Another Spuredda Leccese Carosello

There’s never a way to know what I am going to get when I grow out any carosello variety that is referred to as a “Spuredda Leccese”. Being that the word “Spuredda” means the same thing as Carosello and that many of the Carosello varieties in Italy come from the Leccese region, it is very much saying “We have no idea what this type of cucumber-melon seed this is, but it is a carosello and it may have come from this one area. So – we’ll sell the seed in packages with a fancy stock photo of a carosello on it”.

As with most carosello varieties, it requires growing the seed out to see if it is both viable and also worth saving. This variety did not look much different from others in its seed package, but from early on, it looked darker than other varieties (a good sign). On further inspection (gently brushing off the fuzz) I recognized that this variety had some real potential. If you cannot tell from how I feel about fancy cucumber varieties, I have a real love of cucumbers with stripes.

So, after I messed up one group of carosello due to some misunderstanding of how to properly water the hydroponic buckets that I had in the greenhouse, I decided to try growing this variety out again. So – this variety is very much like some of the darker Scopattizo Barese carosello varieties that my friend Giuseppe has grown.

So now I am faced with yet dilemma – should I continue this line of Carosello Scopattizo Barese or not? I’m not sure. It is really hard to tell what I want to continue to grow unless I grow it next to another very similar variety. Perhaps in a year or two I will find another garden from which I can do a Scopattizo Barese or Spuredda Leccese grow out.

The Almost Dark Carosello Spuredda Leccese

Sometimes knowledge can be a very good thing. Knowing that fire is hot and knowing the correct color for each wire to connect to an electrical switch are two examples in which knowledge can be very good. However, once someone has knowledge responsibilities soon follow – such as using the fire to cook dinner or fixing the light switches as part of someone else’s to-do list. 

In relation to my garden, the knowledge of what I can grow can sometimes create its own challenge. I can see that others grow a specific cucumber by a specific name or I could have grown a specific cucumber from a previous generation only to not encounter the same cucumber again.

Carosello Spuredda Leccese Dark 7/18/2019

In 2018 I grew a nearly completely dark Spuredda Leccese. However, I did not have as much luck as when I had grown it before. Either because the female flower was crossed with another variety or because the genetics of its mother fruit were not completely dark. The result was a "not quite dark" Spuredda Leccese. 

I’ll keep looking around. Hopefully, during some future carosello grow-out, I’ll find exactly what I’m looking for.

Carosello Spuredda Leccese (almost dark) 8/1.

My sad attempt to grow the Tursuluk Kelek

In Turkish, the term Tursuluk Kelek roughly translates into “unripe melon”. However, the word Kelek or unripe can mean a number of other things, such as without hair or stupid. A doctor I was talking to one day who came from Turkey said that it also means that something is “no good”. The last meaning is what my experience with the Tursuluk Kelek.

March 23rd, 2019

March 26th

April 1st

April 3rd

The seeds that I received from my brother were very good seeds. They sprouted quickly and the plants grew well. Once in the ground, however, it was a different story. As anyone who has grown in a sterile soil can tell you, plants require healthy bacteria to grow well.

April 11th

April 29th

Having healthy bacteria - along with being aware of when the plant was low on water - were two things was just one of the many mistakes I made with this plant. Part of the problem was how I set up my hydroponic buckets. The issue is that I was using tomato cages that were larger than the baskets. This meant that if I wanted to look under the baskets, I had to remove the wire cages from the soil around the buckets.

April 30th

June 11th

By the time in the season that I figured out this trick and began looking at water levels more often, it was too late. I tried my best to add water to the Tursuluk Kelek, but the roots that required air were already growing down toward the bottom of the bucket. This meant that when I added a lot of water, I drowned the plant. If you, as a gardener, have ever experienced how a plant acts when it cannot get air, you will understand what I am talking about. Though I imagine plant roots can live without air longer than people can, the window of time for plants to survive without air is extremely short.

June 14th

Agrolife Tondo Massafrese

One of the Carosello varieties I decided to grow out in 2019 was the Agrolife Tondo Massafrese. It is not that I do not already have a good Massafra variety. The truth is that I am always looking for other good variants of what I have to help provide additional positive genetic inputs into the seed I already have. Think of it as expanding the genetics of my future garden.

Growing the Agrolife Tondo Massafrese earlier in the season

While I enjoy many of my current carosello cucumber varieties, if I can get other similar variants of the same variety that have desirable traits, then the cross of these two variants should produce a more desirable carosello than their parents. This is why I am often growing similar carosello varieties. It is not just that I love growing carosello (which I do). It is also that I am continuing to look for the most productive beautiful and delicious cucumbers that the world has to offer.

Though a picture is worth a thousand words, many seed packets are worth two words in my vocabulary. The most common phrase I pick when looking at a carosello seed packet is “We’ll see”. As for this specific seed packet, my growout of this carosello left me saying just one thing: “Nope”.

Long Shot Carosello Barese Growout

In a long-shot attempt to find a spotted carosello specimen similiar to my friend Giuseppe, I grew out the Carosello Barese in my hydrophonic basket to see if anything different occured Apparently not. This grow-out turned out to produce the same carosello cucumber variety as always.

Note: growing in poor soils or conditions in which the plants feel stressed will not produce bitter fruit. However, fruit size and shape will suffer as a result. Of all the factors that result from plant stress, I have not found that fruit color changes from plants grown in ideal conditions to those grown in less desirable conditions.