Kitchen Garden Seddlings. Progress Notes. 3.30.2021

 Today I'm resting from a medical procedure last week (or maybe two weeks ago now?).  Plus the second COVID shot.  So it's just obsessing over the seedlings, and maybe a trip outside later.

I've been sitting some of the chill tolerant seedlings out on the deck to get time more tolerant to unfiltered sunlight, expose them to more light and wind, and get them ready for permanent outdoors life.  Just the nontropicals that like chill, or can tolerate it.  Currently it's overcast, which is helpful, a little too cool but OK.  Some have been outside for 2 to 4 hours on previous days - potatoes, apples, celery.  Today's goal is maybe 5 or 6 hours.  Depending on how bright it is outside.

Those celery are for Ning.  Homegrown is much stronger flavor than grocery.  I ate the "microgreen" thinnings, nice celery flavor.  The cultivar "Utah" is shorter and greener, while the Chinese type is taller and has white stems.  There will be enough for quite a few meals when it's ready.

Those apple seedlings again.  The top is #3, the last to germinate but quite vigorous now.   Currently still fertigating with 1/4 tsp miracle gro per 2 quarts rainwater.  They need water almost daily.

The second is greener than when it started out.  Stem shows a bit of red but minimal.  The most vigorous of the three.  It also seems to be starting tiny branches at the leaf nodes.

#1 is odd.  It had distorted leaves at first, then I replanted it.  Then it got a longer stretch of thin stem, now a tuft of smaller leaves with narrow internode spacing.   It seems to be growing now.  No idea what the final tree  will be like, or what its fruit, if any will be like.  But it's fun to grow them.

Apple Seedling Progress Report. 3.27.2021

 Just showing one, but all three of the apple seedlings are growing nicely.  When it's nice outside, I'm setting the plants outside in full sun for a few hours.  They get "fertigated" with 1/4 tsp of Miracle Gro per 2 quarts rainwater, just about daily.  

Maybe it's just my imagination.  I still think the stem is stouter than I expected, with closer than expected internode spacing.  The big question will be whether that will continue. 

So far I'm loving the burgundy color of these leaves and the stem.  Another seedling is darker, and one is almost entirely green now.

Pinching Peppers and Eggplants. 3.27.2021

 Some of the peppers are developed to the point where I can pinch out the tops, leaving four good leaves / leaf axils.  I do this so that the plants will be well branched from the outset.  Instead of one growing point, there will be at least four.

Before photo of Banana Pepper seedling.  It's doing nicely, has four good leaves with reasonably separated leaf axils.

Same plant after pinching.  I actually don't "pinch" although that's what it's called.  I use a scissors with a fine tip, to cut at the right point and not crush stem or cause other damage.

Here is an Early Jalapeno that I pinched about a week or two ago.  The branches are starting to grow nicely.  It's interesting that branches may be starting at the cotyledons too, so it's possible there will be six branches instead of four.

In the background someone can be seen watching for cats, considered by someone to be the spawn of Satan :-).  

Some internet writers state this "forces" the plant to produce branches, or "directs energy" to the branches and roots.  In reality, the growing tip produces a plant hormone, auxin, that flows downward in the plant.  The auxin inhibits growth of lower buds.  Without the auxin produced by the growing tip, which is now removed, the buds at those leaf axils are released from dormancy and grow.   That's different from "forcing".  

This year I'm trying the same for at least some of the Japanese eggplants.  They are from the same plant family, and seem to have similar growth habits, as peppers. 

Northpole Apple. Pruned and Ready to Bloom. 3.27.2021

 This is the Northpole apple tree on unknown but aggressive rootstock.  Or, planted to deeply so the scion grew  its own roots.  Twenty or twentyone years old.  I pruned it a couple of weeks ago.  I actually like the odd shape and sturdy trunk, but it's too vigorous for the small garden and less aggressive pruner.  My newer grafts are on less aggressive rootstocks.

Kitchen Garden Seedling Progress Report. 3.24.2021

 They are mostly doing well.  Lots of growth for the up-potted tomatoes, eggplants, and some of the peppers.  Basil is growing nicely.  I also planted some old basil seeds.  The 5 year old seeds had spotty germination.  A pack not labeled by date, maybe a year or two old from Baker Creek, purple leaf basil, germinated very well.   Chinese and regular chives from home saved seeds doing very well.   Lettuce and celery doing well.  Apple seedlings too.

Slicing and Salad Tomato Seedlings

 

Basil, Lettuce, Some Peppers, Marigolds, Celery, and others.

More Tomatoes, Peppers, Eggplants, Kale. 

 

Planting More Seeds for Kitchen Garden. 3.24.2021

 This morning I planted more seeds for the kitchen garden.  With so many seedlings already, it can be a challenge to give them space under the plant lights.  Most of the early ones are tropicals, like tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, but some should be able to go outside soon.  Like lettuce, cilantro, celery, chive seeds.

What I planted:

Two six-packs of Chinese chives.  We use a lot of those for dumplings.  Home-saved seeds from last fall.  We've been growing Chinese chives from our saved seeds for about 20 years.   They are perennial so I don't save and plant every year, or even every other year.  The seem to fail to thrive after four or five years, so it's good to regenerate them now and them.

Two containers of cilantro.  One from new seeds, one from seeds saved last fall. 

Paste tomatoes, experiment.  One batch is Roma II hybrid, one is Amish paste tomato.  One six-pack of each.  I have not tried either.  The best are Ranger hybrid from Territorial Seeds but they are WAY more expensive and their shipping and handling is horrendous.  If the Amish turn out OK, I can save seeds from those for future growing.  If not, there is the Roma II hybrid.  My main challenge with paste tomatoes has been blossom end rot.  I read that calcium spray will prevent that, so ordering that now.  Flavor-wise, it's possible that either the Roma or Amish will be better than Ranger, anyway.

I planted some old parsley seeds.  About 5 years old.

The last batch of cilantro seeds was interesting.  I thought the home saved seeds always did well.  This time, germination has been spotty.  Maybe I'm just too impatient.  Still, there is some.  Today, to do a side-by-side comparison, I planted a pot of new Ferry Morse cilantro seeds, and another pot of home saved seeds.  We can use a bunch of cilantro each week, so they can be planted every week or two.

Photo is cilantro seedlings.  I think this is about 2 weeks old.  It does look like more are germinating.

Update on Potato Seedlings. 3.24.2021

 Today I repotted the potato seedlings.  Germination was actually pretty good. I had planted about 3 seeds per cell.  Germination was about that, or slightly less.  From the 6-pack plus 2 cells, I planted 16 plants, and discarded a couple of runts.

The potatoes still seem delicate, and quite a bit behind the tomatoes and most of the eggplants, and a bit behind most of the peppers.  There is quite a wide range of vigor, and some have different leaf appearance and coloration.  Maybe this up-potting will give them a big boost.

Spreading Wood and Chicken Bone Ashes for Mineral Supplementation. 3.24.2021

 Yesterday I spread a small bucket of woodstove ashes in one of the tomato beds and one of the sweetcorn beds.  I had to pull back the leaf mulch for the tomatoes.   I hand-tilled and turned over the corn bed.  That one is in the footprint of a former raised bed.  The raised bed was one that I had built the first summer here, 2012 or 2013.  I don't know whether being where a raised bed was, is good for the soil or not.  The soil here is low in calcium, good in potassium, low in phosphorus, low in magnesium.  The wood ashes are a combination of trees that grew here that were cut and burned for firewood, and the bones that resulted from making dog food from chicken thighs.  Those will be high in calcium, phosphorus, and trace minerals.  Potassium too from the wood ashes.  It kind of averages out to a decent mineral supplement for those vegetables.  Plus, the soil here is very acidic.  The ashes are alkaline, so moderate that.  I apply a dusting of ashes, and let it mellow for two or three months before using.

Potatoes should not be given alkaline supplements, so I did not apply in potato areas.

The bone fragments are still visible, but after burning them they are soft and fragile like chalk.  They break down very quickly.

After rains, turning the soil and tilling in, the minerals will be pretty evenly dispersed.

 

Plums blooming now. 3.21.2021

 It looks like all of the Asian plums and plum hybrids are blooming now.  They seem to have a lot of overlap.

Hollywood Plum.  I grew this from a cutting, from the Hollywood plum I had in Vancouver. It stays fairly small.

Crimson Pointe (I think), ornamental plum.

The white flowered branch for this plum is Beauty.  The tree also has a graft from a very dark skin and flesh pluot, farmer's market, that I grew from seed.  It has never fruited, but it blooms.  This tree was originally "Ember", a hybrid Asian/American plum that never bore either.  I had grafted it on a Hollywood rootstock, which seems to work fine.

This tree is Methley.  The tree is more than 8 years old - I replanted it from my old front yard in Vancouver, where it had grown for a couple of years.  The pollinating Hollywood (again) branch seems not to be there now.  It also has a branch of Shiro also in bloom.

This is Flavor Supreme Pluot.  I don't know if it bloomed before.  I planted this a couple of years ago in the front orchard.  It's too much trouble to water and weed that area now.  It has continued to grow anyway.

There is also an unknown plum, possibly grown from seed, that was here when we bought the place.  I went crazy grafting other varieties to it - Shiro, Hollywood (of course), Ember, Hanska, La Crescent.  I don't think any of those Hansen plums (Ember, Hanska, LaCrescent) has ever borne a single fruit.  They bloom every year.  Still, it's a pretty tree.  

Nadia plum X cherry hybrid is next to the highly grafted tree.  Nadia is also blooming.

Daffodils. 3.21.2021

 Each fall I plant bags of daffodils and other bulb seeds.  Most bloom the first year, then a lot of them disappear.  Some persist for many years.

And some hyacinths, which are looking nice this year.

Up-potting Tomato Seedlings. 3.21.2021

 I repotted the first dozen tomato seedlings.  There are still some left that I will give Ning.  I have a theory that when their roots start winding around in the container, their growth becomes stunted.  Or maybe its just the seedling medium. Anyway, after up-potting them, they usually take off and grow fast.

I am not a pack rat.  But I do save some things, like some of the plant containers from previous years.  The multi-packs are handy, maximum use of space.

Before repotting.  I don't know where that pink container came from.  Probably flowers last year or the year before.  I like to label each cell, directly instead of with a label I'll probably lose.

The roots are pretty nice looking.  It still amazes me that a tiny seed grows into a nice tomato plant that grows bigger and bigger and makes tomatoes.

Twelve tomato plants, ready for their next step in life.

Vegetable Seedlings. 3.20.2021

 Most are doing very well.  I think the tomatoes are due to repotting into the next larger containers.   Soon.

Repotting Some Tropicals. 3.20.2021

 I repotted a couple of Nepenthes.  The sunroom is too hot for them and they dry out way too fast.  That led to the demise of the larger ones.  For these, I had some heavier pots so they don't fall over any more.  Also a more moisture retentive soil.  We'll see how they do.  Also, I repotted two small zygocactus, and took a bunch of cuttings from the oldest, largest one.   That's the top left one.  The flower is a nice salmon color.  I've never seen another one like that. 

Early Seedlings. Some Multiplier Onions. 3.19.2021

 We got some chicken feed at BiMart.  Went early, so store would be near empty.  Everyone was socially distant and wore masks.

They had some of the multiplier onions that I tried a couple of years ago but lost to weeds.  It would be interesting if these are potato onions.  Not that I need more.  But I bought a package.  Actually, three of them were bad, moldy, so who knows.

Two or Three weeks ago I planted seeds in the raised beds, spinach, radishes, lettuce.  It's been chilly since then with a couple of frosts.  Today I noticed the spinach, radishes, and lettuce are all germinating.

 

Lettuce, Black Seeded Simpson, home saved.

Spinach.  I forget the variety.

Radishes, mixed varieties.  Some of the seeds were 4 years old.

Completed Grafting. 3.19.2021

 I enjoy making new grafts, a lot.  It still feels like magic, taking a stick (scion) from one tree and adding it to a rootstock or shoot of another tree, and having it grow and become one with it's understock and make fruits.  So I look forward to when the weather and season are right.  I plan ahead, collect scion wood and refrigerate it over the late winter, and order from sources such as Burnt Ridge or Fedco.  This year I ordered a couple unnecessarily.  I was over enthused.  Blame the pandemic.  Even so, all of the grafts are done now.

Apples -

I started converting the Jonathan multigraft back to mostly Jonathan.   Some of the older grafts were not appealing for me (Keepsake and Granite Beauty) so why keep them?  I got to test them out, which is good, and they didn't pass.   Porter, on the same multigraft tree, is very good.  I want to keep it, but it is too vigorous on a Jonathan, so I started the process of cutting that back.  I have a minitree started for Porter which probably won't bear for a few years.

So I pruned off Keepsake entirely.  Granite Beauty had a graftable small shoot that I grafted with scion from Jonathan, then removed the rest of that branch.  Granite Beauty was also too vigorous for that Jonathan.  I also pruned back about 1/3 of the Porter, and grafted two small lower shoots of that with Jonathan scion.  If they take, I hope there is still some good structure and I can get the tree mostly converted to Jonathan.  It will be interesting to see what happens. My scion in the fridge was a little mildewed, so I cut new scion from the Jonathan, seeking stems that had buds that had not started to open yet.

That leaves Priscilla, the rest of Porter, and a large branch of Airlie Red Flesh on that tree.  I want them to bear this year, then reevaluate for whether to leave any of those on or go 100% to one variety in the next year or two.  Priscilla is OK, is disease resistant, and bears well, same vigor as the Jonathan, but doesn't seem too special.

I'm not that crazy about the Airlie Red Flesh now.  It's a decent apple but tends to get scab.  I also have a branch of that on another tree, so that might be enough.  They seem to keep - I had some this week, so at least few kept in the garage to March and that was better than the famous super-keeper, GoldRush.

Pears - I grafted "Dana Hovey" onto a branch of "Rescue Pear".  Fedco describes Dana Hovey as "Small...  rich golden-yellow russeted pear. Possibly the best eating of all winter pears. Keeps extremely well."  That tree needs some pruning and shaping. Pear grafts usually take very well.  I thought a winter pear seemed like a good idea.  Usually a lot of the summer pears spoil on the tree.

I had some rootstock left over from last year, Geneva-222 that had a graft of Fuji Beni Shogun that didn't take.  I think the Geneva wood was too thick and hard at the time for a whip-and-tongue.   It was still alive so I cleaned it up and put on a new graft with William's Pride.   This time, a cleft graft.  The William's Pride scion was skinny, so we'll see.   I don't know what I'll do with it if it takes.  There are usually some trees that die or I give up on them, so there will be a replacement ready.

I also added grafts to two of the Chestnut trees.  One goes on the "Marissard Seedling".  I planted that tree about 4 or 5 years ago before I understood that a chestnut seedling may not bear for many years, compared to a grafted tree, and that it may not make pollen (that variety), and that there is no assurance that it will even make nuts.  That tree is upwind of the 3 other chestnut trees, so I want it to make pollen if nothing else.  Last year I grafted the four lower branches with Precose Migoule, Marigoule, and Marivale.   That way, if one or two are not compatible, there are still the other(s).  Those all seemed to take.  This year I added Primato.   Primato is reported as early ripening, which would be good here in WA State.  The branches are so high, I stood on the bed of the pickup truck to graft it.  That scion was more than pencil thick, and hard.  I don't know if it will take.  I also bought scion of the variety "Bisalta #3".  I added that to the Easternmost tree, the Precose Migoule. I thought it might be useful some time in the future to take over the tree if that one continues to have nuts that are (a) quite a bit smaller and (b) fall from the husk, allowing animals to eat them.  If nothing else, two of the four chestnut trees now have potential pollen producing branches within the tree, so wind direction and insects are less of an issue.

I also added one more black cherry graft to the North Star pie cherry tree.  That's a sad looking tree, due to a giant maple fell on it a month ago.

That's all of my Spring Grafting for the year.  Apples, Pear, Cherry, Chestnuts.  Mostly some whip-and-tongue but also a couple of cleft grafts.

Healing Sunburned Bark on Jonagold Tree. 3.17.2021

 Around five years ago, I moved this Jonagold dwarf tree from my old yard to the current yard.  In it's orivinal spot, it didn't get much sun.  It developed a large area of sunburn, which I wondered might be fatal.  But it wasn't.  I didn't do anything to cover the wound.  It is almost completely healed now.

Notching Apple Branches to courage Latent Buds to Grow. 3.17.2021

I've never done this before.  I read that if you want a latent bud to grow, you should cut a notch through the bark above the bud.  The top of the tree sends auxin hormone to buds that keep them from growing.  Cutting the notch interrups the flow of auxin, allowing growth.  At least, that's what the books say.

 I want this Akane apple tree to have lower branches, so I can lower the top.  So I did an experiment and notched about these two buds.  We will see.

Cutting Back Last Year's "Whips" for Miniature SIze Trees. 3.17.2021

 I was reading that for miniature trees, one year old whips should be cut back to knee height -about 2 feet.  That way, they will branch near the ground, forming a bush.  It's a difficult cut to make for a baby tree, but if that's what's needed, then it should be done.  So I did.  All of them.

Grafting Apples. 3.17.2021

 It seems like just about perfect time for grafting apples.  We are probably done with hard frosts, the understocks have not started blooming yet but budes are starting to swell in some.varieties.  Now three of the espaliers have grafts for new tops - so now the Zestar will have top tiers of Rubinette, Calypso will have top ties of Otterson, and Honeycrisp will have top tiers of Gala.  I chose Gala because it's a good variety that I know I like, Rubinette is a great variety, very delicious, that's  grows well for me but isn't available in stores, and Otterson is supposedly the darkest red apple grown - possibly smaller and less vigorous than others, so it seemed like a nice top for Calypso, which I suspect will also be less vigorous.

I also grafted Duchess of Oldenberg onto Milo GIbson.  I might want to discontinue the Milo if the apples are no more special than last year, in which case I will have a new top of it from the graft of Duchess.

Lastly, I had a graft of a red flesh apple on Geneva 222 rootstock last year, but I don't want it.  So I top grafted that one with Opalescent, a historic apple that I like and have a small graft of on a multigraft tree, but it isn't getting much of a chance.  I'm not sure where this tree will go if it does well, but there are choices.

I also started putting on some new labels, that have the probable harvest dates.

Here are most of the grafts so far.   All except the Otterson are whip and tongue.  The Otterson was too small so I did a cleft graft for that one.