Radishrain

I finally discovered what the dark-headed sparrow-like birds that come on our property probably are: Dark-eyed Juncos (the Oregon-type)!

Also, the yellow-eyed blackbirds we have are possibly Brewer's Blackbirds. We have yellow-headed blackbirds, too.

Here's a list of some more, in no particular order:
• Hybrid doves (they're crosses between mourning doves and collared doves; the mourning doves were native, but I'm not sure if any pure ones persist); other kinds of doves seem to live here, too
• Robins
• Seagulls (usually, we just see them in the sky, at parks, and in parkinglots)
• Canadian geese (usually, we just see them in the sky, but they land in parks and stuff, at times)
• Starlings
• Herons
• Ducks
• Red-tailed hawks
• Barn owls
• Great-horned owls
• Sparrows
• Ospreys
• Finches (including yellow ones)
• Hummingbirds (three+ sizes)
• Woodpeckers (at least two kinds, probably more)
• Sandpipers
• Crows
• Magpies
• Turkeys
• Pheasants
• Quail
• Chukars (presumably they're in the Treasure Valley, but I haven't seen them, to my knowledge)
• Stellars jays (I only saw one)
• Oregon Juncos
* Blackbirds
• Yellow-headed blackbirds
• Pigeons

Reported by other people I know:
• Cranes
• Pelicans
• Swans (in Boise)
• Bald Eagles
• Golden eagles
• Snowy owls (a relative says she almost hit one with her car; I don't think they're otherwise known to live here, however)

Our most abundant birds seem to be these, right now (2017 through 2020):
• Blackbirds
• Sparrows
• Doves
• Oregon juncos
• Robins
• Magpies
• Red-tailed hawks
• Robins

Bird feeders on my street almost exclusively attract blackbirds (both types), sparrows, and juncos.

The birds I hear singing the most (and identifiably) are blackbirds, doves, and robins. Cries from red-tailed hawks are fairly common, as are general tweets from unknown kinds of birds. I used to hear magpies a lot as a child; they're still around, but not quite as vocal. A few years ago, I heard a lot of barn owls at night, and one year I heard a lot of great-horned owls at night.

junco_
oregon_junco
blackbird_

• 7 Pot Gigantic SR Chocolate
• Aji Habanero (seeds saved in 2019)
• Big Mustard Mamma
• Black Mustard Bhutlah (seeds saved in 2019)
• Bulgarian Carrot
• Georgescu Chocolate (saved seeds)
• Jimmy Nardello Italian x Corbaci F2 (saved seeds)
• Lipstick (saved seeds)
• Neapolitan (seeds saved in 2019 and store seeds)
• Randy Sine's Evil Jalapeno, orange (seeds saved in 2019)
• Ring of Fire (Baker Creek one, saved seeds, 2016, not labeled for the raised bed in the shade)
• Sweet Banana (seeds saved in 2019)
• White Cloud (saved seeds)
• White Fatalli
• Others

If I obtain seeds:
* Paper Lantern

pepper_growlist

This article is interesting: https://nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/nph.12560

It gives us to know that sunroots are hexaploids (among lots of other interesting things).

Here are some seeds from the sunroots I grew (I say they're wild because I got my original seeds from a wildflower store).



Anyway, I have a lot more seeds to go (these are all of this year's flowers):


Those pictures were taken maybe a couple days ago or so. I got more seeds out of some dried flowers, and zapped all of the seeds I have out so far, in water. They're drying, now.

Some flowers have several seeds. Some have none. Some have one, two, three, etc. Some have seeds that are soft and maybe empty-ish.

I know our first frost was in October some time ago, and we've had lots of hard freezes since then. All the tomato plants are long dead, and most of the fruits are flat, soft, and/or and drained and dried (including the green, unripe ones). However, my Galapagos Island tomato plant (also long dead) had a number of fruits on it that look and feel good enough to eat! (I'm not planning to actually eat them, btw.) You wouldn't know they'd been frozen. Anyway, I'm wondering if the seeds I plan to save from them will sprout and whether this freeze-resistance will be genetic.

Here's a picture of them I took minutes ago (all but one or so were still attached to the dead and mostly dried up plant):


There were plenty more from the same plant that were softer than these, but otherwise were similar.

So, I'm making some Red-seeded Citron watermelon (AKA Colorado Preserving Melon, AKA Tsamma) crisp. It's basically a mock apple crisp. This is my second time making it. It tastes approximately like apple crisp. Sorry—I don't have exact proportions to tell you.

Filling ingredients:
* Citron watermelon
* Natural brown sugar (natural just means the molasses wasn't taken out and added in later)
* Nutmeg
* Cinnamon
* Citric acid

Topping ingredients:
* Old fashioned rolled oats
* Butter (ideally soft or melted)
* Brown sugar

Directions:
Cut the rind off the watermelon and then cut the watermelon into quarters. Remove seeds. Cut the watermelon into small to small-ish pieces, and remove seeds as you do so. Put the cut-up watermelon into a mixing bowl. Add brown sugar, nutmeg, cinnamon, and citric acid to taste (you can taste the filling raw to see if it tastes right). Mix. Put the filling in glass baking pans (cassrole-style pans). Separately, mix the butter and brown sugar, and then gradually mix it into the oats (mixing the oats while you do so); alternatively, use another apple crisp topping recipe. Put the topping on the watermelon filling. Bake on 400° F. for about 35 to 40 minutes.

If your topping can't handle being cooked so long, you may want to add it after the filling has been baking a while.

You could probably use the filling for pies and such, too.

One regular Citron watermelon is enough for about two full-sized watermelon crisps.

We were low on brown sugar, today, so we melted some raw sugar into the butter to make up for it (for the topping; we had enough for the filling). Hopefully it works! (It worked.)

You may like it with milk (especially if you added too much citric acid). Letting it sit in the milk for a while before eating may improve the taste further.

recipe_

Based off of things I've read (I do a lot of tomato research), and some things I've grown, I'm going to make a list of particularly notable tomato varieties here. I've only tried some of these. They're not all my personal favorites, but in my opinion, they're all notable, and if you grow them all I'm sure you'll be enriched.

Note that if I say 'see also', I don't necessarily mean that there's a genetic relationship between those two tomatoes, but rather that I think those ones may also be of interest. If it starts with a question mark that means I suspect it belongs in this list, but I'm not 100% sure.

If I put an exclamation mark before it, that means I personally think it belongs here, but that few to no other people that I know of particularly do. Two exclamations means other people think it belongs here, but from my experience, I don't particularly agree.

Tomatoes make it to this list due to one or more of several factors:
• Unusually good taste
• Production / vigor
• Popularity
• Hardiness
• Other notable qualities

• Amana Orange (Burrough's Strain; see also the regular Amana Orange, and Chef's Choice Orange F1)
• ?Ambrosia Red
• Amish Paste
• !!Aunt Gertie's Gold
• Aunt Ginny's Purple
• !!Azoychka
• Bear Creek
• Better Boy F1
• Black Beauty
• Black Cherry (see also Austin's Black Cherry)
• Black from Tula
• Black Krim (see also Noir de Crimee')
• !!Black Prince
• ?Black Sea Man
• Bloody Butcher (also see Mat-Su Express)
• Blush
• Box Car Willie
• Brandy Boy F1
• Brandywine (Sudduth's, OTV, Cowlick's, Yellow, Black, True Black, Red; also similar types like Caspian Pink)
• Camp Joy
• Carbon
• Celebrity F1
• Cherokee Purple (also see some other Cherokee types: Cherokee Chocolate, Cherokee Green, and Cherokee Lime)
• Chocolate Cherry
• Chocolate Sprinkles F1
• Crimson Cushion (AKA Beefsteak)
• Cuostralee (see also Pink Cuostralee)
• Dester
• Domingo
• Dr. Wyche's Yellow (see also Sweet Ozark Orange)
• Druzba
• Early Girl F1
• EM Champion
• !Galapagos Island (S. cheesmaniae; the early, yellow, round cherry)
• German Johnson
• Girl Girl's Weird Thing
• Gold Medal
• Green Doctors (also see Green Doctors Frosted, Dr. Carolyn, Dr. Carolyn Pink, and Galinas)
• Green Tiger (also see Maglia Rosa and Pink Tiger)
• !!Green Zebra
• Hillbilly PL
• Indian Stripe PL (see also Indian Stripe / !!Indian Zebra, and Cherokee Purple)
• Italian Heirloom
• J.D.'s Special C-Tex
• Jagodka
• Japanese Black Trifele
• Jaune Flammee
• ?Jim Dandy
• Juliet F1 (see also Jujube)
• KBX (see also Kellogg's Breakfast and Kellogg's Beefsteak)
• Malakhitovaya Shkatulka (see also Aunt Ruby's German Green, Green Giant, Grubb's Mystery Green, Hugh's, Cherokee Green, Cherokee Lime, etc.)
• !!Marianna's Peace
• !Marion (see also Homestead and Rutgers)
• Marzano Fire
• Mountain Princess
• !Napoli
• Opalka
• Orange Jazz (see also Jazz)
• !Ovita
• Pale Perfect Purple
• Pantano Romanesco
• Paul Robeson
• Persimmon
• !!Pineapple
• Pink Berkeley Tie Dye (see also Berkeley Tie Dye)
• Pink Oxheart
• Polish Linguisa
• Pruden's Purple (see also Vorlon)
• Rebel Yell
• Roma (also see VF Roma)
• Rutgers (see also Rutgers 250, Rutgers Schermerhorn 250, and Marion)
• Sausage
• !Sheboygan
• Stump of the World
• SunGold F1 (see also SunSugar F1, SunOrange F1, etc.)
• Super Snow White
• Sweet Cherriette
• Terhune
• Thessaloniki (see also Creole)
• Thessaloniki Ox Heart (AKA Thessie O; Note that 'Ox Heart' is the correct spelling in the variety name, even though oxheart is the correct spelling for the shape of this tomato.)

This question on BYU's 100 Hour Board is one I've probably thought about before, and the answer is great, IMO: http://100hourboard.org/questions/22782/

salt_

I put what I think are some Aunt Molly's ground cherries (from a volunteer plant) in some spots so they would volunteer there next year. It might be crossed with other ground cherries. It got bigger and tastier fruits than the Ammon Martin's and Rachel's Favorite ground cherries that I started from seed and transplanted, this year. They had black plastic and eastern shade, but Aunt Molly's had shredded wood mulch, and I guess it had some eastern shade, due to the grapevine.

We've had Aunt Molly's ground cherries growing on the property for a few years now. It's a good variety. However, I preferred the taste of Ammon Martin's and Goldie the first year I grew those (which was the second year I grew Aunt Molly's).

Aunt Molly's is a good variety, similar to Goldie and Ammon Martin's.

I first grew the King Winter watermelon in 2016, watered well without black plastic or any kind of mulch. It got a fair amount of small-ish fruits, with dull skin. the taste was like watermelon Jolly Ranchers. The seeds were black. I grew it again in 2017, with drought conditions, unmulched, without black plastic, with similar results. I didn't grow it in 2018. This year (2019), I grew it with black plastic with western shade. I grew seeds saved in 2017, and seeds from the original seed packet, this year. The rind has more prominent stripes than Navajo Winter. In 2016 and 2017, the rind was almost white.

The rinds look glossier/waxier and greener, this year, for fruits from both seed sources, which makes me think maybe warmer soil helps the rinds to be glossier.

I just opened a fruit (from seed from the original seed packet) and ate it. It was over-ripe and not surprisingly, didn't have the watermelon Jolly Rancher taste. The center was mushy and on the sides was firm. The seeds look larger, this year, but are black as usual. A lot of seeds were stuck together (but I separated them in my mouth).

Here are pictures of it:



This is a large spoon (I prefer regular spoons, but large spoons are the only available ones …):