[gardeners] Uh oh....
Marianne Lepa (gardeners@globalgarden.com)
Thu, 27 Aug 1998 15:59:29 -0400
Well, well, well, I think I got trouble.
Last spring I didn't want to pay the extrodinary US exchange rate to order
a few packets of seeds from the States. (It was, btw, an exchange rate I
now look back on with fondness.) So I chose to forgo trying out the
Zuchinni costata romanesco, aka Green Thighs, the subject of such vitriolic
prose from Liz. Instead, I purchased an innocuous looking variety from
White Rose by the name of "Chefini". As I have a very small vegetable
garden this year, I planted only one Chefini and one Gold Rush zuchinni.
Mistakenly, I later determined, I planted the zuchinni only 3 feet away
from a row of San Marzano paste tomatoes. The tomatoes took off early in
the season, they grew an easy 2 feet in one week, then they kept going. By
mid-June they were over the cages and bounding off in all directions.
Still, the zuchinni were doing well themselves. The Gold Rush got off to a
weak start but was coming along fine. The Chefini, however, grew
supiciously large leaves...larger than I'd seen on any zuchinni before. But
when the first 6 inch fruit was harvested from the plant in late June I was
delighted. It continued to produce one fruit every other day, a pleasant
rate since it's just me here.
However, soon after, the San Marzanos had grown to such a size that the
cages couldn't take the strain and two plants came crashing down on my Gold
Rush zuchinni.
That seemed to make the Chefini mad...
It's begun to vine it's way down towards it's crushed and ailing comrade.
It's putting out three, four, five zuchinnis a day. I can't keep up,
they're becoming huge out there before I can harvest them. Overnight
baseball bat sized zuchinnis appear, and they keep coming. The Chefini
alone is holding up 4 San Marzano tomato plants. These huge leaves are all
tangled in amongst the tomato vines.
Now it's heading for the beets...................
Marianne
Southeastern Ontario AgCan zone 5b