What grows best and worst for you?

[amiee]

My best is cucumbers- always grows over abundantly here.

My Worse is carrots- must be the clay soil here but they don't grow that well nor do they have much flavor when they do.

[4furrypaws]

I haven't gotten into fruits/veggies yet.

As far as flowers, I'm still learning at our new house due to woodland critters and a naughty puppy!!!

My previous house I had awesome luck with Cosmos, Zinnias, Roses - and bad luck with any bulb flowers.

[amiee]

I am not great with flowers in general except Marigolds and Nasturtiums, but always stick some in my veggie gardens to attract bees. I'm way too scared to try Roses yet.... though I think some rose bushes would be nice to have.

[olenka]

best: kale, potatoes, onions, garlic. I don't plant a ton of flowers but I usually put a few nasturtium seeds on the edges of my garden boxes and they tend to do great.
worst: peppers, melons, basil.

[bonzo2012]

In then past, I had good luck with lettuce, tomatoes, and sugar snap peas. Worst was spinach and carrots. This was all container gardening.

I have no idea how any of these will perform where I am now! Totally different climate and soil conditions, plus rabbits. We will see what works this season!

[rubysi]

Best:Blueberries, tomatoes, garlic

Worst: melons

[queenrichie]

Raspberries grow like weeds here, they will over take a garden easily.
Strawberries grow great as well.

Flower wise: We have a few shady spots and the begonia's do so well in the shade. Bulbs do great with our weather.

Not so good: I have had bad luck with rose bushes! I am not giving up though!

[menrandes]

Last year we had an overabundance of zucchini. It took until this month actually before I was ok eating them again after last sumner. We also did very well with cucumbers, but I was willing to eat them again by November.

Worst is unfortunately tomatoes. Grapes and cheery tonayoes do great, but larger ones tend to rit before ripe.

[rubysi]

Feb 21, 2015 21:34:07 GMT -5 menrandes said:

Last year we had an overabundance of zucchini. It took until this month actually before I was ok eating them again after last sumner. We also did very well with cucumbers, but I was willing to eat them again by November.

Worst is unfortunately tomatoes. Grapes and cheery tonayoes do great, but larger ones tend to rit before ripe.

Add calcium to the soil to avoid rot. Many the fertilizers specific to tomatoes are rich in calcium. Roma or plum tomatoes are also more prone to rot.

[towerclimberswife]

Ohhhh! Great question!

Best: Beans, Carrots, Lettuce.

Worst: Peppers, Tomatoes & Onions.

My onions all fell over before the bulbs grew - what a bummer. We have a super short growing season here so anything needing heat is tough. I think we're going to try to set up a greenhouse/hoop house this summer to try to get tomatoes.

[towerclimberswife]

Feb 22, 2015 8:31:59 GMT -5 rubysi said:

Feb 21, 2015 21:34:07 GMT -5 menrandes said:

Last year we had an overabundance of zucchini. It took until this month actually before I was ok eating them again after last sumner. We also did very well with cucumbers, but I was willing to eat them again by November.

Worst is unfortunately tomatoes. Grapes and cheery tonayoes do great, but larger ones tend to rit before ripe.

Add calcium to the soil to avoid rot. Many the fertilizers specific to tomatoes are rich in calcium. Roma or plum tomatoes are also more prone to rot.

I'm glad you mentioned this. I think I'll have a soil analysis done this summer, so hopefully that will give me some direction as to how to supplement if needed. We have all aged manure compost for our garden and I have a feeling it isn't very well balanced, though... as stated above -  my beans did fucking fantastic last year!

[amiee]

Feb 20, 2015 11:12:50 GMT -5 4furrypaws said:

I haven't gotten into fruits/veggies yet.

As far as flowers, I'm still learning at our new house due to woodland critters and a naughty puppy!!!

My previous house I had awesome luck with Cosmos, Zinnias, Roses - and bad luck with any bulb flowers.

Did you do anything special for the roses? My grandma gives them beer....seems to work?

[menrandes]

Feb 22, 2015 8:31:59 GMT -5 rubysi said:

Feb 21, 2015 21:34:07 GMT -5 menrandes said:

Last year we had an overabundance of zucchini. It took until this month actually before I was ok eating them again after last sumner. We also did very well with cucumbers, but I was willing to eat them again by November.

Worst is unfortunately tomatoes. Grapes and cheery tonayoes do great, but larger ones tend to rit before ripe.

Add calcium to the soil to avoid rot. Many the fertilizers specific to tomatoes are rich in calcium. Roma or plum tomatoes are also more prone to rot.

Yeah, this year should be better.  Our compost this year had a rather large abundance of egg shells, which will help the soil.  We knew the problem pretty quickly, but it was too late to fix it unfortunately. 

[4furrypaws]

Feb 22, 2015 12:47:58 GMT -5 amiee said:

Feb 20, 2015 11:12:50 GMT -5 4furrypaws said:

I haven't gotten into fruits/veggies yet.

As far as flowers, I'm still learning at our new house due to woodland critters and a naughty puppy!!!

My previous house I had awesome luck with Cosmos, Zinnias, Roses - and bad luck with any bulb flowers.

Did you do anything special for the roses? My grandma gives them beer....seems to work?

I'll be honest...I've done nothing with mine...just got lucky I guess!! 

Last winter we had mega cold temps which killed two of my rose bushes at this house. Two others came back a little. I need to pay more attention to them! 

[bonzo2012]

Feb 22, 2015 19:14:27 GMT -5 4furrypaws said:

Feb 22, 2015 12:47:58 GMT -5 amiee said:

Did you do anything special for the roses? My grandma gives them beer....seems to work?

I'll be honest...I've done nothing with mine...just got lucky I guess!! 

Last winter we had mega cold temps which killed two of my rose bushes at this house. Two others came back a little. I need to pay more attention to them! 

What do you do for roses in the winter? The previous owners had two rose bushes on the side of the garage, but because of when we bought the house (late Oct) it had already snowed before we could do anything to protect them. And...I haven't done anything since besides prune some branches on warm days. They seem to still be alive, so if they grow nicely this spring and summer I'd like to protect them better next winter.

[dontstopbelievin]

I only did a few containers last year. The previous owner put rose bushes in containers by the front door. Those did great this summer, but I didn't really like the way they looked so I tore them out. In my pots with herbs, the thyme, lemon balm, oregano, and sage did great. Parsley seemed to die, but is growing again now? Not sure how that works, we've been having lots of cold weather and some ice/snow.

Cilantro did great to start but died by the end of the summer. The dill, basil, and Rosemary did not do well.

Pansies have done well this winter, I killed the mums, probably because I didn't water them.

[cinnamonsmiles]

Jumping in here now that I found this forum!

Best: Zucchini, tomatoes, blackberries, okra, and winter squash.
Worst: Peppers, cruciferous veggies, and melons.

[CaptainLeela]

I haven't tried many fruits/veggies yet and mostly do flowers. Hostas, astilbe, bleeding hearts, irises, rhubarb and tiger lillies do great. I have a hard time with hanging pots of some reason - my fuchsias always get super leggy (I'm assuming I'm using the wrong type of fertilizer but haven't looked into it yet), my petunias don't bloom as much as I know they could, and I managed to kill an entire basket of lobelia last year. ETA: I, too, have bad luck with bulbs. I've managed to get a few tulips but that's about it.

[NariaDreaming]

Best: Tomatoes, Peppers, Beans, Zucchini
Worst: Lettuce, Spinach, Radishes

[mlal78]

Best: cucumber, tomatoes, coneflowers, daisies

Worst: radishes, strawberries (laying straw under mounds this year). We also have to fight the critters off from the strawberries, so I am hoping to put a net up around them this year. Last year a blue jay dropped one right in front of me.

[bonzo2012]

mlal78, we have had good success with strawberries planted in those narrow rectangular planters that we then mount to the deck rail. We did this out of necessity while balcony gardening, but I think we will still do some this way again because it keeps the strawberries safe from slugs, rabbits, and everything in between. The birds can still get them, but since you rule out a bunch of the ground pests, you might get more strawberries to actually eat.

[KayVeeKay]

For me, if it's in the ground it's almost guaranteed to live. Pots? It's dead within a week.