Recent posts

#1

Tomatoes / Re: potting soil makes a diffe...

Last post by Adrian - Today at 05:14:07 AM

Hi Diane,
https://www.sungro.com/retail-product/sunshine-mix-4/
https://www.sungro.com/fr-ca/professional-product/sunshine-mix-5/
Sunshine 4 il more draining than sunshine 5.
Sunshine 5 is probably better for old plants.
You can mixed 1 bloc of coco peat or a draining potting soil at sunshine 5 for get a better result with the seedlings.


i was got greats results to mixed 1/4 of biobizz worm humus at universal potting soil.

#2

Tomatoes / potting soil makes a differenc...

Last post by Diane Whitehead - Yesterday at 03:18:01 PM

I have seeds of hundreds of different tomatoes, and every year I decide on about 100 in a different category each year  (tastiest?  earliest?  multiflora?  unusual colour   etc).  I start them inside in pots of Sunshine 4 which comes in a giant black plastic bag.

When I transplant them into the garden, they go into my natural soil.

This year, the seedlings did not grow well at all.  I don't have big tomato plants out in the garden.

I was puzzled and then I remembered that I bought a different kind of Sungro this year - not Sunshine 4, but Sunshine 5. I can't remember why - I guess the store was out of 4.   

I decided to run a test - the same tomato seeds, in green pots of Sunshine 4, and blue pots of Sunshine 5.  What a difference!  The plants in the green pots are about four times the size of the ones in blue.  They were all sown at the same time and have the same conditions under a growlight.

#3

Tomatoes / Re: Montana Tomato Project

Last post by Diane Whitehead - 2026-08-16, 10:43:14 PM

It's the blue and green stripes I'd like to see a photo of.

#4

Tomatoes / Re: Montana Tomato Project

Last post by William Schlegel - 2026-08-16, 08:32:01 PM

This year is not very photogenic being heavy on F1s with red tomatoes! Unless you like red cherry and saladette tomatoes some with a bit of blue skin already! So yes- 2027 will probably find me taking a lot more photographs! The 294 descended F2s should be nice!

I only have a couple 294 plants this year- mine arent ripe yet- though other folks are growing them and they look and taste great.

If some of the part sibling 303 crosses segregate back to blue bicolors next year that will be nice as well.

#5

Tomatoes / Re: Montana Tomato Project

Last post by Diane Whitehead - 2026-08-16, 07:04:29 PM

I look forward to photos next year.

#6

Legumes / Re: Everyone's Pea Projects?

Last post by Diane Whitehead - 2026-08-16, 06:55:10 PM

I looked through Peace Seedlings list of peas and couldn't see one marked new or giant.   Which is the one that interests you?

#7

Legumes / Re: Everyone's Pea Projects?

Last post by AndrewB - 2026-08-16, 12:22:18 PM

The Kapulers at peace seedlings have a new giant snap pea. I haven't grown it yet,  but it sounds intriguing.

I have been wondering for years if Bijou/ Carouby de Massaune/ Green Beauty crossed with a true snap would produce a large snap.

#8

Tomatoes / Re: Montana Tomato Project

Last post by William Schlegel - 2026-08-15, 10:31:21 PM

I attempted as many as 55 unique crosses today and yesterday with my cherry tomato which is a blue bicolor potato leaf 50% wild accession currant tomato #303 as the father. My plan with this is to get lots more lines that are greater than 50% wild and indigenous and fancy. When the 294 descendants start to segregate next year I'll try to find a striped blue green when ripe to make crosses with. I know from the cross that got me 294 that the crosses between blue bicolors and striped blue skinned green when ripe tomatoes will be highly variable and exciting. I doubt all attempts will succeed but it was a good effort in a year I haven't had much time yet to attempt crosses. In some cases the mother was simply red genetics, in others there is already some fancy parentage and these will have a high potential to segregate to fancy types in 2027.

I've continued collecting tomatoes for seed and it looks like this latest picking is 18 F1s. Highlights include two crosses with 294 and one with the best tasting variant of 339. One of the more important goals next year will be to get fancy segregants from these 294 cross lines. So a larger growout!

From last weekend there are about 11 cross takes

#9

Legumes / Re: Everyone's Pea Projects?

Last post by Carol Deppe - 2026-08-15, 08:08:11 PM

The name of Jim Baggett's pea is Oregon Giant Sugar. You can buy it from Nichol's Garden Nursery. That's the one that is what I am proposing is a new category, to be called flat snaps. Baggett's variety Oregon Sugar Pod II is a snow pea with unwrinkled seed, not a flat snap. It does not have thick walls on pods. I think this variety would be selling much better if Baggett had realized he had created a new market class and named it Oregon Giant Flatsnap.

I think the Kapular snow and snap peas could all be improved by crossing to Oregon Giant Sugar and looking for segregants in the F2s. (I'm not planning on doing that myself, as I am pretty happy with Oregon Giant Sugar flat. And pea breeding is frustrating here in Willamette Valley Oregon, where so much of the dry seed is destroyed by weavils.)



You can tell pea enation virus on the plants because the pods have little disfiguring bumps on them. You can tell powdery mildew because the entire plant including pods becomes covered with it. Obvious and unappetizing. With fusarium wilt peas look unhappy. Fail to germinate or germinate and grow poorly, or wilt and die. Can be very variable in expression. Wide spread enough to have a major impact on pea canning industry in NE.

#10

Tomatoes / Re: F2 between determinate and...

Last post by Steph S - 2026-08-14, 04:10:11 PM

Hi Adrian,

Yea the combination of indet and det genetics produces a huge range of variation in F2.  Growth habit is very complex and the expression of determinate/indet combinations is almost/maybe limitless. ??
I remember an F2 plant I was sure was indeterminate, repeating 3 leaves between trusses six or seven times then suddenly it terminated.  And the side shoots made determinate patterns after seven leaves/nodes.

That plant produced another whole range of growth habits in the F3, from quite small and compact to leggy tall 'determinates' or semi-determinates.

You can really get a lot of different growth habits from these combinations, to choose whichever suits you best.