Teen mom Anaheim pepper.
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I hesitate to expand on the metaphor. 
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Go for it. It’s very young plant, barely a foot tall.
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I believe if you remove that “little one” the whole plant will shift more energy to the roots and plant, and do better in the long run. 
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You want me to…terminate? What if it breaks her heart and she just gives up?
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…
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I agree with you. Past experience told me, small size plant with early fruits would end with few. Better root system and more leaves = a lot more crops. Add fertilizer that helps growth of leaves and roots. When plant in adult size, reduce watering to promote flowers.
My first trial of “bunching onions”, or Allium fistulosum, in 5 gallon buckets with GroBucket inserts.
The usual Dwarf Tomato Project tomato suspects
Look at all the flowers on this one! It was kind of distorted and had white patches.
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In the better-late-than-never department, our spring veg are finally starting to come in. Daytime temps remain in the upper-50’s to low 60’s - unusually cool for the PNW at this time of year. Tomatoes and peppers look abysmal, but the rest of things are doing OK.
Here’s today’s pick of leafy greens. Washed, spun, and put into green bags with paper towels - it should be enough to carry us through the week.
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I applaud your skill. i used to have a house that was good for growing greens, this one is not. Makes me miss my arugula and cilantro
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The onions and tomatoes look good. Are the tomatoes getting calcium fertilizer or a source at the roots? Cal-Mag can help with that, just don’t use it during the hot part of the day. That may clear up the white patches, or keep them from forming. Your CA sun may also be at work.
A. fistulosum gets huge! Three feet tall is not uncommon. they’re very useful and a good stand-in for scallions, which have become pricey out here.
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My 3rd year of growing a few peas, and this year one of them is just racing to be the tallest, lankiest pea stem I’ve ever seen. Even as a seedling, it sprouted fast, and it was twice the height of its fellow seedlings. Now that they are outside and planted, the plant is just beginning to flower and the top already has exceeded the height of the trellis. It’s sitting in a raised garden bed, so I can’t add any more height to this. Have you had these over-achieving pea plants before? What’s a practical way to manage this and not damage the plant or discourage flowering and pea development?
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All the boxes have fresh Epsoma organic food, Garden Tone in this case, and Garden Lime left from previous seasons, but in a few boxes I accidentally used extra food and no lime, and the white patches showed up in two of fourteen plants a day or so later.
I checked the pH and they where 8+ (if the pronged 3 way meter is to be believed, but I don’t know why that would effect some plants and not others.
I took the plant out of the box, put it in a gallon pot with fresh ProMix for about a week, crossed my fingers, then put it back after replacing more container mix.
It is still stunted, several weeks later.
All the boxes have fresh Epsoma organic food, Garden Tone in this case, and garden lime left from previous seasons, about half old container mix and half new.
In a few boxes I accidentally used extra food and no lime, and the white patches showed up in two of ten plants a day or so later. I checked the pH and they where 8+, but I don’t know why that would effect some plants and not others. I took the plant out of the box, put it in a gallon pot with fresh ProMix for about a week, and crossed my fingers.
It is still stunted, several weeks later.
One of the other boxes was leaking sediment, so I took it completely down and found this sediment below the “aeration screen”.
You are supposed to be able to re-use mix for “four seasons” I think think. Every year I completely replace the mix in a few boxes, but I can’t do all of them every year.
OK, let’s start with the pH meter. I’ve not found metal probe pH meters to be even close to accurate. A proper pH meter has a permeable glassy bulb at the tip, which must be kept moist, usually in either a pH 7 or 4 buffer solution. The meter’s caps are normally designed for this. Most importantly, they can be calibrated for accuracy. Extech makes several pH meters, which I use. You’ll need both above buffer solutions for calibration. A spray bottle with distilled water is very handy for rinsing off the meter’s probe. (Do not store the probe tip in distilled water.)
To test soil, mix one part soil with two parts distilled water, in a plastic or glass container that was rinsed with distilled water. Mix and let sit for some hours, 8–24. Rinse off the meter probe and measure the water above the sediment. You want a pH that’s slightly acid; pH 6.5–6.8 is ideal for tomatoes.
The white patches may be either fertilizer burn, or possibly high conductivity/salt content, which can affect some varieties more than others. The solution is to leach out salts. Unfortunately, the way to know if this is the issue requires another meter, a Conductivity or Water hardness meter. I use this one. To test, one runs some water through the containers and collects a sample of the water. Don’t use a meter that measures TDS or PPM: they are arbitrary and not always accurate. The conductivity/water hardness meter will give values in µS/cm (microsiemens/cm). If the water is testing very high, say 900 µS/cm or higher, dissolved salts may well be too high.
If plants don’t grow out of it once soil issues are corrected, other causes coule be:
Broad Mites-microscopic, pale mites. The males have to whip-like rear legs. They are quick to hide and only visible under high magnification. Broad mites inject a toxin into plants which can deform them, long term.
Aphids, mites, and/or thrips-a magnifying glass can help reveal these.
Virus-Any plant can get virused. The only solution is to destroy it.
Fungal damage to the roots or vascular system. If the roots look unhealthy, it’s best to pitch the plant.
Anaerobic bacteria can either infect plants or damage roots by removing oxygen in soils that become too wet and mucky. Often, they give off an unpleasant sulfurous odor. Prevention is the best solution: check the soil and drainage.
And still another cause is genetics. Seeds can have variations or mutations that make them stronger or weaker. If you start more seedlings than you need, and pick out the strongest-looking, you usually avoid weak genetics.
It looks like the easiest solution is to pitch the stunted plants, just in case. I’d carefully examine those, far from the rest, just to look for any clues. Then, carefully wash your hands and any tools!
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Thank you again, for sharing so much useful information!
Hmmm…let me think 
…I’m going with pulling the still stunted plant ( one of the two is doing much better), examining it, then tossing it. Who really needs 14 tomato plants?
I actually have a pH meter from a previous consultation!
Ill have to make better use of it.
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first raspberry of the season. spring has been very off and on this year, so pollination was not 100%. i’m eating the very first fruit. but the bulk will be put back into the ground to hasten the creep of the raspberry plants from the shaded west facing front part of the house to the sunny south facing side of the house.
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Nice, and I like your planter. Do you mind sharing where you garden? I am in Northern California.
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Coastal South Carolina!
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