New plant review

I am constantly in search of plant species that do well in my garden. Plants that better fit my needs. I thought I'd start a new series on these new species, how they are doing and whether I'd grow them again. (I know I need a better name for this blog series... New Plant Review seems rather unimaginative).

1. Black Cherry Tomato- For years... I would search through Gardenweb forums for the best cherry tomato... the two that generally come up all the time are sungold and black.  I grew a black cherry tomato from Burpee two years ago and quite frankly it sucked. Tasteless nothing special except for color. So this year I did a little more research and bought seed from the original breeder of the black cherry tomato... the Sapp's who own Tomato Grower's supply (TGS). Boy does this make a difference. This tomato tastes GREAT!!! Even my daughter loves it (she can be picky about her tomatoes... she is not all that crazy about sungolds... she will only eat them if there are no other ripe tomatoes around). This one has definitely won a permanent spot in my garden. This one is even open pollinated so I am considering saving seed (just considering... there is always that small chance that the fruit was cross pollinated). The one con to this plant is that it is very susceptible to "stuff" (i.e. diseases).  One way around this is to pick the fruit very soon after it ripens. I gave one of these to my dad and he kept pruning away the diseased parts of the plants (I am a lazy gardener and didn't do this) both his plant and mine continued to produce. I think next year I will grow this one in a more controlled location (I have some locations which do better with hardy hybrid varieties).

2. Supertasty Hybrid Tomato- This plant is almost everything I hoped for from a hybrid... it fruited early and is PROLIFIC (I mean really prolific). It is not a bad tasting tomato, but doesn't taste as great as an heirloom tomato. I make sure I picked my tomatoes when the weather has been on the dry side (not after rain or not after being watered). This does seem to help with flavor. This really was a great one for sauce for me. It really kept well, definitely longer than my heirloom and red rose.  This one was the first "big variety" to ripen which is a plus. Definitely a keeper.

3. Red Rose Tomato- This is a cross between Rutgers and Brandywine. The seed was free from TGS when you purchased $15 worth of seed. This one really worked out well for me this year. I had a good amount of fruit and the plant did great. This one ripened right after my supertasty hybrid so the timing couldn't have been better. I ended up making sauce with a lot of these just because I had that many. Taste was great and very minimal to no cracking (they only cracked at the end of the season when the night temperatures were just that unpredictable). I think this one will be a fixture in my tomato plant lineup. The only thing I wonder is whether it will perform this well in a more wet summer. This year was a relatively dry summer, last year was a more wet summer. Tomatoes seem to do better when it is dryer. 

3. Mexican Sour Gerkin- I LOVE this plant... definitely planting at least 2 next year (I only planted one this year). It is such an odd plant... if you know your cucumber vines you know they are relatively thick and strong... in comparison these are.... well.. delicate. I always feel like they are going to break. I have to say though you really shouldn't be fooled by their delicate nature... these guys spread.  So give them a good trellis.

My kids LOVE these little cucumbers and both my kids fight over them. I am really hoping that when the novelty of the little fruit wear off that my kids still enjoy eating these (after all that is the true test). These did great in our dry summer. I got a little lazy about watering this portion of the garden and my regular cucumbers died early (lesson learned!!)... these guys kept right on producing up until the frost hit. I can't say enough good thing about this one. 

4. Sugar Pumpkin- This one has survived two attacks by the local deer population and still seems to be kicking. However it just wasn't strong enough to fruit fully (but it was flowering right down to the first frost).  It was a good plant though. Next year I am going to direct sow and protect the young plant till it strong enough. 

5. PAY DIRT F1 (synergistic) NAT II, Corn- Picking a variety of corn is like picking a variety of tomato... they are both really easy to breed and so there are a million varieties of each. Of course the deer took some good bites out of these so I only ended up with two ears of corn. It was a great experience growing corn, they definitely need a lot of sunlight. I definitely want to try to grow a few corn plants every year.

6. Casper Eggplant- When it comes to growing eggplant from seed I absolutely blame this on operator error. I am not good at growing eggplant (or chilli's for that matter) from seed. Their are a few things I want to try next winter.. with the hope of growing healthier plants from seed. Anyhow... of the three eggplant varieties I grow (i.e. asian long, shooting star and Casper) Casper grew the best from seed and was the most productive. I am inclined to think that eggplants need fresh seed every year and don't do well when stored for more than a year. I only say this because each year the one plant that is the most productive is the one with the freshest seed.  

7. Cayenne Chilli/ Ancho Chilli/ Greek Peppercino Chilli- I think I need to do a whole post on chillis. Anyhow, I bought these from Tomato growers supply.  These did great and really inspired me to dedicate more space to chillis. The cayenne really did the best (pictured on the left). I had enough to make my own version of red hot hot sauce (a much spicier version). All three chilli plants were great though. The ancho's would have done better had I kept the deer away (they loved this plant for some reason!).  I want to try doing more processing of peppers into chilli powders, pickled peppers and sauces (like sriracha... I'd love to try smoking some and making my own chipotle peppers in adobo). Anyway I will reserve this for another post only on chillis.

8. Jalapeno- I bought cheap seed at the end of last year and quite frankly this plant is not doing well (worst of all my chilli's). I think I will try this one again as I know there is room for improvement on my part. I may buy better seed.

9. Sugar Baby and Blacktail Mountain Watermelon- On one hand I wish I labeled which watermelon was which (this one in the picture is likely the sugar baby, blacktail mountain has a much darker fruit)... on the other hand it doesn't matter they both had a great start. I made a rookie mistake with these two and planted it behind (i.e. north of) my tomatoes. I thought the watermelon would climb up the trellis faster than the tomatoes filled their cages.... that didn't happen. I will definitely grow both of these again next.  

10. Redwing and Pontiac F1 onions- I am still in search of a good red onion that does well here.... I don't know if the redwings didn't do well because Trixy wouldn't leave them alone for the first few weeks after being planted or that they just don't do well here in Zone 6b/7a. The pontiacs definitely did great. I just finished the last of them about a month ago but they definitely would have stored for several more months.  The Pontiacs are definitely a keeper... the redwings I may give a second chance. .