Those sound wonderful! I can't wait to hear what kind of pepper you have!

I'm a newbie but I have found a cucumber that I will continue to grow from now on. It's the Sikkim Cucumber from Bakers Creek and we have just loved it! The

Dorothy, I had a Joe E. Parker, Jalapeno and a Cubanelle for supper last night. This was a first time to try the Joe E. parker, so far it is a keeper.

Larry

Dorothy,

I grew Ruby Queen the first two or three years after it was introduced and we really liked it, but then I started planting more heirloom corns and quit planting it to make room for Country Gentleman and Texas Honey June.

I especially liked it in the years when we grew Silver Queen, Ruby Queen and Dwarf Blue Jade, which matures a dark blue. We had red, white and blue ears of corn....until we cooked them. Those same years we had red, white and blue potatoes so I made a patriotic potato salad for the Fourth of July.

Ildi has been a favorite of mine for about a decade now. i don't even remember how I first found it, but we loved its flavor and high productivity from the very first. In a fairly rainy year it has more fruit than foliage. I used to plant Yellow Pear for some of our friends who liked them, but gradually dropped them to make room for more Ildi plants. This year I tried Yellow Submarine, Medovaya Kaplya and Pear Drops, but none of them come close to the flavor of Ildi, so next year I'll likely use Ildi as my only yellow bite-size tomato and just plant more Ildi plants instead of those others.

Isn't it fun to find new favorites? That's one reason I try so many new (well, new to us) varieties every year. Most of them won't be anything special, but every now and then you find a real jewel.

Dawn

Trees, we raised the Sikkim Cuc from Baker's Creek this year too, but unfortunately I missed all three of the cucs it has produced so far until they were way too large. We love the Metki from Baker's Creek. It's one of the Armenian types, which is really a melon, but looks like an English cucumber and tastes better. Also love the little yellow Poona Keera from Baker's.

Larry, Tomorrow I will look at the planting record and figure out which one of the ones you sent me that we like so well. You sent both Cubanelle and the Joe E. Parker. I think it's the latter. It is so much more productive than Poblano and peels better that I think it's a keeper for me too. I have a recipe for Poblano/chicken soup that this new pepper should work well in; it should also make a great chili relleno.

Dawn, you were the one who mentioned Ildi and I tried it. Carol sent me seed of Sungold a couple years ago and I loved that one too. I grew 2 plants that were supposed to be Yellow Pear this year but only one was and it got really sick early, so I yanked it. The other one wasn't yellow and wasn't a pear. It was golf ball size and shape and two-toned at first, red with green shoulders.

As sad as it makes me, I have already decided to stop watering over half of my tomatoes unless we get rain this week. The garden is pretty much finished. All the corn is out, the potatoes dug, all the greenbeans that we need in the freezer. Only tomatoes, okra, sweet potatoes, peppers and cucumbers are left and the cucs look really spent. Oh and tomatillos. They selfseeded in the garden plus I planted some. The selfseeded ones are ahead of the sown ones. Eight plants are too much. Next year I think 3 will do

Thanks for the letting us know your new favorites. I am going to try Ruby Queen and Blue Jade! I just saw picture of both, they looks beautiful and you said they tasted great! I like Ildi too and other nice flavor tasted like grapes is snow white. -Chandra

Mulberry,

Are you in or around Okc? I would be willing to share my next crop if you are close!

Trees, thanks, but no, I am over here in Lapland, where Okla laps over into the hills of Arkansas. Specifically Adair Co. I went out today and found a Sikkim cuc ready but not overripe, so we will get to try it.

Larry, my new favorite stuffing pepper is Joe E. Parker. Thank you so much for sharing your seed with me. Now I need to know the source (unless it's OP, which I doubt), so I can buy more seed next year.

Dorothy,

I love your description of Lapland.

I hate that you have had to stop watering, but I understand completely. I watered my garden on June 30th,and feel like I may not water it again. I am undecided. I am definitely not going to water the tomatoes in the big garden. We have preserved tons of them, and as I type this I have 14 bowls, buckets and baskets of tomatoes sitting all over the house awaiting processing. I should be doing them today, but am trying to wait until after the 4th, because we usually have a lot of fires on the 3rd and 4th and I wanted to be able to leave the house if the pagers go off without having a big mess in the kitchen. It is 100 degrees here, the RH currently is 26% and the wind is gusting up around 20 mph, all conditions that make our firefighting family antsy.

I might keep watering the peppers, cukes, melons, winter squash and yardlong beans for a while, and do intend to water the container tomatoes as long as they keep producing. I don't know that they'll keep producing well enough to make watering them worthwhile in this heat. I guess time will tell.

There's a new map on the OK Mesonet that shows how much available moisture is in the soil at the specified level. I'm going to link the 4" one below, and there's maps for the 16" depth and then I think 34" depth on the Mesonet Soil Moisture/Temperature page. Your part of the state has especially low moisture levels, but then, you've known that for months now. I find it interesting to look at the map and see what it looks like around the state. It doesn't too very good in very many places, that's for sure.

Dawn

Here is a link that might be useful: Available Water At 4

Dorothy, your are welcome, I was glad to share my seed.

The package only says NK 100% organically grown on it. There is a good chance they came from Atwoods, I only say that because I would stop at Atwoods and read the seed racks every chance I got. I also bought a New Mexico #6. I will have to read my labels in the garden to see If I have any of those. They sound like they may be a little hotter than the Joe E. Parker.

None of these peppers I know anything about, this is a learning process for me.

Larry

Dorothy Joe E Parker should be an OP variety. Anyway all the selections of it I have grown are. It is an NM Chile type developed by NMSU and named after Joe Parker an alum of NMSU. I'm growing several types of NM chiles this year. I would be glad to send you a few seeds of some of them to try. I'm growing a few new to me this year. One is Lumbre said to be the hottest of the NM chile types. And Mosco a variety from the CSU experiment station at Rocky Ford,CO which many are high on. Another of my favorites is from a grower/breeder at Fowler, CO. And then I really like many of the heirlooms from the small villages and reservations in NM. Most of the fruit from the latter are smaller. I will post a review of my peppers after the season is over. Jay

Thanks, Jay. But I probably wouldn't be able to save seed this year, would I, with the Joe E. Parkers planted next to Cubanelles, Pepperoncinis and a Tam jalapeno?

We don't do well with very hot peppers, hence the Tam jalapeno, but otherwise I would be happy to try some new varieties.

Dawn, I hate to give up watering too and will still water some select tomatoes and peppers and part of the okra. And still have to water the perrenials on the place, strawberries, blueberries, young fruit trees, potted figs. But we just can't afford such high water bills. And we have plenty of early stuff in the freezers so...better luck next year.

I don't have the experience or expertise with as many varieties as most of you guys, but I CAN recommend the Mammoth Jalapeno. They are huge and never cork and have produced well every year for me. I've stopped growing all others. If you are really picky with the flavor of jalapenos, you might like others better, but I can't tell the diff in taste. I've never started with seeds since I can get my seedlings close by here at Bixby.

Be warned, they get huge and it takes an entire piece of bacon to wrap it well when stuffing them.