The Martina Franca in the Raised Garden

Even though things don’t work out the way that we had planned, as we are open to the possibilities, we are often able to see our problems work out. One example of a problem working out for me was in growing the Martina Franca in the Raised Bed Garden. This was definitely not my first choice of places to grow. However, I was told that one of my cubic yard gardening bins needed to be moved on short notice. This made it so that my Martina Franca no longer had a place to grow. At the same time, I kept having major damage to my English cucumber variety at the raised garden. With the onslaught of pillbugs destroying my seedlings, and my dwindling supply of English cucumber seeds, I found that there would be ample space in the raised bed garden for the Martina Franca.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thanks to the BioDiverso Puglia website, I knew about the Martina Franca for about a decade before I had the opportunity to grow the variety. I actually had a picture of the variety up on my wall for years, hoping that I would one day be able to grow it. I don’t know why opportunities happen, but when they do, I am grateful for them. The opportunity to recently acquire the Martina Franca from an Italian grower was a cherished moment for me. I continue to try to reach out to the gentleman who shared this variety with me to thank him for all that he shared with us.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Martina Franca is a very vigorous variety for me. It grew extraordinarily well and quickly set a host of fruit near the base of the plant. The fruit is a beautiful color and texture and the flavor at picking stage makes it one of the best fruits that I have tried in a while. It continues to amaze me how many of the extremely rare caroselli (plural for carosello) produce very high quality fruit. It is a shame that the world is missing out on this gem of a cucumber.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

When it finally came time to harvest the cucumbers, I noticed that the flowers looked like perfect hermaphrodite flowers and some of the fruit had low seed count or a high percentage of flat nonviable seed. This trait reminded me the Tondo di Galatina, which has parthenocarpic traits that can make it difficult to set seed. I decided to try growing the Martina Franca again soon, in order to find out if my observations about seed set may, in any way, be related to parthenocarpy in the variety.

Bringing back the San Donato

With such a rich history in the area of San Donato di Leccese, it is a wonder that the once highly prized San Donato Meloncella required so long for me to be able to get to a point where I could share it with others. While it took a lot longer than I thought, I'm satisfied that at least progress has been made.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For context, I received this variety back before 2020, when I decided to grow this polymorphic cucumber-melon. While the color of the variety exhibited a classic light with splotched form, a dark form, and a medium dark with dark splotching form, the fruit had more problems than just color. A small percentage of the initial plants I grew yielded bitter fruit. While I was able to cull out the bitter fruit and save seed from the first fruits, I was unable to save seed from the second crop - which was free of pollen from the bitter-fruited plants. Prior to the younger fruit being able to mature, the later crop succumbed to the effects of Powdery Mildew. Given the multiple factors required to remediate its deficiencies, it took several years for me to get back to the San Donato. I did, however, blog about the variety back in 2022.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Speaking of 2022, that’s when I finally got back to trying to grow the San Donato. I grew it out in a garden at the college. I would have to say that, given the 40+ hours I spent working on that plot, that it was a complete failure. That being said, I did grow out the San Donato, though not in isolation. Some garden experiences are just an experience – and that is what my San Donato plot was like when I blogged about it in 2023.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Fast forward another two years and I finally moved the San Donato into my backyard. That was close enough for me to really perform the work on the most important concern about the San Donato – removing bitterness from the population of fruit. Given a study done in Sudan, I pursued a method of reducing the bitter traits in the population. I began with an overabundance of seedlings that I planted into the garden bed. I then tasted the leaves of each variety. The seedlings that were more bitter were culled and the rest were left until the plants grew large enough to cull again. This pattern was repeated again and again until there were 8-9 plants left. Then I began tasting the flowers and the immature fruit. If there were any bitter immature flowers or fruit on any plant, then I would pull the plant. Having tasted all the small fruit from each plant and finding none to be bitter, I then left the plants to cross-pollinate and produce whatever fruit they would. This would enable a large enough population to keep me from experiencing bottle-necks with the population the next time I grew out the San Donato.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

While I was not able to select for fruit color this time, I was successful in doing what mattered most. Besides a little spider mite pressure, the season when relatively well. While I may not be able to return the Meloncella di San Donato to its former glory, I am grateful that I can work on it enough to be able to share it with others. On that note, you can learn more about the San Donato at Cucumber Shop’s Cucumberpedia page here. https://cucumbershop.com/the-cucummaru-de-san-donato/