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Post by reed on Mar 12, 2017 10:10:11 GMT -5
Overcrowding has always been pretty much a norm in my little gardens and now that I'm interested in selecting and breeding work I'm seeing it as more of a positive cause of letting me keep more diversity. I'll keep going with my corn, tomatoes, onions, melons, so on and so on but I'm largely relying on other people to give big head start on all of those. Several people are far ahead so I figure I'll just set back and let them keep doing the heavy lifting there. To compensate for their trouble I plan to run a sweet potato seed factory with a mass polycross. I got around 600 seeds last year from eight plants and this year I plan on a minimum of thirty plants with several new varieties added in. Because of difficulty sprouting and for maximum diversity I want a minimum of 100 preferably 250 seeds to include in any trading. The 20 or thirty seeds each I sent out this year just isn't enough. I also want if possible to be able to say what variety the mother plant was. AND I intend to cross I batatas x I pandurata. The issues of space and time for grow outs and selection of better roots will have to be addressed later. Second to the TSPS, I had good luck increasing seed last year of P polystachios so I want to try crossing it to P vulgaris, P lunatus or P coccineus. Any crosses between any of those would be fine but the real goal is a truly hardy perennial bean that's good to eat. The TSPS goal is in sight, the crosses may or may not be possible but I intend to find out.
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Post by reed on Apr 16, 2017 6:06:14 GMT -5
My Utah Heart tomatoes have not sprouted. All the others are growing nicely but no UH. I can't understand it, all the pots were prepared exactly the same. Same soil mix, same amount of water, placed together in the same cold frame but no UH plants. Ten to fifteen nice plants in each of seventeen pots but nothing in the pot labeled UH. I'm pretty disappointed as it is one of my favorites.
I wonder if it would help to put some UH seeds in the pot labeled UH?
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Post by SteveB on Apr 16, 2017 6:32:55 GMT -5
my limited knowledge suggests that seeds are a basic requirement to grow.... But I'm no expert
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Post by steev on Apr 16, 2017 16:08:15 GMT -5
If, however, you can grow plants without seeds, it would be a major agricultural advance; I mean, just stick a label in a pot and watch the magic happen. Perhaps just put a sign "Full Garden" in a field; talk about laborsaving!
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Post by reed on Apr 16, 2017 18:35:24 GMT -5
Heck, if that works I'll take it a step farther and just put labels on canning jars. Even better just print up a nice big collection of reusable menus, then all ya gotta do is slap one down with a napkin three times a day.
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Post by SteveB on Apr 16, 2017 18:52:34 GMT -5
Dang Reed, I was on the way to the patent office when I read this... I'm so outdated...
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Post by steev on Apr 16, 2017 19:59:48 GMT -5
I think we're onto something revolutionary here; this could be bigger than the shmoon.
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Post by 12540dumont on Apr 17, 2017 11:27:30 GMT -5
I like that, menus on a napkin. Definitely revolutionize the farm. Of course, that means I'd have to know what everyone wants to eat.
Maybe I could just get a set of colorforms with plastic placemats, the men could select and plop them on them down. Hmm, would I still have to set the table and wash the dishes?
So, regarding the UH tomatoes. If you have more seeds, trying soaking them for 4-12 hours in a week solution of fish emulsion and water, or Schultz's liquid plant food and water......
I use this method to propagate my tomatoes each year. I have had 100% germ even on store bought seeds!
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Post by reed on May 10, 2017 15:23:20 GMT -5
I drove out the driveway this morning real, real slow admiring my early sweet corn patch. I drove back in this afternoon to see 80% or more of it either gone or laying on the ground. Starlings, I'm sure, as if squirrels and coons needed the help. I'm pretty disgusted over it but I guess I'll replant but about 6 inches deep and never, ever go outside with out a rifle.
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Post by SteveB on May 10, 2017 16:53:56 GMT -5
"One for the Blackbird, One for the Crow, One for the Soil and One to Grow" ...... I suppose we should add a few to cover starlings, deer and coons as well...
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Post by steev on May 10, 2017 19:13:27 GMT -5
I guess when you put the "corn" sign in that patch you forgot to stipulate "starling-resistant".
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Post by reed on May 11, 2017 7:31:58 GMT -5
Yep, should have noted that on the sign.
I have experimented with a camouflage technique that I think has pretty good potential to protect plants, especially young ones from a lot of different critters but especially birds. Don't till and don't weed. Maybe mow first and hoe out your rows and plant. Let it get overgrown till you crop is 6 inches or more tall and then clean out the weeds.
I didn't know what would eat sunroots so when I planted then for the first time last year outside the fences I didn't mow or weed until they were foot and 1/2 tall. At that point deer did find them and nipped the tops but they recovered fine. Also last year I had an early corn patch that got overgrown due to weather and other issues, it was about a foot tall when I cleaned it up and also did fine.
Purposely allowing weeds to the point they largely obscure a crop goes against pretty much all conventional wisdom on gardening but I am becoming more convinced it can be developed into a very useful technique. Saving seed from crops grown that way might breed strains that are fine with it.
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Post by reed on Jun 5, 2017 2:44:09 GMT -5
My melons this year are in a part of the garden not especially suited to melons and it was cool and wet when I planted. Only about 10 musk melons and 3 watermelons look good so I replanted yesterday. I have most of my melon seeds in separate little packs but I bet there is at the very least a pint jar full of each so I decided to plant about a 1/4 cup of of each in my little patch and thin to the best.
I think I'm a little slow on the uptake, as they say. Why the heck didn't I plant a 1/4 cup in the first place instead of acting like I'd paid $3.00 for a few seeds?
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Post by reed on Jun 24, 2017 5:50:19 GMT -5
This has been an interesting year with a few set backs, mostly non garden stuff interfering with my gardens, both of which have suffered some neglect. I'v been able in last couple weeks to get them mostly caught up and rescued from the weeds and just in time as we had nice rain last couple days. To make myself feel better about it I wandered around last night looking for things that were not that bad after all and though I'd do a run down of everything up till now.
Last fall I tilled and fenced a new area and sowed it full of turnips and radishes. The radishes matured back then and self seeded for a nice crop this spring and the turnips did fine also. I'v let them mostly just become weeds and have them growing here and there in all stages with a constant supply of tender shoots and seed pods which I enjoy lots more than roots. This spring or rather late winter I tilled that area again and filed it with all kinds of surplus seeds, more radish and turnips, various brassica, carrots, lettuce and other stuff and lots of it took off on it's own and has provided a good continuing supply of salad fixings.
Lettuce, I planted more this spring in an actual patch and along with the previously mentioned have had a nice continuous crop with a bunch of good plants now in bloom. I got a nice mix of reds and greens with several different leaf types. I'm gonna carefully save a nice supply but let most just scatter itself around to volunteer.
Carrots, my spring planted carrot patch did great and we are eating them now. Happy to see some replanted ones from last fall did fine and are blooming now, I'll get the carrot thing figured out one of these days.
Only have three plants of my brassica mix that lived last winter and think they are primarily kale. Gonna continue work on my winter hardy brassia weeds project. Think it has great potential, I just haven't got the timing right on exactly when to plant. Been enjoying spring planted broccoli and cabbage and burssels sprouts are making now. Little early I think for mature burssels sprouts but fine with me.
My bread seed poppies got much taller than expected and have finished blooming. Had a nice variety of color with dark red and dark bluish ones being my favorites. The woman liked a pink one with white center.
Beans, bush snap beans are ready to go into the canning jars in next couple of days. Great to see that after last year's near total crop failure the pantry is low on green beans. I acquired a new semi-runner bean called Refugee which turned out to be a darn good green bean, just s mall patch so the rest is for seed. Only planted one of my crosses, a pretty purple bean that showed up in my brown greasy patch a couple seasons ago, they are doing fine. Ohio pole, brown greasy, NT 1/2 runner and a couple others are blooming now.
Dahlias have done very well, much larger than I expected from seed grown. Lots of buds but only two have bloomed so far. A pink one with yellowish center and a yellow one with pinkish center. Expect most to be bloomed by end of week.
Miniature gladiolas that I planted last year at the ends of rows overwintered and are 4' tall or more, I'd hate to see normal size ones.
My sunroot patch is big and thick. Appears to be easily controlled just by mowing around it. Apparently energy goes back into the ones you leave rather than trying to resprout in the mowed areas, I'll did some up and try them this year. It's pretty over there with horseradish, rhubarb and patience dock making the first row backed by the sunroots then wild blackberries and then wild burdock.
Peaches and other trees did not set fruit well this year but grape vines are loaded. If I get my act together for it I'm gonna try making some brandy in my stainless steel milk can converted to still.
Garlic is doing fine although crowded with flowers and bulbils popping out of the paper sheaths now. Except for that poor Russian Red, only two plants even made scapes. I see garlic scapes here and there in the weeds where I pitched hand fulls of bulbils along the road. The new garlic I found a few weeks ago is going ahead and making bulbils even though the leaves all died. I'll go back there soon and get more of it.
Onions, got lots of flowering going on with some planted from store bought bulbs. Have one that has turned into a walking onion and also bloomed. Can't tell yet but looks like I may have seed from it crossed with my old walking onions which ave gone insane with a lot of different configurations of bulbils and flowers. All my seed grown onions and leeks are way bigger than I expected in the first season from a seed.
Corn, my first sweet patch is tasseling now. It was all my seed but the plants from su mothers fared better from the cold wet period and bird attack than the ones form se mothers. The Harmony grain corn mixed with my own flour corn is kinda mixed with some doing very well and other plants rather puny. I culled a few plants setting ears almost at ground level. LOVE the looks of the Neandercorn, strong dark green plants and almost 100% stand, no empty spots at all. It is in semi isolation about 20 feet from the other grain patch.
Melons, both musk and watermelons had some issues with the cold wet period with only 1/2 dozen or so of each surviving which are now nice and strong with some blooms on musk melons. Later planted seed has filed in the empty spots.
Tomatoes are doing well with lots of blooms and lots of small fruits. I made them an experiment by just chopping out spots in the wild radish / turnip patch I mentioned earlier. For a while you couldn't tell there were even tomatoes in the garden but then I harvested radish and turnip seeds and hoed here and there and poof, all of a sudden a tomato patch appeared. I left a lot of volunteer turnip and radish to reseed for fall. Might be on to something here in an effort to move to no till. Most of my wild cross tomatoes are not looking good at all and some have died. I saved a few seed for back up and thinking of plating them in pots out on the patio where I can keep a close eye on em.
Potatoes, been enjoying fresh dug potatoes for some time with plenty left to last well into early winter, I'll mostly just leave hem in the ground and dig as needed as we don't have good storage place fr potatoes. Stems dried up on my two seed berries so I brought em in to finish maturing on the window sill. Looks like I'll get few if any seed from my TPS plats. I think they just don't like the heat and most flowers have aborted. Plants are nice and big though so hopeful I can try again with tuber grown plants next year which hopefully will flower sooner.
Sweet Potatoes have taken over my life with way more than I expected to sprout along with bunches of slip grow ones and now up to three volunteers. I found a weed across the road which I assume to be bind weed. It's cotyledons and leaves look almost exactly like sweet potato except it is a climber. I potted one up and set it by my sweet potatoes, I'm gonna try to emasculate it's flowers and see if I can get a cross. I haven't seen any flowers of the I. pandurata along g the road yet but on the look out every day. I'll post more about all this over on the sweet potato thread.
I'm sure I missed a thing or two but the sun is up and the roosters are complaining to be let out so I'll have to finish up later.
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Post by reed on Jul 10, 2017 4:05:33 GMT -5
I have to mention my Neandercorn. Very interesting plants. Lots of ears formed and pollinated already and more coming. Little worried about pollen availability for the later ones but there are a few plants that haven't tasseled yet. Expect quite a bit of crossing with the adjacent patch of mixed flour and flints. Most of the hand pollination I did went from Neandrcorn patch to the other patch. Some of the Neandercorn made huge amounts of pollen. I'll keep careful track of which stalk an ear comes from in case I find any tuberous roots. I'll also try to keep them alive if I do.
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