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Post by Tucson Grower on Nov 24, 2022 13:55:30 GMT -6
Update #4: There are three mini side-buds that are now nearly in full bloom. Today is very windy. It's the first strong wind we've had for more than a month. It, along with the colder temps has nearly dried up the older yellow petals on the two larger sunflowers. The wind and cold have also blasted the tops of several native jimson weed plants (Datura wrightii) --> Very poisonous, as some ornamentals tend to be. These can grow as perennials, but most of them on my property are just growing as annuals. The seed came in on a load of crushed rock, many years ago. Though they arrived, here, as hitchhikers, they were already growing all around us, to our East, less than 1/4 mile from us, in and around some arroyo's (dry washes). There they are growing as perennials.
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Post by chrysanthemum on Nov 24, 2022 21:04:13 GMT -6
People grow a lot of Jimson Weed around here in their ornamental gardens. It is very pretty, but I was still a little shocked as I just knew it as being a poisonous plant (and the subject matter of a famous Georgia O’Keefe painting). Nobody whom I’ve talked to about it calls it Jimson Weed, though. They just call it Datura. Maybe that’s how it’s sold in the plant nurseries or something.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Nov 29, 2022 10:35:23 GMT -6
I've read that there are about a dozen species of Jimson weed, but they are all poisonous. Our local variety has holly-shaped leaves, with a prickle at the apex of each leaf lobe and several sharp prickles along the length of the stem. The plant gives off a pungent, foul odor. The flowers are smaller than the ones pictured above, having a purplish cast that darkens to a deep purple hue as one gazes toward the center. At the very center are bright yellow stamens. My grandma treated Jimson weed with respect, as if it were some sort of superstition. She kept her garden hoed clean of any sort of weed, but would not harm a Jimson weed. I wish I would have asked her why, but it never occurred to me until I was attempting to rid my garden of them where I live now. I used to keep hogs here. Hogs will eat just about anything, but they will not touch Jimson weed. For that reason, Jimson weed found it had no competition here and tried its best to take over my hog pasture. It was a never-ending battle to try and irradicate them after the hogs were gone. Below, is a gardening website with a photo that shows our local variety. www.backyardgardenlover.com/what-is-jimsonweed/
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Post by amyinowasso on Nov 29, 2022 12:42:30 GMT -6
You can put your tomato horn worms on Jimson/datura. The grow into a really cool moth, so I hate to kill them. They can't have my tomatoes though.
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Post by chrysanthemum on Nov 29, 2022 21:30:26 GMT -6
I did not know that they would feed on Jimson Weed, amyinowasso. Thanks for that tip.
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Post by Tucson Grower on Nov 29, 2022 22:38:18 GMT -6
Yep, the tomato hornworms (sphynx moth larva) quite often feed on the Datura in my yard. There are several other weed species which hornworms also utilize. There are, however, several species of hornworm in our area. I've noticed 3. The tomato hornworm, usually on tomato plants, sometimes on Datura. I haven't seen any of the other species on tomato, and I've only seen tomato hornworms on tomato and Datura. I've seen the other 2 on Datura and other, as yet, unidentified weed species. I'm planning to start growing eggplant this coming season, I'm wondering if hornworms bother them, too.
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Post by Tucson Grower on Nov 29, 2022 22:51:30 GMT -6
Update #5: Almost all the large yellow petals have fallen, but the plant with side-buds now has three small sunflowers, in full bloom on the stalk beneath the main flower. They are cute. We've had two nights were the temp ostensibly dipped to 30F. The most obvious affect was to nearly kill the smallest Sea Island Red okra plant, while the larger one, next to it, was almost untouched. The AfricanX plants just dropped another older leaf or 2. I do find it fascinating how these two okra varieties can have such different appearances. I'm also wondering if a possible breeding goal parameter/trait might be frost tolerance. The hyacinth beans and jimsonweed are very heavily damaged by the cold we've had.
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Post by macmex on Nov 30, 2022 7:40:16 GMT -6
Having "Africa" in its name, one might think it would be less cold tolerant than other okra varieties, but AfricanX handles coolness far better than any other variety I've seen. Once touched by frost, however, I haven't seen it continue to produce. That's probably because, here in Oklahoma, we often get some really cold nights right about the time our first frost hits. Still, with AfricanX, I get okra for a couple more weeks than I would if only growing Stewarts Zeebest.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Dec 1, 2022 19:36:16 GMT -6
This might be a little off the subject, but since it was the sunflower thread I thought I'd post here. Every year, I put 40 pounds of sunflower seeds in my letter to Santa. So far, every year, I've gotten them for Christmas, but this year, they are a bit pricey. In the past, they've always been right around $15.00 to $17.00 per bag. I usually end up feeding two or three bags of them to the birds before Winter is over.
This year, they are currently $25.00 per 40-pound bag and $36.00 per 50-pound bag (if they had them), but they were out of stock. Apparently, the drought this Summer was pretty rough on the sunflower harvest. It sounds like a guy ought to cabbage onto a bag of them soon, if he expects to have any at all this year. I usually grow enough of them to share with the birds in my garden, but this year, the grasshoppers devoured every last one of them before any of them set flowers. If I find any in stock later, I'll be feeding them sparingly. We usually have an annual migration of goldfinches that come through here in December, but I haven't seen any of them yet this year. I'm hoping to have seeds out for them when they show up.
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Post by amyinowasso on Dec 2, 2022 9:39:12 GMT -6
Can you get safflower? It's not attractive to starlings and house sparrows, but cardinals will eat it. I doubt you would want to snack on it. The price of everything is going up. We'll have to grow it all.
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Post by macmex on Dec 2, 2022 12:08:49 GMT -6
I just came from the feed store. They're having trouble stocking the allstock feed we've used for the last 15 years. This is the first time they've ever been out of stock. The proprietor told me that he's pulling his hair out, trying to keep basic feed in stock. In Keyes, a neighboring community, the local feed store closed. They couldn't handle the higher prices and lower demand, as farmers are selling off stock to avoid feeding. I suspect Amy's comment about "growing our own," hits pretty close to the mark.
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Post by Tucson Grower on Dec 2, 2022 14:59:14 GMT -6
Update #6: This morning the mini sunflower side buds were in full bloom, but each one was turned a different direction. Though their stalks are extremely short they're still long enough to allow them to turn whichever direction they prefer. This morning, the top one was pointing East, the middle one was pointing South and the bottom one was pointing West. ??? I am definitely planning to grow a much larger contingent of sunflowers in the coming years. I'll grow some of these Mammoth Russians, especially continuing my breeding plans, but I'm also trying more of a variety called Zeus, which is a variety that grows very large but the flowers are like giant green dandelions ->
The above is a photo from Burpee. They are the seed source, but mine turned out much greener than the ones above. I'm hoping to harvest enough sunflower seed to be able to avoid buying the seed (for food) in the future.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Dec 5, 2022 15:32:31 GMT -6
I guess we're lucky where we're located, I've not seen starlings or sparrows around here. We live in a wooded area and have lots of cardinals, gold finches, and house finches.
I just feed black oil sunflower seeds. Our birds don't eat wild bird seed very well, but they really clean up the sunflower seeds.
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Post by Tucson Grower on Dec 14, 2022 6:42:34 GMT -6
Update #7: I already harvested the 2 shorter/smaller plants. In doing so I noticed the one with the slightly thicker stalk had mostly a reddish tint on the stalk and leaf petioles - that's headed in the direction I'm looking for. I want plants whose normally green parts, leaves, petioles and stalks have their chlorophyll masked with red anthrocyanin pigment, even the backs of the flowers, but not the petals.
The 2 larger sunflowers are still maturing their main seed heads, and the one with 3 smaller leaf axil blooms have those petals fading.
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Post by Tucson Grower on Feb 24, 2023 8:21:39 GMT -6
This season, I've obtained many different varieties of sunflower. My plan is to plant each variety in a group, beneath the edge of a creosote bush (for support from wind). I can tie them to the stiff creosote bush branches (these bushes are everywhere, throughout my yard). They generally only grow about 3-4 feet high. But where there is irrigation near them, they've grown more than 12 feet tall.
I'm looking forward to seeing the variation, we humans, have been able to nurture in this amazing sunflower species.
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