Stopped by my local Lowe's this afternoon, after work, to pick up a few things. Wanted to check out my favorite part of their gardening section! The "clearance" plants! What are clearance plants? Deeply discounted plants, that for whatever reason (usually bad watering!) have shown signs of distress, and are not pretty enough to sell at full price! How good a deal are we talking? How about an 8 pack of French Marigolds, that had a few blooms that died. Normally $4.48......now $1.80! Geez, I bought two of them, and I'm thinking of going back, later this week, to pick up whatever other ones they have, at this price! The beauty of marigolds, is that the blooms hold SEEDS. Cut them off (deadheading, we call it), and dry them. Pull them apart, and you've got ~50 seeds, to start next year's crop! When you cut off the dead blooms, it signals the plant to grow MORE BLOOMS. And since marigolds are AWESOME to gro alongside your veggies, for pest control and pollenator attractors, it's a win-win for you and your veggies! Sorry, no pics (I left them outside, so they'll be ready to transplant).
Can find some real bargains this time of year, just have to rummage through the ones to far gone. I foolishly skipped marigolds this year and the flea beetles are feasting on my eggplants, the squash beetles are all of my summer squash and the horn worms are a daily walk through and pick them off for the chickens. Not my first choice but nuked it all with Sevin to wipe out the squash and flea beetles and dusted the tomato plants with BT powder. Now you have reminded to go marigold shopping on my trip to town tomorrow! TY!!!
I love the clearance section! I've found some really nice plants there and it's fun to nurse them back to life.
It's sloppy seconds around here. You can put in a second crop but sprouted seeds could get cooked in the hot dry summer heat. Then if it does rain it could easily be a thunderstorm dumping pea sized hail.
The weather is only going to keep getting worse, sorry to be the bearer of bad news. The marigolds are a nice touch, I will have to remember that! I'd also highly suggest indoor gardening, aquaponics sort of thing to anybody capable. I started small and got into microgreens with low power LED grow lights. Nutrient dense foods, great survival concept.
Good way to make some side income if you are so inclined. One of our Market Vendors started dabbling with micro greens about 10 years back and that is all he grows now and sells out every market he goes to. He says he is knocking out $1500 per week in off the books side retirement income. LOL he started out barely being able to give a bag of micro greens away as samples and is making more now from them than he was working a full time job.
FYI, I contacted Harbor Freight, a while back, concerning the wavelength of their often on sale LED strip light. 5000K was the answer, which is always a good choice for plants. They've discontinued one of the strip lights, but the other will either go on sale, or have a good coupon price, quite often. Pretty sure this is the light fixture I'm referring to. Sign up for HF e-mails, and watch for deals! https://www.harborfreight.com/5500-lumen-4-ft-linkable-led-hanging-shop-light-59506.html
Stopped by Lowe's again today, and scored 3 more 8-packs of marigolds. Normally $4.48, got these marked down to $2.02 each! Comes out to ~$0.25 per marigold plant! I'll spend a couple days watering the heck out of them, then transplant 'em into the containers where I've already got tomatoes, peppers, cukes, etc growing.
When I go to Lowes I always look at the fertilizer, lime and mulch for broken bags you can get them for half price---the way prices have increased it helps
