Yesterday turned out to be a pretty busy day - much of the day spent preparing some plants to ship to friends, the rest taking stock of how the garden in general is progressing. I am going to get a little specific below, with some current results:
Disease watch - in general: Plants look healthy. Only 1 tomato lost to disease (Yellow Ponderosa, Tomato Spotted Wilt, replaced) and Striped Sweetheart looked like a plant with the weird thread leaf genes that some Lucky Cross offspring have - that was replaced as well. Lower foliage is showing a bit of Early Blight and/or Septoria.
Indeterminate tomatoes in large pots: Open flowers on pretty much all varieties except Cherokee Purple (showing some buds), Striped Sweetheart (which I just replaced with a new seedling), Lillian's Yellow Heirloom (small buds), Lucky Cross (buds), andLarge Lucky Red (small buds). There is fruit set on Cherokee Chocolate (alas, it may be crossed - the fruit look too round; this is from 1998 saved seed, so I can set another of the plants in somewhere and hope it isn't crossed as well), Piennolo, Torre Canne (which I now suspect may be a determinate and I am regretting removing suckers), JD Special C Tex, Mexico Midget, Hege's German Pink, and Giant Syrian.
Front Row garden cherry tomatoes: all have at least open flowers and most have set fruit; Tiger Tom, Green Zebra Cherry, three of the Sungolds and Sungold Select II should set fruit any day now.
Small Pot Indeterminate tomatoes: Too many to mention w/r to open blossoms, so I will report fruit set only right now. This is occurring on Burgundy Traveler, Leggy F1 (a new cross for the dwarf project), Softy F1 (ditto), Arkansas Traveler, Kiwi F1 (also part of the Dwarf project), Taps (regular leaf), and Casey's Pure Yellow regular leaf, likely an F1 - just planted. Most have buds, half have open flowers (approximately).
Dwarf tomatoes: Open flowers everywhere! Fruit set occurred on: Lemon Ice 3513 (heart shaped), Pink Passion 3180 (heart shaped), Lemon Ice 3156 (heart shaped), Golden Heart 3149 (heart shaped), Scarlet Heart 2648 (heart shaped), Beryl Beauty, Dainty F1, Boronia (both 3420 and 3463), Loaves and Fishes, Wild Fred 11-35. I am really impressed with the aggressive flowering and fruit set - early! - with the Nosey line.
Eggplant: Buds already showing on Skinny Twilight and Midnight Lightning. All are looking great and growing rapidly.
Sweet Peppers: Growing rapidly and most are showing small buds.
Hot Peppers: Growing rapidly and a few are showing buds - some even have open flowers.
Beans: great germination with all beans, it seems - I went in and did some additional seeding at the inevitable blank spots (after all, seed doesn't germinate reliably at 100%!).
Squash - all are in flower and Butta golden zuccini set fruit. Spaghetti Squash is starting to stretch out.
Cukes - despite critter damage, Diva set some fruit
Melons - Susan Healey is blooming, Edonis growing well.
Lettuce and greens - significant bolting occurring (not surprising). The Asian Greens were a big failure - got them in too late and significant pest damage (probably the cabbage moth). Swiss Chard is finally starting to grow well. Once the lettuce is gone, I will put either more beans, or watermelon, in that area.
Beets - just beautiful plants; I hilled them up with additional soil and we should be harvesting at any time.
And here we are getting a nice deep rain this morning. More packing to do...and Sue returns from Nova Scotia today. I am very happy about that!
Disease watch - in general: Plants look healthy. Only 1 tomato lost to disease (Yellow Ponderosa, Tomato Spotted Wilt, replaced) and Striped Sweetheart looked like a plant with the weird thread leaf genes that some Lucky Cross offspring have - that was replaced as well. Lower foliage is showing a bit of Early Blight and/or Septoria.
Indeterminate tomatoes in large pots: Open flowers on pretty much all varieties except Cherokee Purple (showing some buds), Striped Sweetheart (which I just replaced with a new seedling), Lillian's Yellow Heirloom (small buds), Lucky Cross (buds), andLarge Lucky Red (small buds). There is fruit set on Cherokee Chocolate (alas, it may be crossed - the fruit look too round; this is from 1998 saved seed, so I can set another of the plants in somewhere and hope it isn't crossed as well), Piennolo, Torre Canne (which I now suspect may be a determinate and I am regretting removing suckers), JD Special C Tex, Mexico Midget, Hege's German Pink, and Giant Syrian.
Front Row garden cherry tomatoes: all have at least open flowers and most have set fruit; Tiger Tom, Green Zebra Cherry, three of the Sungolds and Sungold Select II should set fruit any day now.
Small Pot Indeterminate tomatoes: Too many to mention w/r to open blossoms, so I will report fruit set only right now. This is occurring on Burgundy Traveler, Leggy F1 (a new cross for the dwarf project), Softy F1 (ditto), Arkansas Traveler, Kiwi F1 (also part of the Dwarf project), Taps (regular leaf), and Casey's Pure Yellow regular leaf, likely an F1 - just planted. Most have buds, half have open flowers (approximately).
Dwarf tomatoes: Open flowers everywhere! Fruit set occurred on: Lemon Ice 3513 (heart shaped), Pink Passion 3180 (heart shaped), Lemon Ice 3156 (heart shaped), Golden Heart 3149 (heart shaped), Scarlet Heart 2648 (heart shaped), Beryl Beauty, Dainty F1, Boronia (both 3420 and 3463), Loaves and Fishes, Wild Fred 11-35. I am really impressed with the aggressive flowering and fruit set - early! - with the Nosey line.
Eggplant: Buds already showing on Skinny Twilight and Midnight Lightning. All are looking great and growing rapidly.
Sweet Peppers: Growing rapidly and most are showing small buds.
Hot Peppers: Growing rapidly and a few are showing buds - some even have open flowers.
Beans: great germination with all beans, it seems - I went in and did some additional seeding at the inevitable blank spots (after all, seed doesn't germinate reliably at 100%!).
Squash - all are in flower and Butta golden zuccini set fruit. Spaghetti Squash is starting to stretch out.
Cukes - despite critter damage, Diva set some fruit
Melons - Susan Healey is blooming, Edonis growing well.
Lettuce and greens - significant bolting occurring (not surprising). The Asian Greens were a big failure - got them in too late and significant pest damage (probably the cabbage moth). Swiss Chard is finally starting to grow well. Once the lettuce is gone, I will put either more beans, or watermelon, in that area.
Beets - just beautiful plants; I hilled them up with additional soil and we should be harvesting at any time.
And here we are getting a nice deep rain this morning. More packing to do...and Sue returns from Nova Scotia today. I am very happy about that!
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