By gisette
Minis Summer'09
Submitted on Sat, 2009/05/30 - 2:57pm
Last updated on Sun, 2009/09/27 - 2:44pm
Posted in
My old minis topic, Coleus & Snapdragons & Lettuce, was getting overlong and its title no longer fit. (Not planning to grow coleus and snapdragons again for a while).
From 2009-05-23 :
Past time to replant the minis. 
I'm not sure what I'm going to do next with the flower mini yet. For now, it's starting some cuttings.
2009-09-27: Replanted. End of this log.
Wed, 2009/06/03 - 9:42pm
#2
The calibrachoa (I cannot spell or pronounce that name...) roots emerged from its sponge and it developed a flower, so that's planted outside now, too. The rooted pineapple sage are still doing well.
I plugged some old Italian Herb kit basil pods in the holes. But they both grew gelatinous goo. Tossed those.
So today I decided to replace the one calibrachoa pod with a final attempt for this year at growing a cape gooseberry plant. The one I tried to germinate in a paper cup never showed. 
It's getting awfully late in the year... but maybe if it's kept radically pruned, I might get a small clutch of fruit to ripen.
For the other two pod holes, I decided what I really wanted to do was more fun with cloning hormone, and two holes wasn't enough. So I've set a full 18-hole Park Starts block there -
- 2 basil pods (one sweet basil seeds, one lemon basil seeds courtesy of PolarVtx - thanks, Polar!)
- 3 more calibrachoa clones
- 1 experiment at cloning a dolcissima petunia
- 12 pansy clones
I'm thinking maybe my autumn Pansy Preservation Project might work better with really small plants, rather than trying to take already-going-leggy full size plants, lopping them back, then trying to keep them alive in the warm and humid garage for 3 months. (Though not air conditioned, it's one of the cooler spots in the house in summer.) Then I can keep the grown pansy plants where they are and try other schemes to keep them alive and/or attractive there in parallel... Wish me luck. I tried reading up on this on the web. General consensus is pretty much what I've always followed in the past - "it's no use, just yank and toss pansies when it gets hot".
Sat, 2009/06/06 - 9:09pm
#3
Still having fun with cloning. 
The new romaine mini should be ready to eat in another 2 weeks. I don't know that I have much hope left for the cape gooseberry idea, at least for this year.
Sat, 2009/06/13 - 8:18pm
#4
Sat, 2009/06/20 - 1:27pm
#5
Not sure what I'm going to do with a cape gooseberry started so late...
Sat, 2009/06/20 - 2:39pm
#6
Yea for the little guy!
What are cape gooseberry's used for? Sounds like a candidate for jam.
Sat, 2009/06/20 - 2:52pm
#7
I think you eat them fresh. Awfully expensive / rare here to use for jam. Supposedly like a pineapple-sweet flavor cherry tomato in a husk.
Sat, 2009/06/20 - 3:52pm
#8
Look what I found.
Harvest: The fruit is harvested when it falls to the ground, but not all fallen fruits may be in the same stage of maturity and must be held until they ripen. It may take some experience to tell when the calyx-enclosed fruits are fully ripe. Properly matured and prepared fruits will keep for several months.
The ripe fruit can be eaten out of hand or used in a number of other ways. The unique flavor of the fresh fruit makes it an interesting ingredient in salads and cooked dishes. Cape gooseberries cooked with apples or ginger make a very distinctive dessert. The fruits are also an attractive sweet when dipped in chocolate or other glazes or pricked and rolled in sugar. The high pectin content makes cape gooseberry a good preserve and jam product that can be used as a dessert topping. The fruit also dries into tasty "raisins".
Sounds good!
Sat, 2009/06/20 - 4:20pm
#9
Mmm. The apples and ginger confection sounds good!
Well, we'll see if I get any... The concept was just to use the mini to get it to germinate faster, then after it got some roots, pot it up and put it out in the summer sun. I don't know that there are enough months of summer sun for it to reach harvest, though, at this point. Though the fact that Beth's already has husked fruit gives me some hope... There are now 3 months to fall equinox. After that... it'll be too cold, though in a pot I could eek it out a little longer by my bedroom slider. Wouldn't get much light, though.
Sat, 2009/06/20 - 4:55pm
#10
And it's proven that the light is extremely important.
Sat, 2009/06/20 - 5:06pm
#11
Yeah, with all members of the tomato family...
Well, we'll see what happens. Maybe if I bonsai it enough, it will get a few fruit set. Or I could leave it in an AG & see what happens... I suspect that's not worth it, though.
Wed, 2009/06/24 - 4:48am
#12
My mom grows earth cherries and she picks them and leave them on the counter for a day or two while the husk dries. Then she removes the husk and the fruit is ready to eat. They can also be frozen if you don't have not many at a time and I have thrown them into the magic bullet when making smoothies with other fruits.
Wed, 2009/06/24 - 6:48pm
#13
Do they really taste good? Sweet as a fruit?
Fri, 2009/06/26 - 12:08pm
#14
Yesterday, I gave up on the cape gooseberry. It still was growing ultra-slow. Since no foliage had shaded the sponge for so long, the algae buildup was terrible. So I used a peroxide Q-tip to try to kill it back, but the seedling kind of fell over after that. It wasn't dead, but... Tossed it.
Cleaned out the mini and planted 3 new pods - 2 convolvulus and 1 marigold, probably to transfer outside once they've got roots.
Sat, 2009/06/27 - 1:54pm
#15
Sat, 2009/06/27 - 4:58pm
#16
Sorry about the gooseberry.
Sat, 2009/06/27 - 5:20pm
#17
Thanks. Yeah, I was looking forward to that... Maybe I'll try again sometime.
Thu, 2009/07/02 - 2:20pm
#18
Gisette,
Ya gotta try the CG again. The fruit tastes like pineapple! I'm sure they aren't even fully ripe when they fall off - but I had to taste them. It is one huge plant, though. More like a tomatillo that a tomato. The pot I planted it in is way too small. The plant wilts every day. And this was supposed to be smaller than a regular CG plant (Little Lanterns)! I think it needs at least a 5 gal pot. But a really cool plant. The one in the garden recoverd from the mystery larva attack, but with my luck it will be a favorite of the bunnies/squirrels! I took some pictures of the outside stuff. I'll try and get them posted this weekend. BTW, the florida petite tomato in work is not liking the A/C and lack of light. The tomatoes are nothing to write home about - watery. It was fun to grow, though.
Beth
Thu, 2009/07/02 - 7:47pm
#19
Oh, those cape gooseberries do sound good! It's too late, though. The dratted thing took three weeks to germinate in an AG. 
And no winter habitat for a 5-gallon pot indoors. Next year...
Thanks for letting us know about the Florida petite. Looking forward to gooseberry pictures!
Sat, 2009/07/04 - 2:51pm
#20
These really need replanting. Will probably eat the last of the lettuce for supper. Then maybe turn them off for a while.
Sun, 2009/07/05 - 2:15pm
#21
Ate the lettuce last night. Replanted both minis today in lettuce - one heatwave mix (burpee) and the other Korean red curl.
Sun, 2009/07/05 - 2:55pm
#22
Then maybe turn them off for a while
Yeah, right. 
Sun, 2009/07/05 - 5:47pm
#23
LOL, Judith! Yeah.... 
It would be the logical thing. It's not like I'm suffering a plant shortage. And lettuce doesn't do so well in my house in summer. I don't like to use the AC until the house gets over 80°, and have clever sunshades arranged to forestall that happening.
But leave fallow plant capacity? Nah!!!
Sat, 2009/07/11 - 2:13pm
#24
One week new mini lettuces. Didn't germinate too well - have some fuzz problems, and replanted one whole pod after soaking a new sponge in H2O2. But, probably growing only 1 or 2 lettuces per pod will be just as well...
Sat, 2009/07/18 - 10:32pm
#25
Lettuces aren't coming along spectacularly, but they're getting there. I have 9 herb pods started in the block for the 7-podder AG Pro100 in the kitchen for its next project. One of the lettuce pods still hasn't germinated right, so probably I'll give up and plug a spare pineapple sage cutting in there. The pineapple sage is really good for iced tea.
Sat, 2009/07/25 - 4:24pm
#26
I did replace the still-no-show KRC pod with a pineapple sage. These plants seem on track now. Could harvest some of the heatwave lettuce this week, but will probably wait to 4th week.
Sat, 2009/08/01 - 10:18pm
#27
Happy and harvesting the lettuces. The pineapple sage cutting didn't make it, and it's tough to get anything started in there now that the KRC lettuce are growing well. So, two pods KRC for that AG.
Sat, 2009/08/08 - 1:20pm
#28
I've had so much outdoor produce, I've been lagging at harvesting lettuce. It's good. The "hook-leaf" lettuce is a real pain to harvest leaves from, though... I think its real name is Crispy Frills.
Sat, 2009/08/15 - 1:09pm
#29
Sat, 2009/08/29 - 4:25pm
#30
Getting time to replant these, whenever. The unpromising tomato clone is down here at the moment. May try starting a Jet Star tomato from seed down here. There are only 3 lettuce pods left. And start some flowers for the dark months. Not sure which flowers, though.
Latest lettuce good. Bought some rooting hormone ($4.50 at Walmart) to help along the cuttings, and it did miraculously well on the pineapple sage - already planted that out! No roots yet emerging from the sponge on the calibrachoa. Haven't decided yet what to do with the two freed pod holes.