Hey Fellow Floridians - Year 2

[MarlynnMarcks]

Re: okra You can also get it in the frozen food section in the chain stores. I love it and buy it that way all the time. Coat it with a little coremeal and it is never slimy.

[Zone9b]

Transplanted the following tomato varieties into mostly 10 gallon containers and a few into 6 gallon containers today. Those in Raised Beds were transplanted earlier.

Charger F1 Tomato (days to maturity 72)

Bloody Butcher OP Tomato (days to maturity 55)

Brandywine Cherry Dark OP Tomato (days to maturity 69)

Champion II Indeterminate F1 Tomato (days to maturity 65-70)

Fourth of July F1 Tomato (days to maturity 49)

Tycoon F1 Tomato (days to maturity 80)

Store Bot F3 Tomato (days to maturity 65-70?)

Esterina Cherry Tomato F1 (days to maturity 60)

Skyway 687 F1 Tomato (days to maturity 78) .

Grandma Picks Hybrid F1 Tomato (days to maturity 75-80)

Bush Early Gir F1 Tomato (days to maturity 65)

Jetstar Tomato F1 (days to maturity 64)

Tomande F1 Tomato (days to maturity 68)

BHN1021 F1 Tomato (days to maturity 76)

[Fiishergurl]

Originally Posted by ginger2778

Interesting post Larry. What do you do with cowpeas, I never grew them.

Marsha,

They are past transplant size. I would have made the drive home and flown back already but my job has interfered with the schedule and then the in laws have been visiting for 10 days. I think i can get them home on the floor boards in the back seat of my car still.

Growing the favorites... PBTD, Sgt Peppers, NPS, Paul Robeson, Rebel Yell, NAR, Cows Tit, GP, Cherokee Black Heart, Fishlake Oxheart, Black Cherry, etc and trying out a handful of new ones like Coustralee, Gardeners Delight, Indigo Cherry Drop and a few others I cant think of right now. I posted the list when I started the seeds.

Ginny

[Fiishergurl]

Originally Posted by Barb_FL

Ginny - your seedlings are beautiful. Are you planning to separate the ones in the solo cups? If so, you might want to do that now even if it is in a paint cup and will be replanted later.

Marsha - do you sow in individual cells or multiples per cell / 4" square? What a day you must have had.

Kay - Forgot to mention but the peppers on Buena Mulata are about 1/2 red. Both plants are loaded.

Hi Barb,

No just going to snip off the smaller plant.

Ginny

[ginger2778]

Originally Posted by Fiishergurl

Hi Barb,

No just going to snip off the smaller plant.

Ginny

Oooh, what a mean mama you are! Hahaha, kidding. i will have to go back and read the list if I can find it. I hope you can get home soon, I know you must be feeling the push to get home, I know I would.

Barb- I sow in 72 cell kits, the sunflowers each got their own cell. A lot are up now.
The tomato and pepper seeds were from 3-12 per cell, depending on how many I needed. I put them the full 1/4 inch deep this time, I used to put them on top, then just sprinkle a bit more seed starter over them, but I always got a lot of helmet heads. This time I want to see if sowing a bit deeper stops the helmet from happening, but it is taken a little longer to see that familiar "elbow" as the seedling starts to come up

[Barb_FL]

Originally Posted by ginger2778

Barb- I sow in 72 cell kits, the sunflowers each got their own cell. A lot are up now.
The tomato and pepper seeds were from 3-12 per cell, depending on how many I needed. I put them the full 1/4 inch deep this time, I used to put them on top, then just sprinkle a bit more seed starter over them, but I always got a lot of helmet heads. This time I want to see if sowing a bit deeper stops the helmet from happening, but it is taken a little longer to see that familiar "elbow" as the seedling starts to come up

RE: Helmet heads - I've pretty much eliminated them by starting everything in the paper towel method. I never had cucumber seeds with HH, but there is a cucumber site and it was recommended there; so I did it anyway and this is when I had the 12 hour germination and then < 24 hours for the seed to pop up in the mix.

Then tried with peppers where I always had a lot of HH. Major success and much quicker to germinate in the mix.

This year I tried it with tomato seeds; When I left, I sowed the dwarfs and some others where I had a lot of seeds straight in mix and left them. All the others were sown in the paper towel method. When I got back the ones sown in the mix had a huge % of HH and the ones in the paper towel virtually had 0.

[Fiishergurl]

Ok just pulled the tomato plants here to get ready to go home and ended up with 33 pounds of green tomatoes. Going to make a few different green tomato relish and other green tomato recipes to freeze today and take home. Not going to can as we have a large freezer at home that we emptied out before we left.

So if any of you have a favorite green tomato recipe please post a link... :-)



Ginny

[Barb_FL]

Ginny - but aren't you going back to PA? Won't they last until freeze?

[Fiishergurl]

Yes but we are leaving this house soon to go to a hotel closer to my husband's job site so he will be closer to the job at the end since he will be there day and night right towards the end. He has about a 45 minute drive each way right now which allowed us to be in the suburbs. So we wont be at this house much longer. And I'm packing as much as I can to take home in my car with me.

Ginny

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N910A using Tapatalk

[Barb_FL]

Ginny - Got it; that makes a lot of sense. Couldn't you just stay in FL since he will be working so much anyway?

BTW - Here is what I'm growing from seeds given to me by my TV-FL Friends:

Marsha - General Lee, Dusky Rose

Kay - Beauty King, Indigo Cherry Drops,

Ginny - Brad Gate Mix, Champion 2, Skyway, Jet Setter

Will post rest later.

[ginger2778]

Originally Posted by Barb_FL

RE: Helmet heads - I've pretty much eliminated them by starting everything in the paper towel method. I never had cucumber seeds with HH, but there is a cucumber site and it was recommended there; so I did it anyway and this is when I had the 12 hour germination and then < 24 hours for the seed to pop up in the mix.

Then tried with peppers where I always had a lot of HH. Major success and much quicker to germinate in the mix.

This year I tried it with tomato seeds; When I left, I sowed the dwarfs and some others where I had a lot of seeds straight in mix and left them. All the others were sown in the paper towel method. When I got back the ones sown in the mix had a huge % of HH and the ones in the paper towel virtually had 0.

Barb- with 105 varieties, it's a practicality issue. I just can't separately wrap, label and bag 105 separate packs of 3-12 seeds, then as they sprout radicals painstakingly carefully remove each seed and transplant it, even then, no guarantee of not helmeting.
I used the paper towel on the Sweet Success you sent, mine took about 48 hours to germinate, but it got transplanted after the first sighting of a root tip., didn't you say it took 18 hours in a prev. post? I dont know why our results are different, but who cares, I love that cucumber.

[Fiishergurl]

Originally Posted by Barb_FL

Ginny - Got it; that makes a lot of sense. Couldn't you just stay in FL since he will be working so much anyway?

BTW - Here is what I'm growing from seeds given to me by my TV-FL Friends:

Marsha - General Lee, Dusky Rose

Kay - Beauty King, Indigo Cherry Drops,

Ginny - Brad Gate Mix, Champion 2, Skyway, Jet Setter

Will post rest later.

Yes but I always help him drive home. He doesnt like driving long distances and I don't mind. So i will hopefully be home a few weeks and then fly back up to help him pack up the last things and drive home... :-)

Ginny

[efisakov]

Ginny, pink and yellow varieties do ripen from green ok, black are more finicky. You can keep them in dark room at 70 degree (hotel will work fine) to ripen within next month. They would do fine covered with paper.

[Fiishergurl]

Originally Posted by efisakov

Ginny, pink and yellow varieties do ripen from green ok, black are more finicky. You can keep them in dark room at 70 degree (hotel will work fine) to ripen within next month. They would do fine covered with paper.

Thanks Ella, I think I'm going to do that because we made some green relish yestrday and we liked it but we wont eat that much of it. So I think I will try to let them ripen... :-)

Ginny

[efisakov]

Time to post pictures of all new germinating seedlings, babies. It is one of the most exciting moments of growing from seeds. The next one is transplanting them into their "home". So mean mamas and papas, are we there yet?

Marsha, you started it.
O, and getting first flowers and fruit setting. I know you enjoying it all. Yey, new season.