Watermelon Landrace Update

On May 15th I planted the watermelon patch. Since I'm doing a landrace I planted the pollinators (Congo, Joseph Lofthouse Landrace and Hopi Red) on three corners of the patch. Those were started in the greenhouse. The Hopi Red and JLL were immediately eaten by insects, the Congo had no problems so it is considerably further along than the rest.

On the same day I planted 25 watermelon seeds from last year's crosses.

At this point (6/15) there are 15 left. Others failed to thrive (2) or were entirely eaten by insects. Several didn't come up at all.

Of the fifteen, three are obviously thriving.

Others...aren't.

Most of them are somewhere in between.

To this point I've only been removing those that were obviously dead or dying--seed leaves without any green, secondary leaves not developing. At the end of June (probably) I'll be sorting it down to five.

I'm tempted to leave more than five, although that would probably crowd them too much. These fifteen survived the sandy soil, lack of water, intermittent heat and cold, insect attack, and even being stepped on (oops). My plant-brain says they deserve to survive. The thinking brain says get rid of the weakest.

We'll see.

Watermelon Landrace

This was scheduled to be published 5/25 and it didn't happen

In short form, a landrace is a locally adapted variety of a plant, often a food plant. Up until the advent of "perfect" food requirements in grocery stores, landraces were the norm rather than the exception. Farmers would trade seeds, knowing from experience that different varieties made for stronger plants.

Over generations, much of that landrace heritage has been lost, to the point that most people believe hybrids to be bad or weak. We plant one variety of squash, one variety of tomato, one variety of beans, and then when the circumstances aren't precisely right for that plant it dies or doesn't produce. This is the plant kingdom's version of siblings marrying generation after generation after generation. Of course the genetics are going to be weak.

With humans we accept the fact that inbreeding is a problem, but in our food we want stability and perfect taste, and we breed for those things. As variations are deliberately bred out of our crops, so are the abilities that made their ancestors thrive.

I've said before and I'll say it again (probably often) that I want strong, self sufficient monster plants that will spit "not good enough" back in my face and thrive in spite of my neglect. In order to do this we need to have variety in the plant genes. There have to be ancestors that thrived in desert conditions, ancestors that resisted insect attack, ancestors that have the perfect taste we love, etc. Over time it all comes together.

Last year I started a watermelon landrace, so this year I should get a bunch of first generation hybrids. Last year I ended up with four varieties of watermelon--Jubilee, Sugar Baby, Ali Baba, and an old variety that I've been growing for years. I have no idea what the ancestry is, so I just call it Traditional.

I pollinated a bunch of flowers, but only one survived (this is normal for watermelons). It was an Ali Baba female parent, crossed with Sugar Baby and Traditional. So this year I should get Ali Baba-sugar baby crosses and traditional-Ali Baba crosses. That being the case, I will not be planting Ali Baba, Sugar Baby, or Traditional. I will be re-planting Jubilee, but only as a pollen donor.

Three new varieties will be introduced into the landrace this year; Congo, Hopi Red, and Joseph Lofthouse Landrace. Congo I already have seeds for but it got eaten by bugs last year. Hopi Red (an established landrace) is drought tolerant, and the JLL includes hundreds of different varieties.

I will watch and see which plants the bugs and snails like, which take off and thrive in my yard, which shrivel at the first hint of cold, and probably about mid-June I'll cull the landrace patch to the strongest. I'll leave the Hopi Red, Congo and JLL--they will be pollen donors only, I won't be keeping seeds from them. The seeds will be taken from the Landrace watermelons that survive.

This is the "hybrid" year, working with first generation crosses of three heirloom varieties. 2019 will be the first year we start to see the results of true variety mixing, and first generation hybrids with the new varieties from 2018. 2020 should be the turning point with my watermelon landrace, meaning the point where I'll begin to see true adaptation to my environment, my water, my soil.

Capsiacin made with vinegar

Capsiacin is a pure crystaline extract taken from plants in the capsicum family--otherwise known as peppers. Part of the nightshade family (Solanaceae) there are a number of different kinds of peppers but all have some level of capsiacin. It's this chemical that gives peppers their heat and unique flavor.

Capsiacin has been shown to be a potent painkiller, both taken internally and rubbed in topically. Recently it has also been used (on an experimental basis) for painkilling after surgery. The numbness continues for up to two weeks and the capsiacin also aids in healing.

This is definitely something I want in my emergency first aid kit.

I found a post on the forums at Gardenweb about creating pure capsiacin. To get the crystals would take more time and effort than I want to expend, so I'm working on extracting the capsiacin gel or oil.

The information I found all indicates to use 190 proof alcohol, which is dangerous, flammable, and expensive. Since many herbal mixtures will work with vinegar when alcohol is called for (and I have vinegar sitting around the house) I decided to use vinegar.

I didn't use the hottest peppers. I had the seeds, so I grew an heirloom habanero pepper this year. I pulled off the fruit, dried it thoroughly, crushed it small and poured vinegar over it.

I ran the mash through twice, and ended up with this. This is placed on top of a candle warmer so you can see the color.

Almost a full quart of liquid. This is after several filterings--one through paper napkins, one through fabric, then I let it settle and poured off the clear liquid from the top. I started with about a quart and a half. There was that much gunk mixed in with the liquid.

11/14/2014

This next picture is after three or four days of evaporation. Since it's cold outside and I'm not working with toxic chemicals I have it in a crock pot with water up to the evaporation line.

There is some settling even now. As the liquid evaporates I am seeing granules separating out at the bottom of the bottle. I'm not sure what they are yet--they may be capsiacin granules, or they may be leftovers from the filtering process that are starting to coagulate.

11/17/2014

When it started to get thick I poured it in a pint jar. This stuff has a life of its own. There's about a half inch of black goo at the bottom of the jar. No light gets through, it's like tar. It crawls up the glass and clings.

That edge you see isn't the level of the goo, it's the stains on the glass. I used a toothpick and touched it to my tongue, and my tongue is still burning.

I think this experiment has been a qualified success. I found a smaller jar to put the stuff in, a glass jar with a glass lid. It's going in my emergency kit with a bottle of olive oil and a handful of latex gloves. :)

Isolation techniques

I walked into a nursery a few blocks from my home and talked to the lady who orders the seeds. She said that heirloom plants were a fad and would fade out in a few years.

I said "Not for me."

There are a number of reasons that people buy heirloom seeds and plants. They are generally a bit more expensive, but they are GMO free (so far), have more variety, and you can save seeds with the assurance that you'll get the same thing next year.

Or...not quite.

If you plant two heirloom varieties of squash close together you might get a hybrid the next year. A pumpsquash maybe, or a waterlope. :) Just kidding.

While tomatoes and peppers, peas and beans, are generally not pollinated by insects (they're self-fertile and most blossoms pollinate themselves) there is still a possibility of a mixture.

There are a number of ways to make sure you get the same variety, mostly determined by the way the particular plant is pollinated.

The simplest is distance. Do not plant wheat, for example, within half a mile of any other strain of wheat. They will mix. Corn is also wind pollinated but the pollen is heavier--plant different varieties of corn about fifty feet apart.

The second option, which relies on the experience of the gardener, is to plant different varieties at different times. This might be as simple as planting each variety in an alternate year, or it might mean planting them a month or two apart. It depends on how long the flowering season is for each variety and how long it takes the seeds to mature. This won't work for some types of plants.

The third, and the one I prefer for most things, is isolation. From a seed bag (scraps of gauze with yarn woven around the outside to make a drawstring bag) to a tent over an entire plant, isolation makes sure that only you can get to the blossoms to pollinate them. Done with a paintbrush, a q-tip, or some other similar item, isolation is the only way to completely verify that you're getting the pollination you want.

It's a learning curve. If you accidentally end up with something unintended, try again next year. That's part of why I always plant only a small portion of the seeds in any one year. I always have something left over from the last batch so I can start over if necessary.

Old-fangled

I saw the first cantelope poke its head up today!

The last few weeks I've been having long, fun conversations with a friend across the street--about gardening, of course. She blogs at Me My Garden and I, and mostly she blogs about...you guessed it. Gardening. It's her favorite toy.

A month or so ago I planted kamut (a variety of ancient wheat) and hull-less oats in a test patch. That was going to be the limit of my experimentation this year (or at least my garden experimentation) but I decided to do Jerusalem Artichokes as well. I'm also trying no-till in the main garden, just to see how it works.

Next year I'll try spelt, and then white wheat the year after unless I find something else to play with.

Right now I have nineteen tomato plants in the ground and four of my potatoes are up. The melons (watermelon, cantaloupe, winter squash, cucumbers) are in the main garden, and in the boxes the peas, beets, broccoli, onions and greens are up. Greens going wild, of course. We can't eat the stuff fast enough. The garlic is growing like a weed. The zucchini won't go in until we figure out the sprinkler issues, since the sprinkler problem is right where the zucchini was SUPPOSED to go.

I planted the carrots today. Once it warms up a bit more I have two more tomatoes (both mortgage lifter) to go in the ground, as well as five bell peppers, two jalapenos, and a handful of habaneros which will be used ONLY for my first aid kit.

And one solitary lavender plant. One finally came up, although I'm probably jinxing it by saying that. :)

Everything heirloom, of course. I'm trying hard to keep the new-fangled stuff out of my garden. Everything I keep for seed is pollinated by hand so I know precisely what I'm getting. I really don't want to be accidentally eating bug killer genetically engineered into my corn because someone else decided to plant GMO's.

A rant for another time.

I guess I'm just old fashioned.