Any 2018 harvest yet?

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Today's cherry tomato harvest of 1.1 kg some I will leave to ripen a bit more for a few days before washing and packaging for the freezer
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I harvested my first ever Kotlas/ Sprint tomato.

What a bitter, bitter disappointment!
It was grainy, mushy and had no flavor!

I've topped the plants to stop them growing and I'm never planting this variety again.

I'm unhappy with the scraggly, runty plants, I'm unhappy with the size of the small fruit and I'm unhappy with
the flavor and texture.

They didn't get a single hint of disease but I'm not sure if that was because of good management practices
or because the wretches are that disease resistant...maybe both?

I'm pretty steamed at the result considering just how much time and effort I poured into them.

The KY1 tomatoes I'm hoping will be better than these but they're no where near ready yet.

I'm trying to figure out if I've got time before the killing heat of summer to try other variety of
full sized tomatoes.
 
Tank-Girl said:
I harvested my first ever Kotlas/ Sprint tomato.

What a bitter, bitter disappointment!
It was grainy, mushy and had no flavor!

I've topped the plants to stop them growing and I'm never planting this variety again.

I'm unhappy with the scraggly, runty plants, I'm unhappy with the size of the small fruit and I'm unhappy with
the flavor and texture.

They didn't get a single hint of disease but I'm not sure if that was because of good management practices
or because the wretches are that disease resistant...maybe both?

I'm pretty steamed at the result considering just how much time and effort I poured into them.

The KY1 tomatoes I'm hoping will be better than these but they're no where near ready yet.

I'm trying to figure out if I've got time before the killing heat of summer to try other variety of
full sized tomatoes.
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Damn ... Sorry to hear that TG. I guess we all know it can be a crap shoot but it's still disappointing when we put a lot of effort into something with high expectations and it's a flop. Here's hoping the KY1 is a much better experience!
 
Got me a bunch of elderberries today. Got almost all the stems out. If I remember right I can get the greenies out while boiling. I'll get some good honey or maybe agave nectar and make a good syrup tomorrow. Anybody have any suggestions you might do? Thanks, pretty solid 3 cups worth. Just the beginning of the harvest. I have a dozen bushes.
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From our gardens today we finally mastered broccoli growing after many tries and here is the first of the harvest 238 g head of broccoli after getting so many tiny heads of broccoli before. Funny thing is I thought I planted cauliflowers and some broccoli but apparently I had put broccoli seeds in with the cauliflower packet, oh well nothing lost as they were expired seeds and we love broccoli anyway :) .

2018 best ever broccoli harvest.JPG
 
Sewingcreations15 said:
From our gardens today we finally mastered broccoli growing after many tries and here is the first of the harvest 238 g head of broccoli after getting so many tiny heads of broccoli before. Funny thing is I thought I planted cauliflowers and some broccoli but apparently I had put broccoli seeds in with the cauliflower packet, oh well nothing lost as they were expired seeds and we love broccoli anyway :) .

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I harvested my first ever broccoli head this morning SC!!

I LOVE it!
Just delicious.
The plant is already throwing side shoots
I netted my entire brassica bed so they're not only
perfect, zero bug damage but also 100% free of sprays.
I have sugar cabbages and Spanish collards in the same bed.
 
:woo hoo:@Tank-Girl doesn't it feel good to conquer something you found difficult before to do :) . Think we shall start doing that here is netting the brassicas as there is so many cabbage moths laying eggs on them usually and then of course you have the subsequent caterpillars munching their way through them. Seems with the drought here and the frosts we don't have them here at the moment so I will be harvesting like a mad thing as soon as they are big enough.
 
I'm getting Okra every day now so I pickled 3 jars the other night the same way I did mu cucumbers earlier this year. It's a refrigerator recipe so you don't have to do all the canning boiling and all. They last about 90 days so at my house they never even get close to being old . Man these are some kinda good!!!
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You folks are shaming me still harvesting so much produce. I dug my onions Saturday, didn't even get a bushel. Last year with fewer slips planted I harvested 4 bushel. So much rain this year most rotted in the ground. I think I'm gonna get a hiller attachment for the tractor and try to lift the onion bed next year to try and keep them dryer. I did grow some Red Torpedo onions this year. They are pretty good and produced enough to try again next year.
I did get several water melons and have another 30-40 to go. Butternut squash and Spaghetti squash are doing very well. Peppers, both bell and jalapeno are still producing. Maters are winding down. And other than a picking here and there we are letting the okra go to seed.
 
I don't know yet. From what I've read they are a bit like elderberry. Just OK when eaten straight but they make really good tasting jelly. I had never heard of them either but I got an identification from a friend and they grow wild here. A few YouTube videos later and I'm a gonna do some jelly! I'll let you know how it goes.
 
After a week of being gone, I came home to picking a large bowl of tomatoes, a bowl of cherry tomatoes, bowl of green beans, a few zucchini, and miscellaneous peppers. Fridge is full of turkey, duck, and chicken eggs. Son brought in some cobs of blue corn he grew. I boiled up some and they were chewy. Maybe better dried and ground. He did a farm to table dinner in our yard while we were gone and did well. Duck tacos (butchered my extra males and smoked them), and a bunch of fresh side dishes, made mostly from the garden here. Son in law made the wine, and peach cobbler was dessert. I was up to my elbows in peaches last month. Charged $50 a head. Had a dozen guests.
 
Since last report we pulled up the last of the cherry tomatoes and took off the good ones and threw them in the bin and have frozen them which will probably give us about 1 more meal of tomatoes for the freezer. We also harvested about 150 stems of English lavender and around 30 stems of French lavender and have them hanging to dry.

Yesterday we harvested 29 bunches of silverbeet and about 2kg of broccoli not in the picture. After blanching and freezing we got 24 double meals of silver beet for the freezer and 2 more double meals of broccoli for the freezer.

Here is our harvest of the silver beet we picked from the gardens yesterday -

silverbeet harvest sept 2018.JPG
 
Today's surprise growing in the garden amongst the garlic was a really large field mushroom which will go into tonight's dinner. They tend to come up after large downpours of rain in the country paddocks ,in the vegetable gardens amongst mulch and under trees and have dark black gills underneath. We will keep our eye out for more that may come up and harvest them for meals as mushrooms are so expensive here to buy fresh.

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How are your gardens going @Dutchs I hope well :) .

Today we harvested about 1 kg of carrots from the gardens which we juiced for lovely sweet carrot juice after lunch. Is it my imagination or are the carrots from the shops now tasting woody and not sweet at all ?. Things harvested from the gardens taste sooo much better than shop purchased.
 
Sewingcreations15 said:
How are your gardens going @Dutchs I hope well :) .

Today we harvested about 1 kg of carrots from the gardens which we juiced for lovely sweet carrot juice after lunch. Is it my imagination or are the carrots from the shops now tasting woody and not sweet at all ?. Things harvested from the gardens taste sooo much better than shop purchased.
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Doing well SC15, Thanks for asking. I just planted my carrots, I have corn 8 feet tall, Big nice sunflowers, Eggplant doing well, I've harvested enogh cucumbers to make 30 quarts of pickles. My Kidney beans are looking good, Sweet potatoes will be ready this or next week. Sorghum looks great and Amaranth is looking real pretty. I have 5 nice Pumpkin growing and another couple dozen trying to get grown. Some of the pumpkins get started and die on the vine. Seems they aren't well pollinated? Not sure.....Here's some pics! And I got a TON of Beauty Berries I'm going to make Jelly with this weekend!! This is SOOOOO Much FUN!!
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Everyone's stuff looks great.
I harvested the last of my watermelons and butternut squash Saturday. Got 10 melons over 30lbs each. and 15 or so butternut's. Wife picked 2-3 gallons of bell and banana peppers. Still have more bell's, serranos, and jalpenos to go. Tomatos are done and okra is going to seed. everything else has been mown down. Will be subsoiling all the garden spots next week.
 
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