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Post by heavyhitterokra on Jun 15, 2019 16:06:41 GMT -6
Great photos, Glen!
Thanks for posting them, your yard looks great too. That makes me feel good, just to see the pictures of it and it's not even my yard or my okra. I like George's idea of planting African-X in someone's flower bed. I know it gonna look great later on. They ought to like the foliage.
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Post by glen on Jun 21, 2019 14:06:53 GMT -6
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Post by glen on Jun 23, 2019 22:23:09 GMT -6
As sort of a journal entry I did notice the first okra bloom on 6-22-2019. I should be cutting okra pods fairly soon. There is no branching yet so the harvest will be slow for a while. If we start getting more sun, branches will form and begin producing in about a month. Its going to be a slim harvest until branching kicks in.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Jun 27, 2019 17:38:24 GMT -6
Glen,
You mentioned posting sort of a journal entry as to the date you first noticed blooming on your okra plants; one of my favorite attributes of this website is that you can scroll back through the years, just like a journal and compare notes from one season to the next. This information helps you to know if you are on target with your planting dates and what not. Those notes come in really handy through the years, as you make adjustments to your plans for the next several seasons.
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Post by glen on Jun 27, 2019 22:11:42 GMT -6
The purpose of this thread is to record the growth of this new variety of okra. People could browse the foto's and see how it progresses on a weekly basis. I really have never seen this done before for an okra variety. Okra is not hip. Not much interest in it. Notice the readership clicks to this thread. No interest. However, maybe someone will take an interest. I will gladly share some seed with them. This variety of okra is very beautiful and a dependable producer of okra. I have it growing in horrid conditions. Rainy. No sun. Humid. Lots of diseases abound. You should see this okra. No pests. No desease. Soon okra will begin to come in. I will have a dependable steady supply of okra that should last into December.
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Post by glen on Jun 29, 2019 15:57:55 GMT -6
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Jun 29, 2019 16:30:17 GMT -6
Glen,
I looked back through my HH thread posts and see that I planted my first okra on April 23rd this Spring; about the same date you did. Our plants are at very similar stages of growth. Lots of branching, lots of flowering, a few pods here and there, but the exponential pod production is still about a month away when the branches start producing pods too.
Very interesting that these two completely different varieties are growing so far apart but are following such similar growth patterns. (Mine will not make it anywhere near to Christmas though). It will more than likely be killed by frost, sometime in October or November.
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Post by glen on Jun 29, 2019 20:01:49 GMT -6
We did plant at about the same time? I planted on April 24th. Last year I quit cutting okra in early October and let all the plants go to seed since I planned to give away as much seed as I could produce to the Peace Corps. I gave them over 5 lbs of seed, saved from only 17 plants. I am not sure if that had anything to do with why the plants quit producing in December or not. We will find out this year since I won't be saving any extra seed this year. The plan is to choose one plant and save seed from that plant only. I personally only need 300 seeds. I will have extra to give away if anyone wants some but that will be only a few seeds. There is no demand for AfricanX okra. Its just beautiful isn't it?
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Post by glen on Jun 29, 2019 20:07:28 GMT -6
This year I plan to experiment with fermented okra. If it starts coming in good. I will make basic fermented okra. Just okra in a salt brine maybe with a hot pepper or two in the jar. I have never tried doing this. I have had pickled okra before which is pretty good. But, fermented okra is what I want to experiment with. I am wondering how long it will preserve the okra for one thing. It might be a good thing to do after I get okra'd out for the season. Maybe the okra would keep for a couple of months covered in a brine in a nice half gallon jar or two? I already made a half gallon jar of grocery store sweet peppers. I cut them into bite size peices and filled a half gallon jar and covered em with brine. They taste excellent. Just crunchy sweet pepper pieces. I did notice that the flavor is stronger. They taste good with sauerkraut as well.
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Post by glen on Jun 29, 2019 20:25:01 GMT -6
There is one plant that has leaf curl virus. You can see it-its foto number 2. I haven't pruned any of the leaves so you can still see the damage. The plant is just powering right thru it. I believe that eventually the plant will shed those as lower older leaves that show signs of damage and you won't even know the plant was ever infected. Leaf curl damage can destroy crops but it is not always fatal. This time its not. I have quite a bit of desease showing up in my pepper plants. Most of the plants end up dying. AfricanX okra is very durable. I have never seen this new variety sick with the Yellow mosaic virus. I have this in my area and I have seen it in my garden. I do not know if my plants are resistant to it or if I am just lucky. That's one virus you don't want. Its always fatal and very contagious. White fly is the vector usually that passes the virus onto the okra. If I see white fly, it is during the dry season. This is one of the reasons I never plant okra during the dry season. White fly's-but also because okra doesn't grow right during the dry season. Plants bolt quickly and only put on a few pods. They they decline and die. I have no idea why?
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Jul 1, 2019 6:10:23 GMT -6
Glen,
I didn't use to be able to grow cucumbers in my garden; they would get the mosaic virus and die. This seemed strange to me that I couldn't grow cucumbers, yet Bill could grow them by the bushels, less than a hundred yards away.
Then, I found out, through soil tests that I had submitted to a local University, that BIll's garden had a pH of 6.0 and mine had a pH of 5.4, my garden was too acidic to grow cucumbers.
Cucumbers require a higher pH in order to prosper and were just too weak to fight off any attacks. After I adjusted the pH, cucumbers did very well there. I also noticed my okra looks a lot healthier and a lot greener too.
Also, I ran out of chicken litter last Winter when I was spreading it on my garden. The strip that got no litter is very pail and anemic right now. That side of the garden gets sapped by the roots of a nearby persimmon grove and any plants in that area are way more subject to disease that does not affect the plants only 8' or 10' feet West of there in a different row.
If I had it to do over, I'd make an effort to find enough litter to cover that last strip of ground. I suppose I was just tired, as I had already spread 2,500 pounds of chicken litter by hand at that point.
You can just see a stripe of pale green, sickly, plants in contrast to dark green, robust plants, only a few feet away.
Both sets of plants get attacked by whiteflies and disease, but the stronger ones overcome it and keep going.
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Post by glen on Jul 1, 2019 17:49:06 GMT -6
Very good obervations Ron. So far, I am happy with the way the okra is growing. As far as ph goes, AfricanX okra is very reddish shaded when the soil is acidic. When the soil is on the neutral side it is more green. So far, the first okra I am seeing are totally green. AfricanX okra seems to be doing pretty good this year, considering the conditions that I am growing in. I am only seeing serious blights and viral issues in the hot peppers. The hot pepper seeds were sent to me from the US so they are not acclimated yet to Panama's climate either.
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Post by glen on Jul 7, 2019 15:35:31 GMT -6
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Post by glen on Jul 13, 2019 18:31:26 GMT -6
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Post by glen on Jul 13, 2019 18:37:24 GMT -6
This is a photo of Panamanian nyahoo or coffee okra growing in a vacant lot. Panamanians just scatter the seed. The rainy season is when okra is grown in Panama. This photo shows young okra plants, around 3 feet tall. They are about 75 days old. No okra is being formed yet nor are there any blooms or pod heads on these plants. They will form pods when conditions are correct. Plants will be branchy and big. Some will get 8 feet tall or more. As you may or may not know, AfricanX okra is very closely related to Panamanian coffee okra or Nyahoo, as the locals call it. This is rainy season okra. However, it still needs more sun than we have been receiving in order to produce a crop.
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