Leaping Grasshoppers and Gloxinias

PLANT DOCTOR

Has anyone experienced grasshoppers eating the lot in their garden?

Long Horned Grasshopper in Bromeliad photo M Cannon

They are tiny little eating machines!!
Some gardeners have discovered that the best chemical-free method for getting rid of grasshoppers is to simply take off their thongs and smack the little blighters.
If you were to follow this plan of attack you’d be at it 24/7 and would end up demolishing every plant in your garden and you’d have to be fast!
Is there a way to get rid of them without nasty chemicals?
Let’s find out ….I'm talking with General Manager Steve Falcioni from www.ecoorganicgarden.com.au

The eggs pupate in bare patches of soil, sometime for years, then hatch out when the rain and warm weather arrives.
So many grasshoppers eating tomato leaves and flowers and indeed most plants' every morning-even your orchids!
You can let your chickens into the veggie patch to try and curb the infestation, but grasshoppers can jump very high, either into or out of that same patch.
But there’s no need to go out on a killing spree because the grasshoppers will beat you every time.
Go for that neem oil.
If you have any questions about your grasshoppers or a photo, send it in to realworldgardener@gmail.com or write in to 2RRR P.O. Box 644 Gladesville NSW 1675.

VEGETABLE HEROES

Today’s vegetable hero is cucumber or Cucumis sativus

Cucumbers just love the hot weather, so they’ll germinate and grow quickly at this time of the year.

Did you know that cucumbers are a member of the gourd or cucurbita family and have been grown for 4000 years?

Did cucumber start off in India? No-one’s really sure.

Some pretty famous people have been known to be fans of cucumbers, even cucumber pickles.
Take, Julius Ceasar, he ate them everyday, - and Cleopatra, thought cucumber pickles helped her skin complexion, and other pickle lovers included George Washington and Queen Elizabeth 1.

Would you have thought that Cucumbers are one of the world’s favourite vegetables?
I would’ve said the tomato, but there you go.

When is the best time to grow some cucumbers?

Cucumber plants do best in all types of temperate and tropical areas and generally need temperatures between 15-33°C. Cucumbers are happiest when the average temperatures are around 21⁰C

For this reason, they are native to many regions of the world.

Sow the seeds of Cucumber in late Spring and early Summer for cool temperate districts, spring and summer for arid and temperate zones districts, from August until March in sub-tropical areas.

Only the cooler months for tropical areas-so April until August unless you’re inland.

Lunch box sized cucumbers. photo M Cannon

And where can you grow these delicious cucumbers?

You need to pick a sunny, well-drained spot, because Cucumbers are a subtropical plant, that needs full sun.

What do cucumber plants love?

Cucumber’s can be a bit fussy about position.
In cool zones, they are best in full sun.
For areas with hot summers, shade is better for your cucumbers.
TIP:Did you know that you can actually grow cucumbers in about 30% – 50 % shade in places where the air is warm?
A simple shade covering, temporary or something more permanent will protect the plants from the harsh sun as well as lessening the  risk of scarring the fruit, (it might have the added benefit of protecting your plants from pests too).

Cucumber vine photo M Cannon

Cucumbers are mostly vines that need to climb.

Pick a position that provides them with the right amount of sun and also gives them a bit of support.
Fences and trellis do fine as do wire supports.
In fact, growing up a trellis would be a great way to avoid all the mildews and moulds that cucumbers are prone to in still humid weather.
If you like to grow sweet corn then plant your cucumbers amongst them so they can climb up the corn stalks- a good way to make the most of the space in your veggie bed.

Cucumber flowers. photo M Cannon

Just like zucchinis, cucumbers have separate male and female flowers. Male flowers come out at first, but don’t worry too much because the female flowers will arrive soon after.

Cucumbers in Pots
There’s also a number of dwarf varieties if you’d like to grow your cucumbers in pots.
Try Mini White- one of the most popular. Grow it for yourself and see why. The 10cm long fruit and is best picked when young. Gives you lots of fruit per plant and it’s burpless  
Or you could try Cucumber Mini Muncher as well.
You’ll need to go to www.diggers.com.au , or if you’re in Adelaide, go to the shop in the Botanic Gardens.

The best thing is that Cucumbers aren’t picky about soils.

As long as your soil is well-draining and has a pH of around 6.5.
Add in plenty of organic compost and fertilisers like chook poo or cow manure.
I’ve seen an idea where you make mini mounds, wet the soil first and then drop in 4 -5 seeds into the top of each mound.
Mulch the mounds so they don’t dry out but not too much or you’ll be wondering why nothing is germinating, that’s because the seed has rotted away.

When your seeds have germinated, pick out the strongest couple and throw away the others so you don’t get overcrowding.

Water regularly at the base of each plant – keeping leaves dry or you risk powdery mildew disease – and feed every couple of weeks with a soluble plant food.

IMPORTANT:

Cucumbers, like many vines, are prone to fungal infections.

Powdery mildew is a fungal disease that is spread by spores carried by the wind.

Look for white to grey fungal deposits on the leaves and stems of your cucumbers. As the mildew spreads, the leaves become brittle then start to die off.
There are some types of cucumbers that resist this disease for a time anyway.
You can also try a natural fungicide. 1 part whole milk to 10 parts water, and spray in the cool of the day.
Prevention is much better than cure so; use a clean soft mulch like sugar-cane or straw, drip irrigation instead of overhead watering preferably early in the morning, not crowding plants to get good air movement, and a trellis or support.

TIP: When picking your cucumbers don’t pull them off the vine.

Twist the cucumbers off the plant or cut the stalk just above the cucumber tip or cut the cucumbers off with a scissors or secateurs, making sure you leave a bit of stem attached to the fruit.

 Bitter Cucumbers?

Who out there hasn’t tried a cucumber that’s tasted bitter?

I’m sure some time in your life, that’s happened hasn’t it?
There’s seems to be a few theories for bitterness in cucumbers
One theory is that the bitterness is caused early in the plant’s development by terpenoid compounds that give a bitter flavour to the entire plant.
Usually the bitterness accumulates at the stem and below the surface of the skin of the cucumber.
According to this theory it’s a genetic problem.

I’ve always thought it to be the result of Cucurbitacin.
Found in most cucumber plants, Cucurbitacin causes fruit to taste bitter.
Cucurbitacin levels increase when a plant is under stress, and can make the fruit taste really bitter.

Anyway, it proves that you shouldn’t stress out your cucumbers!
By the way, if you do get a bitter cucumber, peel it and cut of the ends by about 2.5cm, that’s where the bitterness concentrated.

Cucumbers should be ready at about 2 to 2 1/2 months and picking fruit sometimes encourages more to start growing.

They keep for 7-10 days in the fridge then the start to look like something that came from outer space…green and slimy

Why are they good for you?

Cucumbers have lots of Vitamins C but why you should eat them is because the silica in cucumber is an essential component of healthy connective tissue, you know, like muscles, tendons, ligaments, cartilage, and bone.

Cucumbers have some dietary fibre and Cucumber juice is often recommended as a source of silica to improve the complexion and health of the skin, plus cucumber's high water content makes it naturally hydrating—a must for glowing skin.

So eat them quick in sandwiches  salads or juice them for healthy glowing skin!

AND THAT WAS OUR VEGETABLE HERO SEGMENT FOR TODAY!

DESIGN ELEMENTS

 with garden designer Lesley Simpson

Create a Potager Garden

photo M Cannon

The French term potager refers to a home kitchen garden that grows a mixture of annual and perennial fruit, vegetables and culinary herbs.

Potager gardens are meant to supply a household with food.

Let’s find out about create one of these gardens.

PLAY: Create a potager garden_31^st  December _2014

Organic gardeners tend to replace ordered rows (still seen in many European kitchen gardens) with more informal plantings.

English potager garden photo M. Cannon

By underplanting, interplanting and companion planting not only adds interest to the garden but that this mix improves growing conditions by offering plants shade and protection from hot sun or strong wind.

It also may just discourage or confuse attacking insects while encouraging beneficial insects into the garden.

PLANT OF THE WEEK

Gloxinia speciosa or Gloxinia

This next plant is the type you buy after seeing it in a florists display because it looks so exotic with it’s rich velvety petals.
You think to yourself, “ I’ll get that” as a reward for something you’ve done like finishing a horticulture, gardening or floristry course or a difficult task. Perhaps even after losing some weight.
If you find the right location, they last for years and years.

The plants commonly known as Gloxinias, or perhaps florist Gloxinias, are mostly varieties of one species, Sinningia speciosa, which come from Brazil.

Gloxinia photo M Cannon

The name Gloxinia was given in honour of Benjamin Peter Gloxin, a French botanical writer working at the end of the eighteenth century.

Wilhelm Sinning, head gardener at the University of Bonn in the mid-nineteenth century was associated with the hybridization and selection work which has given us the flower we know today.

These modern hybrids have brilliantly coloured trumpet-shaped velvety flowers and very beautiful, large, flat, velvety mid-green leaves. 

The flowers vary in colour from rich crimson, deep red, violet and white to various combinations of  colours.

The biggest difference between growing Gloxinia and growing African violets or Streptocarpus is that Gloxinia require a period of dormancy or “winter rest” in order to flower again.

Your plant will start to wind down, usually around April or May with flowers fading more quickly and fewer or no new buds being formed.
When that happens, your plant is telling you it’s time to rest.
Reduce watering to about half the usual amount and remove dead flower stems.

The really great news is that once you have a mature gloxinia plant, it can live for years. There’s the belief that if you can successfully grow African violets, you can probably grow gloxinias. They both are members of the Gesneriaceae family. The care of the two species is similar, other than the gloxinia's required periods of dormancy.
Funnily enough I can grow my Gloxinia outdoors under a peach tree in a pot, but can’t do that with my African violets.

Flowers or No Flowers, the Big Question

Wildlife in Focus:

Apostle Bird

This bird is also known as the Grey Jumper, is a quick-moving, and is a native to Australia where it roams woodlands, eating insects and seeds at, or near, ground level. It was first described by ornithologist John Gould in 1837, Let’s find out more about this bird…with ecologist Sue Stevens.

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As Sue mentioned, the Apostlebird was named after the twelve apostles.
In fact, Apostle birds travel in family groups of between 6 and 20, even joining other family groups creating large feeding flocks of over 40.
It also seems that they have plenty of nicknames not all of which are complimentary.
Sometimes called Lousy Jacks (due to heavy louse infestations), Happy Jacks, Happy Families and CWA Birds. CWA birds is a bit of a dig of a Country Women's Association meeting by comparing it to the Apostle bird's constant chatter.
You may just well come across it in your travels, is so, we would love to see your photo of this bird. Send it in to realworldgardener@gmail.com or post to 2RRR po Box 644 Gladesville NSW 1675

Vegetable Heroes

• The answer to the question about helping you sleep better is Lettuce and I’ll tell you why a little later on.
• LETTUCE or Lactuca sativa, The Lettuce (Lactuca sativa) is a temperate annual or biennial plant of the daisy family Asteraceae.
• You might think it too boring to be a hero, but the earliest mention of lettuce in history is a carving on an Egyptian temple.
• Lettuce was considered an aphrodisiac in Egypt.
• But the Greeks used lettuce as a medicinal plant to induce sleep.
• Lactuca sativa or lettuce is just everywhere and thought to have started of  in the wild as a prickly lettuce, found as a weed in the Mediterranean.
• Nothing beats the freshness of home grown lettuce though.
• Just pick some leaves fresh when you need them. The flavour is lost in as little as 24 hours, and there’s no way supermarket lettuce is only 24 hours old.
•  Lettuce can be planted all year round in all areas of Australia.
• Having said that, in Arid districts, it might be a good idea to avoid the hottest months of the year, and in cool temperate districts, you might light to grow your lettuce in a greenhouse or undercover somewhere during winter.
• Not all kinds of lettuce are created alike!
• For all areas, planting or sowing in the summer months, should only be the loose leaf types of lettuce.
• Sorry, Iceberg is out, as is the other hearting lettuce varieties, like Butterhead .
• These hearting varieties are OK in the coolest months. (The upper temperature limit to grow heading lettuces is 28°C)
• Summer is just too warm for the hearting types.
• Lettuces taste best when they are grown as fast as possible and for that they need water and food.
• I had visitors recently who noticed that my seedlings had doubled in size in 3 days! That’s good going.
• Any gardening book (all written for cooler climates) will tell you that full sun is essential.
• Full sun is best ONLY when it isn't too hot. Once the temperatures go into the thirties, your lettuce will definitely appreciate some shade, especially afternoon shade!
• Don't plant them in deep shade, like under a tree. They will just grow into pale, leggy things with few leaves on them.
• If you can’t find a position that provides dappled shade in the afternoon, try interplanting between taller plants that will not totally shade them like capsicums/peppers or eggplants, staked tomatoes.
• Commercial growers recommend using 50% white shade cloth for growing lettuce and other summer vegetables.
• White shade cloth let’s in the UV rays needed for growth.
•  After that, Lettuces need good soil.
• It should be light, free draining and rich in organic matter.
• It needs to hold lots of water and lots of nitrogen and other nutrients.
• Sandy soils need help from your compost bin or worm farm.
• If you have clay soils, growing lettuce shouldn’t be a problem, as is growing them in pots.
•  Lettuce has shallow roots, so it dries out easily.
• You must keep up a steady supply of water because any set back will at least, make them tough and bitter, at worst it will cause them to bolt to seed straight away without making any leaves for you!
• So make sure they never get stressed (e.g. by forgetting to water them).
• To sow lettuce seed, either spread the seed very thinly along a row and cover lightly with soil, or sprinkle it over a bed and rake it in.
• For all you balcony gardeners, any largish pot will do for 3 or 4 lettuce seedlings.
• Lettuce seed is very fine so you’ll get a few clumps.
• Thin them out, you know the drill.
• If the weather is very hot and your soil sandy, you will need to water daily. Stick your finger in the soil if not sure.
• By the way, lettuce seed doesn’t germinate that well at soil temperatures over 25⁰C.  So if you are sowing it in a pot, keep the potting mix cool by putting it in light shade until the lettuce seed germinates.
• I mentioned before that hearting types of lettuce will go to seed in summer very quickly and not form a heart at all.
• The same goes for Cos/Romaine types as they’re also very heat susceptible. I do grow those but they are the first to bolt to seed at the first sign of hot weather
• The most heat tolerant kinds of lettuce are the open leafed varieties (Looseleaf). All the pretty fancy lettuces you see in the shops, the frilly and curly varieties, they are your lettuce varieties you need to grow.
• Darker lettuce absorbs more sunlight than lighter colours, so they’ll wilt sooner (but they are prettier). Choose light green over dark red.
• The most heat resistant kinds of lettuce I’ve found to be are the oakleaf kind.
• Is your lettuce grows slowly even though you’re giving them plenty of water, then they need more food.
• Did you add organic compost, manures or worm castings to the veggie bed before you sowed the seed?
• If you didn’t, then you need to supply extra nutrients, especially nitrogen. Some of the liquid fertilisers will do right now.
• So why is it good for us?
• Lettuce is very good for digestion and promotes good liver function. It can reduce the risk of heart attacks and is good for healthy eyesight. It has good levels of Vitamin C, beta-carotene and fibre. You won’t put on any weight eating Lettuce  because mostvarieties have over 90% water and are extremely low in calories.
• Lettuce contain the sedative lactucarium (lactoo-caree um) which relaxes the nerves but not upsetting digestion.
• As a general rule, the darker green the leaves, the more nutritious the salad green.
• By varying the greens in your salads, you can boost the nutritional content as well as vary the tastes and textures.  
• For some unusual seeds try these online suppliers.

+ www.heritageseeds.com.au
+ www.pleasanceherbs.com.au
+www.greenharvest.com.au  Happy Lettuce growing everyone!

Design Elements

Redefine the concept of no flower garden?…Perhaps you have a friend like I do, that actually doesn't like the look of flowers in the garden.
Or do you think flowers are over-rated in gardens?  Perhaps even you think, the flowers are so fleeting that they’re not worth the trouble?
You probably spend all heaps of time preparing those flower beds and then, the wind or rain, spoil it all, does that happen to you?
Maybe you can find some tips in the no flower garden…

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I hope that’s given you some idea if you’re tired of your flower display being spoiled by inclement weather and want a change that still adds colour interest to your garden.
It doesn’t mean that you can’t add some flowers later.

Plant of the Week:

Now for the complete opposite of the no-flower garden.Gloxinias: Syningia speciosa
Do you like flowers, lots of flowers, indoors and out? Are you often buying bunches of flowers from the florist, supermarket or produce markets?
How about buying a spectacular flowering plant, that keeps on giving each year, that you can grow indoors.

The name Gloxinia was given in honour of Benjamin Peter Gloxin, a French botanical writer working at the end of the eighteenth century.

The modern hybrids have deep coloured trumpet-shaped flowers and very beautiful, large, flat, velvety mid-green leaves. 

The flowers vary in colour from rich crimson, deep red, violet and white to various combinations of such colours.

Some forms, called the tigrina gloxinias, have flowers heavily spotted or delicately veined in these colours on a white background, and others have frilled edges, touched with white.

I used to treat myself to a red velvet flowering gloxinia when I finished my horticulture exams.

They would last a couple of years, then it was time for a new one.

The tubers will survive from year to year but they should not be kept longer than 2 or 3 years as old plants tend to lose their vigour.

Yes, I spent quite a few years studying.

As a rule of thumb, if you can successfully grow African violets, you can probably grow gloxinias.

Having said that, Gloxinia prefer higher humidity than African violets or Streptocarpus, and many serious growers find that they must supplement the humidity in their grow rooms with pebble trays or a humidifier in order to grow Gloxinia successfully year-round.

If you’re ever fortunate enough to be able to attend an African Violet show, then you’ll find that Gloxinias, along with Streptocarpus are also exhibited and for sale.

The biggest difference between growing Gloxinia and growing African violets or Streptocarpus is that Gloxinia require a period of dormancy or “winter rest” in order to flower again.

Your plant will start to wind down, usually around April or May with flowers fading more quickly and fewer or no new buds being formed.

When that happens, your plant is telling you it’s time to rest.

Reduce watering to about half the usual amount and remove dead flower stems.

After three or four weeks at reduced watering gently dig up the tuber, remove any remaining leaves, trim away any dead or rotted roots, and rinse well under tepid water.

Place the tuber in a small plastic container or Ziplock bag with about a cup of moistened perlite or vermiculite and store in a cool, dark place.

The ideal rest temperature would be around 10 - 12⁰ degrees C – the refrigerator is much too cold! Try a protected area like the garage. 

Put a "note to self"Check your tuber for new growth every month or so.

When new sprouts appear (usually 3 months  it’s time to repot the tuber in fresh medium and enjoy the flowering cycle again.

 

Most likely, listeners to this program will be growing their gloxinias indoors unless you’re living in a sub-tropical or tropical climate.Indoors, gloxinias rarely develop diseases, but do get the occasional fungal problem such as gray mold and crown rot if the leaves are splashed frequently with water.
Avoid watering from overhead, and don’t use cold water, which can cause leaf problems, as with African Violets.
Tepid water is the go.
Mites and thrips are common house plant pests that can also attack gloxinias and African violets causing the leaves to either curl under or have a bumpy appearance.
You can try and control the pests with soapy water, or with insecticidal soap spray.
Don’t forget to pick off heavily damaged leaves.