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Post by heavyhitterokra on Sept 6, 2020 13:03:52 GMT -6
Yes, Maam,
Better keep a watchful eye this week. It only takes about four days from blossom to harvest if there is plenty of water and a decent amount of sunshine.
That would be awesome if you got enough tender pods to be able to fry up a mess of okra the same week as the Labor Day Celebration. You've certainly put in enough garden labor to deserve a Holiday to commemorate it.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Sept 6, 2020 21:28:42 GMT -6
My Daughter came down from Oklahoma City to visit this weekend, so she and I pickled 9 quarts of baby okra today. Our goal was to can at least 12 quarts (one for her to eat every month for the coming year). So, looks like we'll be picking more baby okra tomorrow morning to make up the difference.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Sept 7, 2020 9:32:00 GMT -6
I was out and about bright and early this morning, picking more baby okra to be pickled. I ended up with about 8 pounds *Way more than I needed to finish off pickling my Daughter's additional 3-quarts. Looks like she'll be taking home a few bonus jars this afternoon. (I sure hope I have enough vinegar and spices left in the cupboard to do that many more).
No matter, we'll have fun working on it together. We've made pickled okra on Labor Day Weekend ever since back in the days when she used to help me at the Farmer's Market on Saturday mornings in High School. (She's 26-years-old now). So, it has become a tradition of sorts in our family ... That, and canning up our annual batch of sriracha.
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Post by macmex on Sept 7, 2020 9:45:06 GMT -6
What a wonderful tradition!
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eddie
New Member
Posts: 1
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Post by eddie on Sept 7, 2020 18:19:39 GMT -6
Hi,
I am interested on Heavy Hitter Okra seeds anyone here selling this variety?
Thanks
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Sept 7, 2020 19:45:40 GMT -6
@ eddie,
This is Ron Cook. Contact me by email: heavyhitterokra@gmail.com
I have a separate website for seeds, but am out of stock until my next harvest of mature pods in November 2020.Yesterday's harvest for frying and for pickling. Each basket holds 15 pounds.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Sept 15, 2020 4:02:33 GMT -6
Affects of Day Length on Okra Production in Late Summer I've just received an interesting email from one of my customers:September 15, 2020Hi Ron, my okra is growing well and I harvested a few pods but they are not edible. They are very hard even though I pick them when they are young. My friends said the same thing. We water them and take very good care of them but the plants give very hard okra and not very productive. 1 plant giving about 3 -5 okra. Is this variety give hard okra? Very hard that you cannot eat them. Looking forward to hearing from you. Thank you. Sad as it may seem; this was my reply.Summer is at its end now.
This is perfectly normal for this time of year. All okra will begin doing that in late summer, as the days become shorter and the nights begin getting too cool for optimum growth to occur. The shorter days and cooler nights will slow down the growth rate of the pods, causing them not to develop much length before they start getting tough.The tenderness of any okra pod depends less on length than on the age of the pod. Okra should be harvested about 4-days after blossom set. Any pod 4-days old or older will begin getting tough really fast. In late summer, when the days grow shorter and the nights begin growing cooler, the pod's growth rate is severely affected, causing them to gain length much more slowly.(After all, Autumn Solstice is only 7 days away).You may notice the sun is setting a lot earlier in the evenings now, since the summer solstice, which occurred June 21. Since that time, we have lost approximately two hours of daylight, per 24-hour growth cycle. That loss of sunlight, coupled with the lower temperatures will severely retard growth rates, causing 4-day-old okra pods to remain quite short. Though they may look tender, they will be tough at that age of development.Any pods harvested at this time of year will be more suited for pickling or stir fry purposes than for pan frying. (Remember: Be sure only to harvest the youngest pods). It's best to ignore size at this juncture in their development and just concentrate on days since blossom set.All the best,Ron
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Sept 15, 2020 20:55:29 GMT -6
This time of year, baby okra is about all you'll be getting. It will be slim pickins from here on out.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Sept 23, 2020 20:25:16 GMT -6
Looking good, Bon!
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Oct 1, 2020 11:56:42 GMT -6
Scary Close Call! Tonight's low is forecast to be 37 degrees.
Tonight: Clear, with a low around 37. North wind around 5 mph. Clear
Low: 37 °F
I'm not quite ready for the bottom to fall out of our nice Fall temperatures ...
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Oct 2, 2020 6:40:04 GMT -6
Bon,
It was nice to read your garden report this morning. I always love reading your comments.
It looks like the weatherman called it. My little thermometer down at the chicken house said it was 37 degrees this morning at 7:00 am. My hens sure were snuggled up to the rooster this morning!
I still have a very few, pitiful looking tomatoes hanging on out there, but the peppers are bulging with fruit. I picked a 3 gallon tub full of peppers last evening. I'll be making brine to pickle those today.
My sweet potatoes don't look so good. I haven't dug any yet, but the deer would not give them any relief this entire growing season, so my vines never got over 2' feet long without being trimmed back to the nub.
My Roselle is brimming with fruits, I harvested 5 gallons of those yesterday afternoon and spent the next several hours de-coring and dehydrating them for winter. I had a small campfire going nearby, with a boiling pot of hot Roselle tea on as I worked. That sure was welcome last night, come dusk; it was pretty nippy out there by then.
I only got to drink about half of my first cup of hot Roselle tea though ... My wife's baby deer that has been wandering about our neighborhood all Summer has a knack for sniffing out anything that resembles a 'goodie' and was soon, whiskers deep in my coffee mug, slurping up my freshly sugared tea.
My Winter cover crop is doing well though. I planted Austrian Winter Peas, Hairy Vetch, Crimson Clover, and Winter Rye, back in early September (right before the rains came). They're all up and signaling that it's nearly time for the garden to take it's long Winter's rest. I just left little foot paths along each row, to walk on to harvest, the rest is growing up in 4" to 6" inch high ground cover.
My pumpkin vines are dying back to reveal their meager Summer's toil. We won't go without pumpkin pie this Thanksgiving, but the Jack O' Lantern won't be much to look at this year, that's for sure.
I don't suppose I can blame her for slurping my Roselle tea; that field corn mixed with goat pellets looks pretty bland. If I was her, I'd probably want to spice it up a bit too.
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Post by macmex on Oct 2, 2020 6:42:06 GMT -6
By about 7:45 or 8:00 am temps should start going back up. You should get a good idea what was harmed and what escaped harm. We got down to 37 according to the internet. I don't have an outside thermometer at the moment. I didn't see any frost, though many weeds' leaves were behaving like they expected to get hit.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Oct 4, 2020 12:32:10 GMT -6
There was no frost here that I could tell, so I took the opportunity to harvest about 400 mature okra pods to get a head start on the 60-pound seed order I have with Baker Creek this autumn. 400 hundred mature pods will only supply about 4 pounds of seed, yet, they filled two, 5-gallon buckets brim-full and packed down tight with dried okra pods.
I've got my work cut out for me this seed saving season. It will take somewhere between 3,000 to 5,000 mature pods just to fill that one order. I'll be cracking pods and sorting seeds for days and weeks to come.
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Post by rdback on Oct 5, 2020 8:45:14 GMT -6
WOW!
Glad you dodged the frost Ron. But sixty POUNDS of seed?
All I can say is WOW!
Best of luck!
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Oct 8, 2020 19:53:49 GMT -6
I harvested another 400 mature pods this evening. There are more in the field; I just ran out of daylight and energy. Trying to build a patio, re-paint an office building in downtown Tahlequah, refurbish old office furniture, fix a broke down tractor, and garden at the same time. I may be getting too old for this.
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