Seed Catalog Time!

[sparkles2307]

Funny, I spent about an hour last night and another half hour this morning going thru the tomatoes in Baker Creek I can't wait to start getting the 2011 catalogs!

 

[lesa]

Hey, Sparkles- I don't remember seeing a report on your garden? I think you direct seeded your tomatoes? And what about the million squash you planted?? Hoping you had a very successful harvest!!

 

[hypnofrogstevie]

Ok I dont know if I trust johnny's seeds....

http://davesgarden.com/products/gwd/comments.php?compid=84&type=3

 

[digitS']

I am not sure what you see here, Stevie.

Johnny's has become a large company. They have had lots and lots of customers and, within any large group of people, there are some that will not have a good experience.

My relationship with Johnny's goes back a very long time. My continuing relationship with some varieties of plants go back nearly as far. For example, I bought a variety that was grown by Petoseed Company years ago. It was successful in my garden. Then Petoseed became part of Seminis. Then Seminis was bought by Monsanto.

It is like my relationship with Shumway. That goes back into the 60's . Gosh, it is nearly 50 years! Anyway, Shumway began acquiring other seed companies. Then they must have sort of imploded because Jung's bought them. That's another company that I've been ordering seed from just about forever.

Things get complicated . . . Now, Johnny's is partly owned by its employees and the plan is that they will eventually own all of it.

Change happens and I do the best I can to adjust to it but there are varieties that I have trusted to grow well for me for decades. I try new things every year but I had a garden for years before Monsanto even went into the seed business. This year was the 1st time in about 15 years that I didn't grow Peto Wonder sweet peppers :/.

Johnny's was one of the 1st companies to have an online catalog. Soon, there was more on the web than in their catalogs. I thought it was great!

A few years ago they evidently had some serious problems with security. They notified me but it didn't involve my credit information.

This was about the same time that Rob Johnston began selling Johnny's to his employees. It seems to me that Johnston just began to lose interest in the business side of running the company. New plants are apparently more his concern now. Rob Johnston isn't a kid anymore, either. How he leaves Johnny's will say a lot about how he led his life. He is adjusting to change, too.

Steve

 

[hypnofrogstevie]

If you say its good enough then I will use them. What scared me was all the credit card theft posts. I double read and made sure they were not owned by monsanto. If I do order from Johny's I will be sending a check or money order

 

[sparkles2307]

Funny, I spent about an hour last night and another half hour this morning going thru the tomatoes in Baker Creek I can't wait to start getting the 2011 catalogs!

The squash are piled up in the garden cart in my garage.... till I get more room in the crawl space or can them. I got a pressure cooker, yay!

The tomatoes were beautiful! My lattice plating aide made for straight rows with nice plant spacing, and I noticed that (I dont believe in thinning) the seedlings seemed to all meld into one plant after a while. The Hillbilly Potato Leaf had lots of plants but I only got one tomato. Used it for some nice yellow salsa. I got LOTS of purple cherokee and Japanese Trifelle Black. I can't remember the other varieties, but lets just say that its mid-november and I just used the last fresh ones that I ripened in the house this week. I had lots. I have many many quarts of canned tomatoes, we will get thru till next spring

I noticed that the summer squash plants molded badly this year. I think it was becuase they were so thickly planted....no sunshine ever got thru the canopy to dry the ground at all, and there was lots of heavy white mold on the stalks. Didnt affect the harvest, We had so many I was just tossing them to the chickens because we couldnt eat them fast enough.

For some reason, my cucumbers always do poorly. I mean, we get enough to eat fresh, but not even close to enough to pickle. The plants start out great, then the leave get all curled and brown, really dry looking, but its always really wet and warm here, its very weird.

We planted the corn in the wrong end of the garden. Theres a gentle slope, and at the bottom the soil compacts and the sun doesnt bake the ground all day. The corn never did produce. Disappointing for sure. When its at the top of the garden it does really well. But, I used the top for my tomatoes this year.

The watermellon was a flop. I used a realyl long growing variety, not suited for our summer length. We got two that ripened, and the ducks ate the rest. I know for a fact that the neighbors get so many canteloupe-type melons that they throw piles of them to the deer, so we CAN grow melons here....I just have to find one that works and that I LIKE.

I got about 1 cup of raspberries from my 2nd year stalks and 6 gooseberries from the plant I put in on Mother's Day. This spring before they wake up I'm moving them out of the garden and into special berry-beds.

The lettuce, altho it made for pretty pictures, was terrible. The red bolted too fast, and the green mini-head type rotted right away. I'm not doing lettuce next year, strictly spinach. We dont care much for lettuce anyway.

The peas were great.

Um, what else did I plant...... oh, all the exotic melons failed terribly, so I think I need to talk to one of the local Amish farmers and get seeds from them for melons.

The End

 

[lesa]

Hey, all in all not a bad year!! You and your family ate a bunch of delicious food and you learned a lot of stuff for next year! I'd call that a complete success! Great idea to ask others in your area, what melon they are having success with- saves a lot of experimenting...I had a bad year for lettuce, as well. I laughed when I was out picking some swiss chard for dinner.. the lettuce I planted way back in July is coming up and looks beautiful. I know it doesn't like heat, but it has been below freezing at night, many times!! Go figure, mother nature always has a plan of her own!

 

[BetterHensandGardens]

Thanks for the other catalog suggestions everyone. I just signed up for the High Mowing Organic Seed, Pinetree, and Seeds of Change Catalogs. I have another suggestion for potatoe growers: http://www.woodprairie.com/ Looks like Johnny's doesn't have their 2011 catalog out yet.

 

[hypnofrogstevie]

The wife is so going to kill me LOL!! I just requested for the mag below. Better start stocking up on more shoe boxes LOL!!!

 

[Hollywood Gardens]

If you say its good enough then I will use them. What scared me was all the credit card theft posts. I double read and made sure they were not owned by monsanto. If I do order from Johny's I will be sending a check or money order

I ordered with a credit card and had no problem! those posts from DavesGarden.com are over a year old!