Cultivated

A Winter to Remember

2010-02-08T06:54:00.000-05:00

Normally, about this time of year I begin tormenting northern gardeners with pictures of snowdrops or crocuses or maybe even an early daffodil. This is not a normal year.

That's my deck at Tangled Branches North yesterday morning.

You may have heard about our recent snowstorm. I think it was on the news. But you may have forgotten about the similar storm we had in December. Coming so close to Christmas, I didn't write anything at the time but I did post some pictures on Picasa.

That's the same table on December 20. We guesstimated that was about 20 inches of snow, but after the recent storm we actually measured.

That's a patch on the driveway. About 24 inches of snow. It took the spouse and I three or four hours of shoveling, but we finally broke through to the street yesterday. And we don't have a long driveway.

This is what we saw when we opened the garage door Saturday afternoon.

That is not a snowdrift. That's flat accumulation of snow.

This is after the first shoveling session.

There is a similar-sized pile of snow behind the photographer. The blob to the left of the pile is a Japanese yew that I've hated for years. I think nature may have helped rid me of it. I brushed some of the snow off, but it's quite bent.

There's a lot of tree and shrub damage with this snowstorm. This is a small oak tree in our wooded backyard.

The white blob to the left of that is my favorite holly tree. You win some, you lose some, but I'll take steps to try to save the holly.

This is the neighbors' detested (by me) Bradford Pear. There was a low branch that protruded over the sidewalk. Nobody but a small child could walk under it. That branch is lying in the street in this picture.

Normally, I don't post wide shots of the backyard because I find few angles that don't include the neighbor's woodpile, compost pile, shed, swingset, garbage cans. As I say, this is not normal. The snow airbrushed out all the uglies.

Well, I think you get the idea, but it really was a storm for the record books:

PUBLIC INFORMATION STATEMENT...CORRECTED REAGAN NATIONAL INFO
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE BALTIMORE MD/WASHINGTON DC
1030 PM EST SAT FEB 06 2010

...PRELIMINARY SUMMARY OF TWO-DAY STORM TOTAL SNOWFALLS EXCEEDED IN THE BALTIMORE-WASHINGTON AREA...

THE 32.4 INCH TWO-DAY STORM TOTAL SNOWFALL RECORDED TODAY AT DULLES INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT EXCEEDS THE PREVIOUS TWO-DAY STORM RECORD OF 23.2 INCHES ON 7-8 JANUARY 1996.

THE 24.8 INCH TWO-DAY STORM TOTAL SNOWFALL ESTIMATED TODAY AT BALTIMORE/WASHINGTON INTERNATIONAL THURGOOD MARSHALL AIRPORT EXCEEDS THE PREVIOUS TWO-DAY STORM TOTAL SNOWFALL RECORD OF 24.4 INCHES FOR BWI AIRPORT FROM 16-17 FEBRUARY 2003. THIS WOULD ALSO BE THE 2ND HIGHEST TWO-DAY STORM TOTAL ALL-TIME SNOWFALL FOR BALTIMORE RECORDS WHICH DATE BACK TO 1871...BEING SECOND ONLY TO THE 26.3 INCHES WHICH FELL 27-28 JANUARY 1922.

THE 17.8 INCH TWO-DAY STORM TOTAL SNOWFALL RECORDED TODAY AT RONALD REAGAN WASHINGTON NATIONAL AIRPORT IS THE SECOND HIGHEST TWO-DAY STORM TOTAL RECORD...SECOND ONLY TO THE 18.7 INCHES FOR NATIONAL AIRPORT FROM 18-19 FEBRUARY 1979. THIS WOULD ALSO BE THE 4TH HIGHEST TWO-DAY STORM TOTAL ALL-TIME SNOWFALL FOR WASHINGTON RECORDS WHICH DATE BACK TO 1871...BEHIND ONLY THE 27-28 JANUARY 1922 KNICKERBOCKER STORM WITH 26.0 INCHES...THE 12-13 FEBRUARY 1899 STORM WHICH PRODUCED 19.0 INCHES...AND THE 18.7 INCHES WHICH FELL 18-19 FEBRUARY 1979.

AS WITH ANY MAJOR CLIMATE RECORD ACHIEVEMENT...THESE PRELIMINARY RECORDS WILL BE QUALITY CONTROLLED BY NOAA'S NATIONAL CLIMATIC DATA CENTER OVER THE NEXT SEVERAL WEEKS.

Winter Orchid Foliage

2010-01-22T16:12:00.000-05:00

Couldn't think of a catchy title.

What does this look like to you? A pile of sticks? (Say yes.)

But let's look more closely.

There's something green and growing beneath the sticks.

It's a Downy Rattlesnake Plantain orchid, or Goodyera pubescens to its botanist friends. The pile of sticks is my doing. In the fall of 2008, I found a single Goodyera pubescens in the woods. When I went back a few days later to look for it, it was gone. Deer? I don't know, but the deer are getting all the blame for any missing plants lately. So this fall, I was surprised and happy to find two plants nearby. And wondered how best to protect them. Well, maybe not best, but adequate. So my reasoning was that a loosely woven cover of sticks might hide the tasty plants from any casually-nibbling herbivores, but let in enough light to keep the plants alive. So far, it seems to have worked.

A story of mistakes.
My fingers almost cannot help typing Goodyeara instead of Goodyera, and that is what I did when I wrote about this plant over a year ago. The genus name has nothing to do with tires, but is instead named for John Goodyer - an English botanist who lived from about 1592 to 1664. You can read all about him on Wikipedia or elsewhere on the internet, but a lesser-known fact, I think, is that the naming of the genus was a mistake. It seems that Robert Brown (famous Scottish botanist), wanting to name a plant after Goodyer, assigned the name Goodyera repens to an orchid found in the north of England and in Scotland that he believed was the same as an orchid described by Goodyer which is found in the south of England. His reference for this belief was Gerard's Herbal, which had been revised by a friend of Goodyer's (Thomas Johnson). Johnson erroneously attached a drawing of Goodyera repens (the northern orchid known to Brown) to a description of Epipactus palustris (the southern orchid known to Goodyer).

My typing mistake could have a basis in fact however. It seems that the surname Goodyear, forever linked with tires in my mind, is probably the same as the surname Goodyer. Charles Goodyear may or may not have invented the process of vulcanization, whereby natural rubber is converted into a material suitable for tires (and other things), but one of his relatives writes the following in a genealogy of the Goodyear family:

But back to winter orchid foliage.

Lately, I've been finding more and more Cranefly Orchid (Tipularia discolor) foliage in various places in the woods. I stumbled across this single leaf while out with the camera a week ago, far from any previous discoveries.

Way back last summer, I meant to post something about the flowers of the Cranefly Orchid. The patch I found a couple of winters ago bloomed, and the flowers were not eaten, this past August but I had a terrible time trying to get a good photo. I never did get a good photo, but these are some of the least bad.

Well, it is an orchid - I think you can see the family resemblance - but very plain compared to many of its cousins. The flowers are practically invisible due to their size, coloring, and habitat. They're so perfectly camouflaged in the woods that if you didn't know to look for them you probably wouldn't notice them.

Maybe next summer I'll have some pictures of the flowers of Goodyera pubescens as well.

GBBD

2010-01-15T15:51:00.000-05:00

Garden Bloggers' Bud Day?

'Rijnveld's Early Sensation' narcissus will be blooming soon.

'Jelena' witch hazel thinks it's still too cold.

Garden Bloggers' Bug Day?

Some type of stink bug? Found crawling on the floor this afternoon.

Garden Bloggers' Bird Day?

My little chickadee.

Nuthatch with prized sunflower seed.

Shy cardinal.

Garden Bloggers' Blue Day?

Sweetgum seed balls against the deep blue sky.

How could I be blue with a gorgeous sky, plenty of twittering birds, and today's spring-like temperatures? No blooms for Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day, that's how! But soon there will be flowers. Maybe even for February's GBBD. Stay tuned.

Some flowers from previous Januarys:
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009

Big Bird

2009-12-30T14:05:00.003-05:00

While tethered to the computer slaving away at end-of-the-year bookkeeping, I heard the unhappy sound of a bird hitting the patio door. Must have been a big one, I thought.

Bigger than I imagined. When I first laid eyes on this, my brain couldn't reconcile the songbird I expected to see with the large brown creature I actually saw.

I didn't want to disturb it while it was still stunned, but I wanted a photo. And I was troubled by the sight of its extended wing and wondering how to contact a wildlife rehabilitator. I got close enough to the door to take a couple of good pictures and then...

Oh no, it's headed right for the door again.

It corrected its mistake at the last minute and headed for the trees instead. I didn't see where it went, but felt relieved that it could fly.

I think it's a juvenile Red-Tailed Hawk, but I'm no expert on big birds. Anybody else have an opinion?

Garden Bloggers' Bud Day

2009-12-18T06:59:00.000-05:00

Taking advantage of the lull before the storm, I'm here to report that I had no flowers in bloom for Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day earlier this week.

But there are buds.

This is one of 3 such buds on a Camellia japonica, newly planted this spring. I cannot believe that I lost the label already. Its neighbors, with no buds, still have intact labels. Why?

I hope those buds survive to make flowers for a future GBBD, but today it sure feels like we're in for a long cold winter. I'm a novice camellia-grower, but I think the japonicas are less hardy than the sasanquas? But that one is still a very tiny plant, probably less than 12 inches tall, and if we get the foot of snow that's predicted it will be totally covered up and well-insulated. (I first typed insulted instead of insulated; hmmm.....)

December Tomatoes

2009-12-10T14:58:00.000-05:00

Did she say December tomatoes? Yes! But it isn't like they came fresh from the vine today. This one has been "ripening" since mid-October when we frantically picked all we could before the frost. I think it may be the variety 'Persimmon', but in our haste we didn't bother to sort the tomatoes by variety - just dumped everything into any container we could find. We'll call it Persimmon. Or maybe Kellogg's Breakfast. Or maybe even a Virginia Sweets. One of the big yellow ones anyway. But I think it's Persimmon.

A good many of those hastily harvested tomatoes never "ripened" but this one did and we ate it for lunch today. It wasn't the same as a mid-August tomato, but it wasn't bad either. I scrounged a small amount of coriander/cilantro from the garden this morning, but unless we get a heat wave, that will be all until spring.

Earlier in the week I made a sort of pasta all'Amatriciana with some other varieties of tomatoes that had "ripened" off the vine but those weren't as good as today's.

With all the precipitation of the last few weeks the garden is sloshy soggy. The deer have been making their presence known by eating almost every green thing left in the garden, and now they're wading ankle-deep in mud to do it. Well maybe I exaggerate a bit, but the hoofprints are quite deep. And they've been eating things they are reputed not to like. Onions for example. So it's just as well that I didn't get my fall onions planted. The ones the deer are eating were the perennial types that I left in.

I'm content to just let the garden go for a few months. I like vegetable gardening, but it's very time-consuming. So time-consuming that I didn't write half the blog posts I had planned. Maybe I can make the clock run backwards, writing up the garden events in reverse chronological order. By the time I get caught up, we'll be back to spring and time to begin again.

Southern, Downy or Plain?

2009-11-20T09:05:00.000-05:00

Most of the year this Viburnum sits quietly at the edge of the woods blending in with the greenery in the summer and the bare branches in the winter. But it has brief moments of glory twice a year. I love the way the pleated leaves unfold in the spring. And in fall, it does this:

This is a wild plant, by which I mean that I didn't pay for it or plant it. It was just there at the edge of the woods at Tangled Branches North. Early on, I thought I had identified it correctly as Arrowwood Viburnum (V. dentatum) and that was that. Oh, but things are rarely that simple in plant taxonomy and this innocent little plant is a good example of just how complicated the business of assigning names can be. Our taxonomic frenemies have split the one species - Viburnum dentatum - into several botanical varieties. Why botanical varieties and not subspecies? Good question. I quote from the abstract of a paper titled "IMPLICATIONS OF THE EQUIVALENCE OF SUBSPECIES AND VARIETY, AND OF THE IRRELEVANCE OF FORMA":

Subspecies and varieties are theoretically and practically indistinguishable, but both are currently used; and the choice relates more often to the geographic origin of the taxonomist than to the biology of the plants.

Glad we cleared that up.

Further, some plants which were formerly known as botanical varieties of Viburnum dentatum have been promoted to separate species. My plant may be one of those. The Digital Atlas of the Virginia Flora says that a botanical variety named Viburnum dentatum L. var. lucidum Aiton is present in Fairfax County. But wait, the USDA Plants database says that Viburnum dentatum L. var. lucidum Aiton is a synonym for Viburnum recognitum, its true and proper name. Then they go on to list four other synonyms. By the way, I think that the variety name "lucidum" is a hoot, considering the tangled taxonomic mess we find ourselves in. Well maybe we could just call it Southern Arrowwood and be done with it. The USDA says that's the common name for all the plants in question here.

Unless it isn't one of the Southern Arrowwoods. Maybe it's a Downy Arrowwood (Viburnum rafinesquianum). I was browsing the catalog of Gardens North (on a tip from Kate) when this description caught my eye: "...this shrub also has outstanding fall color ... a dazzling display of golds, pinks, and reds". And they say it will grow in dry soil, which is where mine is. Duke University says V. rafinesquianum is similar to V. dentatum, and their photos look a lot like my plant.

So I don't know. It's a pretty plant and I like it and I wish to address it properly. I haven't found a key or guide to distinguishing these species, subspecies, varieties...whatever. If you know of one, please leave a comment.

Back to The Digital Atlas of the Virginia Flora, we learn that Viburnum dentatum is a "... variable species; several varieties have been named based mostly on the distribution of various types of hairs. Their occurrence and distribution in Virginia are perhaps worthy of study." They could come to my house to start.

Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day

2009-11-16T11:22:00.000-05:00

Mid-November and I still have flowers. That's something to talk about! Now these are not robust and happy summer flowers; these are survivors. We had our first frost in mid-October and several since then, but no hard freezes yet, and so....flowers. Some of these survived because they're hardier than others, some because they're in sheltered places, and just a few because this is their season of bloom.

I've been discouraged lately by a surge in deer damage. For 3 years, they've been politely tasting in the garden, but now they've settled in to feast. And coming closer to the house to do it. I was contemplating planting some hostas next to the front porch where these cupheas are. Now I'm not sure.

You'll notice some crudely cropped off stems in those photos - that's the work of the deer.

It's interesting that many of these survivor plants are hummingbird plants, but then again maybe that's just because I plant so many of those. I've not seen a hummingbird since late September, but keep hoping for a visit from a stray western species.

The 'Cramers' Amazon' celosia up in the vegetable garden is long gone, but the plants next to the deck are still hanging on. That's the top of one that inserted itself under the deck railing (about 4 feet off the ground).

The deer showed absolutely no interest in the lantana, by the way, and it's a hummingbird and butterfly favorite. Must remember that next year.

I think this is Krishna holy basil. Or maybe it was Rama. Or maybe it's 'Blue Spice' basil. In any case I couldn't tell the difference between 'Blue Spice' and the one holy basil variety that germinated and grew, so I'm prepared to say they are one and the same. I sowed some other holy basil varieties, but lost many seedlings to damping off and the rest to some type of larvae.

The plant was buzzing with insects in yesterday's unusual warmth.

That warmth also brought out some of my honorary flowers - the butteflies. This one is a Common Checkered Skipper.

Lastly, there are a few flowers whose season of bloom is very late in the fall or very early in the spring. I have rosemary in bloom, but the photos didn't turn out. And I have really high hopes for these - the camellias.

Last year I cautiously planted a few Camellia sasanqua and was very impressed with how well they survived last summer's drought followed by a colder-than-usual winter. So this year, I planted more camellias. More C. sasanqua, some C. japonica and even a C. sinensis - the camellia whose leaves I see every day in the bottom of my tea strainer. They're still tiny plants and most of them have flower buds, but no open flowers. Our next door neighbors have camellias in bloom next to their porch (should have photographed those), so I assume now is when at least some of them should be blooming. Actually one of mine did bloom a few weeks ago - the tea plant (C. sinensis) - and it's setting seed.

As usual, I'm a day late for Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day, but if you haven't been there already then head over to May Dreams Gardens and see what else is blooming on the internet.

Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day

2009-10-15T09:47:00.000-04:00

I forgot.

But the loveliest thing blooming right now is the hardy cyclamen (Cyclamen hederifolium). If it stops raining long enough, I'll go out and take a picture. Really, though, it looks just like last year and the year before and...

Ping

2009-10-07T11:09:00.000-04:00

I'm still here. Beautiful fall weather has descended and I just don't feel like sitting in front of the computer. I haven't even done much photography lately; I'm content to just enjoy being outdoors before it gets too cold. And the vegetable garden is still producing. I've been drying peppers, freezing peppers, eating peppers, and making hot sauce. I like peppers. Here's a photo I did to accompany some given to my in-laws.

I asked the spouse if he could ID them for his family and he said no, hence the photo guide. 'Bulgarian Carrot' was new to me this year, but has become a favorite. Thick walls, hot, and early. A real winner.

Here's something I never saw before - a walking stick (insect).

I think the correct ID is Northern Walking Stick (Diapheromera femorata), but let me know if I'm wrong. Ordinarily, they should be in the woods eating oak leaves, so I'm not sure what attracted it to our front door.

Leaves are starting to drop and the deer are munching their way through the woods. You see things that were hidden before. These Euonymus americanus fruits for example.

E. americanus is apparently a deer favorite because we have many many wild plants of it in the woods and almost all of them get chewed off as soon as they attain any size. They overlooked enough of this one to let it produce a few fruit capsules.

I wish I knew more about mushrooms. We get a progression of them spring through fall. I keep thinking that I'm ignoring free delicious food through my ignorance at identification, but fear of making a mistake has kept me from sampling any. I need an expert to come here and guide me.

These were huge and obvious and the only ones of their kind I saw as I meadered through the woods yesterday. I have no idea what they are...

The County Fair, Part 4 (Livestock)

2009-09-17T14:39:00.000-04:00

I like chickens. I don't have any, so when I go to fairs I always have to see the chickens. I wish they had other poulty at the Sandwich Fair as well, but apparently only chickens are allowed.

It is a chicken. Honestly.

Rabbits with eye makeup? Looks like it, but they're a breed called Dwarf Hotot. The eyeliner is part of the standard.

The larger livestock is a little harder to photograph unless you get a chance to see the judging. This cow apparently won a red ribbon, whether she wanted to be in the show or not.

The County Fair, Part 3 (Horticulture/Agriculture)

2009-09-17T14:16:00.000-04:00

Taking advantage of today's wet weather to post the rest of the pictures I took at the Sandwich Fair last week. I decided to break this into several posts so as not to crash your browser. First up, the rest of the Horticulture and Agronomy displays.

Popcorn, my second favorite food.

Big is important at the fair. These dahlias were the size of lunch plates. (Dinner plates are bigger than they used to be. Lunch plates are now the size of dinner plates.)

The blue ribbon pumpkin weighed something over 300 pounds, if I remember correctly.

The County Fair, Part 2

2009-09-11T09:05:00.000-04:00

A short selection of pictures from the Horticulture displays at the Sandwich Fair yesterday. More pictures to come when I get them edited. There's plenty to see at the fair besides horticulture: rabbits, chickens, cows, needlework, baking, canning, and antique engines to name just a few.

Above is the "new" Horticulture Building (did you notice the very tall sunflowers at the entrance?). The "old" Horticulture Building was shown in the previous post. The following description of the "old" Horticulture Building is from The Sandwich Fair, Since 1888, published in 2001 by The Sandwich Fair Association, Inc., Sandwich, Illinois.

When Floral Hall was replaced in 1905, it was recognized that provision of separate areas for different types of displays would be beneficial, so $2,000 was expended for a building specifically dedicated to horticulture and agricultural products.

This original Horticulture building was an octagonal structure forty-eight feet in diameter. It housed exhibits of fruits, vegetables, grains, floral arrangements, baked goods and needlework. Having a hall specifically dedicated to horticulture has contributed further confusion to the potpourri of building names. In the minds of some, it properly became Floral Hall since it now housed the flowers. A large addition was added to this building in 1915.

In 1931, leaf burning was cited as the cause of a fire that destroyed the hall. Firemen quickly arrived on the scene, and they thought they had the smoldering fire under control; however, the tinder-dry frame structure suddenly burst into flames. The firemen's efforts were turned to saving nearby buildings.

The County Fair, Part 1

2009-09-09T08:45:00.000-04:00

Poets call autumn the melancholy season, but to American farmers it was the season of fulfillment and a time of rejoicing. Why else would they have chosen September as the Season of Fairs?

Eric Sloane, The Seasons of America Past

Virginia is a wonderful place with a rich agricultural history, but its county fairs leave a lot to be desired. So I'm off to Illinois to see a good county fair - The Sandwich Fair. You see, I'm interested most in the agricultural and homemaking exhibits, and the Sandwich Fair has them in abundance.

Here's Eric Sloane again, lamenting the decline of the county fair:

European fairs, and those of early colonial days, involved the sale of cattle and produce, but the Great American Fair became a farmer's holiday and general exhibition where prizes were given for products and handiwork of the community.

The downfall of the old-time American agricultural fair to the level of the modern American carnival is regarded by many as a national disgrace which belittles the institution of farming. The introduction of a circus midway has made the agricultural exhibits only a side show to the fair, and many of America's oldest fairs have degenerated into collections of barkers, salesmen, freak shows, Ferris wheels, and "girly shows." The farmer's carnival of today is far removed from the institution it was a century ago.

Well, yes, but the agricultural side of the fair is still important in the Midwest, and that's why I'm traveling there to see it.

I'll have full report later, but in the meantime you could read a general history of agricultural fairs in the 19th century, or the history of the Sandwich Fair.

Arachnophobes, Look Away

2009-08-24T15:24:00.000-04:00

Really, if you don't like spiders you won't like this post.

We start to see some misty, foggy mornings about this time of year and they do magical things to the meadow.

About a week ago, we had one such morning. When the fog lifted and the sun filtered through, it lit up dozens of sparkling spider webs.

I see several types of spider here, although I wasn't trying to photograph spiders - just their webs.

One spider was especially striking. Sheer size alone would command attention, even if it didn't have this beautiful multicolored pattern.

Thanks to a post by Naomi on her Nature Nerd blog, I think I've identified this as some species of Argiope.

There's so much variation in the style of webs, once you begin to really look at them.

Tomato Tasting: Virginia Sweets

2009-08-22T14:47:00.000-04:00

OK, this won't be a detailed review like the last one, but we really liked the large 'Virginia Sweets' tomato which was the subject of the previous post.

Without doing a direct comparison, I'd say the flavor is similar to 'Kellogg's Breakfast', but with this one you get all the pretty yellow/red variegation to look at too. I cut a slice off the blossom end and took a bite. Wow, you have to taste this, I said to the spouse. He agreed it was good, but then he never gets as excited about these things as I do.

For lunch, we had Indian Railways Omelet Sandwiches with one slice apiece from this tomato on no-knead sourdough bread. Those two slices were plenty; I had to cut each in half to get them to fit on the bread. In fact, the tomato was too big for my Warther Tomato Knife to slice through it in one go.

Virginia Sweets will definitely be invited back next year.

An Even Bigger Tomato

2009-08-19T13:01:00.000-04:00

Forget about the One Ton Tomato. This one outweighs it.

2 pounds and 3.6 ounces.

The variety is 'Virginia Sweets' and it's new to the garden this year. It looks yellow here, but is really streaked through with red when ripe. There's a little cat-facing on the other side, but I think the whole tomato is sound. I'm gonna give it another day or so before I cut into it, because I've been picking the tomatoes before they're really ripe and before the critters take an interest in them. This is the second or third one I've picked; the first was very cat-faced, but worked out OK when cut up for fresh salsa. I mixed it with many other types of tomato in that salsa, but my first impression was that it was tasty (Virginia Sweets, I mean, although the salsa was tasty too). Further tasting is planned - there are lots of green fruit on this huge plant.

Tomato Tasting: Persimmon vs. Kellogg's Breakfast

2009-08-19T09:09:00.000-04:00

I've been growing 'Kellogg's Breakfast' for several years and think it's one of the best tasting tomatoes there is. Until I tasted it, I believed that all yellow tomatoes were insipid compared to red. But I'd read glowing reviews of another large yellow tomato called 'Persimmon', most notably from MSS at Zanthan Gardens (1, 2, 3, 4), and last year decided to compare it to 'Kellogg's Breakfast'. As it turns out there are at least two different tomatoes called Persimmon and the one I grew last year may in fact have been 'Russian Persimmon'. I thought it was just OK in the flavor department, but the fruits were gorgeous to look at.

So this year I bought seeds of 'Persimmon' from Southern Exposure Seed Exchange. The plants grew well at the beginning of the season, but during the cool, rainy early summer they started to develop some type of leaf spot disease. All 14 of my tomato varieties show the disease to some degree. I haven't tried very hard to diagnose the problem, but it may be bacterial speck. It begins as small brown spots and eventually kills the entire leaf. 'Persimmon' was one of the worst-affected plants and is now almost completely defoliated with just a few green leaves at the top. 'Kellogg's Breakfast' was infected later and has lost much foliage, but is still growing vigorously.

'Persimmon' set only 5 tomatoes, all approximately the same size. Of these, I picked three while semi-ripe and left two on the plant. Those two were chewed in half by some critter just as they were beginning to color up. So I've only got three to taste.

'Kellogg's Breakfast' has yielded 6 or 7 tomatoes so far, including one very large one, with more green fruit on the plant. Some of those are showing sunscald, however, due to the loss of the lower foliage from the leaf spot disease.

For the direct taste-off, I selected one fruit of each variety as nearly the same size and degree of ripeness as I could. 'Persimmon' is on the lower left and 'Kellogg's Breakfast' on the upper right.

You can see they are quite similar in appearance. 'Persimmon' is somewhat more ridged or scalloped. 'Kellogg's Breakfast' is rounder and a slightly deeper orange. I should note that it was also slightly less ripe than the 'Persimmon'. On the top side, both have cracks. 'Persimmon' (upper left) shows concentric cracking and 'Kellogg's Breakfast' radial cracking.

With the top sliced off, neither one of these particular specimens displays the irregular arrangement of seed chambers commonly seen in beefsteak tomatoes. It was more evident at the blossom end, but I didn't take a picture.

I wanted to be as fair as possible when comparing, and arranged a blind taste test with my spouse and myself as judges. In everyday life this is the only audience I have to please in the kitchen. I cut up the tomatoes into similar size pieces and placed them into identical bowls with a label on the bottom. It was easy to disguise the identities of the tomatoes from my spouse. He didn't see which tomato went into which bowl. The plan was for him to rearrange the bowls after I filled them, so that I wouldn't know which was which. No good. Having done the growing, the picking, and the processing, I could see the difference even though I tried to make the bowls appear the same. So, I put both bowls on a plate and rotated it round and round and round with my eyes closed.

With eyes still closed, I tasted the first one. Oh, that's 'Kellogg's Breakfast'. To my mind, it has a great balance of sweetness and tanginess delivered in a very meaty, mouth-filling bite. I tasted the next one. Similar in some ways, but much more tart. I perceived the taste as more "thin".

Well, that was Judge 1. What did Judge 2 think? He preferred 'Persimmon', saying it had a little more flavor. I couldn't get any greater specificity from him.

So, it looks like I'll be growing them both for some years to come. I'll be very interested to see how they compare in a year with more-typical weather. I feel that any judgments of any plants this year are bound to be distorted by the very unusually cool and wet early summer. It's lately turned warmer and drier, by the way.

And what became of the rest of those tomatoes? A delicious salad for dinner. Sliced tomatoes topped with 'Mexican Cinnamon Spice' and 'Sweet Petra Dark' basils, sea salt, fresh ground black pepper, and a drizzle of good olive oil.

Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day +2

2009-08-17T09:11:00.000-04:00

Late again, but I've been busy.

The weather forecast was wrong every day last week. They kept predicting rain, sometimes a lot of rain, and I worried about the semi-ripe tomatoes cracking after taking up so much water. Turns out I needn't have worried (because it didn't rain), but I picked all the tomatoes that were showing any color at all. The edible plants have been taking up all my gardening time. Not that this is a bad thing, but blogging and other things have faded into the background.

But we do have flowers. Still mostly annuals at Tangled Branches South, and some of these have seen better days, but technically in bloom. The list is the order in which I wrote them down as I was walking around trying to make sure I included everything.

Petunia 'Old Fashioned Vining'
Dianthus 'Rainbow Loveliness'
Verbena bonariensis

Various basils
Celosia 'Cramer's Amazon'
Cuphea sp. (self-sown, lost track of ID)
Cuphea x 'David Verity'
Petunia 'Superbissima'
Cuphea glutinosa
Calibrachoa, red
Cuphea llavea (bat-faced cuphea)
Lantana 'Dallas Red'
Lantana 'Lucky Red'
Angelonia
Cuphea ignea ('Matchless' and the plain species)
Viola 'Bowles' Black' (still hanging on in this cooler-than-usual summer)
Hibiscus sabdariffa (Thai Red Roselle)
Tagetes lucida
Various thymes
Garlic Chives
Achillea 'Summer Berries'
Verbena hastata 'Pink Spires'
Wormwood
Lonicera sempervirens (coral honeysuckle)
Petunias (self-sown from last year's 'Balcony' petunias)
Calamintha nepeta
Celosia 'Sylphid'

Lavender 'Munstead' (rebloom)
Bronze amaranth (self-sown)
Origanum vulgare? (white-flowered oregano)
Nepeta transcaucasica 'Blue Infinity'
Helianthus debilis (was supposed to be 'Key Lime Pie', but isn't)

Helianthus 'Claret' (must have more sunflowers next year!)

Scabiosa 'Black Knight' (really does look black with the right lighting)

Zinnia 'Envy'

Zinnia 'Benary's Giant Carmine Rose'
Salvia 'May Night' (rebloom)
Cosmos sulphureus 'Bright Lights'
Cosmos bipinnatus 'Versailles Tetra'
Nasturtium 'Fordhook Favorites'
Dill
Fennel

Next post: the tomato taste-off between Persimmon and Kellogg's Breakfast...

One Ton Tomato

2009-08-03T13:04:00.000-04:00

Are we having a big-tomato contest this year? 'Cuz I think this could be a contender.

That's almost 2 pounds of 'Kellogg's Breakfast', or 1 pound and 15.4 ounces for you precise types. A mere factor of 1000 away from a One Ton Tomato.

I know that at least one other garden blogger has heard the Michael Nesmith version of Guantanamera aka One Ton Tomato. The video below doesn't have the original video footage, but the audio sounds like I remember it when I saw it on Television Parts.

How do I know that at least one other garden blogger knows of this song? Because, while searching for original video footage, I found a comment by Annie in Austin on Chigy's Gardener's Anonymous blog about it.

If they had the internet back in the dark days of 1985 Michael could have looked up the lyrics in seconds, or even watched a video with subtitled lyrics.

But back to my tomato. The B side, as usual, isn't as popular. More than a little cat-facing here, but it looked callused and dry, so I think the inside is going to be just fine.

If you're wondering what I did to get such a large tomato, the answer is Nothing. Well, not much of anything. I did prune off some of the lowest side branches so it wouldn't get too unruly for the tomato ladder that's supporting it, but that's about all. Last year, I tried tomato pruning (to 3 stems) for the first time, and concluded that it wasn't worth the effort. I thought pruning might produce fewer and larger tomatoes, but I don't think I got any this large last year from this variety - Kellogg's Breakfast. One of my favorite varieties for flavor, by the way.

And I've been singing One Ton Tomato all morning...

Ding Ding Ding, Time's Up

2009-08-02T10:44:00.000-04:00

I see I'm not the only one who never noticed the feathery centers of ...........

Zinnias.

The first one was 'Envy'

And the second was 'Benary's Giant Carmine Rose'

Digital photography is a marvelous thing. I probably wouldn't have "wasted" film on the center of a zinnia.

Can You Guess?

2009-07-30T08:31:00.000-04:00

Do you know what this is?

Hint: this next one is the same kind of flower.

I never noticed the beautiful featheriness in the center of these flowers until I took a closeup photo and looked at it on the computer screen.

Hummingbird at Work

2009-07-27T22:34:00.000-04:00

My best photo of a hummingbird. It was just a lucky shot. I was in the garden with the camera when I heard the telltale hum as it zipped past me on its way to the flowers. I thought I was too far away and that the autofocus wouldn't work and that the bird would fly away when it saw the camera and ... well sometimes you get lucky.

First Real Tomato of the Year

2009-07-26T20:31:00.000-04:00

...and what became of it...

The variety was 'Bloody Butcher'(the smaller ones on the plate are 'Matt's Wild Cherry'). I should have waited a few more days - the tennis-ball-size tomato was not quite fully ripe, but it was still tasty. We were just over-eager for the first fresh salsa of the year. Lots more to come, I hope.

But while we're talking about salsa, I want to put in a good word for the 'Bulgarian Carrot' pepper. I'm growing it for the first time this year and I'm so impressed with it. The plant is loaded with peppers and they are hot. It's hard to get a good hot pepper this early, even in a normal year, and worse this year when it's been so cold. When we get some really ripe tomatoes, they'll make a great combination.

Dead Leaf, No, Wait

2009-07-24T08:54:00.000-04:00

I was about to brush a dead leaf away from the front doormat this morning, when I noticed that it was curiously symmetrical. Curious, that is, for a leaf. But not for a moth.

It turned out to be fairly easy to look up. I searched for orange moth on bugguide.net and it showed up on the first page of search results.

This is the Spiny Oakworm Moth aka Anisota stigma. They spend the winter underground as pupae and emerge in the summer as adult moths. The adults do not feed, according to Butterflies and Moths of North America. The caterpillars, however, are voracious consumers of oak leaves.

Fortunately we have plenty to spare.

Now I have got to go clean that doormat so it looks good the next time I find an interesting moth on it.