What New Veggie Are You Trying This Year?

I grow my pole beans in a compact fashion. When the vines get going, it's really hard to see the beans buried in all the foliage. So I am trying the Purple Podded Pole Bean this year. I think purple will contrast well against green, how about you?

What new plant are you trying?

PUMPKINS! (Mostly for my Grandson).

I am growing "Windsor" pumpkins, which are small softball sized pie pumpkins that are intended for a container (I'm using a 5 gallon bucket):





And Knucklehead Pumpkins, which, no are not related to an antique HD Motorcycle, but are dark orange Jack O'Lantern pumpkins covered in warts. I'm growing them in a tractor tire filled with composted cattle manure:



Neither of them will win any giant pumpkin contests, but they should be entertaining. Sadly they are both hybrids.

Year one was: Will this SFG thing really work?

This is year two for us.
First try at:

bush beans
broccoli
brussels sprouts
beets
kale
peas
spinach
radishes
sweet potatoes

DH wanted at least 4 more beds, so there's plenty of experimenting room.

Neither of them will win any giant pumpkin contests, but they should be entertaining. Sadly they are both hybrids.

 
There's nothing wrong with Hybrids. Nature does it all the time - it's called cross-pollination, and sometimes something reproducible comes of it. Genetically modified is an entirely different ball of wax! Hybrids are okay IMHO.

If you are interested in a pumpkin for pumpkin pie - by all means grow the best kind for it - which is not really a pumpkin at all. It's called Australian Butter, and it's squash. How about that!

FeedMeSeeMore wrote:Year one was: Will this SFG thing really work?

This is year two for us.
First try at:

bush beans
broccoli
brussels sprouts
beets
kale
peas
spinach
radishes
sweet potatoes

DH wanted at least 4 more beds, so there's plenty of experimenting room.

Congratulations on making it to year two. Brussel Sprouts are difficult and space consuming. I grew some last year with moderate success, but they really do belong somewhere along the house or something so they can grow. I would like to try Okra, but I measure what we will grow by how reasonable yield is to invested labor and time. Brassicas - they just don't cut it for me.... Have fun with the taters and let us know how the sprouts do!

New for me this year:

Red Winter kale
Georgia collards
Purple Petra basil
Sweetie cherry & Striped Roman tomatoes
Danvers 126 carrots
Delicata & Trombocini squashes
Orange Lunch Box & Pepperoncini peppers
Lots of different lettuces, chards & beets
Seven Top turnip greens

I think that's it.
CC

I'm trying Kalettes.  New to me in Johnnyseeds catalog this year.  A cross between a kale and Brussels sprouts that produces small kale florets up a long Brussels sprouts-type stalk.

In this photo they are the lower left cell pack.  I have to up-pot those and my mini-tomatoes today.  They all need more room.

jamesindetroit wrote:I grow my pole beans in a compact fashion. When the vines get going, it's really hard to see the beans buried in all the foliage. So I am trying the Purple Podded Pole Bean this year. I think purple will contrast well against green, how about you?

What new plant are you trying?

James, I've been growing purple podded pole bean for many years now.  I love it!  The plants are beautiful; they have purple flowers and purple vines, and the leaves are a lovely dark green.  And yes, the beans are so easy to find, plus, they're HUGE!  I'm sure you'll love them.



What I'm trying that's new to me is:

Peacevine tomato (A dehybridized version of Sweet 100)
Black cherry tomato
Joan rutabaga
Yukon gem potato
Red kuri winter squash
Rossa di Milano onion

That's really about it.  I saved a bunch of seed from last year.  Also, I buy all of my seeds from High Mowing seeds, and although I like them a bunch, they don't have a lot of variety.

Purple hull peas
Bush Beans
chinese yellow cucumber
Black Krim Tomaotes
Fox Cherry Tomatoes
Pink Bumblebee Tomotoes
Djana's gold tomatoes
New Zealand Spinach
Purple Sicily cauliflower
Chinese cabbage
Potatoes

I built 3 new beds this year so plenty of room to try new things.

Pretty, KatJohn. 
Heck, those snakes would keep ME out! I wonder if pcs of hose or tubing would work as well. 

CC

First time to try broccoli in the spring.  They do well in the fall and into the winter cause of the long season.  We cheated this year and planted early for us 3-8 to be exact.  You may remember from another post it was 3 full weeks before Mr Pecan gave the all clear.   We gambled cause of the extremely late damaging frost last year.  Which don't happen but once every 10 or so.  The bet paid off on the brocoli dept and I planted 8 at 1 per square.  I just came in with a bowl full and we any get another crop if the temp stays below an 85 degree average.  I just know spring fresh broccoli is a real treat for us.

OK I cant figure out how to insert a quote, but I'm not concerned about hybrids as such, I just wanted to save seeds (especially from the Knuckleheads).

oh, yeah: SNAKE!

Having had great luck with Scarlet Runner beans, last year - I will be trying other pole beans this year:
Blue Lake - P
Kty Wonder - P
Purple podded-P
Rattlesnake -P

Several of you like Dragon tongue bush beans, so I want to try them too.

First time for garlic, shallots, and multipler onions, but they were planted last October - they look good and I'm hoping that they grow bulbs.

I planted a collection of intermediate zone onions from Territorial - but they don't seem to be storing onions.  If they form bulbs, I'll probably have to dice and freeze most of them.

I'm trying pumpkins this year too!

Bush lima beans.  Funny story.  I was in the Feed and Seed store today and asked the old timer there which bush lima bean he would recommend.  He asked me where I was from.  He asked if I was a Yankee.  I said no.  Then he said the best bush butter beans (southern for lima beans) were Henderson.  But he said he never recommends them to the Yankees because he likes to save them for us southerners.  Apparently, the other lima beans are mealy but not the Henderson.

best pumpkin for pies / eating I find is  Cushaw Green Stripe Crook Neck.    4th year I'm growing em.

I had a 1 - 4x4 about 4 or 5 years ago and had success with leaf lettuce (don't know what kind) and jalepenos. Pretty much everything else was a bust. So I am finally giving it another go this time with a Table Top. From what I can tell the plants I selected are easy to grow, usually successful and all things I eat (except for the Swiss Chard. Everyone on here seems to grow it and love to eat it but I have never tried it but like the bright colors.

So here is my list:

1. Swiss Chard - Lots of people on this forum grow it and I like the colors.
   
2. Cucumbers - Slicing - Cukes seem to always grow without much trouble.
   
3. Pole Beans - I saw Yolos and I want to have giant plants too but not sure how to do it in a table top.
   
4. Lettuce - Leaf - had success in the past, going to try various varieties.
   
5. Lettuce - Leaf - "
   
6. Lettuce - Leaf - "
   
7. Lettuce - Leaf - "
   
8. Pepper - Bell Green - Hoping the bells grow as I had success with jalepenos but I was the only one to eat them.
   
9. Pepper - Bell Yellow - "
   
10. Squash - Zucchini - I need to make sure I have the vining type not the bush. I plan to let them run on the ground. Hopefully I can get the soil right and not suffer from end rot like last time.
    
11. Tomato - Cherry or Grape - I couldn't get a full size tomato to ripen because of end rot, so I will try little ones.
    

Feel free to offer suggestions on which varieties i should use. 
Now what the heck are those purple beans? do you eat the pods or just the innards?

1.  Rutabagas
2.  Two new rare melons that I don't have the name memorized or with me right now.
3.  Rutgers tomatoes
4.  A couple new squash, one is a buttercup and i can't remember the other!

Hello all,

New for us this year are:

Ghost Peppers
Parsnip
Orangeglo Watermelon 
New England Sugar Pie Pumpkins

I'm very excited about the melons and pumpkins, though because of work I won't be around much this summer to see how they do.

I saw this on yahoo last night and thought the traveler tomato and red noodle beans might be worth a shot if I get my other beds going in time.

https://www.yahoo.com/makers/10-wonderfully-weird-seeds-to-plant-in-your-spring-116069357210.html

I'm trying out spaghetti squash this year. 

Would like to try Tromboncino if I can get my hands on some seeds. Forgot to order tromb. seeds..... maybe someone has some and/or would like to trade seeds?

Trying Orach.  Tried growing some last year, but the summer ended up being VERY hectic, a friend had to move her garden from their rental into a few of my boxes (one of them was the failed Orach box) so the scrawny, puny Orach got overshadowed by peppers and cukes.  This year will be different, really!  (got a bridge to sell ya, as well  )

I am really trying to consolidate this year and focus on what we really like and can grow.  So I informed my DH that there will be NO okra experiments in the green house this year.  4 years of trying and about 4 pods for the effort.  So my continuing experiments are in peppers, rutabagas and pole bean growing.

The pepper line up is Krimson Lee, Syrian 3 sided, Hot Hungarian Wax, and Ancho.

The rutabagas are Joans and they get a full bed to themselves and I will start them inside this time and a month earlier this time.  

The pole beans are Violet (I notice a trend here), Helda Romano (in the greenhouse), and Blue Lake (reliable from other years).  Noodle beans are going the way of okra, even the greenhouse is the wrong climate.

GG, I bet that once your orach gets going it will return forever for you   It likes a really early start, it is already up in my garden from were it sowed itself last year.

I have gardened in the past but for many years I have only done tomatoes in the summer because of my limited space. My first SFG and it isn't small as recommended (the beds were already there) and once filled with MM, I couldn't resist "filling" them. So far, so good. Except for the bugs, but I think that is now under control. Anyway, things I have NEVER grown include lettuce, kale, turnips, beets (two kinds), trombocini and pattypan squash. The turnips are doing the best! I don't particularly care for turnips, but I have a Russian tortoise that thinks the leaves are heavenly!