Morning y’all, and welcome to another downheah edition of Saturday Morning Garden Blogging. While it shouldn’t be, Spring is definitely in the air.
Looks like more of the same next week...
Last season, I embarked on my own tomato breeding journey called The Sully Project. Y’all can read more about it HERE and HERE. I saved seed from nine of those F2 Sully plants.
My plan is to grow out around a dozen each of the Volunteer and Dwarf #3; that’s about all the space I can spare. Our own cwalter will be growing out Sully Plum and Dwarf #2 on her suburban farm up in South Dakota. (check out her website HERE!) I’m looking forward to seeing her results.
Other tomato varieties for me this season include Big Beef F1 (hybrid), County Agent, Chef’s Choice Pink (F6) and Ukrainian Purple. I’m growing a couple of other varieties for friends and neighbors: Chef’s Choice Pink (F1) and Stump of the World. I started all my tomato seeds on 2/20.
I decided to splurge on new starter trays this year; they were a bit pricey, but should last several years… I got them HERE. Wow, they’ve gone up since I bought them!
I also decided to upgrade and standardize my transplant pots this year. I now have 100, all 4.25” square and about 5” deep. I think this larger size allows the seedlings to form a bigger root system prior to planting out. See them HERE. I also bought matching carry trays.
I started pepper seeds on 2/12. The “usual suspects” are back again this season: Prairie Spice, Hinkelhatz, Jalapeño and Rooster Spur.
The tray on the right (Prairie Spice, Jalapeño and Hinkelhatz) had to be replanted on 2/20 due to a feline-induced “stumble and dump”, so they are bit behind…. Other pepper varieties this year include Fatalii, Shishito, Magnum, Georgia Flame and Biggee Chile Hybrid. All these varieties, except Shishito, are hot to some degree. Fatalii and Magnum are extremely hot….
The next step will be to get the plants “up potted”, or transplanted into individual pots. I usually do this when they have grown their 2nd set of true leaves. Most of the peppers will be at that stage sometime mid-next week; tomatoes about a week later. The last couple of years, I have used a mixture (roughly 60/40) of Sta Green Potting Mix and Black Kow composted manure for up potting my seedlings, and have had good results; I’ll probably go with that combination again this year. The Sta Green stuff has fertilizer in it, so there’s probably no need to add the Black Kow, but I’m just stubborn like that… However, I did run across something called Decker Dirt last week; looks interesting. The place is about 25 miles South of here, but it appears that the stuff is sold in bags at one of the farm supply places here in town. We’ll see…
Those of you who have read my diaries know that I’m a hardcore tomato & pepper guy, but I have been known to grow other things. Ok, one other thing: garlic.
Last year, one of our SMGB members, Backus, gifted me some of her seed garlic. I planted 18 cloves and they did great! This year, I planted 10 cloves and all are looking good, even though I planted them about 3 months late… If you love garlic, and want to know how to grow it, take a look at this diary: Garlic Love
With climate change being the bitch that it is, my “plant out” date is very weather dependent. Our “last frost” date is technically April 1st, but things have been really screwy these last few years. As of this writing, I’m looking at a plant out date somewhere in late April/early May. Lots of work to be done between now and then….
That’s about all I’ve got from Downheah this fine Saturday Morning. I’ll be doing another diary sometime in April or May with an update. What’s going on in your garden?
**Late Edit**