298 The Greatest Garden Basics Hits of 2023, Pt. 1

Show Transcript

Ep. 298 2023 Greatest Garden Hits, Pt. 1 TRANSCRIPT

Farmer Fred

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Welcome to the Garden Basics with Farmer Fred podcast. If you're just a beginning gardener or you want good gardening information, you've come to the right spot.

Farmer Fred

As 2023 closes and 2024 begins, I like to look back and check out which topics and episodes of the Garden Basics podcast really hit home with our listeners. What were the episodes, and what were the parts in those episodes that attracted the most downloads and listeners? So I’d like to share those with you now. They just might be topics that you missed the first time around or you want to refresh your memory on a certain garden topic that got a lot of attention. This episode includes info on how to grow vegetables, including tomatoes, squash and onions, how to start a garden, how to irrigate your garden, and tips for garden success…11 tips, to be exact.  And it’s amazing what you can learn with a repeat listen. I listen to each Garden Basics episode at least four times, and I learn something new each time. So, here is Part 1, entitled, 2023’s Greatest Garden Hits. Part 2 will be next week.

We’re podcasting from Barking Dog Studios here in the beautiful Abutilon Jungle in Suburban Purgatory, it’s the Garden Basics with Farmer Fred podcast, brought to you today by Smart Pots and Dave Wilson Nursery. Let’s go!

THE TOP HOMEGROWN VEGETABLES Pt. 2 (originally aired in Ep. 264)

Farmer Fred

The National Gardening Association conducted a survey, asking what are your favorite garden vegetables to grow? The NGA, along with the Rapid City South Dakota Journal newspaper, came up with 10 backyard favorites, from coast to coast. Well, that sounds like a good topic for a garden podcast! So, Master Gardener and vegetable expert Gail Pothour and myself set out to discuss those top 10 and how to grow them, along with our favorite varieties. There’s no surprise that the topic gathered so  many listeners to make it rank in the top 10 Garden Basics podcast episodes of 2023. What was surprising, were  the vegetable choices that piqued the curiosity of the most listeners in that two part series, that aired in episodes 263 and 264, and is presented here: zucchini and onions.

Farmer Fred

Last week on this Garden Basics podcast you may recall we were talking about the top 10 garden vegetables to grow at home. Gail Pothour was with us and we went through tomatoes, cucumbers, sweet peppers, beans and carrots and we ran out of time. So this week we're on to part two of the top 10 most popular garden vegetables to grow. It includes summer squash, onions, hot peppers, lettuce and peas. That is according to the National Garden Association and the Rapid City, South Dakota Journal newspaper. Gail, let's get going on six through 10.

Gail Pothour

Yes, let's do that.

Farmer Fred

Moving on to number six in the most popular garden vegetables to plant at home. I laugh because who hasn't had way too many zucchini or summer squash. And zucchini is just one form of summer squash. There are all sorts of summer squashes.

Gail Pothour

Oh yeah. In fact, some of my favorites I my favorite heirloom zucchini, another heirloom is I'm interested more in heirlooms for tomatoes for the flavors. But there are some other crops that have heirlooms that are really good. It's called Ortolana di Faenza. I don't know how to say it in Italian, but it's a light green zucchini instead of that dark black green that a typical zucchini. It is  real prolific and so I grow that every year. And then there's your yellow crookneck or there's scallop or the Patty Pan. So there's a lot of different ones. I love Butterbelly, that happens to be a hybrid yellow crookneck. And I grew it up a pallet last year. It's a bush variety, but I wanted to get it up off the ground. So I propped up a pallet and grew it up the pallet and it saves space. And it was easier to pick and it was an outstanding variety. It was new new for me last year. Zephyr is always a good one. It's a yellow crookneck with green at the bottom, kind of a light green color. And then my favorite scallop is Sunburst. It is the yellow patty pan with a green button on the bottom. And that happens to be an All America selection winner.

Farmer Fred

Among the scallops that are recommended by UC Davis - and these are varieties  you'd probably find at your local nursery if you're wanting to plant them from transplants, but they're really best planted from seed. But refer back to our story of why you don't want to cram the roots.

Gail Pothour

Oh yeah, just like cucumbers. They don't want their roots disturbed. Yeah.

Farmer Fred

That's why it really is much easier from seed to grow summer squash. But  among the UC recommended varieties are Peter Pan hybrid, sunburst, scallopini, early white Bush, those are the scallop recommendations. Among the yellow summer squashes, they like early prolific straight neck, Sundance, early golden summer crookneck, and Dixie.  Among the zucchini,  their favorites include aristocrat, Grayzini, Ambassador, Gold Rush, and Burpee Fordhook.

I think a lot of the problems that people have with summer squash is the lack of a killer instinct. First of all, they're doing the right thing by planting from seed. And usually the recommendations of planting by seed say, “Mound the soil up about eight inches tall and about 12 inches wide, sort of like a plateau. Use really enriched soil, maybe mix some manure in there. And then in that plateau that is 12 inches across, put six seeds in a circle. And then wait. And then when they germinate, they don’t thin them out to one per hill. Honestly, if you have, let's say, two mounds of zucchini seeds planted, and you've got 6 seeds in each and you have a normal sized garden and you don't want too much zucchini, thin it out to one per hill. Good luck on that.

Gail Pothour

Yeah, I am sort of hesitant in that I'm going to grow two different squash varieties this year. Generally I do one. That's plenty from for me and my husband. But I'm going to grow my favorite zucchini, Ortolana di Faenza, and the yellow, the yellow crookneck the Butterbelly, I'm going to do two different plants. And I'm thinking that might be crazy, because it's probably twice as much squash as I need. I've already been collecting recipes on what to do with all that squash. But yeah, it's very prolific. And if you keep harvesting them when they're small, that will keep them producing if you want to stop the production, let them grow to a baseball bat. And that'll slow them down a little bit.

Farmer Fred

Okay.  ideally, for best flavor, zucchini is best harvested when they're eight inches or less. Right?

Gail Pothour

Yeah, they will get too seedy whey they are huge. Otherwise, when they start to get over-mature, they'll get really seedy inside, yeah.

Farmer Fred

A lot of people  plant the zucchini seeds or the squash seeds in May. And by June they are complaining, “Look, look at the fruit that's coming out. It's stunted. It's short, it doesn't look right, what's going on?”. It's usually incomplete pollination because of the fact that they have separate male and female flowers, and they don't produce male and female flowers necessarily on the same day, especially if it's too hot or too cold. And the bees sometimes don't help out very much. But usually it's that incomplete pollination. But if you are just patient, if you just wait, you'll get normal sized zucchini. The weather will even out and you will have more zucchini, then you know what to do with.

Gail Pothour

Exactly, yeah, and generally the male flowers start out first. And so you'll have all these flowers and you think I have no fruit? Well, the female flower will have a little immature fruit at the base of it. And so you can tell the difference. And they the male start first and the females when they need to get in sync with each other in the morning to do this. Generally they're viable in the morning, and it takes a while and the weather can disrupt that. So yeah, you just got to be patient.

Farmer Fred

As the University of California Davis says: under good growing conditions, fruits are ready for first harvest 50 to 65 days after seeds are planted. And in the world of summer vegetables, that's pretty darn quick.

Gail Pothour

It is quick. Yes.

Farmer Fred

Moving on in our list of the 10 most popular garden vegetables to grow at home: Number seven is onions. And onions, Gail, take patience.

Gail Pothour

Oh, absolutely. And I find growing bulbing onions, a typical big onion, to kind of be a challenge. So I rarely grow onions in my own garden. If I do grow them, I'm going to grow one variety, and it's called Stockton red. And it's getting a little more difficult to find seeds for Stockton Red, but that's one that I really like. But onions are daylength sensitive. So you need to grow a type of onion, whether it's long day, short day, intermediate day or day neutral, depending on your latitude. I think that's where a lot of people have problems, they are growing a variety that maybe isn't suited for their latitude. And so they either bolt prematurely or they don't bulb at all. So with Sacramento being in about a 38 degree latitude, we are an intermediate daylength, so choose varieties that say they are intermediate day, or that are day neutral. Day neutral means it doesn't matter. Anybody can grow them. So that's kind of the key and where I've run into problems. If I buy sets or something, they don't necessarily tell you if they're long day, short day, intermediate day, whatever. And so I'm buying the wrong variety. Stockton Reds, I know, will do well here. So that's an intermediate day, but onions can be a challenge. And so let's just say I don't grow them that often. I'll grow green onions I'm currently growing Egyptian walking onions but bulging onions I don't do too often.

Farmer Fred

Generally onions are planted in late summer or early fall here in USDA zone 9. September October, and aren't harvested until June or July, if you're growing the bulbing onions. Now green onions are a different story, green onions or scallions. You can grow those year round here. Varieties like evergreen white, Southport white, white sweet Spanish, white Lisbon, Tokyo Long White, which I planted for the first time this year. And if you use a lot of green onions in your recipe preparations, always have a pot of onions growing.

Gail Pothour

That's what I found. Green onions are something that I use more. Well, I use regular onions a lot too. But I use a lot of green onions. And so those are easy to grow, I can grow them in a container. I can grow them practically any time of the year. If it's too hot, I can move them into the shade. So yeah, that's a good one to grow.

Farmer Fred

Yeah, unfortunately, by the time they are ready to harvest. It's not like you can take the onions out and plant something else. Actually, you could. When the onions are harvested, reinvigorate the soil, and you could probably put in zucchini or another summer squash or a winter squash.

Gail Pothour

Or  set that space aside for planting your fall crop. Because some of those can go in August or September. They like to have warm soil to germinate, but they need a cool climate to mature. So a lot of our cool season crops we would start growing when the soil is still warm, but we want them to mature when it's cooler out. So once you took those onions out, you could then plant something for the fall.

Farmer Fred

Among the onion bulbing varieties recommended by the University of California Davis, their Vegetable Research and Information Center, are Grano, Granex, California Early red, Fiesta yellow, sweet Spanish white, sweet Spanish, Southport white globe, Southport red globe, and the Stockton yellow globe.

Gail Pothour

No Stockton Red on their list. We actually did an onion Variety Trial almost 10 years ago at the Fair Oaks Horticulture Center, where we grew several varieties of long day, intermediate day and short day onion varieties to see how they would do in our climate. And all the long day onions bolted. And some some of the short day onions did as well. But that's what's critical, was to grow the right type. And what I mean by long day, intermediate day length, short day:  if you look at a map and you see your latitude, long day are going to be up north, so they need 14 to 16 hours of daylight in the spring and summer in order for the bulb to start. intermediate days, 12 to 14 hours, short days, 10 to 12 hours, that's down south. So it does have a lot to do with your latitude.

Farmer Fred

Exactly. If you live in Edmonton, you can grow long day onions.

Gail Pothour

And we did grow them here and we found they don't do that well.

Farmer Fred

I am not surprised about that.

THE 2023 TOMATO PREVIEW SHOW (from Ep. 259)

Farmer Fred

Also making the 2023 Greatest Hits list among listeners to the Garden Basics podcast was a conversation we had about new tomato varieties back in March, with nursery owner Don Shor. It originally aired in Episode 259.

Farmer Fred

I was just reviewing my notes for my 2022 vegetable garden. And on September 30th, I made this note: shortest tomato season ever. Well, all gardening is local. And here in Northern California, we had one heck of a heatwave in late August and early September last year, with record high temperatures. And that's why it became the shortest tomato season ever. So I am extremely optimistic about 2023. I hope Don Shor is as well. He owns Redwood Barn Nursery in Davis, California. And Don, how was your 2022 tomato season?

Don Shor

Well actually, it was very good. But I have to say that the plants took a lot more water than usual. I was deep irrigating those vines, I was giving them 10 to 12 gallons of water a week, generally all at once if I possibly could, because I'm out in an open field. It’s a normal, garden-farm type situation. There are no raised planters, such as what you deal with. And as long as I kept them going and kept the plants vigorous, they did well. But  I have to agree with you that the heatwave did a lot of damage to a lot of varieties. If their fruit was exposed on the morning that I knew was gonna get over 110 degrees, what I would do  is pick it and bring it in, so that I knew that that particular fruit wouldn't get sunscald or sunburn as typically happens when tomato fruit that's close to ripe is hit by 95, 100, 105 degree temperatures. You know you're gonna get some injury on that side of the fruit. 116 degrees, which we recorded two days in a row in the Davis area is an absolute record. Not just for the month, but the all time record, followed by five more days over 105. Yeah, it kind of finished up the crop for a lot of people, especially if their plants were drought stressed.

Farmer Fred

I did put in an optimistic note after I wrote, “shortest tomato season ever” back on September 30. I pointed out that the Gardeners Delight tomato, the Sweet Million, the Sungold, the Valley Girl, all have flowers. Maybe they will bear fruit. And then I turned the page to October, and on October 25 I wrote, “removed remaining tomato plants. the shortest tomato season ever.” Thanksgiving tomatoes are commonplace here. Christmas tomatoes aren't that unusual.

Don Shor

But last year a lot of them finished up early, and that heat just finally took its toll. I did have a couple of varieties that really impressed me for their ability to continue later on. Usually there's a half dozen varieties that will keep setting fruit, keep fruiting, all the way through October and into November.  I do want to mention one all time top 10, the Champion tomato, just kept on going. I was still picking those in early November. And I've got to bring this one in: New Girl. the New Girl is giving Early Girl a run for the money because it was continuing to fruit all the way through October.

Farmer Fred

New Girl was one of my better performers while tomato season existed in 2022. I will be planting New Girl again, as well as its sibling, Valley Girl.

Don Shor

Yes, these are all competitors to the throne of the one of California's absolute favorite varieties, the Early girl. That has been an all purpose hybrid tomato here since the 1970s. It's very, very popular and for good reason. It sets early. It holds and ripens early, and then  we don't typically get a lot of fruit on it through the hottest part of the summer. You almost always get that late August early September set, however, when we get cooler periods which we do. And they'll ripen here, since we have such a long season, it is usually sunny and warm all the way into the middle part of October. You'll still often be picking Early Girl  as late as well as you know, even as late as Thanksgiving. Because of that, there have always been breeders out there looking to be the next Early Girl. And I think we've got a couple of them that are actually good contenders for that now.

Farmer Fred

Last year, in 2022, the Seed company “Seeds N Such” - because I must have ordered some seeds from them - they sent me a complimentary package of a hybrid tomato called “Early Doll”.  I saw that sitting there in the box of seeds this winter and I go, “Well, I'll try that this year.” it germinated, as I would expect, even though it allegedly was packaged for the year 2022. However, packaged tomato seeds can last, what, four or five years? So I have high hopes for Early Doll, although I don't see it in their latest catalog. But they do have it online. Maybe that's why it was part of 2022 free seed giveaway. It says online: “it's one of the earliest tomatoes we have ever offered. 55 days from planting to fruiting”.

Don Shor

Early Doll. Well, yeah, 55 days is great. And we'll certainly see if that one gets into their list. I mean, this company has come up with a couple of really good ones. And you and I both know that the one that they sent out as a freebie three years ago, we all gave him great feedback on that one.  They've now labeled it, “It’z a Keeper”, which is very productive. It set well, it set early, had very firm fruit and I'll mention that one took the heat very well, as well. So  we gotta keep trying these. I have a feeling, I'm not sure why, that there's gonna be more hot spells in our future. It might be advisable for us to make notes, not just about what sets early, and what produces well into the season, but also what takes direct hot sun on the fruit, and also note the vigor of the vine. I mean, this is something that future gardeners may wish to know about our experiences with extreme heat as things change.

Farmer Fred

So last year, I tried three new tomato varieties. For me, I tried the “It’z a Keeper,” “Big Beef Plus” and “Bodacious”. And I noticed that in my notes throughout the spring and summer, I didn’t mention them anymore. So I'm not so sure that I would plant them again.

Don Shor

Bodacious has done very well for me three years in a row. And it did very well last year. It's actually one of my top producers of all the new varieties that I've been trying. So I do urge people to try that one, you're only going to be able to get the seed for that I believe from Burpee Seed Company, I think it's theirs. Yes, it's not something you're going to find at most garden centers, I do know a small nursery in Davis that is likely to have it. Not everybody around is going to because the seed is not cheap.

Farmer Fred

Let me tell you, now that you're taking us on a nice scenic bypass that has me scratching my head. I was at a big box store, at the garden center portion of the big box store. And I was looking at those poor, young sacrificial tomato plants, the ones that are one inch, or two inches tall, that people are buying now even though like I said, we're waiting for our first 80 degree day. Heck, we would settle for a 70 degree day. So I feel sorry for those tomato plants. But, to their credit, the garden center had a good supply of cool season vegetables, which still makes a lot of sense to plant in USDA zone nine, in March and April. Because you're gonna get two more months - unless the heat sets in extra early - of outstanding growth. But the price!  The price, Don, of that four inch tomato plant! It was going for $5.95. And a six pack of cool season vegetables, small babies, little ones? They were $6.98. It's like the price doubled overnight.

Don Shor

Maybe I better raise my prices. That sounds pretty good. Yes, the prices have definitely gone up. And there's a reason, a couple of reasons, that are fairly obvious for that. One is the cost of heating greenhouses. You don't get tomato seedlings available in March, if you don't have a heated greenhouse. As you know, if you do it at home, you've got to do them indoors, move them out, move them back in, move them back out. They're not doing that in big wholesale growing yards. They're using propane or natural gas to heat those greenhouses. Plus, greenhouses aren’t very effective when it's cloudy. So we've had a lot of cloudy days, like say 50-70% of our days have been cloudy from January, February, and into March. So the area’s wholesale greenhouses weren't working real well. Anyway,  the cost of seed is definitely going up. And what you'll find is that there's a lot of growers that just aren't going to take on a brand new, untested, untried variety, no matter how exaggerated or, let's say, retail-oriented the claims in the catalogs are, because of the cost of the seed. I've got one grower that tells me he's not going to grow anything that cost more than a nickel of seed. But some of these are closer to 50 cents or more a seed. I'll try them. You'll try them. I'll see if they do well. Coming back to “Bodacious” that one has been very consistent for me now, including during extreme heat. To me, it's the best alternative to a beef steak that you're going to get here in the Sacramento Valley or regions like the valley where it gets so hot in the summer. It takes the heat much better than a beef steak type and it's a similar slicer you can slice it with it's got a lot of that connective tissue that holds together for a sandwich, it makes great sauces and salsas, things like that. But I do have a rule. I don't recommend a variety until I've grown it for at least two seasons, preferably very different seasons. We just went through a very hot summer. We've had cooler summers, and it is never the same. This variety is consistent with very few exceptions. “Bodacious”. So far , it is a real winner for me. I'm not sure whether yours was just a fluke or something but I do suggest trying it again and then test it for two or three seasons before you rule it out. Big Beef is a good example. First year I grew it , it was great. 30 to 35 fruits, close to a pound a piece, I thought  that we got a winner here. The next year I grew it, it only had 10 fruit. So that does happen. You need to test them for a couple years under a range of conditions.

Farmer Fred

This may be the reason why, because of fear of the weather - you might say - that I probably am leaning this year to smaller tomatoes that will ripen quicker, so I'm guaranteed some tomatoes, at least. The tomatoes I've chosen - I think the biggest one might be eight ounces - is a “Better Boy” which is about eight ounces.

Don Shor

There's a whole bunch of red tomatoes that are classic and reliable: Better Boy, Champion, Red Delicious, Whopper. Those are four that I find very similar in how we use them generally, very similar in their performance. The most consistent, year to year, has been Champion, which has an easy to remember name. But all those are good. Better Boy has been very consistent over the years. When you get into the really big ones, you are taking some gambles. It seems to me, from experience, that there's more issues of blossom end rot, for example, when you have a very large tomato. When you get it in early and it gets going and it sets fruit, you get all excited. And then you notice that the bottom is discolored on the fruit. And that it was going to be gushy on the bottom, and no good. That's probably  a temperature and moisture related phenomenon. But it does seem to hit the bigger ones worse or maybe it's just that it's more disappointing when it does, I'm not sure. The key is: diversify your portfolio. Yes, good advice across the board. Get some interesting sauce tomatoes, because in my experience, a lot of those are just very consistent. There’s reliable cherry tomatoes. You can't go wrong with cherry tomatoes. Juliet, that's a sort of an in-between one that's cherry size, but firm, textured, incredibly popular, and could be a little hard to find this year. So look around for it. But try to get a whole bunch of different kinds and a couple of early varieties are very good plan. And make sure you get something interesting out there. So you can test some new varieties. But you're right. I think the big ones you're just you're asking. I don't do nothing but oversized tomatoes. Let's put it that way. I grow the Big Zack hybrid. The one that's grown actually has a championship sized tomato. I've had great years. One year I got 35 fruit , all of them were over a pound. They're all beautiful. One year I got three. And you know, that's a pretty big range. If it was the only one I planted, I would have been a little disappointed.

Farmer Fred

You bring up a good point too. For one thing, all gardening is local, as we're kind of talking about here. And everybody's results are going to be different. But one thing that you've talked about in the past that makes a heck of a lot of sense is buy local. Buy those tomato seeds that were developed where you live. And we've often used the example of that classic heirloom tomato, Brandywine, which I imagine, does fine in Brandywine, Pennsylvania, but not here in California.

Don Shor

Pennsylvania, I think, is a fairly mild climate, as far as I can tell, at least compared to what we have here. There's a seed breeder up in Maxwell, California, that's been introducing some phenomenal tomatoes. Maxwell is about as valley as you can get here in the Sacramento Valley. They certainly get as hot as we do, if not hotter up there. Most people go by Maxwell on Highway 5 and don't really notice it. But there's a really good deli there.

Farmer Fred

There is a golf course there, too.

Don Shor

There is the breeder of the tomatoes, the Chef's Choice series. they have all been introduced by a company up in Maxwell, and every one of them, so far, has been a real winner. Particularly I've mentioned it many times on your program, Chef's Choice Orange, one of the first ones they came out with. It is a top performer for me year after year, big fruit, very firm. Now they have a yellow and of course red and pink and striped and purple and I think it was even a white one and then a black one. Several of these have won the All America selection designation which I think you can explain better as to having been tested in a wide range of circumstances.

Farmer Fred

Exactly. They have test gardens from coast to coast and in many different climates. They have national winners, they have regional winners, as well. And if you go to All-AmericaSelections.org you can find their complete list and be prepared to download a large PDF of all those winners. If you go by that, that's not a bad barometer to use for choosing tomato varieties. How about among your customers? What have they been raving or pooh-poohing about in the last year?

Don Shor

Juliet continues to be extremely popular. Sungold is the top cherry tomato. There's always new ones coming along to try to challenge Sungold for that position, and there are some really good cherry tomatoes out there. But that one continues to be just one of the favorites. By the way, one of the favorites everywhere. When I posted the question on our Facebook group of nursery professionals what are your top five tomatoes? Sungold was on almost every single list as was Early Girl, those are consistent. Champion continues to be very good. I do have a lot of older customers. I'm not sure why they seem to really like Ace. And these older guys and their Celebrity. I'll tell you, you and I aren't huge fans of Celebrity, but there are some people out there that just clamor for it. So it's a good producer. I've had issues with sunburn on it and other things, but I have to bring it in for those guys. You know how these old gardener guys are? They can be kind of grumpy.  The other thing is a lot of them are still asking about heirloom types. I've gradually gotten to the point where if someone walks up with just heirloom tomatoes to the counter, I say, “I suggest you try a hybrid to just to see how it performs compared to those.” Because you mentioned Brandywine, that's a good example. It’s very popular, but rarely produces more than one or two fruit here. That has been my experience. It doesn't take the heat well. There's other heirlooms out there that are worth trying. Mortgage Lifter does reasonably well, most years for me. Cherokee Purple has done extremely well. For me, it was my top producer in 2021 of all my tomatoes, the largest number of fruit was Cherokee Purple of all things. So it's a good one for the valley and good one for hot climates. But you've got to try different things and be sure to get at least one or two in there that are hybrids and preferably they have that hybrid built-in disease resistance that can be very important in some areas.

Farmer Fred

The heirloom that has done well for me consistently over the past probably 15 years is “Gardeners Delight.” It's not as small as a cherry tomato, it's more like a plum size or a little bit bigger than a cherry tomato. And it does produce throughout the season. And it's usually my latest performer as well, “Gardeners Delight”. And as far as good cherry tomato that I've always grown, it seems. and I still grow it because it keeps performing is