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Mar. 11th, 2019 09:56 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
unicorndukeI'm having trouble deciding if I care about isolation of certain things in my field.
This is mostly important for my vine crops, squash and watermelons and melons. I've got all these varieties and I'm not sure if I want to try and maintain them as a variety (requiring hand pollination care probably) or if I should just let them all cross.
I've just found the solution while typing this out: both.
For melons and watermelons and squash, as long as you catch certain flowers early enough, you can tape them closed, self pollinate and get pure breeding varieties. But then if you let the bees do the rest, you can get a mixed population out of it.
I think I still need to figure out what I want from these things, because right now I don't know much more than: tasty.
Actually, for the squash, I've got a couple of different things going on. I've got a bunch of different types of winter squash and one summer squash. Now there's three types of cucurbita and generally they don't cross unless you're really trying. I've got one moschata (Seminole), one maxima (Jarrahdale) but I've got three pepo's listed for planting (Cornell Bush Delicata, Tondo Scuro de Nice, Winter Luxury). So for squash, the only things I need to do the isolation work is the pepo and given how different all of those varieties are, I really do need to hand pollinate them. Okay, well now I know.
Melons. This is primarily canteloupe types because that's what I like. The varieties I've got are Bender's Musk, Charentais, Iroquois, Minnesota Midget, and Tigger. One thing I found out when I was looking at the melon varieties is that Charentais will split or burst if it gets overripe, which is fucking hilarious. I am very concerned about getting fruit that I can eat from the melons and watermelons because I can't be at the farm much. I really enjoyed the Minnesota Midget I grew last year, it was palm sized and fucking adorable and nice and sweet. I think I'm going to ditch Bender's Musk, it apparently is a parent of the Iroquois variety so why bother. Hmmm. Again, these are all different types. I should probably do the isolation of most of these for this year and see what happens next.
Watermelons. I've only got two varieties I care about, Royal Golden and Winter King & Queen. Royal Golden has a yellow skin when ripe, but it's still a watermelon, which I find intriguing. Winter King & Queen is a storage watermelon and can be stored until Christmas (apparently). I can confirm they store at least a while even when sitting in the field. They had a bad year (I literally pulled every plant out by the roots while weeding and didn't do a good job putting them back in and I also didn't water them at all or really weed them properly) but they produced small watermelons and sized up by June and I didn't harvest them until end of August and the flesh inside was still tasty and sweet. Not as sweet as a regular watermelon but if you want to have something that last into the fall for some lovely watermelon surprise, I think that's a good way to go. So I will isolate these two and let the other four varieties cross.
I won't be able to trade or list the stuff that crosses because I know people like consistency. But I'll have plenty of other things to work with.
I'm not sure how I feel about maintaining heirloom varieties of things. I know it's good to do that but I find it to be such a pain in the butt, and I don't know if they're that much better than anything else I might shove in that space. I'm intrigued by the idea of landrace varieties and I suspect that's the direction I'll be heading with some things. But again, some varieties have cool traits that I want to keep separate. idek. plants are cool.
If I'm not sick, I'll be heading to PA this weekend and I can get a good look at my winter plants and see if they're alive or not and see how much fun it will be to tromp through all the mud.
This is mostly important for my vine crops, squash and watermelons and melons. I've got all these varieties and I'm not sure if I want to try and maintain them as a variety (requiring hand pollination care probably) or if I should just let them all cross.
I've just found the solution while typing this out: both.
For melons and watermelons and squash, as long as you catch certain flowers early enough, you can tape them closed, self pollinate and get pure breeding varieties. But then if you let the bees do the rest, you can get a mixed population out of it.
I think I still need to figure out what I want from these things, because right now I don't know much more than: tasty.
Actually, for the squash, I've got a couple of different things going on. I've got a bunch of different types of winter squash and one summer squash. Now there's three types of cucurbita and generally they don't cross unless you're really trying. I've got one moschata (Seminole), one maxima (Jarrahdale) but I've got three pepo's listed for planting (Cornell Bush Delicata, Tondo Scuro de Nice, Winter Luxury). So for squash, the only things I need to do the isolation work is the pepo and given how different all of those varieties are, I really do need to hand pollinate them. Okay, well now I know.
Melons. This is primarily canteloupe types because that's what I like. The varieties I've got are Bender's Musk, Charentais, Iroquois, Minnesota Midget, and Tigger. One thing I found out when I was looking at the melon varieties is that Charentais will split or burst if it gets overripe, which is fucking hilarious. I am very concerned about getting fruit that I can eat from the melons and watermelons because I can't be at the farm much. I really enjoyed the Minnesota Midget I grew last year, it was palm sized and fucking adorable and nice and sweet. I think I'm going to ditch Bender's Musk, it apparently is a parent of the Iroquois variety so why bother. Hmmm. Again, these are all different types. I should probably do the isolation of most of these for this year and see what happens next.
Watermelons. I've only got two varieties I care about, Royal Golden and Winter King & Queen. Royal Golden has a yellow skin when ripe, but it's still a watermelon, which I find intriguing. Winter King & Queen is a storage watermelon and can be stored until Christmas (apparently). I can confirm they store at least a while even when sitting in the field. They had a bad year (I literally pulled every plant out by the roots while weeding and didn't do a good job putting them back in and I also didn't water them at all or really weed them properly) but they produced small watermelons and sized up by June and I didn't harvest them until end of August and the flesh inside was still tasty and sweet. Not as sweet as a regular watermelon but if you want to have something that last into the fall for some lovely watermelon surprise, I think that's a good way to go. So I will isolate these two and let the other four varieties cross.
I won't be able to trade or list the stuff that crosses because I know people like consistency. But I'll have plenty of other things to work with.
I'm not sure how I feel about maintaining heirloom varieties of things. I know it's good to do that but I find it to be such a pain in the butt, and I don't know if they're that much better than anything else I might shove in that space. I'm intrigued by the idea of landrace varieties and I suspect that's the direction I'll be heading with some things. But again, some varieties have cool traits that I want to keep separate. idek. plants are cool.
If I'm not sick, I'll be heading to PA this weekend and I can get a good look at my winter plants and see if they're alive or not and see how much fun it will be to tromp through all the mud.
no subject
Date: 2019-03-11 02:41 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-03-11 03:49 pm (UTC)btw I read through the linen book and the author recommended two separate patches, one for seed and one for fiber since the seed harvested when the plant is only partially dried down can be immature even though it looks good. The plants left later I think can be used for coarser linen things like twine or w/e. I need to read it again.
no subject
Date: 2019-03-11 04:04 pm (UTC)I've also read in a couple of places that if you want seed you should plant the plants a little farther apart, so that's another thought-- laying out a section of the patch from the beginning, intending it to be the part that gets saved, and having it be spaced a little wider.
I also got some books out of the library and one of them is talking about hemp for fiber a lot. I wonder... someone was trying to get Zack to plant hemp and he was like listen, IDK but if someone's into it he might go along. If so, I'm gonna try to get fiber out of it.
I have a nebulous plan about using the flax that's too shitty for fabric for paper instead, and that might be a thing I can use the dried flowers I've been accumulating for potpourri for instead-- potpourri is too hard to make commercially attractive if you're not willing to put gross artificial scents into it, but I could do flower paper instead, and that could be mildly scented with the natural stuff I already own. I have no idea where to sell this, but.
This book also had a lot of info on making insect-repellent sachets to keep moths out of your wool, which I thought was kind of great; that could also be a side product line. IDK man, I like making herbal sachets.
Someday I'll finish spinning like, any wool at all. Listen, i started, that's something.
no subject
Date: 2019-03-11 04:34 pm (UTC)sweet jesus, be careful with the hemp shit. everyone is looking to make a quick buck on it, mostly through cbd oil which is not the same varieties as the hemp for fiber production (pretty sure). we went through this for work recently because we need to figure out where it all goes for supporting growers (we still don't know!). hemp for cbd is treated like a vegetable and has to have a thc content under a tiny %. hemp for fiber is treated as a field crop and I think they use different varieties than the cbd hemp but it also must be under the tiny %, otherwise ny will burn it all. literally. thc % varies based on environmental conditions even in the low thc varieties. literally no one knows what they're doing, he should probably keep out of it because you still need a ton of paperwork and also contracts are extremely important with this. the industry is throwing money at universities but we just don't know! we don't know! we have to be extremely careful because we have federal funding! some people are doing hemp microgreens! We. Don't. Know!
ANYWAY sorry about that rant, hemp is the wild west and really should be viewed with extreme caution, I would recommend against it.
paper sounds cool! I think the book mentioned something but I don't think the author had success. I'm going to read the book again, take some notes and then I can lend it to you at some point. I need to get a hold of that museum again, they still haven't gotten back to me :/
I'm struggling with the yarn I'm spinning right now. I tried to set my last batch but it didn't really seem to hold the twist so I stuck it back on the niddy noddy to finish drying so hopefully I haven't fucked it up. I really need to remove what I've got on my spindle.
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Date: 2019-03-11 05:31 pm (UTC)But like. If we get to the point where everyone's growing it, then I want to try getting fiber from it. :)
I have to take a class on paper making, so I plan to corner the instructor and interrogate them extensively. (I mean> I don't "have" to, but it's a good excuse to sign back up for a membership at the book arts center which is a great place and my friend is director now.)
Spinning is harrrrd *whine* LOL.
no subject
Date: 2019-03-11 05:52 pm (UTC)Paper making seems like sorcery to me but that would be extremely cool. You should do it!
No offense to my drop spindle but I kinda can't wait to see if I actually get that free spinning wheel because it would be much easier. Bobbins! to change out yarn!
That's my current problem. I only have two drop spindles so I can only do two sets of yarn at once and my new drop spindle is extremely light and I can't figure out how to spin on it. I probably should make another niddy noddy too. ugh. at least that's easy.
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Date: 2019-03-11 06:06 pm (UTC)He has the problem that he planned on growing corn in a particular field, but the field has a spring in it and the soil's so often too wet to work, and so if you can't spray weedkiller on and have to go back and till over and over for organic weed control then there's no way, you'll lose a whole tractor in there. So I keep trying to think of how to use that field for something else...
I hope you do get a spinning wheel, I want an excuse to get one and I want to see yours, LOL.
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Date: 2019-03-11 04:52 pm (UTC)Lisette lodges less but requires more retting time to break it down. Natalie is more like a standard.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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Date: 2019-03-11 05:32 pm (UTC)What's the treatment for??
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Date: 2019-03-11 05:47 pm (UTC)I think I'm going to set up a field variety trial type thing since I've now got six varieties. Same amount of space for each variety, similar soil, etc so I can get a good starting evaluation on each of them. Then I can keep them all for seed and have a separate section for the grow outs for fiber. As far as I can tell/remember from book, flax is inbreeding mostly, so I should be able to grow them out pretty close without worrying about crossing. Actually I need to think about that. I've got some open space in my crop plan I can juggle some things around.
no subject
Date: 2019-03-11 06:19 pm (UTC)I'd be happy to buy the seed, or like, work out a trade, or whatever. We still haven't made the flax tools; I'm going to go see the ones in the museum at some point a little later in the spring. I guess we'll need them before autumn if we want to process your last year's crop.
(I've been pondering that I might try retting them in an abandoned 100-gal stock tank that's out by the yurt-- if I haul it off a little distance so the smell isn't oppressive, there's nobody else out that way who'd be bothered and I can just haul stream water up to refill it, and check on it daily. I can probably borrow a pump for the initial fill, even, if I wanted to be lazy, there's a little one on the chore truck that's movable.)
You're good at field variety trials, LOL. I have the problem that I think I've written enough down and I'll remember what I planted where, and then I'm like, what the fuck is this thing and why is it here? I'm not super organized.
But if I get Aaron involved, as I'll probably have to so as not to interfere with any of his plans, then I bet he'll show me how to take good notes. He has these exquisite little binders full of his notes now, going back all the years he's been there.
So you could stick all six varieties together and still save the seed and have it be the same variety it started? Cool!
Well, I got my little dime baggie of seed, too, and no idea what kind it is. I guess I'll just plant it along the edge of the patch and see if it's different. Unless you want any, but I can't see as it'd be worth it since I don't know what kind it is!
no subject
Date: 2019-03-11 06:44 pm (UTC)We can probably do some experimental retting in the spring/summer with some of last year's crop, just so we can get a feel for it, but that would be whenever you head to the farm for the first long visit. Try dew and water retting both? See what's more effort lol
I figured I would make all the sections the same size and as it turns out the largest amount I have for some of seed is 3 grams. So little! I'm going to do a 2x2 ft plot for each. So tiny! But that will allow me to isolate them pretty easy, maybe just grow something in between like a small grain.
I am organized, although it might be more like obsessive. This is my current winter/spring planting map. The numbers are the seed logs in my database (except for the center section which I need to change) that has all the info on where I got the seed, what it is, how much I have, etc. It's got more changes to go through......
I'll then have the larger amounts planted out with some for seed and some for fiber just so I can keep those large amounts being produced.
I've got one variety that has no name. The grower called it fiber flax so I've renamed it to the grower name. That's usually what I do when I get something with no name. I traded seeds with someone from India and named what he sent back after him since he didn't label them with a variety.
But keep yours! You can get experience growing it and see how it does! We can always get more later.