In this family we’re all about support: support for trying and not entirely succeeding, support for giving one’s best effort, support for doing the best that you can within reason. Unless you’re a plant, that is. In that case, we refer to the immortal words of one Homer Simpson: “if at first you don’t succeed, give up.”
While we’ve had some wonderful growing successes, some of our plants just didn’t make the cut. While we’re all about giving second chances, we felt that it would stink if we devoted precious gardening space to plants that weren’t going to come up at all, or that weren’t going to do much in the way of producing veggies.
X marks the non-producing squares: this was our least-producing box/pot collection
Thus, some plants have had to be removed. In some cases, the plants were victims of transplanting gone horribly wrong. There are a lot of reasons that transplanted plants can fail to thrive. Sometimes it’s just the shock of moving, other times the process involves damage to delicate plants, there is also the harshness of the elements compared to the cushy lifestyle to which they’d been accustomed. We are also pretty sure that some plants were simply sown too early indoors, and therefore they were far too tall and delicate: they grew thin and spindly because nothing was forcing them to put energy into making strong stems, and as soon as they were faced with wind and rain they simply fell apart.
Dill: demonstrating how to properly adapt to a weak stalk. Whatever works.
In any case, Mike pulled and replaced the following: some basil was replaced with jalapeños, some tomatoes were replaced in kind and some with peppers, some peppers were also replaced in kind, marigolds (that never even sprouted) were replaced by pepper and broccoli, squash was replaced by melons (of what sort, I’m not sure, nor is the little taggy thing very helpful in this regard), and some parsley was replaced in kind. In the pots Mike planted broccoli in lieu of both squash and melons. I’m a little sad about the (apparent) dearth of squash, but I’m reassured by my mother’s ability to produce bumper crops of squash year after year.
Melon: aka Squash Supplanter (note the helpful tag which reads "Melon." Thanks for that).
Parsley: new and improved (alive, that is).
I would also like to point out, at this juncture, that in spite of my aforementioned cavalier attitude to unsuccessful plants, Mike has not entirely given up hope. The pulled plants have been given a second chance at life in a heap of sod next to our compost pile. Best of luck to them. Mike had lots of fun replanting these transplants. Or something like that!
The Plant Retirement Patch
I learn new words from you.
Such as?
It’s a long list…. There is a reason I cannot win scrabble. This week it was Dearth. Every day I thank you.