Viewing comments posted by sallyg

Described as native to eastern North America, I know it as a perennial shared among gardeners. It has bright yellow spring flowers on stems about 12-18 inches high. It will gradually spread from the roots, making new rosettes and then new flowering stems in following years. Not an agressive spreader. Hardy to my zone 7 garden in partial shade.

native to South Africa, per wikipedia

I planted some for a cover crop this fall, it had just begun to bloom, it is one of the first things killed by frost last night. Very frost tender.

Some care, summarized from RHS website:
During the growing season, keep above 60F, bright filtered light, strong sun may cause sunburn. Keep moist, likes humidity, fertilize gently. In late fall/winter, a cooler period but above 50F, and less water. keeping the soil just damp, should encourage budding. If repotting, use a well draining mix and do so after blooming, during the growing season.

Personal comments- Amazing blooms, I think one may want to propagate stems (summer) and get a lot of stems per pot to try and get more blooms. The stems(?) can be long, gangly, some spineless but other may have a few tiny spines to watch out for. I have some bloom each year using above care, though I don't fertilize regularly.

Planted my 1 /2 pound (4 heads) of Lorz Italian today from Mad River Garlic Growers. Each head had 7 or 8 or more good cloves. I did 5 rows of 7 spaced about 8 inches apart both ways, in a newly prepared bed.

This is a long vining type, vines up to 15 feet, bush types may yield better.

First try with Dragon Tongue, I am pleased. Seems high yielding and for weeks, beans are tender. Mine are mostly pale yellow, maybe because of crowding and shading by squash? I will grow them again.

My first year, and two plants of German Lunchbox. Both plants growing well and healthy into mid August, still making clusters of clean, uncracked, pinkish red fruits about 1 to 1.5 ounce, mostly the middle to smaller size in that range. Skin is nice, thin and tender, flavor to me is just average. I halved some and used the dehydrator for dried tomatoes and those are tasty and a really good size for this method.

Growing my first plant of Hungarian Heart after rave review and free seeds from my friend. It is setting massive tomatoes. I cut the first yesterday and it has small seed cavities and a lot of nice pink soft flesh, looks perfect for cooking into sauce.

I got a Lady Bell starter plant this year- a very green vigorous looking plant! High hopes! August update: Hopes dashed. Several fruit lost to end rot, setting very few peppers, those I got don't get very big, nowhere near the size of peppers you buy anywhere. I am not impressed. Plant looks healthy and good sized. Still, it's only one plant and one year, not a fair trial.

Interestingly, this has been used as a trap crop to reduce pests on other cucurbits (which is also a caution for growing this plant, it apparently is VERY attractive to squash bugs and cucumber beetles).

I grew one Giant Marconi from a store-bought starter in 2021. It grew very well for me in Maryland. Lots of peppers and tastes great. It is a larger pepper plant to hold all the fruit and I would be sure to cage or stake it to keep heavy stems from breaking.

I recommend this fern. My son bought one almost 2 years ago and hung it in his bedroom with western windows but no direct sun. It's lived and looks pretty good. Better yet, while it had some dead fronds, they dry up pale green and so don't look too bad, and they do not drop or make a mess.

Leaves present in February, this plant has lived for year in my yard completely without help from me, among maple roots and other plants like liriope.
I dug some up on Feb 20 still with leaves on, and am surprised at the size of the hard brown tubers! Around 2 inches across, flattened, and just below soil surface.

First time growing these, from Baker Creek Seeds. Nice dark green leaves have been plagued with an unknown insect eating holes in them, I suspect brown beetles as I can't find any pests during the daytime. The plants are vining, finding the fence and climbing and will easily go 5 feet, maybe more? so consider trellis.

Bought seed from Pinetree Garden and started my own plants. Grown well and starting to pick a few in July in Maryland zone 7b. Nice solid fruit 5 ounces, no problems.
2023, growing again, with lots of fruit, mostly 5 ounces again, range from 3 to 8 + ounces.

I am growing for the first time this year, central Maryland. I have two plants, one very vigorous, the other less so, but that was planted later (fill in for another plant that died.) So far, about the same size plant and growth rate as other indeterminates. Update July 11. Both plants have grown well, beautiful big leaves, setting good fruit and no sign of any yellow or brown lower leaf as on all other tomatoes. Picked first three fruit today from 3 to 7 ounce, ate the smallest one which was pretty ripe. Good flavor. Will sample more before deciding if its as good as other blacks. July 22, I have eaten a few more, the flavor is just OK and the texture seems a bit mealy or something. It has not gotten to peak production yet, still a lot of green fruit. One plant of the two has suddenly completely wilted and I took it out yesterday. That plant was planted out slightly later as a different start had died in that spot.
2022, growing it again, of those I planted and grew all the same conditions this is the first with several small fruits forming. As of June 27, this plant is slightly smaller in overall growth than three others, but bigger than Celebrity which is called determinate or semi-. Some sources call this semi-determinate. Update July 16 the first one planted out , main garden, is wilting though with all green leaves, the second planted out in the ex-compost area wilted drastically with all green fruit. Cut stem shows brown areas. I will stop growing this one as sudden early death is not in the plan, and it's happened both years. Plenty of other black tomatoes to try.

Found one starter plant of this marked down to a buck at the grocery store. This is late for me to plant peppers, but I decided if it grew one pepper, it was a payoff. Will try to report later. I think it may be marketed more for commercial growers.

First year growing, only one plant. It is not very leafy and has few branches, not the suckering monster some of the others are. It does seem to show more fruit at this point than any others, though they are still small at about seven weeks after setting out. Update July 11- plant has good amount of fruit on but not especially early. Today I picked a few first (not fully ripe) fruits off several different plants, including this. July 22- more ripening while most other tomatoes are still very slow in coming. Sliced one today, I found a nice texture, solid, small seed cavities, good basic garden tomato flavor, good slicer at about 7 ounces.

Not planning to grow again after this year of only one plant:
Started out great. About seven weeks after setting out all my tomato plants. Bush Goliath is very compact and sturdy compared to the others, not even topping the small cage yet most other tomatoes are over four feet easily. All planted the same way, same bed, same sun.
Summer: it made about five cluster of 3 large tomatoes each.Seems like many had cracks going out from the stem though- more than any others I am growing this year.
Fall- October 2 and the plant rebounded in growth, lots of green leaves and the older leaves resist fungus or blight or whatever kills the lower leaves on all my other tomatoes. It added another batch of clusters of good sized slicers. It could have used some 4 to 5 foot supports to hold this new growth, instead they bent over and hung (which was OK. ) The cracking continues though, and some have firm white tissue in places throughout, hardly useable.