July 12 Hail Storm Damages.

We  do not expect snow here  in July but falling ice from the sky is always here. The hail storm came at night  July 12. With the hope for the best I slept till morning. When I wake up I see saw the mess but it was not so bad. Fortunately our area was not effected as others. It is still  fresh in my memory the picture of my tomato plants a few years ago when only main stem left after the hail storm. This time all tomato plants looked well. The main damages were on my new seeding of black radish.

The most recommended Black Radish seeding time

In my first post I mentioned that last year I seeded on June 2. This year I seeded on June 30 that is almost the same day especially if you take in consideration that it is a leap year and, due to added day in February, summer solstice came one day early. From Internet I found that the end of June is the most recommended time for seeding in our latitude (53). recently I've got two packages of Black Radish from Russia. One of those is very specific about seeding time - June -25- July 5.

When I asked my Russian friend to find me a few seeds of famous Russian variety Graivoronskaya, (ГРАЙВОРОНСКАЯ)that many gardeners like so much overhere, she told me that in Russia Black Radish is seeded at the day of the Feast of Saints Peter and Paul. In Russia it is July 12 as the Russian Orthodox church is on Julian calendar but for other living on Gregorian calendar it is June 29. I don't know when such tradition get established and should I trust it or not. If it goes back to the time when Black Radish arrived to Russia we have to turn clock back about 6 days for sure to match the sun position for that day. The most important message for me that in Russian the Feast of Saints Peter and Paul closely associated with summer arrival - the time when nights get warm. For me it means there is no more cold nights to trigger vernalization (less changes for bolting) and it is time to seed Black Radish. Feeling a warm of summer in my garden, I seeded black radish and next day we had a garden party for the first time in the season .

After 3 month of growth

Today my expremental plant, that I started indoor and replanted outdoor (see my previous publication for this plant history), showed sign of bolting and I digged it out. There is good news that I've got good size root, but there is a bad news also. The root is light and it does not look perfect with a lot of laterals.

 

 

 

Garden Extention

Getting close to my target black radish seeding day I recognized that there is not much space left to my black radish. So, I decided that my garden need another extention. It is third one since we moved to this house.

 

 

Black Radish - early seeding failure

In my previous post I mentioned that my black radish started to bolt. Today I pulled all of them that have a sign of putting growth in the main stem. But some is still left growing without forming main stem.

My experimental plant started to bolt

June 14/2012. It is more than two week left to my target seeding date and my black radish plant from experimental early seeding started to show sign of bolting.

I cut all flower stems and left plant to see what will happen next.

Meanwhile my experemental plant that I seeded indoor and replanted outdoor has no sign of generative development and I am looking forward to taste it soon.

 

Else, the seeding time - when Mountain Ash blooms

When I saw a mountain ash in its full bloom yesterday (June 2/2012)  I recall that in the publication, referred in my previous post, it is the time when the author seeds black radish.
"еще срок  посева редьки- когда цветет рябина"
"Else, the seeding time - when Mountain Ash blooms".
I  seeded two experimental rows at this time also.

 

 Below is my experimental plant seeded indoor and replanted in garden at the same day.