|
Post by blueadzuki on Feb 19, 2020 15:39:41 GMT -5
My dilemma with the idea of seed stewardship is that I am very very good at FINDING unusual seeds and very very bad at actually getting them to grow (defining grow as "grow until I can get seed off of them). My soil is poor (on a level where enriching it all is too expensive to be viable) my space very limited, and my critter level unbelievable. Don't feel bad... You are not unique. I'm in the Sandhills, and... Between the bottomless white sand, constant droughts, root knot nematodes, voles... Raccoons, possums, rabbits... Surprising that anything lives at all... Seems like I only get a couple years out of a plot due to the nematodes, no matter how much manure/compost I use! So... A couple years of veggies, and then... Plant walnuts.... Clear additional brush... shovel turn more sand... Still... It's a goal to find anything that will grow in these conditions... Or... Develop food crops through seed saving over time.... You can always try Manchurian Walnuts. From what I have seen online, they'll take almost ANYTHING (their cold tolerant down to zone 20. ( link)
|
|
|
Post by blueadzuki on Feb 16, 2020 2:35:38 GMT -5
No, I mean they literally grow UNDERGROUND, like peanuts. THAT'S why they are called Bambarra Groudnuts (and why the species name is subterrenea.
Those two are both long season ones, so you NEED a greenhouse. This also applies to the red ones Sacred Succulents has, and the brown ones Trade Winds Seeds has (I think the speckled day neutral ones were Baker Creek, but they don't seem to have them). I have the Malagasy ones Richter's had before they had the ones they have now (though I suspect these are in fact the exact same beans, as they look identical).
|
|
|
Post by blueadzuki on Feb 15, 2020 19:29:46 GMT -5
My dilemma with the idea of seed stewardship is that I am very very good at FINDING unusual seeds and very very bad at actually getting them to grow (defining grow as "grow until I can get seed off of them). My soil is poor (on a level where enriching it all is too expensive to be viable) my space very limited, and my critter level unbelievable.
This had left me with a persistent guilt that I should not even be TRYING to grow ANYTHING; that the moment I get some odd seed I should pass it ALL on to someone else; that the fact I enjoy growing things is irrelevant; I have a duty to put whatever I find in more deserving hands.
One thing I DO do is keep a list of what I have, along with the names and addresses of the people who are to get my seed should anything happen to me (I'm a week shy of 40, so that doesn't seen likely, but you never know.)
|
|
|
Post by blueadzuki on Feb 14, 2020 20:56:03 GMT -5
In 2018 a bean collector on Vancouver Island gave me three kinds: CO49956, CO49957 and an unnamed daylength neutral one. Two kinds rotted and didn't germinate. CO49956 did germinate, but I don't think I got any beans from it. Next thing I tried unsuccessfully - four-angled beans. Now I have seeds of bambara beans to try this year. It's fun to try different things, but I'm glad that scarlet runners and various common beans grow well enough to provide sustenance. Depending on where you got your Bambarra beans, you may want to do them in pots, as most of them are VERY long season (There is a shorter season one, but who was supplying it I don't remember {I do remember it was one with speckled seeds, as opposed to white, brown, "butterfly" etc.}) I'm assuming you used a day length neutral wing bean (like the ones Baker Creek and Ricter's sells) If that wasn't good enough for your season that you are right, wing beans are not for you. And plant them wide (remember, the seeds are developing under the ground, so you want a lot of space between plants) Siberian Pea shrub (Caragana arborescens) might be a good choice too, as it is very tolerant of cold (It'll take down to zone 2) and you can eat the pods (though they are tiny)
|
|
|
Post by blueadzuki on Feb 3, 2020 11:19:46 GMT -5
The red brown pea on the bottom left appears to have the marmorated seed coat trait (as well as the black hilum one) This is usually found among older types of soup peas (Carlin, Maple and Latvian come to mind) but is largely excluded from modern ones both because the seed coats are thicker and tougher and because colored seed coats like that are often associated with higher amounts of various substances that can make the peas taste bad.
The pea in the center looks like it has the orc (orange cotelyedon) gene (the pink is actually orange filtered through the white of the seed coat) If you are interested in growing soup peas (which all except the top right probably are) this can actually be a good gene to propagate, as the orange peas are high in beta carotene (much the same as red lentils).
|
|
|
Post by blueadzuki on Feb 1, 2020 18:56:35 GMT -5
Actually, I have since found out there is someone in the SSE that has Avakli (no idea what they charge, but it's probably less)
|
|
|
Post by blueadzuki on Jan 31, 2020 21:19:38 GMT -5
I doubt this will be of any help (given that 1. you seem to already have settled on a pea and 2. you thought 2.50 was steep for seed) but Ricters sells a cowpea in it's seed zoo called avakli that might fit you bill as well. Besides being speckled and bushy (I think, based on the third picture on the general page) it also appears to be fast growing (if they are planting it in May and harvesting it in August) link
|
|
|
Post by blueadzuki on Jan 26, 2020 17:55:12 GMT -5
This could get tricky then, as, given the last dozen or so years, we haven't RELIABLY had soil temps above 50F until late June (our weather tends to linger on with cold and clammy though most of spring, then transition into a jagged period of alternating broiling and freezing which eventually turns to just broiling).
|
|
|
Post by blueadzuki on Jan 26, 2020 2:24:29 GMT -5
Hi All,
This year I am going through my seed box and planting out some of my older seed.
Because this seed is quite old (and hence, presumably will have very low germination) I am starting the seed inside (so as to not waste space in the garden with seed that will not grow).
My question is, for someone in my area (lower NY Hudson valley, zone 6b) about when do you think is it good to try and start them? I know I can't start them as early as I do tomatoes, both because they start later and because it will be a LOT harder to keep cucumber vines in plant able condition than tomato plants that generally don't need support until they are quite big).
I'm not sure if it matters, but quite a few of the cucumbers in question have their origins in places like Thailand and Borneo, so may be heat-centric
Types Assam Parchment Heptagon Siamese Giant Russian Netted Possibly assorted Indian Dosaki (depends on how many of the above germinate)
|
|
|
Post by blueadzuki on Jan 19, 2020 11:04:06 GMT -5
i think the seeds will sprout, the sad thing though is that the seeds are unlikely to be true to the parent tree's fruits, so you really would need to get some of the wood cuttings rooted or grafted. you can take as much small wood off the tree as you can get since it will likely be gone anyways, but at this point it may not matter. take those pieces of wood, use a bit of rooting hormone and put them in damp soil under a cover (to make sure it doesn't dry out) in a cool location and see if they'll root for you. otherwise grafting will be another possible approach but you have to get root stock for that. the problem with seeds is that the genetics of apples are often very mixed when the fruits get pollinated. so the seeds in the fruits are not often even close to fully edible or usable as a fresh eating apple and the most common use of such sour fruits is for ciders as you think this is a cider apple tree anyways. well if you want those kinds of trees you can get them as both known varieties (clones) or plant seeds, but those plants may not be usable until some years later so most people won't do this because they want the known properties of the apples. if you want to save this particular apple tree for the qualities of the fruits you need to keep the wood alive, somehow... To be fair, the apple isn't all that edible now. On that four flavor grading system they use for apples, it is definitely in the bittersweet area, emphasis on the bitter. There is a reason I nicknamed it the Kisco Spitter. And you are of course right about apples having very mixed genes. It doesn't help that the nearest other apple tree to this one (and hence it's most likely pollinator) is a crab apple (which unlike this tree, is doing OK) I suppose the best idea is to check in spring if anything is still alive, then contact the city director of land management (or whatever the title of the person in charge of the trees in the town are) and see if they'll either give me the permission to take the cuttings or, better yet, send someone to do it themselves (better because 1. they probably know someone who is good at rooting and grafting [maybe someone at the nursery across the street) and 2. city sent people can go on the other side of the fence where there may be better wood.
|
|
|
Post by blueadzuki on Jan 17, 2020 20:58:13 GMT -5
A fine idea except 1. I don't know anyone to do that 2. As I said, the tree will probably be completely dead by the time I can take any scions in the spring (no point in taking scions if I end up taking them from dead parts) and 3. most importantly, the police there are NOT friendly or understanding and being caught cutting branches off a (nominally) public tree would probably result in me being in a LOT of legal trouble.
|
|
|
Post by blueadzuki on Jan 17, 2020 18:27:53 GMT -5
This late fall/ early winter I obtained and planted two saplings of Sorbus of Himalayan stock from Sacred Succulents. It will be a while, but they should make fruit.
|
|
|
Post by blueadzuki on Jan 17, 2020 18:26:25 GMT -5
Hi All,
So here is the situation.
Remember that apple tree in the shopping mall parking lot I mentioned in a thread a few years ago (the one I think is an old cider apple)?
Well, last fall, I went to get some fruit from it to send to the Ag station in Geneva New York for identification (i.e. to confirm it was an old cider apple, and possibly get someone to come down and take a cutting for the collection.
To my dismay, I found the tree fruitless (more or less, see below) and at least 90% dead. With it in that shape, I doubt the rest of it will survive the winter (and that also assumes that the village seeing that a tree that hangs over it's mall parking lot space is more or less dead, don't simply cut the whole thing down).
So here is the situation. When I went to the tree, I WAS able to collect a pair of withered fruits that had obviously been left from the previous year, and from one of them extracted three or four healthy looking seeds (I know apples don't come true from seeds, but it is the best I can do and might at least make something similar) which I want to plant.
My question is as follows, since the seeds already spent a winter outside (in the fruit) are they already vernalized and ready to be planted? Or do I need to vernalize them again now that they are removed? I don't have enough seed to try it both ways.
|
|
|
Post by blueadzuki on Dec 31, 2019 20:13:41 GMT -5
It's common to MOST legumes. When's the last time you saw a non-heirloom soup pea (defined here as any pea you are eating dry mature seed as opposed to as a snap or shelly) whose seed coat wasn't white. It's because the darker colored ones tend to have more of the things that can make peas bitter or otherwise unpleasant (colored seed coats are also often thicker than white ones, so there's that as well.) For some beans (like lupinis and lablabs) a colored coat often signifies that the seed has enough stuff to be poisonous when mature, and needing of leaching to be made edible)
In the case of soys, it's more of a cosmetic thing. Those anthocyanins will stain the extracted oil or protein. Undesirable if you want clear yellow soy oil, soy meal that wont be visible, or snow white tofu. You can get around it by dry processing the beans (skinning them when they are still dry as opposed to after they have been soaked). But that is a lot more labor intensive than doing it wet so not done as much.
Ironically I understand there is some research that indicates that black skinned soys may be easier to digest than yellow ones.
By and large, colored skinned soys tend to be for the market for things like black bean sauce and soy sauce (which wind up brown anyway, so no big deal) or for the edamame market (where the beans are consumed young and green, so no one cares what color they turn when ripe).
It's sort of like the situation with green cotyledoned soybeans. Soybeans can have the same recessive gene as peas that allows the insides to stay green. However, barring mutations, you will tend to only see this in colored skinned soybeans. Its the same reason, no one wants to eat green tofu or drink green soy milk. But in the coloreds, it's not a big deal, since the products all end up deeply colored anyway. In fact, in the soy industry it is the norm to find yellow and green inside soys mixed together with no distinction (depending on season and area green soy can often make up the majority of the crop.)
|
|
|
Post by blueadzuki on Dec 25, 2019 14:06:58 GMT -5
Ah yes, what I call Tibbles's Law "As technological knowledge becomes more advance, the amount of environmental damage capable of being done by a given number of people increases, and the number of people needed to commit a given amount of environmental damage decreases.". There's another one that needs a name that goes "Our ability to destroy always far outpaces our ability to fix."
|
|