I sowed a couple of seed today for my tomato cross 'Macalister' which I did the year before last (2019), between Nicoleta X Sweet Ozark Orange an F2 if they germinate. I didn't like it last year as it produced soft fruits when ripe. I'll try again this season, nothing to lose I suppose.
A bit over 3 weeks ago I sowed some Red Panama Passionfruit seeds from a fresh fruit, thinking it wouldn't grow, but I was wrong. Yesterday I noticed a green shoot appearing, from the first seed to germinate. We've tried so many times to get a plant to grow here, without success, so maybe growing our own from seed will change that.
Here's the emerging seedling.
Here are a few seedling tomatoes that have recently germinated in my hothouse. I was going to restrict what I grow, but that's gone out the window now.
Over the past few years, I've been experimenting with gluing the flowers shut on Capsicum & Chilli plants, keeping them to self pollinate. Here are some Candy Cane Capsicums from a glued flower, which will be interesting to see what it actually throws.
Theoretically it should be slightly different to the F1 original plant and should exhibit some traits of one of its parents.
A new to me extension ladder turned out to be a bit different to what it was advertised as. Rather than an aluminium extension ladder, I ended up with a fibreglass ladder. It's a lot heavier than aluminium, but it will do just fine. It's 2.4m to about 4.5m when extended.
When size does matter, the Oregon Giant Pea is a stand out as far as size goes, as you can see with the comparison here with a Greenfeast Pea. Neither are mature yet, so I'd expect some growing by the Giant in the coming weeks.
We have a few growing here which we''ll be saving for an Autumn/Winter growout next year.
I thought about it for a while, then changed my mind with the tomato varieties I'm growing this year. I've decided not to continue growing the Greek Witness tomatoes and limit what others I grow. I have put in a couple of seeds of each Alaskan Fancy and Japanese Pink Cherry for something different.
I was hoping the Alaskan Fancy were up by now, but they've only been down a week, but a couple are germinating this morning.
Wow, the Zucchini seedlings have kicked on with a growth spurt and are starting to get big now. Here's a look at what they look like tonight. The cotyledons are about 140mm across.
Do you fertilise your tomatoes? If not, why not.
Always a question a lot of people don't know or talk about, is whether to fertilise your tomato plants, but in reality the plants are probably screaming out for some form of nutrient and fertiliser gives them that. Over the years I've fed my new seedlings on a diluted does of liquid Fertiliser. For many years, a product called Lush was my go to fertiliser, but they took it off the market some years back and finding a substitute is a real pain, but there are some that will suffice. My substitute this year is Dynamic Lifter Organic Liquid Fertiliser, but it will be slow trial and error process because I haven't used it before.
A few years ago I started using Powerfeed for Tomatoes with mixed results, as it can be quite strong on seedlings and care must be taken when dosing the watering can with it , as it's a soluble and mixes easily. Then as the seedlings grow, you can increase the strength to somewhere near what's recommended on the bottle. When the plants are big enough, change from the Powerfeed to the dry fertiliser Brunnings Tomato and Vegetable Food, which is usually sold at Bunning's for around $8.00 for a 3kg bucket, although it never made it to the shelves at my local store last year. This is my go to fertiliser and use a handful under each plant at planting time. It isn't something the stores actually order in as it's a Head Office allocation to stores, so controlled at the top. This year at the time I'm writing this, it hasn't shown up in Stores as yet, but it will be something I look for from now on.
I'm listing the varieties of the Tomatoes I have growing this season, more so that I can keep a track on the seedlings once they are big enough.
So far, these are what's sown..
Macalister *Late sown
Cherry Brownies *Late sown
Japanese Pink Cherry* Late sown
Alaskan Fancy * Late sown
Giant Syrian * Late sown
Giant Belgium * Late sown
UK2000
Greek Witness
Nicoleta
Lavender Lake
Lithium Sunset
Village Red
Village Red is one I've been playing with for a number of years and I think if it throws a red tomato like last few years will be a winner.
Lithium Sunset is a mystery tomato and has two form in circulation, one yellow inside, the other is pink. It should be a yellow tomato with red stripes.
Lavender Lake is a Lavender/Purple fruit with good taste and sizable fruit.
Nicoleta, a tomato seed that came to Australia many years ago with a Romanian family who migrated here. The seed takes the name of their daughter, Nicoleta.
Greek Witness, a huge red paste type tomato from Greece. A tomato that also came to Australia with travelers/tourists and was given a name some years ago after its origin. A neighbour had the seed given to him to pass on to me by a lady Jehovah Witness. The name takes Witness from the religion and Greek from its country of origin.
UK2000 is our named tomatoes. A nice medium to large oblate tomato, originating as self sown seedlings in a farmers vegetable garden in the 1980's.
A green UK2000
I had to pot up the Zucchini and Watermelon seedlings today as they are too aggressive on the heat mat with their roots growing into the felt mat, seeking warmth and moisture. They all have good root systems, so should be fine in the pots.
Both these seed lots were sown on 8th August 2021, so a week and a day until now.
Not sure this will work very well, but I'm trying a converted jpeg to Pencil Drawing photo. Finding the happy medium with line strength is the only problem.
Activity with the Watermelons today, but only one showing from above. Looking at the bottom of the seed tray, the roots in the top right quarter are actually the Watermelons, so germination happening quite well there by the looks.
We spent the day doing something we haven't done in ages, we went looking for Australian Native Plants away from home. We found a great selection on the road up to Mt Raymond Fire Tower, even found a solitary Donkey Orchid amongst the numerous plants in the section we looked in. Other places we visited were Cann River and the Point Hicks Road, Orbost, Pettman Beach and last but not least a favourite spot of ours, the old Wairewa Road Trestle Rail Bridge, half destroyed in the Bushfire the year before last.
Mt Raymond Tower
Diuris - Donkey Orchid
Tetratheca Ciliata
Wairewa Road Rail Trestle bridge
We spent the day in East Gippsland today so the Zucchini's were left to their own devices and are looking good 5 days from sowing the seeds.
Not much more happening that warrants a mention, but here's what the seedlings are starting to look like.
I seem to have had a good germination rate with the tomato seed sowing, with good numbers on all of the tomato varieties sown. No sign of Capsicum, Zucchini or Watermelon yet, but they'll come in good time.
Apart from using bigger diameter screws, I think we may have solved the leaky roof by removing the screws and the screwing into some galvanised iron cut and drilled for that purpose.
Today, I patched the fracture in the shed door, which is not perfect, but good enough.
I thought I'd fixed the leak in the shed roof, but 13mm of rain earlier in the week has shown it's still not right. When the iron has been screwed down, the screws have stripped the metal in the hole in the roof batten and the screws don't tighten.
A week after sowing, I have my first lot of tomato seeds up, this lot is Nicoleta, but have Greek Witness up as well. I'm not growing many this year, well that's the plan.
Just an update on what's sitting on the heat mat at the present time.
Tomato seeds:-
UK2000
Greek Witness
Nicoleta
Lavender Lake
Lithium Sunset
Village Red
Plus a few seeds of Candy Cane Capsicums from a flower I glued shut in 2019. Then a handful of Correa Bill Cane cuttings.
