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Post by mgulfcoastguy on Jan 21, 2019 0:27:42 GMT -5
Is my first eggplant in 4 years I think. It is one of the long Asian types and more or less picked at random. Trying to add veggies to my grill if it doesn’t reject them. Little Lucy okra also.
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Post by brownrexx on Jan 21, 2019 8:40:46 GMT -5
I love grilled veggies and I grill eggplant and okra quite often as well as summer squash.
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Post by pepperhead212 on Jan 21, 2019 9:17:08 GMT -5
I grew that several years ago, and it was good, but what seemed strange was that it was stopped by heat! Like many tomatoes, it dropped blossoms when it got in the high 90s. I remember wondering how Jersey could be hotter than Malaysia?
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Post by mgulfcoastguy on Jan 21, 2019 12:02:15 GMT -5
pepperhead212 ,Interesting, maybe it is that way with most asian eggplants? brownrexx ,Have been watching a lot of youtube videos about cooking okra and about how good okra is for you.
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Post by pepperhead212 on Jan 21, 2019 17:10:19 GMT -5
pepperhead212 ,Interesting, maybe it is that way with most asian eggplants? Not just Asian, but many other eggplants, as well. I have always tried new varieties every year, and many, if not most, have done what most tomatoes do - drop their blossoms, and stop producing when it gets to the mid to high 90s. The Hari and the Neon (somewhat) would keep producing, and Ichiban, while it would stop, was always the earliest variety I would plant, and incredibly productive. I keep looking for heat resistant varieties, but they are few and far between. Even ones that sound like they are from much hotter areas than Jersey didn't work out, but I figure they must have seasons to grow them in besides the hottest seasons, sort of like Laura_in_FL.
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Post by mgulfcoastguy on Jan 21, 2019 17:27:39 GMT -5
pepperhead212, my climate is essentially identical to her climate. My experience with Thai Long Green was that it really didn't produce until the fall and then lasted until freezing.
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Post by Laura_in_FL on Jan 21, 2019 17:59:06 GMT -5
Hari and Aswad have been my best two through the summer so far. But, I have yet to find an eggplant that does as well in July and August as it does in spring. (Spring is by far the best season for every eggplant I have grown.) I have had mixed results with Hari and Aswad rebounding in fall. Ichiban definitely takes a long summer production break for me, but is super-productive in spring and tends to rebounds pretty well in fall. It will produce right up to frost, unlike some others that taper off in the cool of October and November. Neon was bitter for me, even at small sizes; I only grew it once. The fruit were beautiful, though, so the flavor was a real disappointment. I don't think pepperhead212 has any trouble with Neon being bitter, and he gave me the seeds. So I don't know if the problem is climate, soil, or my palate. I haven't tried Thai Long Green or Malaysian Red. Disease pressure on both leaves and fruit can be an issue with any eggplant in the summer wet season, and that impacts both summer production and fall rebound production as well. The plants don't generally die, but in the worst of summer they get stressed and produce few leaves and even fewer bloom buds. In bad years I end up with nearly leafless plants in July and and August. Which, like I said, sometimes leaf back out and produce well in the fall, but sometimes they just languish until frost kills them. Fruit rots can happen, too. I had a bad time with losing Aswad fruit to rots last July-September (then of course the storm damaged my plants badly on October 10 so I didn't get to see if they would produce a fall crop.) I think Aswad is fine with the heat - it doesn't drop blossoms. But from a disease resistance perspective, it seems to be adapted to a much drier climate and struggles with fungal diseases. I'll still grow it, though. When it's happy it makes giant, bitter-free fruit, and plenty of them! I have considered (but haven't tried) setting out fresh eggplant transplants in August just like I do for tomatoes. It might work better than trying to nurse sickly plants back to health in the fall. Fast-producing, cool-tolerant types like Ichiban would be good candidates to try in fall.
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Post by pepperhead212 on Jan 21, 2019 19:14:28 GMT -5
Sounds like your experience with Ichiban is similar to mine - it rebounds well, and keeps producing to the end. Strange about the Neon - the lack of bitterness seems to stay with mine, even if I missed picking one, and it got seedy. Ichiban, OTOH, has had a tendency to get bitter whenever I would leave one on too long, though I just use things like that in a dish where the bitterness is a good thing!
I also grew Baker's Malaysian Pink, way before I got the Malaysian Red there. Not there for a while before the red, so I thought that it might be the same thing! The red was longer, and more productive, but both were about the same, as far as the heat stopping production.
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Post by Laura_in_FL on Jan 22, 2019 11:14:39 GMT -5
That's funny; I don't recall ever tasting much bitterness in Ichiban, whether I grew it from the seeds you sent me or from other sources. Maybe it's due to something different about our soils/growing conditions? But I haven't grown Ichiban in several years, so maybe this is a case of absence making the heart grow fonder?
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Post by mgulfcoastguy on Jun 9, 2019 23:22:18 GMT -5
Well this variety is beginning to make. Soon I can give a taste test.
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caesg
Pro Member
Posts: 152
Zone:: 5b
Favorite Vegetable:: Butternut Squash
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Post by caesg on Jun 10, 2019 0:14:13 GMT -5
I've never used shade cloth before. Gardeners here seem to be fans, though. Have y'all tried shade cloth when temps climb above 90? If so, did it help?
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Post by bestofour on Jun 11, 2019 22:36:16 GMT -5
I've never used shade cloth before. Gardeners here seem to be fans, though. Have y'all tried shade cloth when temps climb above 90? If so, did it help? Last summer was so hot I put our ball game tent over my tomatoes and left it there all season. Might have to do it again this year.
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Post by brownrexx on Jun 12, 2019 7:29:25 GMT -5
That's a great idea bestofour, I shade my peas when the temperature gets hot and it helps them to live a little longer. In my part of the country we can plant peas as soon as the soil is warm but then they burn up in high heat so it's questionable if I will get many peas if it gets too hot too soon.
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Post by mgulfcoastguy on Jun 23, 2019 23:58:02 GMT -5
These have ended up being one of the smallest eggplants that I have ever grown. They cast alright though.
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