.

Overall colour I'd say is a splotchy/patchy brown.  Two long thin antennae.  End tips of wings are clear.

[Updated on 10 July 2022 to say this is a lygus bug / miridae.  Managed to get a photo of one on a zinnia.  Seems to be quite a few around, as some of the green things I thought were aphids it turns out are probably some young lygus.  Will just let them be and see how things go.]

Tons of stinkbug nymphs (I think) in cucumber flowers! (look like ticks)

Whoa, while going after a cucumber beetle, a ton of small insects knocked out of the flower into my container.  They look tickish in terms of size and shape but I don't they are actually ticks.  They don't seem to have wings, they're just walking around the container.  ~25 of them knocked out of one single flower!

Update:  Posted on an i.d. group and someone suggested stinkbug nymphs.  Seems to fit, so I'll go with that.

Fertilized (and watered) the potted potatoes to see if helps with yellow

The east-most pot, which has the most yellow received 2 Tbsp kelp meal and 2 Tbsp MRP, no alfalfa.

The middle pot received that, plus 1/4 cup alfalfa.

The west-most pot, which has no yellow yet and is the big terra-cotta-colour pot, received the 2 Tbsp kelp + 2 Tbsp MRP, no alfalfa.

And all received a good watering.

Potato leaves turning yellow, especially potted ones in shade -- lacking something?

They haven't flowered yet, and it doesn't look like the normal aging type of yellowing.  For the potted ones in the shade, maybe the lack of sun is finally getting to them?  Or some other issue?

Mystery solved? re: yellow powder on basil -- pollen?

Noticed some of the same yellow powder on a zinnia's leaves today.  I think it's just pollen from the neighbourhood, and presumably the rain has washed it off the upper side of the basil leaves so I only see it on the underside.

Basils have yellow powder on underside of leaves -- what could it be? & harvested/pruned

Hmmm...  The plants look super nice and green on the upper sides, but noticed today while pruning/harvesting that most leaves have subtle patches of yellow powder.  Sort of reminds me of last year's downy mildew except totally the wrong colour, and not fuzzy.  

Oh well, it washed off well, so fingers crossed!

It's on both varieties -- the hybrid I'm trying for the first time that's DM-resistant, and the classic Genovese that I bought from the store.