Hey Fellow Floridians - Year 2

[Barb_FL]

Is everyone having lots of fruit split from all the rain?

My peppers and beans are loving it though. Probably good for the mangoes and pineapple too.

I love pepper plants b/c they can produce a ton and still look good. These plants looked horrible (ie leather leaves) in the winter. My Amethyst pepper plant looks really good too; peppers start off purple and turn red. I don't keep any but they are much more attractive purple.

[DocBrock]

A lot, if not all, of my big tomatoes are splitting but I think it's more because of the extreme heat lately. You're right about peppers though. Mine look like they're going to die any day, but have so many peppers on them that I can't keep up picking them. My havasu's have some weird looking new growth, but the plant has over 50 mature peppers on it. My mini bells are the same way. I tuck the tomatoes under an awning to keep them as dry as possible but leave the peppers out. My jalapeños and serranos have taken off big time with the rain. Their leaves actually look great. The first pic is the havasus with the yellow peppers. They taste kind of like a pepperoncini, second pic is the baby bell. I think the peppers are supposed to be a little bigger than a cherry tomato. I'd like to add that your peppers look great compared to mine. Beautiful!

[Fiishergurl]

DocBrock check with a lens for microscopic bugs. Mine had a gazillion on them and you could not see them without a magnifying glass and the bugs left a toxic juice that made the leaves look like yours. Mine had broad mites... here's a link... https://www.google.com/search?q=broa...MnhhwquHnpYmM:

Ginny

[Fiishergurl]

Originally Posted by Zone9b

Does anyone know the history of the BCD (Brandywine Cherry Dark) tomato? I don't offer much pampered care for my tomatoes, but BCD seems to thrive in this environment. Ginny originally sent me seeds a few years ago. It took me some time before I relized its potential. It is growing volunteer in one bed where it is spreading around and with no fertilizer and little water it has a bunch of toamtoes on it. I'm also growing BCD in in 10 gallon pots. I believe I've grown it for about 8 seasons (4 years) and have continued it by saving seeds. By saving the seeds from one of the better tomatoes each season, I'm wondering if the variety could have genetically modified to a point where it performs better than when I first grew it? I see no listings for the variety online. The name is missleading, in that it certainly doesn't appear to be a cherry. Also it not only performs well, it also appears to be toatlly nematode resistant and tastes good. Amy thoughts?
Thanks

Hi Larry,

I did get the seeds from Barb, but mine grew ping pong ball sized tomatoes. They were delicious but very long season. They also were the only plants that produced well in a season when I had a whitefly infestation so I had wondered if they were somehow whitefly resistant.

The only reason I didn't grow them again was the long date to maturity. Well that and there were just so many other varieties that I wanted to try.... lol.

Ginny

[ginger2778]

Originally Posted by Fiishergurl

DocBrock check with a lens for microscopic bugs. Mine had a gazillion on them and you could not see them without a magnifying glass and the bugs left a toxic juice that made the leaves look like yours. Mine had broad mites... here's a link... https://www.google.com/search?q=broa...MnhhwquHnpYmM:

Ginny

Thank you Ginny,I have seen this for years and wondered why I couldn't grow peppers. This yesr I am having success. Broad mites! Now I know what to look for.

[Zone9b]

Originally Posted by Fiishergurl

Hi Larry,

I did get the seeds from Barb, but mine grew ping pong ball sized tomatoes. They were delicious but very long season. They also were the only plants that produced well in a season when I had a whitefly infestation so I had wondered if they were somehow whitefly resistant.

The only reason I didn't grow them again was the long date to maturity. Well that and there were just so many other varieties that I wanted to try.... lol.

Ginny

Ginny, good to hear from you. What I am growing now doesn't seem to be late. It's as early as almost anything I'm growing with maybe the exception of 4th of July. Do you know if you shared seeds with me that were one's which Barb shared with you or were they from ones that you saved seeds from? How this thing got bigger, earlier and nematode resistant, while still maintaining the look and shape of a Brandywine Black is a mistory or maybe the variety that Barb aquired wasn't stable and I happened on something produced by that instability. May it at some juncture been pollinated by one of the large tomato hybrids I have grown. This season the best performing tomatoes were this variety along with Tomande F1 and Bush Early Girl F1. But if I could only grow one variety this variety in question would be the one that I would grow. Medium sized tomatoes, favored black appearance, very productive, tastes good and resistant like a many hybrids and grows well in our Florida heat. Not much to dislike.
Larry

[Zone9b]

Days to Maturity (DTM). Does DTM for tomatoes start wiith the date of planting a seed or the date of transplanting the plant? Thanks Larry[

[Barb_FL]

I think DTM is from plant out time. I like to calculate from sow seed time.

Larry - Both years I grew BCD, it was early. I may have grown it over 3 seasons. I use to do a separate fall and spring season until Marsha taught me otherwise.

The pink one which I grew only once was really late.

----
Back to peppers, I think I've tried every fertilizer/plant food ever made and the Vegetable one from Texas Tomato food works by far the best for peppers. That goes with cucumbers too. The TTF may work just as well, but I save that for tomatoes.

[Zone9b]

This year Early Blight returned to my tomatoes with a vengeance. At this point there is hardly a green leaf in sight. Bush Early Girl faired a bit better than others. We still got quite a few tomatoes, probably because most varieties were on the early side. A few more still to ripen but the season should be over by the end of the month.
Will seeds saved from these tomatoes carry the virus forward or push them to greater resistance of the virus?

[ginger2778]

Originally Posted by Zone9b

This year Early Blight returned to my tomatoes with a vengeance. At this point there is hardly a green leaf in sight. Bush Early Girl faired a bit better than others. We still got quite a few tomatoes, probably because most varieties were on the early side. A few more still to ripen but the season should be over by the end of the month.
Will seeds saved from these tomatoes carry the virus forward or push them to greater resistance of the virus?

Early blight isn't a virus, it's an airborne fungus, easily killed by fermenting the seeds doesn't get inside the seed coat.
Viruses definitely can get inside the seed germ, but not to worry about EB.

[Zone9b]

Originally Posted by ginger2778

Early blight isn't a virus, it's an airborne fungus, easily killed by fermenting the seeds doesn't get inside the seed coat.
Viruses definitely can get inside the seed germ, but not to worry about EB.

Marsha,
Thanks for the info.

[efisakov]

Hi, how y'all doing?

What plants producing? Any pictures?

[ginger2778]

Originally Posted by efisakov

Hi, how y'all doing?

What plants producing? Any pictures?

This is a purple flesh sweet potato that I am delighted to find out that I can grow in our native soil, Nematodes and all!. I bought the original sweet potato at an Asian market and it cost $5! On a whim I just buried it in our soil and now I am harvesting several, this one was quite large. It also was quite possibly the very best sweet potato I have ever eaten!
Also harvesting some mangoes although it's still a little early and they're not up to their full potential yet, I'm just impatient LOL. Several pineapples are forming in a few are getting ready, and I've got a very large banana stalk that just started about 3 weeks ago.

[efisakov]

When I pill regular potatoes, this pills go into a soil. Many start growing shoots and can produce yang potatoes in couple of months. I wonder if the same can be done with sweet potatoes.

Nice one, Marsha. How do you cook it?

[ginger2778]

Originally Posted by efisakov

When I pill regular potatoes, this pills go into a soil. Many start growing shoots and can produce yang potatoes in couple of months. I wonder if the same can be done with sweet potatoes.

Nice one, Marsha. How do you cook it?

Just baked it