March 25, 2011

6 seeds @ of Beryl Beauty, Rosella Purple and Tasmanian Chocolate planted


March 30, 2011

Beryl Beauty, 1 up, 4 showing
Rosella Purple, 5 showing
Tasmanian Chocolate, 4 showing


Also planted at the same time and in the same numbers:

Golden Bison, 4 showing
Lime Green Salad, none showing
New Big Dwarf, 5 showing
Cream Sausage, 1 showing
Remy Rouge, 3 showing
Polish Dwarf, none showing
Polish Pastel, 3 showing

[quote=nctomatoman;207242]All - Lee just reminded me of a post that I was meaning to make (thanks, Lee) - and here it is! snip[/quote]

[B]Summertime Gold [/B][COLOR=Black]6 of 6[/COLOR][B]----[COLOR=SeaGreen]Dwarf Jade Beauty[/COLOR][/B] [COLOR=Black]4 of 6[/COLOR]
[IMG]http://i1187.photobucket.com/albums/z388/WillysWoodPile/DSCF4967.jpg[/IMG]

[quote=nctomatoman;207317]I also am going to use this opportunity to share a few characteristics for each of these newly commercially available varieties.

Dwarf Mr. Snow, Dwarf Beryl Beauty, Dwarf Jade Beauty, and Summertime Gold are all potato leaf dwarfs that are amongst the taller of the new dwarfs.

Summertime Green is a regular leaf dwarf that is also on the taller side.

The Five mentioned above are more "indeterminate" in nature, though still slowly vertically growing dwarf varieties with the thick central stem and dark crinkly looking foliage.

Tasmanian Chocolate, Rosella Purple, Rosella Crimson and Dwarf Wild Fred are all regular leaf dwarfs that tend to run a bit shorter than those listed above. These are more "determinate" in nature - and tend to have thicker, denser foliage, making it harder to find the fruit - except when the plant decides to throw a blossom cluster out the top of the plant!

If you've not grown a dwarf before - like New Big Dwarf, Golden Dwarf Champion, Dwarf Champion, Dwarf Stone or Lime Green Salad - I think you will enjoy how unique in plant habit this type is![/quote]

On average, how tall does Summertime Gold get? Or is there an upper and lower limit? I need to know for a project I have in mind. I'm looking for a plant that maintains a [3 to] 4 foot height. Smaller is okay but any larger than 4 feet would defeat my purpose.

As to the max height for Summertime Gold, I don't think we can definitely say for sure - Suze, Lee - your thoughts - since the two of you probably have the most experience with it? Problem is that although dwarfs are much slower vertically growing than indeterminates, the amount of sun, fertility, location, season, temps, etc will all have an impact.

[quote=WillysWoodPile;207770]On average, how tall does Summertime Gold get? Or is there an upper and lower limit? I need to know for a project I have in mind. I'm looking for a plant that maintains a [3 to] 4 foot height. Smaller is okay but any larger than 4 feet would defeat my purpose.[/quote]

Summertime Gold can exceed 4', but not by much. Typically I've had mine reach
4'~4.5' in height. Probably won't meet your project requirement unless you keep
the top 6" pruned back. Of course I also get 12 hours+ of sunlight a day on these
plants, which seems to impact their growth rate as well.....

Good to see all the success folks are having with germination!
My biggest interest is to see what everyone gets with regards to growth habit,
plant size, foliage density, fruit size/consistency, and of course taste.

Lee

[quote=Lee;207863]Summertime Gold can exceed 4', but not by much. Typically I've had mine reach
4'~4.5' in height. Probably won't meet your project requirement unless you keep
the top 6" pruned back. Of course I also get 12 hours+ of sunlight a day on these
plants, which seems to impact their growth rate as well.....

Good to see all the success folks are having with germination!
My biggest interest is to see what everyone gets with regards to growth habit,
plant size, foliage density, fruit size/consistency, and of course taste.

Lee[/quote]

Thank you Lee.---

As of Apr 1, of six seeds planted:

Beryl Beauty, 6 up
Rosella Purple, 5 up
Tasmanian Chocolate, 6 up


Also planted at the same time and in the same numbers:

Golden Bison, 6 up
Lime Green Salad, 3 showing
New Big Dwarf, 6 up
Cream Sausage, 1 up
Remy Rouge, 3 up, 1 showing
Polish Dwarf, 3 showing
Polish Pastel, 6 up

Also, thanks to a Tomatovillian generously sharing, planted Mar 31, 2 @ of Mr. Snow and Summertime Gold.

On March 28 I planted, and all are up as of April 03:

Tasmanian Chocolate: 6 of 6 are up
Rosella Purple: 3 of 3 are up

[quote=shlacm;207463]Okay this is a very early report, but they have barely started to peak out, so I might as well...

I planted 6 each of Rosella Purple, Tasmanian Chocolate and Mr. Snow on 3/26
So, here we are on Day 3 and there are two tiny little stems beginning to show of Tasmanian Chocolate, and one each of Rosella Purple and Mr. Snow![/quote]

As of today:
Mr. Snow 6/6
Rosella Purple 4/6
Tasmanian Chocolate 7/6 :surprised:

Actually I remember an extra seed getting into one of them... thought I'd just remember that there were 7 seeds in one of them and I didn't fix the # on the cup!!! Oops!

Now if Dwarf Wild Fred and Summertime Green would come to the party we would be all set, however they are still a no show on Tomato Growers Supply site. :no:

George

[quote=WillysWoodPile;207705][B]Summertime Gold [/B][COLOR=Black]6 of 6[/COLOR][B]----[COLOR=SeaGreen]Dwarf Jade Beauty[/COLOR][/B] [COLOR=Black]4 of 6[/COLOR].[/quote]

Second batch of [B]Summertime Gold:[/B] 6 of 6
[IMG]http://i1187.photobucket.com/albums/z388/WillysWoodPile/DSCF5099.jpg[/IMG]

First batch--definitely PL
[IMG]http://i1187.photobucket.com/albums/z388/WillysWoodPile/DSCF5103.jpg[/IMG]

[IMG]http://i1187.photobucket.com/albums/z388/WillysWoodPile/DSCF5102.jpg[/IMG]

I am growing Beryl Beauty, Mr. Snow, and Emerald Giant as well as New Big Dwarf. Our planting time for seedlings in North Texas is as early in March as possible. I planted my normal seedlings in beds on March 7. I planted the newly arrived dwarf seeds directly into their grow pots on March 7. I planted three seed of each variety and all germinated within ten days. I haven't grown in containers in many years, but simply don't have an open place to grow the dwarfs in my garden beds. I installed a drip irrigation system today to deliver about one pint of water per plant per day. I can increase that if required as the plants grow.

I have already removed the weaker plant of each variety with the intent of removing the second weaker plant in about ten days. I am growing in pots with tomato cages wired to a four foot fence. The wind or an earthquake will not topple them.

I am curious how they will react to our mid summer heat. Typically, we reach average daytime temps of over 90 degrees F and average night time lows over 70 degrees F in mid May. Most of my tomato plants will have bloomed and set fruit before the high averages arrive. I am interested in seeing if the 'Dwarf varieties will continue blooming and setting fruit in the heat.

This is a photo of my dwarf setup taken yesterday. I will furnish additional photos and descriptions as they develop.

[IMG]http://i291.photobucket.com/albums/ll308/tedln/2011%20Garden/IMG_2757.jpg[/IMG]

Ted

Might try a 40 % shade cloth over the dwarfs once you get into June. Looks like a 4' by 10' would cover the potted dwarfs and you might try 2 per pot as it appears that the pots are 10 + gal or larger.

George

Rosella purple and tasmanian chocolate today

Sent from my X10a using Tapatalk

Not sure where I should post this as it involves both the new releases and the dwarves I'm growing out for the project.

I was wondering if possibly some of the problems that are affecting Carolyn's seeds could be affecting seeds from the dwarf project. In other words is it possible that the seeds were processed under too hot conditions ?

Pic 1 is of my own seeds saved last fall of varieties Craig sent me last year (2010).

Pic 2 - Planted on the same day, (4/7/11) partly in the same flat (the empty spots in pic 1), are seeds sent to me by Craig for this year and the seeds I bought from Victory.

True I had more seeds of my own to plant. But I would expect to be getting more than just 1 or 2 out of 10-12 seeds. Only 1 variety is doing well.

From Craig -
Sweet Sue 2
Summer Sunrise 0
Kelly Green 0

From Victory (I know Victory didn't grow them) -
Rosella Purple 1
Tasmanian Chocolate 2
Mr Snow 1
Beryl Beauty 6

These were all planted under the same conditions as about 400 other seed cups. Not all on the same day of course. But I did plant about 50 other trade varieties that same day. No not ALL of those did great, but only a few did this badly.

I feel bad because the seeds Craig sent me were hopeful releases for next year. Kind of hard to evaluate only 2 plants. Hopefully some of those others I have will turn out well tho I think they may be a bit farther off.

All my seeds are started very similar to what I have on this page [url]http://knapps-fresh-vegies.netfirms.com/greenhouse06.html[/url]
I've been using variations of this for about 5 years and will often get germination in 3-5 days.

I'm disappointed and frustrated because I don't know if it's something I did or not. I was hopeful I would be able to make a good contribution this year.

Sorry,
Carol