Good News/ Bad News

Good news! I found seed balls forming on 2 of my potato varieties: Skagit Beets and Nordic October. I'm going to save them and plant the "true potato seed" or "TPS" next spring, so I can discover the next great and most unique potato cultivar....the bad news is, I think most of my plants have that Late Blight disease that everyone's been talking about :

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Good news! Even though it is barely 3' tall, some of my sweet corn, the Luther Hill variety, is going to tassel in a few days and I can see the shoots forming as well, (circled in red), where the silks will form, to recieve pollen falling from the tassel at the top of the plant.
See the new little leaf sneaking out of the craw formed by the main leaf? That is actually the start of the female flower. A close-up of the circled area:

...the bad news is that although my 2' tall (!) Baby Blue Jade sweet corn is currently tasseling and actively shedding pollen, it shows no sign of any shoots or silks.

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Good news! The Georgian Chestnut (moschata) and the Upper Ground Sweet Potato squash (also a moschata) that I planted on a whim on the sod heap at the back of the yard are going absolutely nuts, with vines completely obscuring the pile and tons of baby squash forming under dark green leaves which measure more than 12" across:

...the bad news is that the same varieties planted in the garden "proper" on the same day, in carefully prepared raised beds with purchased topsoil/compost blend and trained on a trellis, are kind of well, disappointing, underwhelming and a sorry joke in comparison:

I would guess that the compost was of the extremely low nitrogen variety, which rest assured will be diligently corrected in the Fall.
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Good news! I was delighted to stumble upon a rare, pure white (albino?) Borage blossom the other day in my prolific Borage patch:

...the bad news is for all the blue Borage plants around it, that are going to get mowed down so I can isolate this mutant and try to save some pure seed of this rare strain for next year.

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Good news! My lettuce continues to look awesome despite the heat!

...the bad news is that the heat has made it too bitter to eat.

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Good news! It is the middle of July and the cauliflower has not bolted.

...the bad news is its the middle of July and not one of my cauliflower plants show any sign of ever forming a head.

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Good news! The Danubiana eggplant, which I had completely written off to frost months ago, has actually flowered and is now (gasp!) forming fruit!

the bad news is...well, finally, there is no more bad news!

yeah but...how are you supposed to know when they're ripe?

The Green Zebra:
egg-sized and -shaped fruits on average plants:

or the Green Sausage, which is a small plant with wispy leaves and bushlike habit, spindly and kind of weak-looking but absolutely LOADED with fruit, two trusses of which are shown here (and yes I know, I see the blossom-end rot):

or the Green Giant (a large beefsteak on a large potato-leaved plant)?

...any tips would be greatly appreciated.

Some Really New Potatoes

OK I just couldn't wait, so I started scratching around the base of some of the potato stems and here's what I came up with:

Not pictured: Little Red Riding Hood. That one was the very last one to send up leaves, in fact for a while I thought they had all died. So its plants are still small and the tubers I did see were so tiny I just left them alone.

Remarkable color in the Skagit Beets, considering most "red-fleshed" potatoes are more on the "pink" side, and notice no white ring:

See the marked contrast between the Nordic Ocober, with nearly pure white flesh and the golden flesh of the Skagit Valley Gold. However, the Skagit is not quite as "orange" as I had hoped:

The aptly named "Paint Jar":

Black and Blue (Negro y Azul):

I did heat up some Skagit Valley and some Negro y Azul in the microwave for about 60 seconds, for a taste test. Skagit was fairly dry, and fully cooked, but just moist enough, with a strong and distinctive baked-potato aroma from even such a tiny marble-sized tuber. It was very tasty. It reportedly has some solanum phureja in its pedigree.

The Negro y Azul was more watery and had a decidedly grassy taste. Maybe it just wasnt fully cooked, or maybe it was exposed to the sun and was "green" (but with such dark pigment, there's really no way to know). Hope that the more mature tubers later this season have better results.

The rest of the samples will be lightly steamed tonight for dinner.

Potatoes in Bloom

The potato sampler from Tom Wagner is growing nicely. I'll try to get more information on each variety from Tom's forum. Apparently he will be in Europe giving seminars on plant breeding this fall.

This sterile polyploid will have golden almost orange flesh~

Skagit Valley Gold:

An improved Lumpers:
(yes, the quintessential Irish potato)


I think white flesh/purple skin?

Nordic October:



no name variety, just a number~
97A4:




Valdez Bay:



The next two are red-fleshed.
Skagit Beets:




Little Red Riding Hood:

The next two are blue-fleshed.
Highly pigmented foliage and blossoms on VERY tall plants~
Paint Jar:

Surprising white flowers with blackish pollen on the

Negro y Azul:

I haven't noticed berries on any of the plants. The flowers so far just fall off after blooming. If I get any berries I will certainly save them. Some of the varieties like Paint Jar and Skagit Valley Gold are almost finished blooming, but others like Valdez Bay and Little Red Riding Hood just opened their first blooms this week. So, I guess you're supposed to wait until about 2 weeks after the tops die down, and then you can dig them up. (or maybe that's onions?) Ok, I'll just wait.

Google Docs are Awesome

Okay everybody, in case you're wondering (and I know you are) about how much and of what I have harvested so far, I have a new spreadsheet, accessable to all who read me thru the link on the sidebar, which keeps running tabs on all the goodies we get from the garden. Isnt that special? And imagine my shock and delight when I found out that I can edit the thing directly and not have to re-upload new versions of it every time I go out and pick some beans? Super awesome! Thank you google docs! And also thank you openoffice.org! Isn't technology wonderful?

And why do I feel compelled to keep such detailed and accurate records of my relaxing hobby you may ask? Well for some reason I have this urgent need to prove to a certain someone in my life that this whole garden thing is not just a stupid waste of time and money (especially money) and tangible results can be prooved once all the pounds of produce are tallied up in the fall and multiplied by the going market price per lb. which will show a very large dollar amount in just the first season which will entitle me to tell that person that their angry tirades and hurtful comments are completely baseless and that they have to take back every single word they uttered against me on this, and I and my garden will be vindicated, and I will have shut that person up once and for all.

And also because it's fun.

Random garden pics

Above is the Maize Morado, about 2 and a half feet tall now. In front are some Baby Blue Jade, and beyond is some Stowell's Evergreen and Luther Hill, all about 4 to 6 inches tall. Next year I think I will start all my corn as I did the Morado: in cells 4 weeks before plant-out.

So this is what has been turning my Roma pole beans into swiss cheese. They seem to love the romas, as my other bean varieties dont have nearly as much beetle damage.

Silver Queen Okra still in the two-leaf stage. Looking rather unhappy. Wonder what is the problem. Maybe all the rain and cloudy days around 70 degrees?

First blossom on the Lebanese Bush Marrow.

Cherokee Purple tomato blossom with a very exerted stigma.

A Green Giant bloom that appears to have exploded...?

A Hillbilly tomato bloom. It is surprisingly tiny, and seems to be a compound or fused blossom. These tiny and/or mutant blooms seem to be appearing on those frost damaged plants, whose primary growth was killed and are now re-growing. I'll be following these more closely.

And the first Borage blossom. I grew these specifically because I read that the blossoms are edible and you can put them in salads or freeze them in ice cubes. Blue flowers in my salad. How cool is that.

What a Difference a Month Makes

You all remember that dreadful morning when I woke up to a frozen garden and lost most of my tomatoes which had been planted out less than a week?

Here is how the White Beauty tomato looked that day. I left it in the ground, because it had one leaf that was not dead.


Can you believe that this is the same plant 4 weeks later. No sign of flower buds yet, but I'm not complaining.

Same with this Bolivian Rainbow pepper, it was the only seedling of this type I had, turned to total goo.

It looked very dead for quite awhile, but it is now leafing out! It's only 3 inches tall but I am overjoyed. Peppers are tropical perennials, you know. Come October, this plant will be overwintering in my finest pot, front and center in the dining room window.

Mr. Casper with frozen bud...

...now looks lush and healthy.

New developments in the garden:

Little Wonder peas planted way too late are slowly coming along.

These below are an unnamed blue-podded variety with brown-skinned peas:

And these below were planted from a bag of yellow split peas from the supermarket. I separated out a handful of pea halves that seemed to have enough of the germ still attached, and planted out the ones that germinated. Cool, free seeds. Compared to the two garden varieties above, the leaves on these are much smaller.

Also, get a load of those wacky tendrils! They should market this and call it "Medusa".

Love the diversity in garden peas. While we're at it, note the diversity in tomato blossoms:

Matt's Wild Cherry tomato above, and a Black Sea Man below.

By the way, we ate the first tomato yesterday for dinner. Boy it was good.

My Graduate

I remember when I was seventeen, and thought I had it all figured out. And I considered my parents two well-meaning but fairly clueless dolts. My how the tables have turned.

Congratulations to my oldest, aka "Weatherboy" in my blog stories. You did it. And did it well. I didn't cry at his high school commencement on Sunday, but for a brief moment tears did well up in my eyes. After all, this means I am now officially old. Now that you're a college man, I hope you show more patience and compassion for your two clueless dolts than I did. Because they just love you so darn much that they can't see straight.

Maybe that's their problem.

Garden Photos w/Commentary

Remember that Stupice tomato seedling that bloomed indoors on April 10? Well, it is NOT one of the plants that perished in the frost, thank you. Here it is 2 months after that first flower. We'll probably eat it later this week.

Potatoes were planted a bit late, but are beginning to pick up. Here is the row of Wagner's potato sampler.

I never knew that potatoes held such diversity. Shown are two of the 9 varieties in the sampler. The Skagit Valley Gold variety (top) has a very fine growth habit, with many thin stalks topped in bright green and nearly round leaves; contrasted with the Paint Jar variety, is probably the most vigorous of the selections, which has few but thick dark purple stems topped with almond-shaped leaves shaded with purple. The Paint Jar looks ready to mound up for the second time, while the other varieties have not yet had their first. Can't wait to see the diversity in the blossoms.

Chard is going strong, and lettuce is doing well, except I think a rabbit has been sneaking some. Time to put up that fence. I did not expect that homegrown chard would taste so salty.

Celeriac that has been kept trimmed by a suspected rabbit is being overtaken by some weeds that I thought to just let grow. Lambsquarter or goosefoot is supposed to be a good and very mild cooked green. In fact I will testify that raw, it tastes better than arugula. But then again so does just about everything. Its already about 8 inches tall, looks like it will be a good harvest, with plenty to share with my numerous neighbors who hail from the subcontinent, who call this weed "buthwa" and cook it as an ingredient in "saag". Apparently the "Eat the Weeds" guy has a similar idea.

And why do onions grown from sets always bolt on me? Why?

Looks pretty good if I do say so myself. That trash can is my homemade compost tumbler. It is now almost full of equal amounts of kitchen scraps and fruit flies. It is now banished from the patio. Pakman has forbidden any further composting activities effective immediately, and has promised to buy me as much bagged compost from the garden center as my heart desires. I think he has a fruit fly phobia.