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Post by blueadzuki on Oct 4, 2013 16:25:03 GMT -5
The answer is yes they are still plantable even if they are bare. You may want to discard them if there are actual dings in the meat of the clove (since that often lets fungus in)but simply sans shell is usually OK.
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Post by blueadzuki on Oct 3, 2013 15:23:21 GMT -5
Well when you get right down to it, I'm not sure ANY of this stuff will breed true. With the sheer diversity of odd stuff I found then, I have to assume that pretty much everything is a mixed gene grabbag. And it's not like things necessarily come true anyway. One year every kernel that went in came from one cob, a mixed color one shaped like a cycad cone. All flat kernels all white (the cob was multicolor, but I only planted the white ones) all floury (again mixed but only floury planted) all large. Of the cobs I got back, one came out chinmarked and all flint, one came out mixed white and blue BOTH came out small seeded, and the kernels looked like buttons (though that part had less to do with genes and more with terrible pollination.) I assume that a lot of the flour/flint cobs I got back then were sibs (or even from one plant) simply becuause they look so much like each other; the same short fat stubby strawberry corn like cobs (they all had that for the first two years I found them, it's only the cobs from after that that had the more normal carrot shaped cobs), same breadloaf kernels with a medium arc. Some are white base peri some red, some chin, but that is really all that differed those cobs; they were clones otherwise (and since a chinmarked plant can throw white and red quite easily, the difference is probably negligable.) I know that all of the dent came from two cobs, the one mentioned and a purple long cobbed one which is sort of marginal dent (24 or so kernels had deep dents, the rest were more "cap corn". those were the only two (well probably see further on) As far as origins, that's really I know. The insect damage on the stuff was so bad that pretty much all of the kernels fell off on the way home, so I basically had to take a big pile of loose kernels and sort them back to their respective cobs as best as I could (that's why I said probably; there are a dozen or so dent kernels that look a little different. Whether they are butt kernels from the gourdseed or random dimpled kernels from elsewhere, I have no way of knowing. But I guess I'd have to leave them out of a "pure cob" growout just to be safe.) All of the mini sweet is sib, since it all came off one cob. I haven't really decided what is worth a growout next spring, but if one of these makes it in and I figure out how to keep the critters off long enough to get cobs back, I'll get back to you on the row count.
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Post by blueadzuki on Oct 3, 2013 8:03:41 GMT -5
K, so what I have is a miniature 36 row pink yellow and white gourdseed. Got it, will change my notes. BTW is a row number like that normal for a gourdseed? I haven't had much experience with those, still less with them as they look on the cob. 36 seems unusually high when compared to most of the ornamental corn I have seen (around here the average is 12-18) and super high for a mini (which usually have closer to the 12 side) But given how slender they are, I supposed gourdseeds could normally have higher.
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Post by blueadzuki on Oct 2, 2013 17:35:57 GMT -5
I defer to your greater knowledge. Though actually I would imagine that sweet/pop crosses would result in a lot of corn that was not much good for anything. A popcorn pericarp over a sweet kernel would presumably result in some seriously unpleasantly tough and chewy corn. Sweet can get into ga1? Hmm I may have to re things some things then. When I found that miniature cob two years ago that had the errant sweet kernels. I made a point of keeping the other kernels from the cob (even though none of them were of particular interest to me) because I though the fact it had taken sweet pollen PROVED it could not have ga1, and someone out there might need such seed at some point. But if sweet pollen can take even if it does have ga1 who knows. It's probably still free of it. Heck it may itself be part regular flint, given the kernel shape (like a lot of the "not pop" minis I found back then, the kernels of that one are pretty wide and flat, more like those of a large sized corn than what one usually sees in popcorns) I never sacrificed any to the popper to check (same reason, I thought someone might need them and 1 cobs worth of corn doesn't really go all that far) Speaking of kernel shapes, I need a favor so I stop possibly making an ass of myself. Can someone tell me the actual definition of what "shoepeg" means in a corn? I've been referring to that odd little mini dent I have (the one that has 36 rows on a ear with a diameter of maybe an inch and a quarter) as a "shoepeg", because I though that the definition of a shoepeg corn was one that had kernels that were very thin and linear (like little planks stood up on end) But wandering around the web, I have seen some people define shoepegs based on the ARRANGEMENT of the kernels (that a shoepeg corn is one that has no rows). In which case what I have is definitely NOT countable as a shoepeg since if there is one thing it has, it's rows. Clarification?
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Post by blueadzuki on Oct 2, 2013 15:49:27 GMT -5
Saw something similar today in my Farmer's marked meandering. One of the corn sellers I buy from regularly (though not this year; he has yet to get anyting equal to or better than what I have found at the supermarket) had a pile of popcorn cobs that obviously had had more or less the same thing happened. Mostly powder pink and blue (the stuff was probably a Hopi Pink/Blue mix, based on the shades) but here and there was the odd yellow kernel that showed where a little pollen from a more "conventional" popcorn had gotten in (somewhat tellingly, a lot of the yellow kernels were slightly bigger than their brothers of other colors from different mothers, indicating Daddy was probably a bigger seeded corn)as well as a smattering of kernels of middle orange (pink over yellow) and greeny (blue over yellow). Speaking of cross pollination, there is something important for all of you thinking about popcorn breeding to keep in mind. A lot of popcorns (by no means all but many) have a gene or genes (called the P gene, I think)if a popcorn has the gene, it will ONLY cross with other popcorns; pollen of other corn types will not take. Popcorn without the gene will cross with other corns (as well as P gene popcorns) and can sometimes be used as a "bridge" to get a gene into a p-gene line, but it is an extra step, and it is something to be aware of. I know Joseph knows about it, so presumably all of the popcorn he is planning to use in his crosses is P-gene free. And I think someone did a list once of which named varieties have and do not have crossing problems. Oh and Joeseph, I actually inadvertently found the answer to that question I brought up on another thread (what happens when sweetcorn pollen gets in a flour corn and vice versa.Paiute sweet corn has just that; while it is mostly a sweetcorn, thanks to some errant pollen in it's ancestry it sometimes throws the odd floury kernel as well. At least, the strain sold by Native Seed's does (I don't remember any floury kernels in the packed of Paiute I used, which came from Kokopelli, but I imagine that rogueing out the kernels before the seed is packed is a pretty simply matter if you aren't working with all that much)
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Post by blueadzuki on Oct 1, 2013 17:01:42 GMT -5
I'm actually a little surprised to hear that. Up here in the Hudson Valley, it seems like the MAJORITY of the ornamental corn being offered is a least partially Glass Gem in origin Below is a link to a pic of a supermarket cob (Dan Shantz Farms, Zionsville PA) I got this year (I'm just linking, since I know there is an uploading problem at the moment. It's definitely not PURE Glass gem (not enough colors, and glass gem does not have this level or type of stippling) but the shade of blue and pink and translucence indicate there is probably some GG DNA in there SOMEWHERE. i245.photobucket.com/albums/gg52/Strasheela/glassg_zps9ee3d0c6.jpg. And we are several zones lower than you so our season should be about a month or so SHORTER than yours (or is it that you are so far south that the whole thing's reversed, and it's the SUMMER that is your fallow season, like in Arizona.) Maybe our stuff is only part GG, and part something shorter season The Shatnz stuff tends to have a fairly large number of "surprise" cobs for a commercial growing system so it's quite possible. And who KNOWS where the local FM people are getting their seed (at least Two HAVE to be planting from their own stocks, NO one could get that many weirdoes without some inbreeding.
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Post by blueadzuki on Oct 1, 2013 8:33:12 GMT -5
Why on earth not. A graft isn't the same thing as a cross. The plant systems get linked up but the cells don't mix the cells on the tomato side of the graft are all tomato the potato side all potato. One very rare occasions you can get shoots that are Chimeras (where there are cells from both sides mixed up in the tissue (Laburnocystis is a famous example) but that is rare and even THAT is two discrete cell lines. The tomatoes will produce viable seeds same as any others, but they will be pure tomato genetically, with normal tomato roots. The tubers will produce normal potatoes. As for taste, that depends on what is going where. Normally each part more or less keeps what it makes so there is no cross taste. This is why the famous drug "trick" of trying to graft hop plants onto the roots of marijuana to make "hidden" dope doesn't actually work. The graft will take just fine (I heard it's actually quite and easy one to do) but the cannabidols do NOT move from the roots into the vines. You'll get nice healthy hops but it will be just hops with only the normal hoppish things in it. That being said there ARE a few cases of things that DO manage to make it through and can accumulate and alter the fruit. One of the most famous examples of that were some experiments done in the 50's where the grafted tomato plants onto the roots of Jimsonweed (Datura stratimonium) in an effort to make the tomatoes more cold tolerant. The grafts took, but as the plants matured the alkaloids being made by the roots began being transported into the tomato side, resulting in tomatoes with levels of them high enough to make the tomatoes poisonous/hallucinogenic if eaten raw. So as far as I know that experiment was terminated (though given the number of people who knowingly use jimsonweed to get high, I would not be surprised if someone out there, someone is doing the grafts with the INTENT of making hallucinogenic tomatoes.
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Post by blueadzuki on Oct 1, 2013 6:38:37 GMT -5
Okay, but barring any proof to the contrary, I still doubt that there is anything Anasazi in Anasazi
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Post by blueadzuki on Sept 30, 2013 16:22:38 GMT -5
That should work well for you, Glass Gem is a superflint to begin with, so it is already half way to making a decent popcorn. You only have to work on kernel shape size and endosperm; the starch ratio should already be basically done (If you are working towards popcorn however, I might eliminate that pastel colored cob that is fourth down on the right from the breeding pool. That looks a little opaque and, unless that cob simply hasn't dried down all the way yet, opaque usually means a lot of soft starch so a lousy popper.
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Post by blueadzuki on Sept 30, 2013 16:13:33 GMT -5
Not a lot and what I do have isn't all the positive. The second plants scape also died without making any fertile seed. This was followed by a winter that was really lousy for rakkyo outdoors. It turns out that, while rakkyo has not real problem with cold or even freezing, it can NOT handled long periods of it being both cold and WET, as it was this previous spring (we didn't start getting the warmer days one associates with spring reliably until almost mid June this year. Most of the rakkyo simply rotted in the ground. Of the 60 or so bulbs that had gone in I think only about 4-5 actually made it through alive, and those made bulbs that are only about 1/5 of the size of the bulbs that went into growing them (since rakkyo reproduces mostly from bulb division bulbs tend to grow to full size and split in a single year. You put one bulb in in the fall and when you harvest in mid summer, there's a cluster of 2-3 bulbs (normally 2) the same size as what you put in. sort of like shallots, I guess) And even THAT one came out kind of odd. ALL of the one's that made it were in a little cluster, tight enough to show they had come from one planted bulb. it basically looks like that one made it through by bypassing it's entire "store up food" phase (they do that through the fall and milder parts of winter as well as in the spring), divided the MOMENT it went into the ground at a rate double what is normal and put it's hopes on many tiny bulbs instead of 2-3 normal sized ones. The bulbs I got are also a lot shorter and proportionally fatter as well as being green but since I transplanted them when spring started (with all of the others rotting, I did not want the fit ones to succumb to saprophytic fungi) that is normal, I must have replanted them a bit shallower than I should (when the bulb on rakkyo is deep underground, like it is supposed to be it comes out long and mostly white with a pale pink/purple overlay on parts. If you move the soil so that the bulb is above ground it photosynthesizes and goes green, and for some reason also develops a shorter more round shape. Or it could be genetic (one bulb from last years crop made 3 instead of 2 and was that same odd rounded green shape. Those three were the only ones of my own that got replanted (I ate the rest) all the rest were fresh from the store bulbs. I suppose it is possible the new bulbs were a different less cold tolerant strain than the old ones, and the ones I got are descended from one of the three re-plants.) What I got is now curing in my drawer, waiting for re-plant time around December. Get back to you next spring, when I see what happens
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Post by blueadzuki on Sept 30, 2013 9:58:22 GMT -5
And of course there is the fact that the Sandhill IS a sweetcorn. As far as I know, Native American tribes (at least north American tribes, I don't want to try and make guesses about Mesoamerica and the Andes) didn't grow a lot of sweetcorn, the short season of use, higher pest issues and fairly limited number of thing you can do with any leftovers once they are too old to enjoy as corn on the cob (Native Seeds mentions pinole, but as far as I can tell, pinole counts as a luxury food, not a staple) made going for a "roasting ear" type corn usually a better option for your "green corn" (at least then, when the crop is too old for corn on the cob, you can grind the rest) Again going to Native Seeds, of the eight sweet corns they sell most (possibly all) only have antecedents dating back to the 1800's (i.e. a time period where the influx of habits from Europeans had presumably already well begun.) By that period the Anasazi had been gone for centuries, if not millennia, so little chance they would have had a sweetcorn. And the color mix screams "modern breeder breeding for multicolor" same as for Alan's Astronomy Dominae.
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Post by blueadzuki on Sept 30, 2013 7:40:01 GMT -5
They're ONE of them though the Anasazi are a different tribe than the Aztecs (I doubt that there are many food remains left from the Aztecs; living in the Mesoamerican jungle, nearly everything organic left around eventually rots. The Anasazi on the other hand were desert dwellers, so things often dry and mummify well if put in the right place.) There's another bean called the New Mexico Cave Bean that looks similar (except the red parts are brown) and for which a more or less identical story is told. Ultimately however the whole story is most likely bunk. The longest record for bean seeds maintaining viability is around 50 years, not the 9,300 or so the story claims. Most probably, some archeologist digging around the south west found these beans being grown by the Native Americans around there (so the beans are probably DESCENDENTS of beans grown by the Anasazi (who now that I think of it, some archeologists DO think might have been related to the Aztecs so you might not have been all that off initially) and thought a creative story would make them more attractive and desirable. Oh and before you ask NEITHER of the Anasazi corns (the floury one offered by Seed Savers) or the Sweetcorn offered by Sand Hill have anything to actually do with the Anasazi, both, as far as I know are modern creations. I suppose the Old World analogs would be some of the stories I heard at some point about some of the einkorn wheat strains on the market having been grown from seed retrieved from Neolithic burials, or in Egypt the whole "mummy wheat" and "mummy peas" thing or the so called "King Tut" vegetable strains, the field pea, the grass pea, the tomato(!)
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Post by blueadzuki on Sept 29, 2013 17:00:12 GMT -5
The one problem I can see in that is that NORMAL Oxacan green has a somewhat reddish pericarp (not so red it covers anything, but the cobs and the edges often have a reddish cast. So it think there is a bit of red in the parts of ALL of them. Rouge out anything with a touch of red, and you'd probably end up rouging out the whole population.
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Post by blueadzuki on Sept 27, 2013 15:48:44 GMT -5
I'd say either a cross or somehow you got off type beans in. It is possible to find solid colored beans in variegated populations (for both colors). But everything about yours seems off, the shade of red, the size, the shape. In fact if it wasn't for the fact that you said the beans looked normal when you planted them, I'd call someone slipping you the wrong seeds.
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Post by blueadzuki on Sept 26, 2013 9:44:18 GMT -5
Just in case it is of interest I will point out there are a few other food products you can get off a pine besides the nuts (though since most of them involve picking the cones pre-ripeness, it's really more of an either/or situation, handy if you live somewhere where your cones won't ripen (don't know of such a place, but it probably exists) but in terms of food value your probably better off with the nuts. Some parts of Italy make syrup out of green stone pine cones(no I don't know HOW you make it, just that it is made) . I've had it tastes a little like blueberries. Might come in hand if you need to thin (plus if you develop a taste for it you can also rest secure in the knowledge that by making it yourself you are not paying the $40 per ounce the one company I know of that imported it charged for it. And of course there is Zirbenz That being an alpine product is usually made of Swiss Stone pine, but I imagine Italian should work as well. Hey, there's a distillery somewhere in Oregon making eau-de-vie out of Douglas fir buds. not that I recommend the stuff, it tastes like Pine-Sol (give me spruce beer any old day!)
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