What Went Well, Bad, and Changes Necessary For A Better 2024 Garden (Tips & Ideas) | BONUS HUGE NEWS 

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Great advice Zach

Peas LOVE mushroom compost. For the tomatoes- turn the cattle panels into arches and guide the plants over them: yes add some center braces.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING TO ALL!!

We used ground red pepper for pest control to stay organic.

Absolutely plant the flowers where they can be seen and enjoyed. Correct spacing will give a higher yield. Intentional planting is beneficial. ❤️😁

Thank you all. I just placed my order but need oils too oregano and Calendola. Wishing everyone Blessed Sunday. Lv and Prayers to all.

Thanks for all that you do and share we us!! 😊

GOOD DEALS

I'm a little east of y'all in Taylor County, KY. I experimented with sweet potatoes in one of my raised beds cause hubby loves them. Planted 6 slips, harvested a bushel of HUGE sweet taters!! That went well. Happy hubby!! Put my herbs in big pots filled with potting soil and they did not do so well. Not sure if it was the soil or the neighborhood cats using the pots as litter boxes, but little yield on the cooking herbs. Will do something different next year!

We live in Texas and the summer heat kills our garden. I interplanted my okra and Swiss Chard. It turned out great. When it got to 115⁰ and I gave up on watering and told my garden to just die the okra shaded the chard and while everything else died when I went to plant my fall garden most of the chard was alive!

I am totally redoing my garden. Expanding it , moving everything. I figured out. I can take 2 raised metal bed kits 4x8x1 and combine. It makes a 4x20x1 bed. Pretty cool. You get an extra 4ft of garden bed ....by combining the 2 kits. Soil I have changed up. Pro mix , cow manure, fertilizer and perlite. Hoping this next season crops will be awesome. Also installing trellises. Already 10yds of pro mix from a nursery. Will need one to two more deliveries. But I am on track to have my beds ready come spring. Have fun yall

I'm in zone 9B. I have decided that I will not do zucchini or cucumbers again. We just can't seem to figure them out. Our cukes get powdery mildew no matter what we do and the zucchini just don't produce. My onions and potatoes were amazing and my green pepper plant is 2 years old and it's production was 4 times what we have ever gotten - it's still producing and I will baby it over the winter and hope it will make it to it's 3rd birthday. Because we have hot, dry summers early girl tomatoes are the best way for us to go and get them started in the greenhouse in January and plant mid-March for an early harvest. Zack - I love seeing you smile and your energy was great! I'll be ordering some product from you but I can't until after Thanksgiving so I'm glad you are running black Friday until 12/1 I just hope you have product left by then. ♥

Since you guys grow such beautiful flowers, have you added Bouquet of cut fresh flowers to your store? Put a bucket of cool water in the store and put maybe 4 bunches of mixed flower bouquets. Or maybe have customers look over your flower garden and point out the flowers they want. Just a thought

Really enjoyed this video. Definitely helpful.

Try setting up a fence for your peas with some chicken wire stretched between some t-posts. I’ve found that my peas attach and grow on that much better. I think it’s because there’s more options to attach too. Cattle panels are big open squares. Chicken wire is tiny squares 🤷‍♀️

Some great advice and ideas today. Thanks!

Zach, I only grow broccoli in the fall here in SE VA, w the cabbage, collards. Dont overlook the leaves as well. They are sweet and wonderful greens in eggs, omelets. I blanch and freeze. Just as nutritious as the fruit, treat them like collards. Also, in summer youve GOT TO COVER THEM and rotate year to year. The trap crop idea works too.

Thank you for the awesome deal. Got myself some stocking stuffers 😊

Zach, I too, have no green thumb w peas, no mater what I changed or tried. However, I've noticed over the last 2 yrs that once the sun goes lower it casts a shaded area( bc of neighbors house) on 2 of my beds. They are cool loving crop, I'll be fall planting next yr. 🤞

Direct sow the peas as early as possible. Some sort of netting might work better.

We never pruned our tomatoes. Our yield was fantastic always!!

Great video!

I still have a patch of calendula growing in with celery here in mid-Kentucky! Small tomatoes were prolific, but large had a hard time. I do have a problem with birds and ripening Tomatoes. Had to use shade cloth to keep them off. Am still growing collards kale Brussels sprouts in raised beds. Your farm is this 70 yr Olds dream. Yes, plant more food, fruit and flowers. Fyi, first year growing sunflowers from seed. The heads folded over as soon as they formed. None stood looking to the sun. What's wrong??

I live in a northeast Indiana in a suburban setting. Not a large back yard but not the smallest either. The last couple of years my garden plants have had slower growth due to the hotter weather here for longer periods. I was blessed to have enough in my rain barrels to water them. I have been changing to raised beds from in ground. I put a good quality of dirt in them. I added rabbit poo along with my regular compost. The plants did really well as far as growth. Berries, Eggplant and peppers did exceptionally well. Tomatoes average. My cucs and peas did basically nothing this year. I got my first GreenStalk the end of June. I transplanted bush bean plants from deck railing boxes. They did fantastic. So much that I have bought two more already for next year. This will free up more garden space. My greens did and still are doing well. So more greens in them next year. We did have the smoke from the Canadian fires. Enough of it for a haze to linger and remain indoors alerts. MIgardener had a great video on the effects this is and will cause. It’s scary. You do need to rely as much as possible on yourself rather than grocery stores. Improvements - fresh quality dirt, good amendments, hog panel arches for the vining plants, stuff, extended in ground and more Greenstalk’s. For next season I am adding shade cloth, more shredded leaf around the plants, more Greenstalk.

Hey @StiversHomestead ! I wanted to share an okra tip that GREATLY increased our yield, AND made harvest almost painless. When you cut the fruit off, cut the leaf below it off also. It keeps the okra stalks clean and you won't get your arms all eaten up. I leave the top 15ish leaves for photosynthesis purposes, and put okra for 10-11ft tall, with a TON. We had one 50ft row and grew enough for the year for our family of 4. We planted our okra on the last West end, because it gets SO tall we wanted to allow the things planted to the east of the okra time through the day to get it's sunlight, because the okra gets so tall it's going to get its sun regardless 😂 by planting in on the west side of the garden, it didn't shade anything too long. If you haven't tried the trimming the leaves under the pond, try it! It was definitely a game changer for us!

Hello you all..I haven't been watching alot of u-tube/ alot going on,I am sorry. Glad store is doing great& you & Jen are going strong. Sounds like you are happy & blessed. Take care.👍🙏🤗💞

Great video guys

We grow A few hot peppers and dry and grind them and then add 1/4 cup to a gallon of water in early spring spray the plants when we see the bugs works Great!! No Chemicals I use Milk jugs

Love you Stiver's 🌷🌺 God bless 🙏❤️

I plant some yarrow and it was amazing green beans did ok sweet potatoes for the first time and it was a good crop I’m starting on raised bed .

Just wanted to let you know that RU-vid hasn’t been showing me your videos. I was off work today and thought, hey I haven’t seen the Stivers in a while. I plugged you in and am catching up on y’all’s videos. Didn’t know you did seasonings,just ordered some plus a couple tinctures. Hope you had a great Thanksgiving,and you feel better soon ❤️

Wed page. Will pray for Mr.wesley

What about carrots.,potatoes.,garlic in the ground??

I put my sweet peas in as early as the ground can be worked in the Spring here in n. Idaho. And use some chicken wire or a size larger th put acrosx those cattle panels! You can put a row on both sides of the fence. They dont like the high heat!

If you grow the pumpkins for sale try some white ones too! Alot of people like them but unless you grow them yourself they are hard to find! Just a suggestion!

we like to plant pie pumpkins

I want to grow herbs. I have never done that. Also we have been building raised beds for the first time. Then finding a different system to do tomatoes.

Our green beans didn’t grow at all, this year. We’ve decided not to grow them anymore. We don’t eat enough of them. I’m going to try growing sugar snap peas instead. We eat a lot of peas.

I had a pretty good garden year but I just can’t seem to grow Brussel Sprouts! 🤦‍♀️🤷‍♀️ I actually got celery this year (first time ever!) started from seed so I’m super stoked!

Okra did well cherry tomatoes but nothing else!❤️🙏🏻🇦🇷🇺🇸

Like you, I need to plant fewer plants, especially tomatoes. I got overzealous and had over 25 plants in too small of a spot. They didn't have enough air and were hard to harvest. It was a jungle! 😊 we battled critters and deer this year for the first time. But oh wel, I guess we fed nature this year. I ended up not having time for canning anyway due to losing my mother in law in Sept.

Try peas in the fall!

Fishing lines fence, deer can't see the barrier.

Hey Guys

I never have any luck with corn

Cover your peppers i leave mine in the greenhouse all year zone 6a. until I did this my pepper yield was puny and not until the end of the summer. It got 114 in there and they were still loving it! You do need to water more but its worth it.

I used nylon mesh trellis for my bean and peas. Works great, but disposable. I think it’s impossible to remove the vines and reuse.

Try just interplanting your flowers with your veggies.

My peppers did great! But I learned to plant them later because, like you, my harvest doesn't come until August/September.

Those Mexican Beans Beetles are ...hun.gry.... here in NC too

PEAS....I put up cattle panel, then zip tied a bird netting on to that...bumper crop!

A lot of similar results in 6aNY. Wish you'd walk in the garden some. Or a tidying vid?

Can't find seasons on wedpage.

Hi Stivers!!!!! 6B GARDEN TIP FROM SOUTH JERSEY! This year I tried a “trap plant” and planted “love lies bleeding” amaranth scattered on one side of the garden, and all the bugs were attracted to them and stayed there and ate the majority of that plant down while leaving my other veggies like tomatoes and beans etc alone! I highly recommend it!

I think my tomato yield would be same if I didnt prune. I get lazy at the end of the season & they do fine

What went well? Peppers of all types, tomatoes, okra, onions and garlic! What went wrong? I got zero squash due to squash bugs, cucumbers didn't do well this year.

Growing your greens says you only get a 10% increase on pruning tomatoes. We quit pruning too.

Swiss Chard went way too good! Cauliflower did great as did turnips, I’m working on cabbages. The squirrel ate all the onions, garlic, tomato p,ants, squash, etc.😢 my onions are already bulging up, hope I get to eat them!

What tinture would you yourself try if u had a blood presure problem do u have one

Thank you for sharing all this common sense information. I just realized that I was no longer subscribed to your channel. Who's unsubscribing your subscribers?

Zack I’m in WV zone 6 a/b. My peas, green beans, and zinnias did horrible too. Do the deer eat up pumpkin? If they don’t then I have lots a space got them. I want to grow banana pumpkins

I love how your animals gather around each other so peacefully. A beautiful sight!! They are happy animals. Your shop is inviting and pretty. Jen has done a magnificent job. You two are a great team! Blessings🙏🏻

I planted cherry tomatoes in grow bags they looked beautiful with the blooms on but then started dropping the blooms. Maybe two gallon bags off 6 plants. Only thing that did great was potatoes. 3 pumpkin plants.. only 3 pumpkin that were very small. 2 cucumbers plants . 12 qt pickles. None to eat fresh. Carrots never grew after they peeked through the garden. Acorn squash blossomed. I felt I worked very hard for nothing. Very disappointed. Love your videos. Would love to purchase from your store. Just have no extra money at this time.Happy Thanksgiving 🦃🦃

We live in a pretty large neighborhood and deer decimated our garden. It went from bad to worse. Everything in our greenhouse got eat up by aphids and worms. We have a tiny garden (just enough for 2) so this year was very disappointing. At least the wildlife got fed. 🙄

I can grow hot peppers by the buckets, but I've never gotten good yields on sweet bell peppers. Anyone got a suggestion?

Peas…instead of using a metal fence for peas, why not cut some branches and brush for them to climb. You can make it look very nice. It’s how they did it in the old days when they didn’t have metal fencing.

I know how yall truly believe in our heavenly father , Can yall please pray for my husband wesley vercrouse he has serious health issues and we see the dr 2mrw about test results please anyone can yall please pray for him God can do all things! Thank yall in advance! And thank you for your videos!

I did 20 tomatoes ..but I might just do 4 .. and focused on my green beans …-cucumbers did well but I want some pickling cucumbers next year what

OMG I AM A FOOD HORDER & I PROBABLY PICKED 50# OF GREEN BEANS shared with a LOT of people okra didnt do crap beets did wonderful peas not enough of cabbage never headed & califlower never headed

Such wise advice in this video! Thanks for sharing your thoughts and advice.

My peas do best when I use a bean and pea inoculant when i plant. I can tell a big difference when I don't use it.

Maybe have a few flower beds near store ?people can buy bouquets ? Linda from Ct

Could you plant extra flowers next year to sell at the shop??? Love the idea of them being up front and seen

We tried Jet Star tomatoes this year and fell in love with them. Also, area 5b we noticed our pepper plants were struggling bad through the Summer, but once things started cooling down...They started to finally start producing. Gonna try planting them in a more shaded area next Spring. Would like to try growing some pumpkins-small and sweet potatoes too. We'll see.

We had an excellent potato and onion harvest this year so, we expanded what we did and prepped more room for next year. We also had tomatoes for the first time, unfortunately, we had to pick them green because they were very late so I need to get them in sooner. We also started converting to raised beds which made a world of difference. We are building raised beds through the winter and are already looking forward to the new garden season.

Zac and Jen.. those Mexican bean beetles have invaded my garden the last 3 years also. Thanks for the tip. I really enjoyed your Airbnb garden while we visited this year and hope to come back again next year. Thank you for the garden updates and look forward to more!!

I am adding new raised beds to the garden to replace the old. I bought seeds. I also like to add something new each year to the mix.

I will not be planting a garden. At least not for myself. I have gone carnivore, only eating meat, no vegetables, no grains, no sugar, extremely limited on fruit. It has been extremely beneficial on many fronts.

Thank you for your honesty in goods AND bads. Always helps to hear that we are not the only ones having some failures. We learn from them.❤ Also, we grew cosmos for the first time this year and they were such a beautiful flower to see along with the zinnias (also one of my favorites). God bless y'all 🙌 ❤️ and much love.❤

Mexican bean beetles are horrid!! This year I put on gloves and smashed hundreds. Maybe that will reduce their numbers next year.

Just placed an order! Thanks for always great vids and looking forward to trying your products ! From one farmer to another :)

Appreciate you and your family. God bless you all with health and piece.

YAY!!!! I love yall's gardening videos!! I could talk about gardening every day. Thank you for this video and sharing what went well and what went bad. The one thing you said that really stood out to me was that we "don't need to be growing a bunch of different varieties of vegetables and getting small yields". That's exactly what happened this year in my gardens. I ordered a lot of seeds with a lot of different varieties and I didn't get as many vegetables as I did last year. Please keep the gardening videos coming even though winter is coming...they help me keep my sanity until Spring!

You guys should really try planting some Echanacia plants, also sometimes called cone flowers. They are a beautiful flower and also a medicinal plant. I think you would really like it Zack because you love planting flowers and Jenn can use them for tinctures also.

Two things we did this year. 1) added a scoop of composted sheep manure in the hole under each plant. So many beautiful peppers! 2) we couldn't afford a load of soil so we put straw in the bottom of our gallon growing pots under 6" of soil and worms made us soil all summer and we now have double the soil we started out with.

Zack we used to raise a lot of tomatoes and I always put a row of panels about a foot apart on each side of the plants . That way you have twice as much support as well as places to tie to . I used combination panels that way small groves at the bottom and larger spaces at the top for threading heavy fruit and branches thru . Your deal just a thought .

Plant peas in the ground. Transplanting peas is not the way to go. Also use string to let peas climb

We loved the cottage garden! There's never enough tomatoes! :)

Tomatoes, okra and jalapeños grew really good this year. Cayenne peppers grew ok. Bellpeppers, squash, habanero, watermelon, pumpkin and a mess of other peppers not so good. Had a hard time keeping th chickens and turkeys out of the garden. I moved to Tennessee in March so I had to at least try and grow stuff. I had a bunch of birds and am now down to about 250 of them they are all free-range so next year i will have a fence around the garden to hopefully keep them out. Thanks for all the great videos you put out. You guys are so inspirational! Keep up the great work!

I didn't trim my tomatoes this year, I didn't even stake them and they were FANTASTIC!! WISCONSIN 4B..CANT WAIT TILL NEXT YEAR

My soil is heavy clay with heavy shade, so I mostly garden in containers.. This year I tried planting potatoes in my Greenstalk ... the only tier that did really well was the very top tier. I'm planning on building a raised bed that I can try growing potatoes in next year. It was a beautiful sight to see a tower full of blossoms, but the yield was really low. The tower that I planted herbs in was awesome. This was the first year I was able to use fresh herbs all summer AND be able to dry quite a bit to use this winter!

I caught a master gardener on PBS years ago, from his suggestion of using old pantyhose, i cut ring from my old ohe to tie up tomatoes to cattle panels. Connecting a few together allows me to tie up several limbs at once when they get wild. The limbs dont chafe and are allowed to grow big but are still supported. Just grab a handful on your morning walk and tie some up. Just an fyi

I had to chuckle... wait till your son hits 14!

Danny & Wanda at deep south homestead has great info pn growing peas & okra. Timing & constant harvest improves # yield on most veggies. 😊

Ya’ll got the space to dedicate to the huge Jack-O-Lantern pumpkins plus the “odd” ones! Both sell well and you can market them with by having mini harvest festival at your place to draw locals in.

We did the cattle panels in a arch over our walkway and had a great yield. We planted early. We are also in Ky.

I hear you on the beans and bugs. I was not able to harvest enough beens to even can. Maybe spring 2024 will be different!

I am excited to see your tomato cages. I also have went to no pruning and I have always used a cattle panel. Like you, I thought I need a better trellis system. They are too much of a jungle. I want something like individual cages for each plant but not the flimsy ones. So I am excited to see what you use. Thank you!

Have you tried covering your green beans with a mesh cloth (like the kind that keeps out the cabbage butterflies)?