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Backyardnotes

~ All things botanical in photos and words—in my West Seattle garden and elsewhere; seeing and creating art and assorted musings.

Backyardnotes

Tag Archives: planting

SAVING SEEDS FOR THE NEXT SEASON

05 Monday Jan 2015

Posted by backyardnotes in Fun in the Garden, Gardening, Harvest, Plant Crazy, Tomatoes, Vegetable garden

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bean seed, onion seed, planting, saving, Saving seeds, Seeds, tomato seed, tomato seeds

Dried Lazy Housewife pole bean seed

Dried Lazy Housewife pole bean seed

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

AS ANOTHER YEAR ROLLS IN there is no better time to begin dreaming about and planning this year’s vegetable garden. Seed saving for me started about twenty-two years ago. Even though the seeds were some type of F1 hybrid (called La Roma) and unlikely to come true, I saved them anyway. The plants from the saved seed were just fine and the tomatoes were successively better each year, farther away from the parent. I still grow these tomatoes, although I no longer am using the original saved seeds.

As mentioned in previous posts, I often let some lettuces, herbs, leeks, and other greens go to seed, then shake the seed around the vegetable garden; the seeds come up on their own schedule; when the new plants are large enough I thin and transplant them into vegetable beds (except for cilantro and dill, which do not like to be disturbed).

Rattlesnake pole bean, green stage

Rattlesnake pole bean, green stage

I have been saving some bean seed the last few years, mostly pole beans. I really like Lazy Housewife, a great pole bean that was from Seed Savers (found at flower and garden show several years back). I also have become fond of Rattlesnake, a good green snap bean and shell-bean. This year I let a lot of beans go to dry seed stage rather than pull them out when the vines started to die back.

 

Rattlesnake beans drying on the vine

Rattlesnake beans drying on the vine

The last stage of harvesting

The last stage of harvesting

Rattlesnakebeans_2

 

Leek seedhead

Leek seedhead

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pollination in action!

Pollination in action! Walla Walla onion seed to follow!

I have always let some leeks go to seed as the seed stalks are tall and the seed heads large and showy, an easy ornamental as well as a tasty vegetable! I also like growing my own Walla Walla sweet onions, but had never saved the seed. In the fall of 2013 I reset some small, unharvested onions so they would set seed the following summer.

Dried seedheads

Dried seedheads

When the onions had ‘bloomed’ and set seed I left the seed heads to mature then cut the tops and set them in a cool, dry and shady spot until the seeds separated easily from their husks. Not very scientific but it worked just fine.

Walla Walla onion seed

Walla Walla onion seed

I was rewarded with more seed than I could possibly plant in my small, limited space garden and I shared some seed with my neighbors. Walla Walla’s are long-day onions, perfectly suited to our long, Northwest summer days and suggested planting is late August. The seedlings were up within two weeks of sowing and are perfectly hardy through our normally temperate weather and sporadic freezing we often have around here; I usually transplant the seedlings in mid-to late February and harvest onions in June and July.

Lots of onion seed and plenty to share!

Lots of onion seed and plenty to share!

BACK TO THE TOMATO SEEDS. In the 1990’s Taunton Press published Kitchen Garden magazine, to which I subscribed until they unfortunately ceased publication. However, in one issue there was an article about saving tomato seed and I have followed the procedure ever since and with good success; the method goes like this:
Remove the seeds from the ‘jelly’ that holds them in place. Place in a shallow container and cover with water. Let the seeds stand until they start to ferment and the water acquires a moldy top layer.

The fermenting, moldy seed

The fermenting, moldy seed

At that point, gently pour off the water and layer of mold; most of the ‘jelly’ has now loosened and separated from the seed; all of the good seeds will stay at the bottom of the container and everything else slips out. Add clean water, gently drain once more and add more water to cover the seed; let stand another day or two then rinse and drain off the water leaving the seeds to dry in the container.

After fermentation

After fermentation

The fermented and dried tomato seeds

The fermented and dried tomato seeds

I may be leaving out something here, and I don’t recall the reason for the fermentation or know the science behind it, but I do know that I have successfully saved tomato seed this way for a very long time. I wish I had saved the article; it is one of the few things not to be found in the vast depths of the internet. But I have thought that tomato seeds that end up in the compost heap go through a similar kind of fermentation and there is never a lack of volunteer tomatoes in my garden beds.

Finished seed for next year

Finished seed for next year

Tomatoseeds_2

At least a few new varieties to save every year

As the seed catalogs begin to arrive, my thoughts are turning to spring planting and the promise of juicy tomatoes, sweet onions and the first pickings of snap beans.

 

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APRIL PHOTO A DAY: MORE GARDENING THE LAZY WAY

29 Friday Apr 2011

Posted by backyardnotes in Vegetable garden

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lettuce, plant starts, planting, potatoes, shallots

AS I NOTED TWO WEEKS AGO in this post I am often a lazy gardener or maybe I’m forward thinking. The bed above was planted last fall with immature shallots and purple potatoes, lettuce starts, of which two are volunteers, the red oakleaf and radicchio. This means I will have heads of lettuce to harvest while I wait for my new starts to reach transplanting size and the potatoes and shallots are months ahead of the normal spring planting schedule and growing well. The air and soil temperatures have been so cool well into April that I have not had the enthusiasm to get the beds tilled and sown. Lettuces and members of the brassica family are sprouting in the coldframe and cukes and squash are starting in the house under lights, along with tomatoes, peppers and eggplants. I haven’t been a complete lazy bones!

Today we are off the see the tulip fields in the Skagit Valley around Mt. Vernon.

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SPRING CLEANING AND DREAMING OF TOMATOES

26 Monday Apr 2010

Posted by backyardnotes in Peppers, Tomatoes, Vegetable garden, West Seattle garden

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peppers, planting, seedlings, Spring cleaning, tomatoes, vegetable garden

EVERY GARDEN NEEDS SOME SPRING CLEANING and there are no exceptions here. The biggest job looming over me has been the vegetable garden. Pulling out the bolted and blooming brussels sprouts, cabbages and carrots that were part of the fall and winter garden was long overdue. Beets and swiss chard are near to bolting and weeds have sprouted a plenty since the last weeding before our trip in March. The endive and escarole are beautiful and full now and should nearly tide us over until new lettuce is ready. The garlic looks great and the fava bean plants are beautiful and plentiful–we can hardly wait until late May when the first pods will be ready to pick. Vegetable gardening is in the blood, I guess. Grandma T always had a very large one and Grandma Aggie always had something growing in her small side garden, including horseradish, which she dearly loved. My late (first) mother-in-law, Helen was my tutor and mentor for the first vegetable garden I ever planted–a whopping 40ft x 60ft garden planted with canning in mind.

Grandma T’s vegetable garden ready for planting in 1982 was nearly two city lots in size. While I was growing up the upper portion had a Yellow Transparent apple tree, peach tree, raspberries (kept to the end), logan berries, and gooseberries. The peach tree eventually came down, the gooseberries came out because they were ‘buggy’ and finally the logan berries went away. She always planted peas (which we sneaked into and then got yelled at), corn, tomatoes, beats, carrots, onions, etc. My grandfather got a couple of loads of horse manure every year and tilled the garden for her. It is hard to believe that she was still planting a garden of this size at the age of 75! She fed her family from this plot of land for more than fifty years.

My initial garden here in West Seattle was smallish when first laid out in 1993 and is loosely designed on the principles described in Better Vegetable Gardening: Peter Chan’s Raised Bed System the Chinese Way, first published in 1977 and an excellent book. My vegetable garden has evolved considerably since then. Today’s vegetable garden area is about 25ft x 20ft. There are four 15ft long x 2.5ft wide beds and four 8ft long ones; they are oriented east to west. The one below is ready for planting. I couldn’t bear to pull out the Swiss chard just yet! I add chicken manure, veg fertilizer and compost to each bed before tilling. I no longer turn the soil by hand after a bout of sciatica several years ago. Now the beds are turned with the help of the Mantis, a great little electric tiller just the right size for these beds. All the beds have black rubber soaker/drip hoses and the paths between are covered with wood chips to keep feet clean over the wet winter. The wood chips need replacing about every three years.

The vegetable garden is on the north edge of the property and bounded on the west by a perennial bed and the house, on the south by espaliered apple and pear trees. To the west is the edge of a slope. As you can see, we having some outstanding overcast weather.

North view

West view

Every year is full of decisions. What worked last year, what’s new to try this year?  I always look forward to starting tomatoes and peppers! When the last tomatoes plants are pulled from ground in October (if we are lucky) we have period of mourning–no tomatoes until next August! By February the longing begins and we dream of sweetly ripened tomatoes, warmed by the sun. Each year I like to try one new one and leave the poor performers behind. This year I started my seeds a tad late, on April 10th. I have started them as early as February (too early) and as late as the third week in April (a little late). By the end of May they have been in the cold frame for a couple weeks, hardened off and ready to go into the ground once overnight temperatures are 5o°, which around here is not usually before June. By that time, the favas are ready to harvest and then plants come out and tomatoes go in. Once the tomatoes are in the ground Tom takes over their care and maintenance.

The seed starting setup.

The seedlings after sixteen days.

Tomatoes are quick to germinate, usually within five-seven days; peppers up to two weeks. This year I have started twelve varieties. My favorite producers are an Heirloom German originally from Johnny’s Seeds, Yellow Flame, Aunt Ruby’s Green, and a Roma type from seed that I saved from plants that I purchased in 1995. My newest favorites are Red Pear Piriform (2006), also from Johnny’s and Japanese Black Trifele (2009) from Territorial Seed Company.  Also good are cherry tomatoes Black Cherry and Sungold. We have such a short season and the first tomatoes are usually ripe mid-August if we have favorable weather.

Peppers do very well and continue to ripen well into October. Last year’s surprise was a little yellow pepper (chosen by one of my daughters), Yum Yum (Territorial), a prolific producer of sweet, sweet fruits. So many that they were turned into pickled peppers. Another wonderfully sweet, blocky, red pepper is Figaro, originally from Shepherd’s Seeds. I have saved seed since 2006 with good success. Last year the Ancho chile peppers were huge and a bumper crop to boot. I canned them using a recipe from Eugenia Bone‘s wonderful book, Well Preserved for Marinated Peppers. The flavor of these peppers six months later is a knockout!

No time for dreaming, it’s back into the vegetable garden for now.

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