Peas on the Go

I have two lots of peas planted this season, one lot showing plenty of pods is the Blue Bantam Dwarf Peas. These have been terribly slow to grow, but looking like they'll produce enough for a few feeds.

We love fresh peas like this.

A Few Varieties Now

It's probably easier to post what seedlings have germinated, as, of today I have action on 9 of the 12 varieties I sowed. One variety, Kenai Mondo Green has failed to produce a single seedling in three years, so I know this seed is useless. This season I have single germination's on a few varieties as you will see in the list below.

Not every variety here are from my own saved seed, so I really have to take that into account too. Anyway, here's a list of what's up as of this morning, first thing.

Rosado de Huelva - 0
Rosado de Ademuz - 1
Valenciano Clemente - 3
Negrillo di Almoguera - 0
Roma - 5
Kenai Mondo Green- 0
Kodiak Brown - 1
Amurskiy - 1
Korichnevyy Rebristyy - 1
Striped Rumplestiltskin -1
UK2000 - 4
Wandocka - 12
Nicoleta X Sweet Ozark Orange - 15

The plan was to get a few varieties ready early, so I've done that, even if there are no more germination's. My main goal was to get advanced plants ready when planting time comes in October, especially with the new cross. The new cross, which I will name soon, along with Wandocka and UK2000 will be my main crop, with a single plant of the others that may grow. Just on the Roma's that are on the list, I will not be growing them in my garden, I have an old friend in town here who loves his Roma's, so much I even purchased a packet of fresh seed for him last year. It will be a nice gift to give him some advanced plants when he wants them.

Tomato Seed Germination Times

Have you ever noticed how some varieties of tomato seed germinate way faster than others. It's very annoying as I have seed from last season side-by-side in the seed tray and one is a good day and a half ahead of the other. The new cross of mine is a good example, it is by far the quickest germinating seed, and barely a month or two later than the others as far as seed collection goes.

Now, three days after the cross stood up with their new cotyledons showing and Wandocka a day behind them, I have one seedling next to them for UK 2000, while three Valenciano Clemente are standing and it was from one year old seed.

I like Updates

I like updates so much I'll post a photo each day to show what the crossed variety is looking like since germination. Today is one week since they were sown. So far there are about a dozen of this variety that are standing up and healthy looking. Other varieties that have also germinated are Valenciano Clemente, Wandocka and Roma.

They seem to be managing OK with the colder nights, so once they get into their individual pots, I'll raise the temperature to manage the extra soil level in the pot.

All good so far - more to come later.

Visible Germination - Day 3

Hardenbergia's are Happy Wanderers

Last year I built a garden arch between two raised garden beds. On one side we bought a plant from the local Bunning's Store, while on the other side, we had a wild pink flowered form that the late Bill Cane had collected seeds for, but it doesn't have tendrils like Hardenbergia violacea. Growing above it on the arch is another wild variety from Stockdale, which I saved after a grader had dug it out on the edge of a buch road.

This morning while admiring the plants, I took a few photos of the plant and posted below.

 

The arch with three plants.

  Stockdale form growing above the pink form.

The Bunning's plant loaded with flower buds.

Getting The Jump On Winter

Winter in Australia doesn't begin until Monday next week, but I am jumping the gun with my seedlings this year due to health reasons. Normally I start my seeds on 28 July, but this year I'm hoping to get some advanced plants grown, so I can get earlier fruit, well that's the plan.

In this photo are a new cross I'm playing with and have high hopes of getting something nice from them. I will sow seeds again in July as normal as well.


Germination is happening, see arrows. 

Visible germination - Day 1

Visible germination - Day 2

Flashback 2016

Flashback

Here's a couple of photos from 2 April 2016 when the hothouse was in Cranbourne and we had better seasons than what we get here.

Growing in Raised Garden Beds

Unless you had the opportunity to have great garden soil, then you need to think about Raised Garden Beds, which as you'll find are a different way to grow in, especially if for vegetables. Having raised beds means that your current soil isn't any good and you need to but in soil to fill them. Just be aware that the soil you bring in, is probably not good growing soil and may even have problems, like we had here with a high soil pH.

My biggest garden bed

In a good Winter when the soil gets wet enough, you can actually dig into it, but about  200mm below the surface, we have rocks similar to river pebbles and it makes a garden in it almost impossible.It took two growing seasons to amend the soil we bought in and it proved a waste until we got the pH down to a usable range before I was confident enough to grow a decent crop in it. We achieved good results by digging in decomposed cow manure from the Saleyards in Sale, as it was full of worms and all the good things we needed.

Saffron, Blueberries and a Worm Tower

The first raised garden bed we made was one I made for my wife to grow her Lime tree in, which she also uses for herbs and strawberries. Then came the main vegetable garden, which is about 7.2m x 2.4m, this year is doing quite well with our Winter Crop. Other beds we bought in are 4 @ 3.6m x 1.5m and 1 @ 1.8m x 900mm, the smaller one shown above with two miniature Blueberry plants and a crop of Saffron Crocus between them, while the two of the bigger beds are used for vegetables, one is used for natives and one has an apple tree and strawberries.

 

Onions, Parsnip and Peas

Garlic

Apple tree, Strawberries with Natives in back bed.

Calytrix Tetragona 'Compact Pink'

While I was still in the mood, I did a few more cuttings today, but this time I did Calytrix Tetragona 'Compact Pink', a very pretty shrub to have in your garden when it flowers. I'll post a photo of it in flower later so you can see what I mean when it flowers.

Correa - 'Bill Cane'.

Many years ago, I met a man who has become our best friend in this town where we now live. I have for many years had an interest in the Australian Native Correa, a beautiful shrub that has bell shaped variable flowers. My friend had a web page and I saw some photos he had posted on it which got my interest. I got invited to visit him, so Jan and I made the 2+ hour drive to meet him. In his garden he had an unnamed Correa given to him by a deceased friend and Nurseryman, named Bill Cane.

To cut a long story short, I asked for cuttings of this straggly prostrate Correa with pink and white bell flowers. Over the years, his plant died and I was able to replace it with a cutting grown plant, as I grew many of them over this time. Bill Cane's son and daughter in law live between here and Bairnsdale and I'd like them to have some plants growing in their garden, hence why I'm doing these cuttings.

Alliums Growing Well

My Garlic and Onions are growing well with the cooler damper weather. For those that start their Onions off from Bunnings seedlings will know how slow they can be to get growing. In my big garden bed, I have three rows of Garlic and a hotch potch of mixed Onions consisting of Cream Gold, Brown and Reds. These started off just being two rows of reds from seed tape, but they were hit and miss so I added as I went to fill up the rows.

In the raised bed, I have about six types of Garlic which is finally looking better now that it's been raining. In another raised bed, I have Red Onions which were so tiny when I planted them, but are starting to hit their straps now.

Photos show Big Garden, Garlic in raised bed, Red Onions in raised bed.

Winter Tomato Seedlings - Don't try This.

Trust me to try something different, but theoretically it should work, but Mother Nature may say otherwise. Anyway, I'm planning to grow some varieties of tomato plants two months earlier than I would normally do. The reason is I want to plant some advanced plants of my new cross tomato (Nicoleta X Sweet Ozark Orange) mid October so that I can get fruit early enough to grow another filial generation in the New Year and to do this I need to grow the seedling earlier.

I set up the heat mat yesterday in the hothouse, so all that's left to do is sterilise the two trays, fill with Propagation Mix and then sow the seeds, how simple that seems.

The list so far.

Rosado de Huelva
Rosado de Ademuz
Valenciano Clemente
Negrillo di Almoguera
Roma
Kenai Mondo Green
Kodiak Brown
Amurskiy
Korichnevyy Rebristyy
Striped Rumplestiltskin
UK2000
Wandocka
Nicoleta X Sweet Ozark Orange

Winter in The Vegie Garden

Winter in the vegie garden, nothing better really. The plants that are growing are looking good with some nice rain since they got planted. The Peas are flowering and starting to pod up, while the Carrots have been thinned out and we're picking some Silverbeet.

The added bonus here this year is the Autumn rain, which has kept the soil wet enough to grow everything, including the Onions & Garlic..

Seed Swap - Clearing Out The Seed Tin

I did a big seed swap today with a follower on Instagram, which saw a large amount (17 varieties) of season 2019/20 tomato seeds packaged up ready to send. Also included is seed for Jade Numbat Zucchini, Canteen Gourd and New Guinea Beans. In return I'm getting some Glass Gem Corn seeds, which we want to grow this Spring, so the tomato seeds are surplus to what I want.

I've been meaning to offer these seeds in a seed swap myself, but since closing down the Forum I had, there was no outlet. Then out of the blue I joined in a seed swap on Instagram and will come out with 30 grams of Glass Gem Corn Jan wants to grow from October when the garden gets planted out.

Here's the package ready to go into the envelope tonight.

 

Spanish Tomato Growout 2020/21

It's hoped that for the Tomato growing season of 2020/21, that a growout of Spanish tomato varieties can be grown out by a few grower friends. Back in either 2009 or 2010, I along with a woman on my then Garden Forum, received some tomato seeds from Spain. Over the years I have grown some of them, so I think they are worth growing again to make seed available as there are some very tasty varieties among them.

The varieties I'm hoping that will become available are:-

Muchomiel Battle
Rosado de Huelva
Rosado de Ademuz
Valenciano Clemente
Murciano Amarillo
Negrillo di Almoguera
Miel du Mexique

The names vary with translation, but this is how they were written on the seed envelopes so the names will stick for the time being. The tomato Rosado de Ademuz is a lovely eating tomato, probably smaller than what you'd normally grow, but they are prolific. Valenciano Clemente are a heart shaped tomato, red in colour and great if you want to make sauce, as they didn't have lots of seed. Negrillo di Almoguera is a black/red fruit which like most blacks are very tasty and make an excellent sandwich tomato. Murciano Amarillo is a yellow fruit which is quite sweet and is nice cut up in a salad. Miel du Mexique translates to Honey of Mexico, which is a sweet prolific cherry tomato which can become a large plant if left unchecked.

                                                       Rosado de Ademuz                                                      

Negrillo di Almoguera

Our Autumn Garden So Far.

There's an old saying, so Far, So Good, well that applies to the garden here so far, as most of what we're growing is doing fine at the moment. The only exception is that the Parsnips didn't germinate, a whole 4 packets, so we'll give up on them for now. In the big garden bed, the potatoes are looking quite leggy, but they can do their own thing as I'm not really worried about them and whether or not the give anything back, as I just used up some seed that Jan had left over when she dug her lot earlier in the season, Onion, red, brown and cream are finally starting to look good, while the garlic is doing fine next to them. Then the Topweight Carrots have been thinned and the peas and silverbeet are powering along, this lot of peas are flowering.

 

 Dwarf Peas & Silverbeet

Topweight Carrots

In the next bed, a raised metal bed 1.5mx90cm are two dwarf Blueberry bushes and between them are the 35 Saffron Crocus corms we planted last year. The Saffron got off to a good start and we managed 26 flowers over the few weeks they flowered in, but the plants are quite full of multiple leaf stems.

 

Saffron Crocus Leaves

The raised bed with the Garlic in it is looking good, so happy after getting a non return crop last year. The final bed with vegies in it is the one with dwarf green peas and red onions in it, both doing good although the peas haven't started flowering yet.

Red Onions

In another raised bed Jan has taken it over and used the available room with strawberry plants, which sit between the apple tree on one end and the Correa's on the other. Overall the growing space for all beds isn't that big, but it keeps us busy looking after the weeds.

Green Peas 

Honey of Mexico Tomatoes

Scrounging through the seed tins, I actually found what I was looking for, some Honey of Mexico tomato seeds. With these tomatoes you really only need one plant, as they grow prolific, both in foliage and fruit. A great cherry tomato to grow and it gets an 8/10 for taste.

Miel du Mexique (Honey of Mexico) 8/10

Seed Swap

Last year I sent my Instagram friend Lee in Queensland some tomato seeds, so this year she sent me two lots of seeds to try here. One is the New Guinea Bean, the other is a Canteen Gourd. Both are Gourds, but if eaten young enough the new Guinea Bean tastes more like a Zucchini.

I haven't grown either, but I did sow some New Guinea Bean seed last year, but it never germinated. They need something to climb on, so our back fence may have to suffice when I do grow them.

Notice the shape of these seeds, very unusual.