Vacation watering

I was setting up my Claber Oasis to water my dill and coriander during an extended long weekend. I got the hoses all setup and filled the thing with water. But before I could locate a 9v battery to try it out I noticed water dripping from the bottom of it. There is a long tube that you insert over the valve inside the chamber and I must have pushed down on it too hard, cracking the plastic beneath it. Maybe I can seal it up again, but likely just a matter of time before it leaks again.

I was never that happy with the Claber. A little over-priced for what it does. But the ceramic watering spikes I've been using for years now never let me down. I just wish they put out more water. In the hot sun, outside, they barely keep up with the water requirements of even the smallest of plants. With some shade from the sun, my celeriac and radicchio were able to survive with six of these spikes in the soil. Looking inside the bucket they were sucking water from, it only looks like the used a couple of litres.

And with all the hot weather, my dill has started to flower. It's suppose to be a smaller dill plant, I think. But it needs to get bigger than this. The coriander isn't doing that well either but in it's defence, I haven't been paying much attention to it. The container could use more light. Less heat would be nice too.

Everything else was fine without me watering it every day. Most of the containers are self watering so the tomatoes, cucumbers and tomatillos had no problems. And the radicchio seemed to thrive behind the temporary sun shade I put up. It still gets some direct sun but only for a couple of hours. Maybe I'll leave it there for a while longer.

Windy

Really windy today. Enough to blow my basil over. Teaches me for not watering it this morning. All of the plants in this container have flowered and are producing seed. The aphids are back too in huge numbers on the top 6 or 8 inches of each basil plant.

My tomatoes are almost done now. Just a few little green ones left on the vines which stopped growing a long time ago. The leaves are starting to yellow and brown from the bottom up. These plants drained all the nutrients from their containers a long time ago. I've still got lots of peppers to harvest - hot wax and California wonder. And my celery is starting to die off. I better use what I can before it's all turns yellow and withers.

Bountiful Basil

The drip irrigation system I had in place when I went on vacation is still running and doing a nice job of keeping the basil hydrated. I've been pinching the tops to get it bushier. It could use some more sunlight though. That's the problem with the gravity fed drip irrigation. The containers need to be down on the balcony floor for it to work.

Something eating my basil

I've been finding basil leaves that look like they've been nibbled on. A worm perhaps or an earwig. I'll have to go out some night with a flashlight and take a closer look. Only a few leaves though and they've been like this for a while now. A couple of weeks ago it was celery. One of my plants had all of its new growth eaten to a nub. I suspect a worm of some sort in that case. It was just the one plant and after I discovered it new growth returned to the plant and I haven't seen any damage to the celery since.

Flowering Rosemary

I brought my single rosemary plant indoor long before the first frost hit. I find they do well in the kitchen window until spring. I don't normally see much if any growth on them when inside but my current plant appears to be flowering. Nice to see during the dreary grey days of winter.

Busy on the Balcony

In the past week I've been planting everything I had started indoors into containers on the balcony. Even reusing potting soil from last year still requires bags and bags of new soil. Nothing special this year, just potting soil. Tomatoes are planted as well as 4 different pepper varieties, sugar pumpkins and some bambino eggplant. Still more to go and I'm a little behind in getting some seed started out there also.

I didn't have plans to grow any herbs this year other than a few basil plants but some oregano, thyme, rosemary and mint found their way here from a local nursery. And my mother brought over a big pot of chives.