Taxi is, by far, the easiest tomato variety I have ever grown. It is almost like cheating. A couple of volunteer taxi tomato plants sprouted up in the fertile garden, so I took some pictures of them. While I do love Taxi, I wish I knew of a similar red tomato variety, that did this well without putting in so much work to maintain it.
I grew out the Emerald Naked-Seeded Pumpkin from the Experimental Farm Network this last summer. They did fairly well until August, then succumb quickly to Powdery Mildew. I didn’t take a lot of pictures of them.
While I love eating Pumpkin seeds, saving these for seed can be quite difficult. The primary issue is that the seeds don’t dry very well and will quickly mold, if there is any humidity. I lost some of my very best seed to mold, despite working to dry them well. I would love to grow this variety again, but am not sure how I would better dry the seed for future planting.
After trying out a number of English Telegraph cucumbers, I had a bit of time to grow some in the fertile garden. Unfortunately, I started the English Telegraph cucumbers off way too late and got very few seed. This variety is generally very desirable for growers, but a pain to grow for the seed saver.
The seed was so light that I have no idea if the little that I saved will grow if planted. I will likely need to re-source the seed – if I can.
I decided to try a new kind of Cucumis anguria this last season, so I planted a USDA variety from Zambia. Like the Ethiopian variety, this variety was nearly spineless. It looked perfect for the conditions I was growing in.
Gherkins usually start out as small little plants and get larger over time. If not kept in check, they can slowly take over the garden. As they are very resistant to a number of diseases, the plants themselves usually only die off after a freeze. As for the prolific fruit, it is important to make sure to pick up any stragglers as the fruit reseeds very easily.
The plants grew well behind and between the other plants I was growing and I harvested plenty of fruit. And its dark color was quite beautiful. Unfortunately, there is something interesting about Gherkins. This variety, along with another one that I grew, produced plenty of fruit and seed. However, the seed did not germinate. Why exactly this happens, I don’t know, but it is pretty frustrating. I’m planning on refrigerating the seed for a while to see if I can determine if there is something about the sprouting technique that I’m missing.
The Tondo di Manduria did very well this year. In fact, they did much better than I expected. This left me with an abundance of seed. Be sure to ask me whatever questions you may have about this variety. I hope you enjoy the pictures of this delicious cucumber-melon.
