Research - An Informative way to select cultivars that will Beet the competition

A Cylindra Beet in my garden

I love beets. Especially butter beets. It took me a while until I found a beet variety that I liked. Most were round and became hard quickly. Being a gardener that does not like to take chances, I prefer to research my vegetable varieties before growing them. Some vegetables, such as finicky tomatoes and cucumbers in the summer must be researched based on an individual’s climate. However, I can use information about other more forgiving crops, such as beets, from researched conducted in another climate. That is why I like the following websites. The first is Cornell’s Vegetable Varieties for gardeners, which gives individual gardener’s advice on specific crops from various regions. The second is Dave’s Garden Plant files, which also gives gardeners the opportunity to rate a crop. And finally, the grand finale is a searchable database of results of test growing of individual vegetable cultivars from The University of Saskatchewan in Canada. In any case, it was from the Saskatchewan searchable database that I learned about the incredible productivity and taste of the Cylindra, Formanova, or butter beet. And I am so glad I did.

To those who ask about gardening in Tucson I say, "It is a science". That is yet another reason for my blog title. Though this is true for growing many things here, growing beets is a cinch. If you give beets enough water when they are starting out you can start them in early September-October when it is 90 degrees outside and they will happily grow until March- April when it is 90 degrees outside again. How I wish my other crops grew as easily as beets! Another plus about beets is that you can eat both the top and the bottom- though we usually give away the tops to another family (whose children appreciate them more) after my family has our first serving of them.

Think tender buttery texture in the form of a beet.

Even this beet possessed a smooth texture.

Direct Seeding versus Transplanting

2009 Tomato Transplants - Notice the Clipboard.

Which is better – direct seeding or transplanting? Direct seeding of course. Some say that direct seeding is the only way to enable a plant to reach its full potential by preserving an undisturbed taproot. Additionally, some farmers assert that direct seeded plants resist frost better and produce an earlier or larger crop than transplants do. My viewpoint is that direct seeding is the preferred method for growing some plants. Direct seeding is the way to go if you are dealing with the curcubit family. Squash, cucumbers, and melons do very well direct seeded and have difficulty with being transplanted after about a week of growth. Often the roots go into shock and take several weeks to recover, if at all. If peat pots are used and the transplant’s roots are handled very gently the plant may recover and grow again. Otherwise it may be more beneficial to use a hot cap to get a head start on cucubit seedlings. Beans, peas, and carrots also do well being direct seeded because of issues involved with their roots.

Another school of thought is that transplanting is beneficial because it allows you to get a head-start on the garden. This is especially true for tomatoes, peppers, onions, and brassicas such as cabbage, broccoli, and cauliflower. These plants often take a long time to mature and do not go through shock if transplanted correctly. I have been growing tomatoes from seeds for a while because that way I can control what varieties of tomatoes I grow. If pests are a problem direct seeding can help you get plants off to a good start before they would have a chance to munch on your little seedlings. Growing from transplants can reduce the time between crop harvest and a new crop. This can increase overall productivity given the ground is still fertile and disease-free. Both of these problems can be aided by the practice of effective crop rotation. Though transplanting may appeal to gardeners who prefer to have attractive and productive garden beds it can be expensive to always buy starts and can lead to potentially unsustainable gardening practices.

Tomato in 2" soil block with deep dowel hole



Tomatoes – The First Trials

Better Boy - A Hybrid Variety

When first starting with tomatoes I bought starts from a local grocery and hardware store. Early Gird, Better Boy, and First Lady 2 were some of the first hybrid tomato varieties I tried. Each cultivar (specific vegetable variety) did okay but not great. Better Boy seemed to take the heat and be disease resistant. I was able to produce nice looking plants but had some difficulty in producing the anticipated quantity and size of tomatoes. Not many tomato varieties do well here in Tucson. Perhaps it is because we hardly ever see weather between 70 and 90 degrees F. My desire to grow hybrid tomato varieties decreased the more I realized that I could not grow “true” fruit using hybrid tomato seed. After learning this I decided to pursue a more sustainable approach and limit my growing to open-pollinated tomato cultivars. In spring of 2009 I planted Glacier, Cold Set, Fireworks, Zhezha, Super Sioux, Buckbee’s 50 day, and Neptune. Most of the varieties did poorly. Glacier  and Buckbee’s 50 day couldn’t take the heat though Buckbee’s 50 day did better on fruit production and disease resistance, cold set can grow fast but can’t take the cold, when disease approached Fireworks went up in smoke, Zhezha produced 1-2 small fruits, Super Sioux could take the heat but produced little, Neptune could take the heat very well but produced little to average. Zhezha and Neptune were the only 2 determinates I grew. They are both true determinates- dying immediately after producing their 1 crop of fruit. Even if I put a plant on the east side of a structure the unforgiving sun quickly taught me that any plants in exposed pots will have their roots pasteurized by about 2 pm in the afternoon- if not sooner.



Neptune can take the heat!

Buckbee's 50 Day - An all around good variety

The First Cucumbers

My journey to growing good cucumbers has been a bit of a long one. No one ever told me, when I first began gardening in Tucson, what kind of cucumbers might actually grow here. One book that I read cited the “Armenian” cucumber as a good pick for this area but after a couple people told me they dislike the taste I began experimenting with other varieties. I grew White Wonder, a pickling variety, and Marketmore 76 before I found something that might work. Then I tried Suyo Long. Very heat resistant, very tasty. In fact – in my book it remains one of the best tasting of them all. Unfortunately it turned out that Suyo long is also very susceptible to some form of root rot. Otherwise, if grown in isolation, it is a disease and heat resistant tasty variety. The pictures below are from my old house and my new house. They represent a few of the varieties that I have grown.



White Wonder Cucumber. Not that remarkable.

A spring cucumber garden at the new house

Suyo Long with very nice big leaves.

The Suyo cucumber grows while others fail

A mouth-watering Suyo Cucumber

After Pit (or Trench) Composting and thoughts about Solarization



Solarizing my Winter Garden after Composting



I am a fan of pit (or trench) composting because it does not make the area look ugly and because it is so easy. Just throw things in a hole, rotate them often, then keep adding things until you get soil that is good enough to plant in. It turned out to not be too easy or disease-free. Though- if you are trying this kind of method I would recommend starting with a whole season of squash vines and mustard greens before planting anything else. Squash vines because they don’t care if the pile is still hot and mustard greens (brassica juncea) to resist disease.

After several partially successful sessions of solarizing soils I have come to the conclusion that there are better disease management possibilities including using a cover crop. One recently growing area of study is biofumigants such as one species of mustard greens (brassica juncea). This involves using various part of the mustard green in greatly reducing a disease until it reaches controllable levels. My current winter garden, with  just a small group of mustard plants is demonstrating a very significant difference in how well my plants are growing. I was afraid I was going to lose some of my artichokes but growing mustard around them has completely subsided my reoccurring septoria! An analysis by the U of A Extension program gives a good overview of what is being learned in this new and exciting field of biofumagation research.

Mustard Greens fighting my Septoria. Go Mustard Greens!