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Post by heavyhitterokra on Aug 4, 2019 12:19:44 GMT -6
I know ... It's Nuts!... I pick the plants clean every other day. Each morning, they are in full bloom and by the next evening, look like they have never been picked in a week! I was a little perturbed yesterday, when one of the people at the Farmers' Market said, "I see you're just like me; you don't pick your okra until it's too big." If he only knew ... Thankfully, I had a sample bag with me, to show him, and people like him, what the big, tough, pods really look like in a good year. My okra this year is growing huge. If you take proper care of okra it has the potential to grow pods almost a foot long in just a few days. This year, I get 4" inch pods in two days. They are tender still, but look too big for pods grown in a regular season. I'll try to attach a few photos as an example of that. I've found pods this year that are not only longer than my 'Straight Eight' cucumbers but have a larger diameter than the ears of corn sold in the supermarkets. This is a 16.9 ounce (500 ml) bottle of water, which is 2 - 1/2" inches in diameter. The 4th pod to the left is 1-7/8" inches in diameter in comparison. This bottle is 8" inches tall. As you can see, all these pods are longer than the bottle is tall. (These are examples of tough pods, not the 4" inch pods I bring to market). This photo shows an array of okra pods, from just blossomed, to 3 days old. None of them are tough yet. This is because none of them are 4-days-old yet. Early on the 4th-day, all okra pods will begin to get tough, no matter how small or large they are. Most people think pod tenderness is determined by pod length alone. Not so. Pod tenderness is determined by pod age, more than it is determined by pod length. In a drought year, a 4-day-old-okra pod, might grow only 2" inches in length, but it will be as tough as an old boot, because of its age. In an exceptional growing season like we've had this year, a pod might grow 6" to 8" inches in that same time frame. Growing conditions determine the size of a pod, age determines toughness. When purchasing okra, you can tell if a pod is tender, by bending the tip over with your thumb. If it's a tender pod, it will be fairly pliable at the tip. If it's a tough pod, you'll be able to tell right away by the resistance it exhibits when you try to bend the tip. The other way to test a pod for tenderness, is to make a slight cut near the stem end with a knife, but merchants frown on that practice for obvious reasons, so don't try that technique at the market. My neighbor picked another 26 pounds of 1" to 2" inch pickling pods out of my okra patch yesterday, so that brings the total to 156 pounds of okra picked this week.
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Post by glen on Aug 4, 2019 13:28:42 GMT -6
Wow, your plants are really putting on the okra. You are having a really good season Ron. Good job. Mine is only now beginning to come in decent and it is coming in in slow motion. Luckily, I am cutting enough just for me and Bercy to eat. I haven't given away a single pod and probably won't this season. It gets eaten as it comes in. We just aren't getting enough sun this season. This could change so I have my fingers crossed that we start getting better weather.
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hank
New Member
Posts: 34
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Post by hank on Aug 4, 2019 18:09:05 GMT -6
I sure would have like some of the rain the past tree days. I got less than a tenth of an inch total.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Aug 5, 2019 1:42:53 GMT -6
Hank,
be careful what you wish for. We got so much rain here that it split most all of my ripe tomatoes this weekend. I gave away 50 pounds of them as canners. I blanched 35 pounds more as home-canners and fed 75 pounds of them to the hogs ... Hopefully, I have someone coming over here today to cleanout about a hundred pounds more, or the hogs will be getting them too.
We had one of those 7-gallon aluminum turkey fryers full of blanched tomatoes in the kitchen last night. After we mixed in a gallon of chopped onions, almost a half cup of salt, lots of peppers and some vinegar and spices, I had to take it out of the aluminum turkey fryer pot and transfer it to two stainless steel stockpots, because it was getting too late in the evening to start canning. Now, I have it all stored in refrigeration until tomorrow night, so we can finish canning salsa. -(All because of the rain that split so many ripe tomatoes).
I never had the chance to pick okra Saturday because of the Farmers' Market and helping a friend with a project over at his house. I try not to do gardening on Sunday if I can help it, so today, I'll be throwing away a lot of okra because of it being to big and tough from neglect... I'm just kind of sitting around waiting for the sun to come up, so I can get back out there and get busy again.
Hank, I'll try to point some of this up-coming rain in your direction. I've had enough to last me a while.
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cao
New Member
Posts: 3
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Post by cao on Aug 6, 2019 9:14:09 GMT -6
hi Ron, i would like to have Heavy Hilter Okra Seed to plant next year. How can I purchase it? thanks
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Aug 6, 2019 16:50:43 GMT -6
@ CAO, new member,
For Heavy Hitter Okra Seeds, contact me by email.
heavyhitterokra@gmail.com
Thank you, Ron Cook This is one of the plants I'm growing this year. Each branch bears a crown of pods similar to this one. My rows are set on 11' foot centers, so I can drive a truck down the centers, so this photo is deceiving to the eye. If these rows were set on 3' foot centers, there would be no way to walk the middles to pick okra. Here is what they looked like at about 60 days of age, just starting to blossom. They grow taller as the season progresses. These are currently 5' to 6' feet tall. This photo was taken while they were only about waist high. They are so much taller now. I bested my own personal okra picking record today, while attempting to clean out and discard all the tough pods that accumulated because of heavy rains and not enough time to do everything at once. I picked 175 pounds of okra today, by myself! 85 pounds of it is under refrigeration awaiting tomorrow's Farmers' Market. 90 pounds of it was tough pods for the hogs. I fed the hogs so many 5-gallon buckets of pods today, that they are literally sleeping on top of okra pods tonight. For that reason, I reserved 50 pounds of surplus pods, for tomorrow's feed, to cut back on waist.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Aug 8, 2019 20:20:30 GMT -6
Earlier this week, I broke my all time, one day, okra picking record.
I started the day off at 6:00 am, and didn't finish picking, until a little after 11:00 pm that night. During that time, I harvested 175 pounds of okra. It took me a little over seventeen-hours to finish ... What a long and exhausting day!
So far, this has been my longest continual okra harvest to date. (Good thing I only planted 3 and 1/2 rows).
A day or so later, I went back out and picked 25 pounds more, making my total okra production this week amount to 200 pounds.
Last year, at the apex of production, I picked 160 pounds of okra in one week. I had all of that on hand at the Farmers' Market, but it was too voluminous to fit on my display tables. I had two tables, brim full of okra, plus two more ice chests full, waiting in the wings. I remember thinking at the time, that was a lot ...
Then, came this! What a busy week this has been!This was last year's big day. I had about 100 pounds of okra on display, plus 60 pounds more in the truck. This year, I forgot to bring my camera ... I guess I was too tired to pack everything in the truck.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Aug 8, 2019 21:26:56 GMT -6
I've been selling okra twice per week at our Tahlequah Farmers' market. I've had several of my customers tell me this season, that they have been really enjoying deep-fried whole okra.
I've never heard of doing that before, so this evening, I've been looking at some Youtube videos to see what all the fuss is about.
From what I saw there, I will definitely have to give whole fried okra a try this weekend, if I get the time.
Here is a link to one of the many videos about using that technique.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Aug 9, 2019 23:07:02 GMT -6
I started picking okra tonight after the heavy rains stopped at 7:00 pm, and picked 75 pounds more, before midnight.
I'm bushed!
I have Farmers Market at 7:30 am tomorrow morning; I'll be lucky if I get 4 or 5 hours sleep. No rest for the weary, this time of year. You can never slow down or you'll miss the season. Such is the life of a farmer ...
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Aug 11, 2019 18:17:09 GMT -6
We are hurtling past mid-summer right now, with the best of the season behind us, and the new Autumn not yet born.
Our gardens, having been in full swing for weeks on end; are beginning to wain and wobble slightly, like a comet, fading into the sunset ... Everything will be downhill from here.
I've picked a little over 200 pounds of okra in the last, few, blurry days of frenzied summer harvest. I've put in long, long, days that have lasted from 6:00 am to past midnight, just picking, canning, pickling, and living onward.
I don't know where the end will be, but I think we're safely past the middle now ...
Soon, the cool, lazy, days of Autumn will envelop us all, like a grandmother, tucking us under her heavy quilts for the long winter's night ahead. Just some of my 'seed okra' going into their 3rd week of maturity. The whole process takes about 8 weeks to complete.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Aug 13, 2019 0:17:39 GMT -6
I picked 32 pounds more okra at dusk this evening.
I'll have to pick again at dawn.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Aug 13, 2019 17:13:56 GMT -6
Here are a few photos of the plants that I have chosen to let grow out for seed saving purposes this season.
I don't think the offspring of these parent plants will disappoint. This is a hard angle to capture. The camera does not see as wide an angle as the eye does. There are branches, and okra pods, going in every direction. Each branch produces a crown of pods, all its own, multiplying the harvest by a factor of several times. All these branches belong to the same plant. I picked 25 tender pods of market okra off this plant in a single day, before I decided to leave it for seed and stop picking from it. This is the same plant as shown above, from a different perspective. Each branch of this variety produces as much okra as a single Clemson Spineless plant does in an entire season. (That's a lot of okra!) Yet, I've sold out each time I've taken okra to market this whole summer long. I've picked several hundred pounds of tender pods and I'm still not caught up on all my back orders.This is a view of a single side branch. Each plant has several side branches. Each branch, bears a number of pods. I counted about twenty pods on this one branch.These okra pods remind me of banana bunches. The maturing seed pods are so heavy that they are spreading the branches. (This's why I select for such sturdy branches). I lose count, trying to figure how many pods of okra, and how many branches, this single plant has.
These seed pods are monstrous! Many of them have reached over 9" inches in length. I pity the poor fool who has to pull these plants out after Fall Harvest ... Wait a minute ... that's gonna be me!
It's probably a Good thing I have a tractor now; I don't think, Earl, the old, red mule, would appreciate the task these plants present. I'll probably drag a looped log chain over each row, just to break them over before I push them into piles using a grader blade.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Aug 14, 2019 20:44:18 GMT -6
I sold 83.5 pounds of okra this evening at the Farmers' Market and still have 30 pounds left on the truck. Looks like I'll be pickling okra this weekend.
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Post by glen on Aug 14, 2019 22:16:46 GMT -6
Those foto's are absolutely amazing. Ron, my suggestion is that you should start a new thread that shows these foto's. After you continue to post on this thread, those foto's will not be viewed. I have never seen anything like that.
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Post by macmex on Aug 15, 2019 5:54:54 GMT -6
I believe one can hardly go wrong by starting a new thread. It makes things easier to find.
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