Gardening

[Vinny]

I really don't agree. I know we are discussing tomatoes but the growing environment effects the final result and no bearing on variety.

Go back through gardening books over the past 40 years or so - they are full of comments about older varieties have flavour and modern ones are high yield with no flavour until something like 10 years ago. Now GQT produces discussions about what NEW varieties are especially good for flavour.

I can remember Pippa Greenwood, actually talking about tom's??????, reading the spiel for a new variety, must be all of 10 years ago, bursting out in laughter as the claim was that it had been bred for flavour - "why else would you want to buy or eat anything.........."

Moneymaker has been around for years upon years and I can remember the comments from the very early days of amateur growing - huge crop, no flavour.

I will refer back to my comment about carrots - supermarket ones now taste of carrot, and I can't believe it is down to change of terroir. Come to that, name me a grape variety with 5% the intensity of flavour of a carrot. It is down to the minimal flavour of grapes that the flavour of wine can be almost limitlessly manipulated, 99% of that nothing at all to do with the soil.

 

[AudioAl]

My dad grew Allacante on one side of the greenhouse and sweet 100 on the other .

 

[foxwelljsly]

Go back through gardening books over the past 40 years or so - they are full of comments about older varieties have flavour and modern ones are high yield with no flavour until something like 10 years ago.

Yeah man, yield and 'flavour' are definitely inversely proportionate. As is getting the NPK ratio right throughout the growing cycle.

 

[mandryka]

I want to train a two year old Buddleia Black Knight into a tree, single trunk, branching at about 5’. I can find just one article online about how to do it - though it’s pretty obvious really! Anyone have any experience of this?

https://fairegarden.wordpress.com/2013/06/10/how-to-grow-a-butterfly-bush-standard/

 

[Copperjacket]

I am very interested in the comments regarding commercially grown vegetables and taste so could someone please explain why some strawberry varieties when grown commercially taste thin and sharp / acidic yet when grown domestically, taste sweet and delicious?

 

[Sue Pertwee-Tyr]

I suspect the commercial vs flavour argument comes down to two main factors:

variety - commercial varieties are bred for yield, and may develop their product quickly and in quantity, which may mean a higher proportion of water to flexh, and thus have less opportunity to develop flavour compounds;

secondly, they (especially things like tomatoes) may have been grown in artificial media with computer controlled feed/water regimes which again reduces/eliminates the opportunity to develop that sense of 'terroir'.

 

[Vinny]

I want to train a two year old Buddleia Black Knight into a tree, single trunk, branching at about 5’. I can find just one article online about how to do it - though it’s pretty obvious really! Anyone have any experience of this?

https://fairegarden.wordpress.com/2013/06/10/how-to-grow-a-butterfly-bush-standard/

Many times, they will default to growing from a leg, by default. Your main hassle will be water shoots but there is no reason, in principle, why you should not get close to a pollard, which is where you will end-up as each season's growth is normally cut hard back each autumn.
Buddleja wants to be a sprawling multi-stemmed shrub, at the end of the day.

I am very interested in the comments regarding commercially grown vegetables and taste so could someone please explain why some strawberry varieties when grown commercially taste thin and sharp / acidic yet when grown domestically, taste sweet and delicious?

Not a huge fan of strawberries, but when I do buy I have very gently squeezed the punnet in the SM and held my nose very close to one of the ventilation holes - they have to smell pretty good for me to shell-out. Recent Tesco offerings have had superb flavour (I have searched the bin for the seal film off the punnets but failed to find any, so can't tell you the variety(s)).
Commercial UK strawberries are now almost universally grown in poly-tunnels, on benches, so cropping is early and last ages, and picking is easy(er). Also very few pest problems and even fungus/mould can be controlled by correct ventilation. What the commonest growing media is, I don't know, but I would bet that it isn't hydroponics or aquaponics - several set-ups round here are on reasonably steep slopes, so that wouldn't work. They are probably drip fed/watered into a growing media similar to grobags.
Blueberries are often cultivated commercially, in pots.

Flavour difference? Probably down to UV and growth rate under glass/plastic v. outdoors.

 

[mandryka]

Many times, they will default to growing from a leg, by default. Your main hassle will be water shoots but there is no reason, in principle, why you should not get close to a pollard, which is where you will end-up as each season's growth is normally cut hard back each autumn.
Buddleja wants to be a sprawling multi-stemmed shrub, at the end of the day.

.

I knew you’d know! How high can it get do you think? I normally prune them in Spring not Autumn, just because they’re something to look at in the winter.

Re fruit, I suspect one big problem with the flavour of shop bought fruit is that they store them badly, too cold, to increase their shelf life. This is certainly the case for pears.

Let me take the opportunity to recommend Morrisons white flesh nectarines. There seems to be a dearth of Chanterais melons in the shops this year.

 

[Vinny]

How high can it get do you think? I normally prune them in Spring not Autumn, just because they’re something to look at in the winter.

Agreed, they are actually quite decorative during winter, like so many herbaceous , but although a VERY long while too late, those in the public eye suggest pruning ASAP to stop seed being released. So dead-head, at least, even if they are a good deal of the attraction.

As said, the problem will be water shoots. In trying to get a standard/pollard, I strongly suspect that getting a main stem straight, may be a problem. That said, a crooked one ought to be more of a sight worthy of contemplation, the bark being a considerable attraction over winter, for those that do but look.

I would GUESS that I have not seen a clear stem more than maybe 1m tall, but that would probably have been fluke - just the way things turned out. In fact, I have not been out with a tape, but one here may be towards that 1m, by accident, albeit at a rather "casual" angle.

I really cannot be doing with formal gardens, it has to be said. Organised chaos (aka informality) and fortunate happenstance are where I am at.

Grown as a standard/pollard they can rival Wisteria, IMO. Whatten House, very near here, has several of those - utterly beautiful (not as fabulous as their many Cercis when in flower - if passing, with time to spare, just 10 minutes off the M1), a wonderful informal, formal garden to spend a while (very nice tearoom offerings too, whenever I have partaken).


Re fruit - anyone ever tasted mulberries?

 

[Mike Reed]

Not a huge fan of strawberries

My straws didn't even make the finals (or semi's) of Wimbles this year. It was all over in a milkshake due to the excess sun and dry conditions (despite watering). Delicious, though. Redcurrants have disappeared, summer raspberries are fighting a losing battle and Bramley Seedlings have dropped off, half their potential size. Not a good year for fruit , but the Discovery crop seems okay (am about to try one, but they're not my favourite).

 

[Vinny]

Discovery? Pass, thanks.

I haven't pruned the Bramley's here for ages so they set MASSES of small apples - very, very few have dropped so far, which is crazy given the usual June drop.

I'd feel guilty, but if I was looking for soft fruit this year, the leaky hose would have been out for a lot of the time.

 

[Dogberry]

What's that "silvery "plant in the foreground?

 

[Vinny]

What's that "silvery "plant in the foreground?

Phlomis - it gets various specific names, I know it as P. byzantinus (or similar spelling).
The commoner species has whorls of larger yellow flowers.

 

[Vinny]

I want to train a two year old Buddleia Black Knight into a tree, single trunk, branching at about 5’.

Thinking about this again........ My impression is that Buddleja wood is rather brittle and prone to splitting/tearing - break a reasonable sized branch and try to remove it without loppers/secateurs and it tends to come away with a big bit of main stem/trunk.
Would a cluster of branches set on top of a stem/trunk tend to pull the trunk apart?

My inclination would be to say that it won't work as you want it to. I am unconvinced that you could easily get a substantial enough main stem to support what even Black Knight would make each season (Black Knight is far from vigorous).

 

[JensenHealey]

Re fruit - anyone ever tasted mulberries?

Mulberries are gorgeous! But they are the messiest of messy things and stain pretty well anything they touch.

 

[Vinny]

Mulberries are gorgeous! But they are the messiest of messy things and stain pretty well anything they touch.

That about sums them up perfectly.

They also go from hard, unripe, woody, to soft to the point of near mush VERY, very quickly, so they are never going to make a commercial crop, unless they are bred for a totally different ripening stage.

For me they taste a bit like, raspberries, blackberries and the best cherries you could ever imagine, all in one.

There are one or two mulberry jams available, at a substantial price. They must be hell to pick and transport, even for jam/preserve-making

 

[Mike Reed]

I'd feel guilty, but if I was looking for soft fruit this year, the leaky hose would have been out for a lot of the time.

I've had to make a choice between veg. and fruit. It's not only the thought of using all that potable but ill-suited water that I dislike, it's the time standing there holding the (leaky) hose, constantly altering the nozzle. Having said that, I think giving the greenhouse plants a total spray, which I cannot do in normal watering can hydration, is beneficial. The trusses on most of my tom's this year are exceptional. A big freezer destined pick is on the cards this evening; some are a very deep red and the prolific Sungold are almost beyond ripe. I'm amazed they can thrive in 35 degree temp's (according to my g/h thermometer.

 

[Vinny]

I've had to make a choice between veg. and fruit. It's not only the thought of using all that potable but ill-suited water that I dislike, it's the time standing there holding the (leaky) hose, constantly altering the nozzle.

Leaky hose is exactly that - porous hose. It is made from old tyres - granulated and then reformed into a hose with a wall something like a coarse-grained sugar cube.
The proper way to use it is from a butt, or mains with a pressure-reducer - it weeps water along its length. I have also set the outside tap to a modest trickle,which you can measure. to get somewhere near to the leak rate of the hose, and then connected the leaky hose.

Best used under a (heavy) mulch of some kind, sometime during the night, so a timer would be ideal too.

We were up to a little over 37C in the shade here yesterday. It will have been warmer in the greenhouse even with vents and doors open - I've not checked the max-min thermometer in there.

 

[Rockmeister]

110 in the scottish greenhouse world (ok ok sry...43). Blinds were down at dawn and all vents open. It's always like that but they do ok. Just keeping the soil moist and misting the foliage at breakfast time.

 

[mandryka]

Thinking about this again........ My impression is that Buddleja wood is rather brittle and prone to splitting/tearing - break a reasonable sized branch and try to remove it without loppers/secateurs and it tends to come away with a big bit of main stem/trunk.
Would a cluster of branches set on top of a stem/trunk tend to pull the trunk apart?

My inclination would be to say that it won't work as you want it to. I am unconvinced that you could easily get a substantial enough main stem to support what even Black Knight would make each season (Black Knight is far from vigorous).

So is this the shape that large Buddlejas make if just left to their own devices -- i.e. a leggy multi-spemmed woody shrub, with arching stems making foliage and flowers at the top? That's tree enough foe me!

The second one is really impressive -- white flowers though, which fade horribly. It's little sister is across the road -- purple flowers but nothing special.

(I don't know how to reduce the image size.)