The 2012 seeds are in . . . . mostly!

I look forward to fall seed collecting every year. Some seeds start trickling in earlier in the summer but it isn't until late October or early November that I can really sit down and assess the years collection. This year was good. Very good in fact. I already have almost all I need for next year plus enough for some good trading this winter. I have a list of stuff to find still but lots of time to find it.

Some of this years highlights . . .

Beans - I grew my favourites from last year, Amish Gnuttle and Flagg. They did not disappoint. Another great success was the Tiger Eye. I started it very early and it was growing great until we got a surprise frost one night after I had started leaving the cold frame open. All but one of the plants succumbed to the frost and died back to the ground. The one surviving plant showed no sign of frost damage whatsoever and it went on to produce a nice sized crop of beans - from which the majority of this years seed came from. a few of the other plants did grow back and do fine and I saved seed from them as well to keep a bit of genetic diversity but I am very excited about the seed from the frost tolerant plant. I ened up planting about 6 seeds in late summer to see if I could get a second crop. As of October 27th they are still looking good and close to producing a few pods of dry seed. We have had several light frosts and the plants all look great still. I will probably start covering them in the next week or so anyway as we will be getting some pretty hard frost soon.

I tried Trionfo Violetta again (out in the Rayleigh garden) and it was fabulous!I also tried the mystery bean from Slovakia. It turned out to be a green snap and was very good. It is a pole and will be on the list for next year for sure. The Gold of Bacau was good and I will plant some next year but probably not a huge amount. Bridgewater did good but was planted too late for a great crop. Calima was way too late and not nearly as productive as I had hoped. I will give it one more try next year and get it planted earlier! The rest of them were all good but nothing to write home about.



Tomatoes - Tomatoes were interesting this year. I lost A LOT of seedlings this spring to to a cold snap while they were hardening off. Some survived and did well (Barlow Jap and Joe's Portugese most notably.) And Siberia did well. I had a lot of mystery tomatoes and single plants of various kinds - too many to list right now. The biggest surprise was the one from the store bought tomato that I saved seed from last winter. It turned out to be a vigorous indeterminate plant with loads of nicely shaped fruit with VERY firm flesh. The taste was good, not knock your socks of great but decent enough. I was hoping for them to be great storage tomatoes and the ones I picked just before the first frost have been keeping well, the flavour is not so great with the ones that are ripening indoors though. I think I will work with it though and hopefully though selection I can get something good. The seed I saved was from the earliest and best tasting fruit.

Another couple tomato surprises this year were a teeny little determinate plant with LOADS of bite sized grape type tomatoes. It was part of an heirloom mix and I have no idea what it is called but it was great. And Kardinal which outproduced ANY other plant this year with big, great tasting paste type tomatoes. I tend to keep away from determinate plants due to space but I think I will plant several Kardinal out in Rayleigh again next year.

As far as seed collection from the tomatoes . . . I got lots of seed for next year. Some for trades but not huge amounts.

Lots of other cool stuff too - lettuces, brassicas, corn, squash, herbs, spinach and more.

Next year I should have a bunch of biennials ready to produce seed . . .

Here is my stash . . .



And some of the trade packages. I already have one BIG bag of trades set aside and ready to ship.