Seed Saving Circle 2020

[JanG]

Jeannine, I wrote a reply to your last post several days ago but it seems to have disappeared, probably somewhere in my laptop!

I'm sorry you had the high level of pain that day and very much hope it's eased now. I sent a PM. Hope you received it. let me know if that somehow got lost too.

[JanG]

[JanG]

Seeds for Lebanon

A Lebanese, Azul Thomé, living in England has put out a request for organic seeds which he can get sent to Lebanon. He posts on Facebook and will send his home address by Messenger to anyone who can send surplus seeds, mainly for growing this season as an immediate response to the crisis there. https://www.facebook.com/azul.thome/posts/10158673452612495.

This is his message in case the link doesn't work is. He specifies a time which has passed but he has other contacts going over soon.

Hello friends - I am Looking for people and organisations who can donate healthy organic or biodynamic seeds (only) to be sent to Lebanon the land of my heart and my father. People are starving and starting to grow food!
Please PM me and we can coordinate with trustworthy people. Sending money is complicated and a nightmare of crooked paths.  But seeds....
It reminds me of a time when I was a grower in London on the roof of a supermarket.
We taught children about urban food growing.  One day each child had two things placed in each hand.  in one hand was placed a coin, in the other hand was placed a seed of a bean plant.  We invited them to plant both in a little pot filled with soil. 
then we asked them: which one do you think will feed your family the longest over time? Their dear little faces lit up...a moment I will never want to forget and hope they have never forgotten.
Still time to plant these:CHICKPEAS <<cBEETS<CARROTS< LETTUCE< PEAS<POTATOES< RADDISHES<SWISS CHARD< TURNIPS ❤ Uk and Europe Today, tomorrow and Wednesday are the days to send them to me first class, to arrive in time. Thank you 🙏  pm me for address in Uk 🙏🌱🙏
Can you share this post.
Deep gratitude. ❤
Azul Thomé

[ruud]

count me in for this year

[JanG]

Great. Good to hear from you, ruud.

[galina]

Just wanted to report that the little fig cutting from a couple of years ago has grown a lot - and the ripe figs (yes!) are absolutely delish! 

[JanG]

That's great going to have ripe figs two years on. I have a much older fig, maybe seven or eight years old, and I've just managed my first properly ripe fig. A lot tend to fall off.
You're obviously doing something very right!

[JanG]

Dehybridising
I've been growing on the ever popular Sungold tomato. As it's an F1 hybrid I knew the next generation would give me a range of offspring. In fact what I got was two or three plants just like Sungold, two or three with small red cherry tomatoes and some stripy ones a but like Tigarella. I was surprised by the stripy ones but just saved seed from the orange cherry Sungold type.

This year from the F2 seed I have about three Sungold lookalikes which luckily also taste like the real thing. Some plum shaped tomatoes have appeared amongst the mix too. I'm again just saving the orange ones.

I wondered whether anyone else had tried dehybridising - Sungold or any other F1 hybrid - and how successful it had been. I guess a few more years are needed before it's stable but everything along the way is fine to eat, if not quite as good as the original. 

Also I'd be interested to know whether the general view is that it's fine to offer such seed to the circle (with a clear description) as there might be members who would like to grow on, knowing that the results might be unpredictable.

[galina]

Absolutely yes for the circle with appropriate description.  If you are getting Sungold offspring that looks and tastes like Sungold, it may well be of great interest.  We have had F2 seeds in the circle before from a blight proof F1 tomato a few years ago labelled appropriately and sent for that reason.

My most interesting and productive Sungold offspring is a long horn shaped red cooking tomato.  Ideal halved for a fried breakfast.  Started out with a delicious orange plum in F3 and has turned into a red long tomato.  This seems to be fairly stable now at F5. 

But that delicious orange plum has never returned unfortunately. And neither have the actual sungold types.  Tim Peters, the plant breeder, dehybridised Sungold and never got a stable golden colour.  Most of his are red. 

The breeding of Sungold must have been fairly complex given what types emerge when dehybridising.  To get a copy of the real thing, is very lucky

[Vetivert]

How many folks are in this year? Just curious so I can gauge what will be feasible to add. Hope you all are well 

[saddad]

Count me out for 2021, am booked for two operations, one on each wrist in succession anytime from this December onwards, although with COVID not sure when it will happen.

[JanG]

Good luck with your operations, saddad. Sorry you won't be able to join the circle.

I think we might be quite a small band this year. Ruud and Markfield Rover have both said they're in. It would be great to persuade a few more to join us, especially at this time of renewed interest in growing one's own food and also in view of seed shortages earlier in the year.

As I think you're suggesting, we need to know quite soon how many are in the circle so that we know how many we are preparing seed for.

Do suggest any way you can think of to attract a few more participants or also share any speculations as to why there aren't more A4A growers interested in taking part. 

[Vetivert]

Sorry to hear that saddad, difficult time with all the COVID uncertainty.

Jan, I really haven't a clue - it's such a shame subscriptions appear to have dropped so much over the years. With the situation this year in particular I would have expected a hive of activity, though I know many who equally haven't had the chance to participate in their usual gardening routine.

[galina]

I think I can be 'in', didn't think so earlier but may I? 

[JanG]

Yes please! That's excellent news, Galina. It's been a difficult year for most but with your extra pressures that's a particularly valiant and valued contribution.

[markfield rover]

I am eyeing up the pods  ,fermenting the toms and whispering Sweet nothings to the lettuce.

[JanG]

Great stuff. I'm fermenting toms too.
This year I've grown two largeish cherry toms which look quite similar to my eye, Black Opal (bred from Black Cherry) and Rosella. They're both a colour which I can't find a word to describe (any suggestions?) - but very pleasing to the eye. Dusky cherry perhaps.
I found they were both bred by Mark Rowland of Gourmet Genetics (now marketed by Kings Seeds) who is the only English breeder of tomatoes I've heard of.
Anyway, I did a taste comparison and although I like both, reckon that Rosella has the edge. It's a little tangier with a mixture of sweet and acidic which I really like.
Hoping to have lots of seed of Rosella and Black Opal, if not too much of a good thing.

[JanG]

More tomato harvesting and seed saving. I came back yesterday from a week away and picked nearly eight pounds of a new-to-me tomato, Super Marmande, just from one plant.
It's an amazing crop. I could only just lift the basket! Sixteen huge heavy tomatoes. I've used one to separate out the seeds for fermenting in a jam jar for three days, then drying and saving and the others will make wonderful fried tomato or, as I'm lucky enough to have generous freezer space, will get frozen for cooking through the year. Lots of soup and vegetable stews in just one haul.

They came from last year's Seed Circle kindly donated by Penedesenca. Quite a discovery for me and lovely as so often with seed circle to be introduced to something new and a bit different.

It's always satisfying how easy tomato seed is to save and how mostly you get lots of seed from one tomato. I imagine this one tomato will produce sixty or seventy seeds.

[JanG]

Photos meant to be with last posting. Still struggling with attaching photos.

[JanG]

And more

[Vetivert]

Nice work :) What do you think of Solar Flare?