A Seed Saver's Garden

heirloomgal

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Garden is 99% empty as of yesterday. Only sorghum remains. I'd really like to learn how to use the tiller this year, but I've got no steel toes and DH is insisting on me wearing some. I guess he thinks I'll be terrible at it!

After the labours of summer, it's nice to be free from weeding & watering. I'm really enjoying the magnificent colours of the leaves right now, it's just so beautiful.

Excited for some fall walks on the nature trails. Then I get to come home to some warmth, take a comfy seat and pop open bean pods to see what's in there..
 

heirloomgal

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What an interesting seed! Apparently you get fruit in Ontario? And as usual; the presentation is well done too.

we’re just about done here; i still have stuff in the greenhouse but the end is near there as well!

BUT, there’s always next year; Lord willing🙂
Yes, lots of fruit in Ontario, though usually grown south of me. My watermelons baaaarely made me some ripe seeds, but I've had a bumper crop of them in a good summer.
 

heirloomgal

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@heirloomgal, watermelons, sweet potatoes and garlic got crossed off the list several years ago. If Costco has melons in the summer we get melons if not, oh well!
i must say these you’ve shown us are a remarkably attractive seed. Im sure they’d make good barter stock;)

Given the mystery of the unforeseeable future, I'm hoping they all do...;)
 

heirloomgal

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Time to start emptying the greenhouse. Had some light snow earlier today. 🌨️

Osmarske Kambe, my favourite tomato type pepper. It's smack in the middle, size wise, between a bell and a tomato type, like a large apple . Very thick walls. The smaller types IMHO just don't seem to have enough flesh, unless you're stuffing them raw.
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Last of the Gong Bao's. Might as well pick 'em before they freeze. Interestingly, nearly all the reds were completely dry when I picked them today. Not something I see often; the Bird's Eye's seem to be doing the same thing.
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Purple UFO. So out performed expectations.
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Can't believe the longevity this plant had, Tigre Jalapeno. The other varieties have (mostly) given up. Another one that outperformed expectation. All 4 of the new ones I tried were fabulous in every way, which comes as a nice surprise.
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Striped Toga eggplants, the ones that didn't mature. They lose the green stripes when ripe. Lots did ripen though, they don't look quite as nice as at that stage.
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flowerbug

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we normally have the pepper shut down by mid to later Sept, so having green peppers to pick still this past week was great. even if some of them had thin walls they were still edible and not damaged by the light frost we had. :)

useful and extra harvest is surely not something to complain about... :) :) :)
 

heirloomgal

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Waiting on these 2 slow pokes.
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Faced the fact that the sorghum is done for. Oh well, next time. One last flowerpot of Gem marigolds in the greenhouse and all seeds are done for the year.

Hard to believe the season has ended. Soon it'll be time to start dreaming of new good things for 2023!
 

Pulsegleaner

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Just finished seeding/eating the green cherry tomatoes I picked a few weeks ago (finally ripened up).

There was a bit of a surprise. As I went though them, I found only three still had the dark green zebra like stripes, so I saved those separately. And, as far as I can tell, there actually IS a major difference between the two, both in size (the striped ones are quite a bit smaller than the non striped, small enough that the non striped of the same size tended not to have mature seeds) and taste (the striped ones are quite a bit more acidic, though not unpleasantly so*). So it think it is quite possible that, despite coming from the same initial fruit (I think) the two plants are NOT genetically the same, and the striped one is in fact a mutation or cross of Green Doctors (my best guess as to what the original was) rather than official Green Zebra Cherry. I don't have a lot of striped seed (besides there being only three fruits they were MUCH lower in mature seed than the non-striped) but I think I have enough to keep going.

*If you are wondering how I can save seeds AND eat the tomatoes, I wash them, cut them in half, squeeze the seeds and gel into a container to ferment, and eat the remaining wall flesh. I don't get a COMPLETE profile of the tomato's flavor (since I don't get much gel effect, being limited to whatever gel juice is left on the walls) but I usually get at least a decent idea.

Actually didn't get to eat much in this case, these were nearly all gel, very thin walls.
 

heirloomgal

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Just finished seeding/eating the green cherry tomatoes I picked a few weeks ago (finally ripened up).

There was a bit of a surprise. As I went though them, I found only three still had the dark green zebra like stripes, so I saved those separately. And, as far as I can tell, there actually IS a major difference between the two, both in size (the striped ones are quite a bit smaller than the non striped, small enough that the non striped of the same size tended not to have mature seeds) and taste (the striped ones are quite a bit more acidic, though not unpleasantly so*). So it think it is quite possible that, despite coming from the same initial fruit (I think) the two plants are NOT genetically the same, and the striped one is in fact a mutation or cross of Green Doctors (my best guess as to what the original was) rather than official Green Zebra Cherry. I don't have a lot of striped seed (besides there being only three fruits they were MUCH lower in mature seed than the non-striped) but I think I have enough to keep going.

*If you are wondering how I can save seeds AND eat the tomatoes, I wash them, cut them in half, squeeze the seeds and gel into a container to ferment, and eat the remaining wall flesh. I don't get a COMPLETE profile of the tomato's flavor (since I don't get much gel effect, being limited to whatever gel juice is left on the walls) but I usually get at least a decent idea.

Actually didn't get to eat much in this case, these were nearly all gel, very thin walls.
The two plants that you harvested green cherries from- what variety was the parent plant? Green Zebra Cherry? I'd be curious to know the parentage of that variety.
 
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