Topic: Seed Sharing Circle 2014?

[galina]

Same here with the 'Piquante' peppers from Jeannine (the Peppadew type of pepper).  At the first sign of colour change on one I removed a few large fruits from the plants to ripen off indoors.  Then I took the plants into the conservatory.  By now (lovely long autumn) the fruits still on the plant are also turning red and I can harvest seeds from fully ripened peppers, rather than emergency ripened. 

Have just spotted this:  Well the lettuce was not quite this red, but this is the variety.  Have to dig out my own photos if we are doing a little catalogue again for our swapped seeds.

   http://market.asiaseed.net/sub/product/detail.asp?idx=102

[sparrow]

The lettuce looks fantastic.

My lemon drops are now out and drying - forgot to wear gloves and the ends of my fingers are very spicy!

[galina]

The lettuce looks fantastic.

My lemon drops are now out and drying - forgot to wear gloves and the ends of my fingers are very spicy!

Great Stuff!     Yes, just touching the dried Alberto Locoto seeds here has the same effect - fresh are even more powerful.  DO NOT touch eyes afterwards.  Washing up after a big family dinner is a useful way to get the hot stuff off fingers.   

Have packeted lettuce and peas today.  Quite a good way to spend a foul weather afternoon.     

[sparrow]

It's nearly Seedmas!!!     

[Jayb]

It's nearly Seedmas!!!     

Woohooo 

[Jayb]

I should have hand pollinated the Beit Alpha cucumbers as the viable seed count for each fruit was low, looking at the drying seed there should be enough for a small amount of seed for everyone. I found they grew well in an open ended polytunnel, producing a good crop of tasty fruit.
http://www.rareseeds.com/beit-alpha-cucumber/

I'd also like to add Violetta TPS to the circle, pods aren't ripe yet but they are starting to soften and I'm starting to get little wafts of scent from them. Violetta are an early maincrop producing a good crop of potatoes although mine were overall fairly small in size, I think due to Late Blight shortening their life span. Skins are darkest purple black and the flesh also has very good dark purple colour. I'd expect TPS to produce a number of early producing plants and should produce in the first year or grow in pots for mini tubers for the following year. Colours, anything from dark purple through to reds and whites, some with solid colour others faint flesh colour or perhaps rings of colour. These are all open pollinated and may be self pollinated or crossed with other varieties. Closet growing potatoes were Hot Dog and Snookie, both very long fingerling potatoes and Palest Pink Eye, a very L. Blight resistant variety.

[galina]

From Jeannine's amazing seed parcel I am happy to add two items. 

First, the Piquante peppers, aka Peppadew.  I have spent fun time in the kitchen trying to recreate how to turn them into Peppadews, stuffed with cream cheese.  Cleaned them out (saved seeds  ), boiled in a little water with a dash of salt, a capful of balsamic vinegar and stevia (sugar would be the normal choice).  Tasted and decided to add a second capful of vinegar and it smells just like the commercial item.  I think they cook the commercial ones for a little longer, mine weren't quite soft.  A bit of cream cheese and Yum - so good!  We only tasted one each so far, to allow the others to infuse in the brine a bit longer.

Jeannine often commented that the choice of squash in the UK was not great.  One of the varieties she added was Temprano de Argelia aka Early of Algiers.  A nice, very slightly bulbous, early, light green courgette.  Only one handpollinated fruit 'took', but there are a few seeds each. 

Both are just drying.        

[galina]

Looking forward to those TPS, the last ones we had are doing well here, had a nice harvest.  It will be fun doing it all again.  Looking forward to the cucumber too.   

[goodlife]

Seedmas...

It has been seedy day here....last of the 'seed' chillies are now chopped and seeds taken to dry out.
And the 'disaster'....
Ventured into GH to get last of the dried seed into house for sorting....all seeds were stored in a buckets...hung up high under the GH eaves....AND...BLOODY MICE! They've managed to climb up and some how make a 'rope walk' on wires...and they've made right mess on my seed stores...
As it was  late in the day...I just grabbed the buckets...checked there were no living things hiding and moved them swiftly into safe place until I can access how big damage they've managed to make... There is sugarbeet, gilfeather and old Welsh wheat that has had hit
The good thing is that most of the other seed crops weren't kept in GH so I've got plenty to 'go for'...
Oh well....should have known that the mice WILL find them eventually and be on the ball much sooner...but, but..etc...

[sparrow]

TPS are veeerrrrrrrrry exciting! Will definitely be reading up on them this weekend. And Peppadews too! *big cheesey grins*

Apart from the lemon drops, which are still drying out, all the other seed will be out of the rice jars and packed up this weekend ready to send off.

Sorry you've had a furry disaster goodlife. Is a good warning though - will have to check the seeds hanging in my shed.

[sparrow]

PS is there an uptodate list anywhere of what's going in? No worries if not, I was just looking for a list of seeds to dribble over. 

[galina]

PS is there an uptodate list anywhere of what's going in? No worries if not, I was just looking for a list of seeds to dribble over. 

Sparrow, not as such.  What we have done in the past is written little catalogues, but we had problems with the site with photos disappearing.  I hope we are doing it again but somewhere without disappearing issues.  This was our last seed circle catalogue

https://sites.google.com/site/seedsharingcircle/seed-parcel/seed-circle-2013

[sparrow]

That comes up as 'page not found'. No worries, like I said, was just wanting to dribble over seed lists and do some gentle planning in the dark evenings.

[galina]

That comes up as 'page not found'. No worries, like I said, was just wanting to dribble over seed lists and do some gentle planning in the dark evenings.

https://sites.google.com/site/seedsharingcircle/seed-parcel/seed-parcel-2013

Should work 

I tried it just now and it worked fine.   

[sparrow]

thanks, it does. The first link says circle not parcel. Took me ages to spot that! Must go home...

[goodlife]

Half of my seeds are now packed and labelled....!!!!!! 

....and more to do tomorrow...


....starting to feel like things are progressing ahead...


I won't be long now..........

[galina]

Half of my seeds are now packed and labelled....!!!!!! 

....and more to do tomorrow...


....starting to feel like things are progressing ahead...


I won't be long now..........

Does that mean the mouse damage was contained?  hope so.

About the same here.  Done Rosalie's Early Orange tomato and herb Salad Burnet today.  Getting there. 

[goodlife]

Code: [Select]

Does that mean the mouse damage was contained?  hope so.
Umm..don't know that yet...I'm facing that tomorrow...
What I saw when I was moving the buckets away...the sugar beet seeds looked quite badly damaged..not sure about the others yet.

Some while ago I had another seed 'disaster'...had some lettuce seeds that I had collected into plastic cup. The cup was pegged on end of cane next to the plants...each day I kept collecting the seed into cup....cup was filling out nicely, nearly ready for cleaning...then came rain and OF COURSE the GH roof had to leak!  Drip, drip...one small drop at the time and straight into cup...couldn't planned it better SO...tipped the cup over into bed and forgot that 'job'....and now I have lettuce seedlings growing on in great thicket!!!
Oh it would be boring if everything would progress 'swimmingly'... But lets hope there is no more surprises ahead...other than the sight of the big and fat seed parcel that postie lady will struggle to carry to me...

[goodlife]

Right...we had dry break with weather this afternoon so decided to face the damage...

...and the outlook is not quite as bad as I thought
Gilfeathers turnips were fine 
wheats and oats fine  ...with those mice had good chomp through my stock for 'eating' and the seed storage heads were untouched 

BUT....the sugarbeet have had good 'hammering'...there was more mice poo in the bucket than what was left of the seeds  I did sieve it but you just couldn't tell if there were still any seeds there.
BUT....I had good look at the old seed heads and those that were still standing upright, they had number seeds still on them!!!???
I collected what I could together and there is enough to go around...but how they are going to be after been so long in all weathers outside..?? They didn't look or feel soggy  So...I give them a week to thoroughly dry out...and bag them up anyway.
BUT...the good news is...the old roots are still alive have put lots of green growth on...maybe I get another 'round' of seed from them next year rather than having to start it all over again... Time will tell...but what I could see ,almost every 'original' root have grown

I shall carry on bagging the seeds...chillies, peppers, peas and tomatoes are all sorted, tonight I get more done and hopefully back end of the next week I get all posted to Jayb

These were my seeds that I saved from the mice damage today...still lot of 'rubbish' in but of course when it is needed, the wind died down!!! Just 'perfect'...

[markfield rover]

Does anyone else get excited by the above photo? Or is it just me?