Seeds! (What are you most excited to grow this year?)

[Royiah]

I finally ordered my seeds! Yay! I cant wait! I even got some tigger melon! hehe I cant wait to get them and start growing!
What are Ya'll most excited to grow this year?
Its probally already obvious what I want to grow but I'll say it anyways. Tigger melon!

[jal_ut]

Over many years, I have tried a large variety of things. At present, I am destined to plant the old standbys, that do best in my garden....... but wait, I do have one new variety to try this season. Red Kuri Squash. It is a C. maxima with bright orange skin and should weigh 5 to 8 pounds.

[ReptileAddiction]

This isnt a veggie but my new peach tree. If it is a veggie it would be peppers.

[jal_ut]

Good luck on the peach tree. I have trouble with peaches here. They will grow fine for 4 or 5 years, then we get one of those darned zone 4 winters and they die. Looking good so far this year for my 2 little peach trees. Here's hoping.

[Royiah]

jal_ut: Wow must be hard with that cold weather. I cant do peach trees here because it gets too hot. At least that's what I'm told.
Marlingardener: haha me too! I'm planting so many new things this year its got me all excited. I cant wait!

[ReptileAddiction]

I have the opposite problem jal_ut. It doesnt get cold enough here for most varieties so I have to go with low chill. If I get low chill varieties they do wonderful usually. My current tree is not at all happy because it is on a rootstock that can't deal with my soil. The new one is on a better root stock and should hopefully do better.

Royiah, My Aunt who lives in Baton Rouge had a peach tree. I can grow them here where it is just as hot just not humid.

[Royiah]

ReptileAddiction: Eh really? I thought I couldn't because everyone said that they needed colder weather to produce like apples.

[Aida]

I think I'm most excited about my tomatoes(first time gardener), as they are the hardest thing I'm growing, and the most thought and preperation is going into them.

[Royiah]

Aida: ah tomato's... I didn't have all that much luck with them last year. :/
Between the birds, stink bugs, and caterpillar's I didn't managed to get but a few cherry tomato's. The rest were eaten. :/
But I am trying them again. And if I have to I'll plant a ton more this year so I can have an actual tomato!

[rainbowgardener]

Don't plant a ton more; plant them under floating row cover for protection. I did have some trouble with the stinkbugs or squash bugs last year, but mostly they just mark the tomatoes, don't ruin them.

[Aida]

Well, in that case, Royiah, good luck to us both!

I'm companion planting a lot of things around them- hopefully it will keep bugs and pesky stuff at bay! (Garlic, mint, marigolds, and I'm going to move my basil pots over there, too)

Mom and I have never had a bug problem in our gardens (more of a "nothing-is-even-sprouting" problem). I think it's because we're right in the middle of a city, and in the middle of a bunch of "gorgeous", chemical-drenched yards.

[Royiah]

rainbowgardener: floating row cover?
The stink bugs swarmed my garden last year. it was horrible. And when I finally got rid of them I ended up with the caterpillar's eating what was left. There were hundreds of them. :K
Aida: haha :/ Thanks! you too!
I tried basil but the basil caused a big problem with bugs. The bugs ended up hiding under the rounded leaves and so I ended up pulling them all. Helped a lot after I pulled them. I think I might try marigolds this year instead.

[rainbowgardener]

floating row cover

keeps insects off your plants IF you peg it down at the bottom and IF you put the row cover up BEFORE the insects are already there. If there are eggs/larvae already in the soil, then it won't help against those.

Did you try Bt for the caterpillars? What kind were they?

[ReptileAddiction]

ReptileAddiction: Eh really? I thought I couldn't because everyone said that they needed colder weather to produce like apples.

You just have to make sure you get a low chill variety.

[Royiah]

rainbowgardener: ohh I get it now.
BT? I believe they were cut worms. Or something along those lines. Just one ate 8 large green tomato's. I was so not happy that day.
ReptileAddiction: That's good to know. Thanks.

[ElizabethB]

My new tomato varieties. My seeds finally came in the mail yesterday. Really want to plant but I am a sick dog. The weather is atrocious. It has been raining for DAYS with another day or two of rain predicted. I am hoping that I will be up and about soon so I can plant my much anticipated seeds soon. I will be planting on my work table on the patio with some lights and heating pads thanks to Rainbow's suggestions. Oh Well - Really feel too cr***y to say much more. Later.

[imafan26]

I just ordered more pepper seed. My new peppers are the trinidad scorpion, peter pepper, bolivian rainbow. I am trying for my new tomatoes sweetie, and Champion II (tomato yellow leaf curl resistant), as back up I have Aunt Ginny's German Green, and druzba. My friend gave me a piece of pepper vine(piper nigrum), so I am trying to grow that. I tried to grow Habucha, but the seed is probably 30 years old so it failed to sprout, and vanilla orchid. I just harvested my first romaine and won bok cabbage in December. I will also grow more of what I had before. Right now I am propagating strawberries, bay leaves, rosemary, and lavender. I am still growing swiss chard, kale, Mexican tarragon, mints,, oregano, Mexican oregano, hibiscus sabdariffa, cutting celery, beans, snow peas, suyo cucumbers, tatsoi, corn, green onions, chives, edible flowers, tobasco, superchili, yellow bell, mini bells and eggplant. I planted onions and garlic in October and November, beets, squash, (Hercules war club. I call it hyotan), lettuce, pineapple, papaya, tatsoi, sesame, ginger, turmeric, baby bok, jicama, taro, pineapple, asparagus, and nasturtiums. I will keep trying to propagate sage, cherimoya, and coneflower. It should not be hard, but they just keep dying.

[rainbowgardener]

rainbowgardener: ohh I get it now.
BT? I believe they were cut worms. Or something along those lines. Just one ate 8 large green tomato's. I was so not happy that day.
ReptileAddiction: That's good to know. Thanks.

Bt = bacillus thuringiensis, sold as Dipel, Thuricide, and probably other things. It is a naturally occurring bacterium that is effective against many kinds of caterpillars, but harmless to everything else.

If you mean actually ate the tomato fruits that would not be cutworms. They attack young plants at the base of the stem near the ground. Cut the whole plant down and disappear it. One of my first experiences as a new gardener was planting a whole bunch of little tomato plants I started from seed indoors. Came out a couple days later to check on them and they were GONE! Cutworms!

I'm not sure what caterpillar type thing would eat a whole fruit. Hornworms are big green caterpillars that eat tomatoes, but mostly they just leave a big hole in it. Sometimes they get inside and start hollowing the fruit out. But they don't eat the whole thing.

[ReptileAddiction]

@iamfan I wonder if the peter pepper will actually make the advertised shape...

[Royiah]

rainbowgardener: Hornworms! That had to be it. Must have gotten the names mixed up. But yeah they ate the tomato. There was almost nothing left on the stem. (there was the top part of the tomato but that was it.) :K The worm I found was huge! Like two of my thumbs combined. But it did seriously eat 8 of my tomato's overnight. There might have been another but I only found that one big one. Found 2 more 2 days later.
But anyways I don't want to kill all the caterpillars. we have a lot of butterfly's in my area and I don't want to go off and start killing them.
I think what I'm gonna do this year is plant some really hot peppers and blend them into a spray and then spray my plants with it if I get bugs on my plants.
imafan26: Wow that's a lot of peppers and plants. I actually am starting an experiment to see if some 18year old seeds will sprout. I found them in the attic. seems my mom bought them a long time ago and never opened or planted them. Its gonna be real interesting.

[aaradyn]

I have a new herb sampler pack that I'm excited for but the big thing for me this year is sweet potatoes and squash! I haven't grown either before so this whole lot of experiment on my part. I'm so excited tho!!!

[southernslang]

got some black krim tomatoes I cant wait to taste.I know its a little early but I germinated my seeds already.

[prettygurl]

Black Krim, Thessaloniki, and the blueberry plants.

[DoubleDogFarm]

Still searching for a niche for the Farmer's Market. I'll probably concentrate on the True Seed Potatoes this year.


Eric

[Royiah]

DoubleDogFarm: You can get a potato seed!? I thought you could only get them as a potatoes seed.
Your potatoes look awesome! Go you!

[DoubleDogFarm]

Yes, TPS look a lot like sesame seeds.

Here's a post from earlier.
https://www.helpfulgardener.com/forum/v ... hp?t=43399

Seed and pulp potato fruit


Eric

[estorms]

I want to plant the new paste tomato from Burpee. Tomato, super sauce, hybrid, disease free, 25 seeds for $6.50. The last two years I have lost all my tomatoes to the blight. This year I am putting them in raised beds and planting them here and there and everywhere on my property, including the deck.

[applestar]

I was organizing my seeds -- finally broke down and decided to use the baseball card keeper method, though I also bought the 2"x2" pocket coin keeper sleeves for small packets of traded seeds.

Anyway discovered that I have two more packets of TPS received from a memeber here, and that reminded me that I have potato berries that I never processed. Also realized I have WAY more pepper seeds than I realized and they need to be grown out. Some of them are varieties I was half thinking of getting seeds for so all good.

Are the baby tubers still keeping well in storage, Eric? I can't wait to see the harvest this year.

I have a lot of tomatoes to grow this year, and want to experiment with more C. Moschata varieties. I also have a new plan for a special variety of watermelon that I hope will work out.

...and...and... I've way too many "favorites" this year

[btrowe1]

Garlic, It was planted in oct and started to grow, I mulched real good, and the little stalks came out of the mulch I had put down so I needed to put on more. Now it's sitting under 12" of snow, can"t wait never planted it before but it seems to be growing quite well. I guess I'll find out in the spring how my garlic turned out..

[rainbowgardener]

Garlic, It was planted in oct and started to grow, I mulched real good, and the little stalks came out of the mulch I had put down so I needed to put on more. Now it's sitting under 12" of snow, can"t wait never planted it before but it seems to be growing quite well. I guess I'll find out in the spring how my garlic turned out..

Should be fine. This is now my third year of growing garlic. After I saw how well it did and how easy it was, I wondered why it took me so long!

The first two times I just planted garlic from the grocery store. This time I had so much garlic, I used my own home-grown garlic for "seed" garlic. So I'm interested to see how that goes. It is likely the F1 generation of some hybrid.

[LA47]

I am going to try growing paste tomatoes this year. We have so much prep to do before we can plant that I'm somewhat discouraged. DH swears he is going to build the greenhouse and have it finished by mid-may and I do know that once I get a soil test that it really shouldn't take that long to gather the the worm castings, compost, etc to build up our garden soil. We did grow a garden last year and it actually did quite well and produced enough that we were able to share with friends and the Senior Center. I just know it can be improved on. I'll probably stick with my old tried and true seeds this year. For 40 years I've planted Blue Lake green beans and Boston Picklers Cukes. I'm almost afraid to try something different!

[!potatoes!]

The first two times I just planted garlic from the grocery store. This time I had so much garlic, I used my own home-grown garlic for "seed" garlic. So I'm interested to see how that goes. It is likely the F1 generation of some hybrid.

huh? unless at some point it reproduced via flowers, it'll still be what it was before.

I'm looking forward to cowpeas, lots of various root crops and tubers, and a range of hot peppers.

[applestar]

I thought maybe rainbowgardener meant tht the original garlic she bought at the supermarket might have been a hybrid.... Then I wondered if there are very many hybrid varieties when garlic is so easily propagated vegetatively.

It turns out that there IS a hybrid -- written up as Chinese, mostly listed on Asian import market websites and one YouTube warning there is a health risk(?)

-- I didnt visit any of the sites or watch the video, but so I guess there is such a thing. If I'm reading the summarized blurb correctly, according to one website, the variety's name is "NORMAL WHITE GARLIC"

[rainbowgardener]

The first two times I just planted garlic from the grocery store. This time I had so much garlic, I used my own home-grown garlic for "seed" garlic. So I'm interested to see how that goes. It is likely the F1 generation of some hybrid.

huh? unless at some point it reproduced via flowers, it'll still be what it was before.

Oh OOPS! Not thinking, of course you are right. I just assume that stuff in the grocery store is all hybrids, though this may not be true for garlic. And yes since the bulb is just growing out it is vegetative propagation not reproductive. Sorry, wasn't thinking clearly.

[!potatoes!]

oh, no apology necessary!

might try my hand at maca his year...

[Northernfox]

having not read the rest in detail I am most exited to grow Raspberries, Rhubarb and Strawberries.

I am going to try to make wine out of them I am also an amateur brewer

[Lucius_Junius]

The crop I'm most excited about this year is mangel wurzel. I had a variety of successes last year, and some disappointments as well, so I've got a few new things I'm going to be trying. Nothing is so exciting as the mangel, however. I'm hoping to be able to feed them to my chickens in the winter and cut back a bit on the feed bill. They got into the garden last fall and cleaned up on my beets, so I'm expecting they'll like the mangels.

[PunkRotten]

Excited about new pepper plants and tomatoes, sunchokes, crosnes, ginger and turmeric, yacon, different cucumbers, some dwarf/bush squash and melons, culantro (not cilantro), oregano by seed, celery, egyptian spinach, and maybe some onions.

[DoubleDogFarm]

The crop I'm most excited about this year is mangel wurzel. I had a variety of successes last year, and some disappointments as well, so I've got a few new things I'm going to be trying. Nothing is so exciting as the mangel, however. I'm hoping to be able to feed them to my chickens in the winter and cut back a bit on the feed bill. They got into the garden last fall and cleaned up on my beets, so I'm expecting they'll like the mangels.

Interesting. If I ever get pigs, I will plant mangel "field beet" in the pasture 6 months before. Give them something to root.

Eric

[ElizabethB]

Sniff, sniff, shiver. STILL raining 45 but real feel is 30. Give me a nice sunny day at 32 and I am happy. This cr## su**s. I have some wonderful new tomato varieties to try from Johnny's Select Seeds. So excited to plant but the weather is just junk. My original intention was to plant on my work table on the patio. Too cold and wet even under cover. I am at the point that I will plant tomorrow and set up a grow station in the spare bedroom on the new wood floor, When G gets home he will have a fit IF he sees my project. The bedroom door is kept closed and he does not go in there. That room is my closet so I may be able to get away with starting my seeds on the sly. IDK I am just SAD. I am taking my vitamins and drinking OJ and eating healthy (lean and green) fighting that urge for a cig. It would be a lot easier if I could get outside and work off that crazy habit.

So sorry I almost forgot what the question was. I am excited about planting new tomato varieties from seed. I have been a Lazy gardener and have planted transplants. So planting from seed is an adventure for me.