It was not a good year this year in southside Virginia. However, I always hold out that next year will be great. The Old Girl was down when it came time to ploughing the gardens. I managed to get a little tiller going that Sister #1 gave me and got the back veggie garden planted. Then bam, the temps went from normal to 33C/92F over night. I think the sudden rise in temperature shocked the plants; they never recovered. The garden in the Little Valley did not do much better; it produced nothing. About the only thing I got was some butternut squash and eggplants. The tomatoes provided a few but none for processing into juice and salsa and relishes. The pear tree did fairly well as well as the red plum. Almost all of the annuals I planted in the flower gardens died on me as well. I did manage to get the red salvias to grow and a few other annuals but most got stunted and just eventually died on me. The Old Girl gave me lift issues last fall and early this spring I decided to go into the lift to fix the problem. I got the lift cover off by mounting a winch to help lift it; its mass is around 100 lbs and it is cast iron. I went to work repairing the issues in the lift cover. The centre housing had bolt holes that were damaged and would need to be drilled and thread inserts installed. Since I would be drilling into the centre housing that also holds the hydraulic pump, I decided to drop the pump. When I unscrewed the PTO cover it was full of hydraulic oil; the seals were leaking. One more thing to add to the list. When I pulled the PTO shaft, I found a large piece of metal in the bottom of the centre housing. Now where did that come from? Well, it was a part of the spider in the differential, one of the arms had broken off. Many years back; before we moved here; Dad died before we could get the property and the house set up, water got into the hydraulic fluid and caused some damaged when it froze. I know Dad went in and repaired things. Mum and I also worked on the hydraulics after we moved here and that piece of metal was not present at that time. However, I started to notice a noise when lifting heavy loads. My guess is that the spider arm cracked all those years back and then finished breaking completely at some point. Well, that piece of spider arm got slung around inside of the centre housing where it caused more damage. I pulled the left trumpet and remove the differential and it could be repaired with a new spider set. However, the centre housing was damaged. I am not sure if that damage could be repair; I know there are good welders that can do cast iron. However, I managed to obtain a centre housing as well as the differential from a nice guy in New Jersey. Hopefully my friend will be able to bring them down to me as shipping such heavy objects is not cheap. I hate having to replace the centre housing since it is original to the tractor. However, several of the side cover bolt holes are stripped out; including the ones that support the running boards so they would have had to be repaired at any rate. I am rather sentimental about this tractor as it was Dad's tractor and it holds special meaning to me. PTO shaft. It cracked where the pinion gear bearing is housed. Not good; if not for that, I would consider using the original centre housing. I don't know if that can be repaired. This is how she has been the whole year and now into winter. I had been waiting for the parts to get down to me so I can get her back together.
Sorry to hear of the tractor troubles. But your the only other person to say their garden didn't do very well. Mine did like yours. Stuff was stunted or never grew and produced little to no vegetables. My tomatoes provided enough to eat but that was it. The okra made about a dozen okras about all summer?? That is very unusual for okra!! Had a few squash and zukes and a few cucumbers is all? Sent from my moto g(7) using Tapatalk
Same for my sister, both veggies and flowers; she lives about 20 some miles to the south of me. I usually have a great crop of peppers but not this year. Okra did nothing. Watermelons died on me, cantaloupes died on me. On top of the other things it was very hot and humid here this year.
I'm way South of you. I'm in upstate SC. Every one said I didn't water enough. I said I don't think that's it. Half the time I am done with okra and I quit watering it and even cutting it and it still keeps chugging out okra even with the ground with huge cracks in the would from being dried out. This year was very unusual. I have 30+- tomatoes and basically my wife and I are almost every one they made. Some lost to rot as we didn't eat them in time and maybe have a dozen away. Terrible year. All my watermelons and cantaloupe died as well. Sent from my moto g(7) using Tapatalk
It wasn't water, maybe the hot and humid weather we had all summer. I have sprinklers for the gardens; I didn't water the Little Valley like I did the back veggie garden but it gets a lot of water run-off from the two slopes that creates the Little Valley. My sister 20 miles from me had the same results with both her veggies and her flowers. At times we got too much water, several times rains were around 5 inches.
I planted four different varieties of melons and they all died. I made sure to put lime around the plants to avoid blossom end rot. I had a really nice sugar baby watermelon and was watching it grow when the vines started to die.
If you are having trouble with your garden, sometimes it pays to get a soil test completed with your local co-op.
Yep I am going to do one. It was planned for prior to the season actually but time and life caught up to me. Sent from my moto g(7) using Tapatalk
The soil tends to go acidic here. Knowing what PH the plants needs is important. I use a general purpose 10-10-10 fertiliser on the veggie gardens. With corn though, you want the nitrogen to be low when first fertilising so you don't get leggy growth with thin stalks. Low calcium in some plants like tomatoes and watermelons will cause blossom end rot, the same for green (bell) peppers. I have been growing veggies since I was old enough to learn the plants from the weeds. Mum would say, "This is the plant we want to keep, pull the plants that don't look like it;" when I was small and helping Mum and Dad in the gardens.
Yes. I built a tall electric fence around the Little Valley garden; the only way I could keep the deer from mowing things down. I use T-posts on the upper run and dug 13 holes for 13 locust posts that I cut from the property; they were standing dead. When Molly the Deranged was here, the deer was not a problem in the back veggie garden. Since she has been gone, I couldn't keep them out of the garden. So that garden has a tall fence made with T-posts; you have to brace the corners or use wooden posts; I brace with shorter T-posts on the corners. The back veggie garden is powered by a ParMark fence charger. For deer, you want a fence charger that can put out 10K+ volts. Deer hair is hollow and you need a high potential to shock through that hair.
