Trying Again - Goji Berries

Back a few months ago I collected seeds from Dried Goji Berries from the Supermarket, with some success I might add. I had done this process back in 2008 with good results, but I'm not sure what happened this time around. I tried a couple of times to germinate the seeds, but I couldn't get any to germinate in the two times I tried.

Fast forward to a couple of weeks ago, when I purchased a pack of approx 150 seeds and today I sowed them on the heat mat. It's going to take a couple of weeks to germinate this mew lot, so I'll update on them when it happens.

Apart from the seed packet, these are photos from 2008. 

End of Winter Seedlings

 Half way through August and almost the end of Winter for us, so what's still growing in the hothouse after it being so cold here. On the heatmat at present are the remaining Golden Nugget Pumpkin seeds, which don't look like germinating, along with some older tomato seeds I thought I'd try to germinate, some 2008 & 2011.

All Capsicums and Peppers that were started apart from Candy Cane are very slow to grow, so the cold is hindering these. The Tomato plants are going OK at this stage with the ones for my plant sale looking happy, while the new seedlings for my own garden are starting to get their first true leaves.

All in all most things are slow, while the early sowing of Eggplants are mostly dead and the Watermelons seemed to have stopped growing. Okra and Rosella plants are still growing, something new for me this season.

Candy Cane Capsicums - Size Difference

A sneak peak at what's in store for you if you happen to grow the Candy Cane (#1 & #2) seeds from any of my seed offers. In this current photo are #1 on the left, with #2 on the right, so not hard to see the stronger of the two.

 

The 2nd photo is an immature #2 fruit from last year.

 

 

Watermelon Seedlings

 I had to prick out the Watermelon seedlings as they germinated, as they were struggling badly in the cold weather, plus the seed coats were stuck on almost all of them. I'v removed the seed coats by hand as they just aren't strong enough to do it themselves.

Hopefully this will help them kick on and get some size now, but I still may germinate a few more.

I have, if they grow - Warpaint, Moon & Stars and Sugar Baby.

Sowed My Own Seeds Today

Today I sowed my seasons seeds, rather than growing seeds for my seedling sale. I sowed seeds for 10x varieties of Tomatoes, some more Candy Cane Capsicums, two varieties of Eggplant, Rosella and some Sweet Peppers.

Now to sit and wait for germination.

Hopefully the seedlings for the Seedling Sale get a move on now and I can empty out the hothouse and give my seedlings a month on their own.

 

Saffron Crocus - Update

 Since we lifted and resowed the bed. spreading out the corms over the whole bed, here's what's happened since then.

We only managed two flowers since the moved, but gee the bed ended up looking great as it grew and filled up.

Here's what it looks like mid July, four months later.

Winter Seedlings - 2022

 Almost at the end of July and the seedlings for my Seedling Sale are all germinated and pricked out into their own pots. The first video shows the plants on the north side of the hothouse.

The second video showing the south side of the hothouse.

Three Types of Carrots

 Growing Carrots is a great way to help get some of these nutritional vegetables  both on the table and in the freezer.

We've grown Chantoney, Paris Market and Baby Carrots this year and we are reaping great rewards from them. The Paris Market are a ball type carrot that are easily pulled because of the shortness, but these are great eating carrots, I prefer them boiled.

As with all Carrots, they take some time to get to the eating stage, but the wait is well worth it.

Greenfeast Peas

Greenfeast garden peas are great value to grow, with an abundance of pods over the course of the season.

Candy Cane Capsicums

 What a hidden gem these two plants were this season, the variegated foliage and fruits were amazing. These fruits were prolific the whole way through the season and we numbered them plant one and two for reference. Plant one was the more prolific, but plant twp looked the goods with more variegation.

Petal loved them and in the finish we had to freeze them save wasting them, with freezing being the best thing we could have done. These are on our grow list again this year, with plans on growing a few extra for a trial I'm hoping to try.

 

 

Parsnips From Our Own Seed

This Summer just gone, Jan saved seeds from a couple of Parsnips we deliberately keep so we could try our own seed saving. As it turned out we collected so many Parsnip seeds we gave a lot away with about 130 people getting them around Victoria.

Anyway, Jan sowed the seed 4 weeks ago and covered with Sugarcane Mulch, but got patchy results and had to resow the gaps that had appeared. Eventually the rows filled up and we now have a good crop started.

Saffron Crocus Corms Lifted and Resown

We had to rush this bit as we weren't sure what was happening with the Saffron Crocus corms, so the two Candy Cane Capsicums that were sharing this bed had to be removed, so today was the day.

We originally planted 35 Corms and this  year would be their fourth in the ground, so we decided to lift them all and fill the garden bed completely with them. Lots of big corms were found close to the worm tower, so once they were all up and the rows ready to sow, these bigger ones went down the centre of the bed. All in all it went well and we soon had all the corms back in the ground, but covering the whole bed.

 

 

Parsnip Seeds Sown

 Well the fresh parsnip seed Jan saved this season has been dried, distributed, shared and now sown in the raised garden bed.

Macalister Tomato

 Last year Macalister was orange in colour, this year one plant is yellow and one is red. The yellow is a good shape and tastes good, but the red turned out to be a pink and is ribbed and very oblate, so it looks like the yellow will continue, as well as the pink..

Zucchini's Doing Well

 Petal's crossed Zucchini is doing well and producing enough to keep her happy with a feed available most days and a few left over, which the worm farm are loving.

This is a bit of a glut she started off with.

Our Strawberries

 Our Strawberries are doing extremely well and we're eating heaps. It would appear that the Torrey variety are a bit better producers than the Red Gauntlet. The flavour is full on and we're both enjoying them.

Our First Ripe Tomato

 We finally got a ripe tomato in good time prior to Christmas, but things aren't good as the tomato is red and not the Japanese Pink Cherry I was expecting. Then to make things really bad, the blackbirds ate it.

 

 Moving on to Christmas Day, our first UK2000 tomato was ripening nicely, so Petal put a bag on it to keep the birds away, so it worked and I picked it probably a couple of days early.

Bagging Tomato Blossoms - My Hobby

 I love growing tomatoes and I have a task I do on them that people think I'm made for doing, but it is what it is.

I place organza bags over my unopened blossoms, so that they can't get cross pollinated - see I told you.

Here's what my plot looks like.

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We Have Roots

 The tomato seedling chewed off by birds has now started getting roots while in a glass of water.

Growing Well

 A few quick snaps of what's growing well in the vegetable garden. Most things are loving the rain, well except for tomatoes and strawberries.

Local Rain and Flooding

Well, we're wet here again after 65mm of rain and as you can guess we've had some local flooding too, which is a regular thing this year.

Having been laid up with a crook back for two weeks, we went out today to have a look around, with our first stop at Weirs Crossing where the Avon River is running very high after Friday's rain.

From the Stratford side.

We then decided to take the Llowalong Rd to Briagolong, but water over the road had us unsure on its depth, so we went back a little to the Startford Briagolong Road, back to Boisdale, then up to the crossing at Valencia Creek, where the river was high, but lower than the flattened grass and trees on the river bank shows a drop in the river of probably 1.5m to 2.0m.

 

 

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Jan's taken over this bed.

 First came the Sweet Corn, then came the Potatoes, so the garden bed is overflowing with growing plants.

Tomatoes are in.

 The picture doesn't show te true story, as I had room for 8x small plants when this shot was taken, so I planted them and the first night, two plants were attacked by birds, one went, the other chewed off at the ground. I'm trying to strike the chewed off plant in water..