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Post by Leenstar on Feb 5, 2012 20:55:04 GMT -5
I have noticed two different growth habits. I can only speak for Aunt Molly with which I have experience.
Ones I grew inside and transplanted were prostrate. Translants I tried from the SSX were also prostrate.
When I direct seeded the plants two year ago they were no prostrate instead they grew long stems and stood up a good foot above the ground
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Post by oxbowfarm on Feb 6, 2012 7:20:11 GMT -5
oxbow, in my experience, the key to taking husk toms to market is sampling. a bit of spottiness is fine on husks if people can see that the fruit looks and tastes fine underneath. Do you find that they sell well then? I do love them myself. I just can't see how to get any money out of them at market. Sort of puts them in the same category as raspberries. Delicious but not economical to pick. |
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Post by canadamike on Feb 6, 2012 8:52:54 GMT -5
They are becoming quite popular in Quebec, there is a guy making 50 acres of them and he is doubling his size. He does them on hills, covered with black plastic. He blows them with a leaf blower in a special 4 feet wide net when they are on the ground...that is the only way he can harvest them economically.
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Post by seamsfaster on Feb 7, 2012 0:05:35 GMT -5
I grew four plants each of both _Physalis peruviana_ and _P. pruinosa_ in 2011.
The intense, unique, sweet-tart flavor of Inca Berries has made it one of my favorites. They are a great size (3.1 gram average) for snacking too. The main problem is that it takes so long (135 days plus) for the berries to fully ripen, and they are just not worth eating until they are bright orange with dry husks and on the ground without any human intervention. In my area (176 frost free days), these would be very well suited to growing in high tunnels or greenhouses.
In contrast, I got my first ripe Aunt Molly's ground cherries on June 8th, just 28 days after tranplanting, and harvest continued until heavy frost in early November.
Aunt Molly's were a big hit with my customers in 2011 (I'm growing on just 1/8 acre). I hosted a tomato tasting event in September and threw in some of these just to see how people liked them. They scored 10's across the board, beating out 83 varieties of tomatoes.
I only grew 4 plants in 2011, but will be trying to squeeze in at least 100 this year. To make harvesting manageable, I plan to plant through landscape fabric in a single row down the middle of a 3' bed. I'll staple the center of the fabric to the ground between the plants, then raise both edges to a frame about 8" off the ground, thus leaving a v-shaped catchment setup for easy and essentially bug-free harvest.
I like the idea of using some sort of vacuum cleaner in addition to this setup, but I can't imagine dealing with even one acre of these tiny (1.4 gram average) berries.
You know those cheap wire "tomato cages"? They are just right for Aunt Molly's ground cherry vines to get them up off the ground a bit. Inca berry vines seem to grow upright (up to 5') without much need for support.
I think (and hope...) that using this setup will make Aunt Molly's, and similar ground cherry varieties, marginally profitable on even a very small scale for CSA's and farmers markets.
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Post by johninfla on Feb 15, 2012 13:49:31 GMT -5
My wife is from Peru and during our last visit (three years ago) to see the inlaws we stopped at the Gold Museum in Lima. In the gift shop they had dried aguaymantos dipped in choclolate. The whole family gobbled the entire bag in five minutes. They were delicious! When we came home tried to find out what aguaymanto was in English.....it turns out it is the cape gooseberry. Since then we have grown them fairly easily EXCEPT that the germination rate is really low for us. They take a long time to sprout but once growing they grow really well here in northern Florida. The dried ones make a passable raisin and they are good fresh on top of a salad but the best for me is when they are dipped in chocolate!
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Post by richardw on Feb 17, 2012 14:08:02 GMT -5
I just wonder, if ground cherries could be harvested with a vacuum cleaner with a little adaptation? I mean, they fall to the ground before you want to pick them, it's mostly a question of how you quick and convenient gather them. Love the taste of them Does anybody have surplus of seeds of Physalis heterophylla and/or Physalis subglabrata ? Does anyone know what type of Physalis i have in the photo,would be happy to take seed from it if want some toad i416.photobucket.com/albums/pp247/Medburygardens/IMG_0001-11.jpg |
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Post by ottawagardener on Feb 17, 2012 15:53:06 GMT -5
Do you have a closeup of the flowers or fruit? Am I right to say that the leaves and stem are hairy and the leaves greyish underneath?
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Post by richardw on Feb 18, 2012 4:06:20 GMT -5
Do you have a closeup of the flowers or fruit? Am I right to say that the leaves and stem are hairy and the leaves greyish underneath? Ok i'll get a close up in the morning |
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Post by littleminnie on Apr 24, 2012 21:09:26 GMT -5
Do you think 3 ground cherry plants would be too many for me and my customers? They don't produce THAT much do they?
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Apr 24, 2012 23:38:31 GMT -5
You 're lucky for the source of plant material. I'm getting a near 100% success rate from cuttings of Cape Gooseberry / aguaymanto in moist, open ground. A trader has reported a high germination rate for my seeds, when under controlled conditions, but my seeds were not as successful, when I planted them in the open. |
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Post by iva on Apr 24, 2012 23:49:54 GMT -5
Littleminnie, they don't produce THAT much. Three plants would be enough for you, certainly not enough for your customers. If I were to sell fruits, I'd go for at least 15-20 plants on a smaller scale...
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bertiefox
gardener
There's always tomorrow!
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Post by bertiefox on Apr 25, 2012 6:29:51 GMT -5
I know people who love both, but whenever I've grown them, my reaction is always the same.
I take a ripe one from the plant and taste it. Tastes great, all that blend of pineapple and apricot and so on in the flavour.
Then a few seconds later, there's an 'after taste' which is rather strange and unpleasant, that makes you think, 'Is this stuff poisonous?'
Perhaps the way to enjoy them is fresh with cream and sugar, or maybe better stewed.
I'm sure I'm not alone in having this enigmatic response to their taste.
Peruviana are lots better than pruinosa in this respect too.
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Post by johninfla on Apr 25, 2012 8:18:50 GMT -5
I'm not sure people here would buy them ripe from the garden, BUT if you dry them and cover them in chocolate I think it's a whole different kettle of fish. When we first tried them it blew my mind how good they were that way.
John
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Post by Deleted on Apr 25, 2012 20:00:56 GMT -5
My friend has invited me to stock his fruit stand. I was thinking of a mix, in a basket, with heirloom tomato, purple tomatillo, cape gooseberry, garden huckleberry, morelle de balbis...
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Post by Joseph Lofthouse on Apr 25, 2012 20:50:04 GMT -5
My friend has invited me to stock his fruit stand. I was thinking of a mix, in a basket, with heirloom tomato, purple tomatillo, cape gooseberry, garden huckleberry, morelle de balbis... Have you ever tasted garden huckleberry? I did for the second time last summer. We grew them when I was in Kindergarten. It was such a horrid traumatic experience that I didn't grow them again for 40 years, but memory fades, and last year I tried them again. Oh my gosh!!! Small little berries that are hard to pick, and taste insipid. But I made a pie... With a furious enough blender, and gobs of lemon juice, and a bag of sugar it was barely palatable:  |
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