Question
I am a first time gardener in Georgia and think I put to much nitrogen on the vegetable garden. Starting with a plot that has been grass for over 30 years. everyone told me, in this area you have to add a lot of 10-10-10 and nitrogen, so I put a whole bag on. Now the onions, carrots, beets, radishes and garlic are wilted and the leaves are falling off the peppers (bell, jalape駉, habanera, and banana). The corn, potatoes, cucumbers, peas, green beans and squash are looking okay but turning slightly yellow

Answer
Shoot first, ask questions later... Now what?

What you've learned the hard way, unfortunately, is that Chemical Fertilizers are just as bad as I have been telling everybody for a couple years now.  Does anyone listen?  Apparently not.

Excuse me, I will now bang my head against the wall.

********

OK.  Thank God it's Friday.  Where were we?  Oh yes, you just overdosed on Chemical Nitrogen in Georgia.  Great.  May I point out madam that these experts on fertilizer that you consulted -- 'everyone' that is -- are probably NOT first time gardeners.  So we'll blame them for this disaster.

It is you who deals with the mess.  However, it is you who deals as well with the lesson.  And that's a good thing, as Martha would say.  It is in fact a VERY good thing.  Because you're not going to make this mistake again... AND you will know how to correct it and describe this to someone ELSE who makes this mistake.  Because believe me you are not the first.  And you will not be the last.

First:  Lift your stunted vegetables and set them aside in the shade so that they do not incur ANY damage to their roots.  You cannot be too careful with this.  Keep the Soil on the roots, by the way, to cut down on damage.  Remove Soil to make Trenches and pile it up around the edge of each Trench for your root vegetables.  Be sure to mark the end of each Trench/row at the end.

Next:  Go down to the Garden Center, Whole Foods Market, Lowes or Home Depot and pick up some Aged Manure and Aged Compost.  Depending on the size of your plot, purchase enough to cover the plot at least 1 inch thick.  Rake over it like frosting on a cake, nice and even.  Hopefully you took care of the marker at the end of each Trench so that you can still go back to the Trenches.

Next step:  If you have the nerve -- you are new to this, I know -- go over to your local Starbucks and ask them if you can have a whole garbage container filled with their used Coffee Grounds at the end of the day.  Spread this over your Compost layer.  You want to create a barrier between the Vegetables and the poisonous Soil they were growing in.  I'd go into the benefits of Coffee (don't worry about the pH) but I'm way too tired right now and so weary of this problem.  Ask me again later if you would like to read all about it.

Now replant your crops.  Water well.  Hope for the best.

Let me explain what besides o.d.'ing on the vitamins these plants are in for.

Wiping out the bottom of the food chain is always going to impact civilized plants.  Because they depend on the food chain, civilized plants forge alliances with microbes in the Soil, trading nutrients they don't need for nutrients they need more of.  But Chemical fertilizers, as well as pesticides and fungicides, are extremely high in salts and toxic to microbes.  Lots of these microbes are 'good' microbes.  And some -- just a few -- are 'bad'.  Killing off the good microbes means there's no one to fight against BAD microbes.  When that happens, all hell breaks loose.  So fixing your Soil excess NPK is only part of the problem.

But it will fix itself, eventually.

I am falling asleep here just trying so hard to finish this answer to you, because we have a nice long weekend coming up and I know you want to get out there and get to work.  If you have further questions pelase ask and I promise not to take too long to get to them.  I am terribly backed up here.  Thanks for writing,

THE LONG ISLAND GARDENER