Do you find a lot of hype surrounding some vegetable varieties?

[GardeningMike]

I was wondering the other day if anyone found some of the claims made for some varieties of vegetable seeds, e.g. comparing varieties in seed catalogues to be exaggerated, or worse, to appear to be untrue?

[davefromthechipie]

I was wondering the other day if anyone found some of the claims made for some varieties of vegetable seeds, e.g. comparing varieties in seed catalogues to be exaggerated, or worse, to appear to be untrue?

Yes Them catalogs /seed packets have to make out they are the best thing since slice bread or we wouldnt be sucked into buying them .Over the years i have tryed many types of veg seeds and have to say most of the time i find you cant beat the classics and return to them But then i find some veg that is true to there word like some tom .. for example T&M tomato tomazing that did what it said ( will not grow again its too sweet for me ) then supersweet f1 sweetcorn
I love this hybrid and always grow it every year ,the write up on it is about right Its hard to say if alot comes down to the way you grow them i guess. Still too many types and not the years in a life time to try them all It would be great if companys gave out examples veg , you know like the cheese /sausage ladys that somtimes are in your supermarket offering testers
Best way to pick seeds/veg is to come to places like this forum and see what other people think is the best But again its down to taste then it can lead to a paradox

[Two_Sheds]

Yes: fly resistant carrots.
Look at mine:

[vicky]

The Artic Plenty Tomatoes lots of us tried last year....
Where not early, got blight and the actual tomatoes were not even that tasty!

[Two_Sheds]

ditto sub Arctic. they were awful

[Alison]

You also have to learn to read between the lines like you do with estate agents or travel agents, eg reliable tends to mean they all turn up at the same time so you get a glut. A lot of seeds are really aimed at the commercial market and they have different requirements to the home grower. I prefer tall peas which you can harvest over a period but commercial growers prefer the lower growing ones (less support required and easier to mechanically pick) which are ready at the same time. I now work on trying things based on recomendation, occaisionally a whim but usually experience.

[Jillyreeves]

The Artic Plenty Tomatoes lots of us tried last year....
Where not early, got blight and the actual tomatoes were not even that tasty!

ditto sub Arctic. they were awful

Glad I read this tread, as was thinking of giving Sub Artic a go, dont think I will bother now

[GardeningMike]

Some howlers when it comes to hyping up seed varieties...

You also have to learn to read between the lines like you do with estate agents or travel agents.

Couldn't agree more Alison. The picture of the carrots infected with carrot root fly (I assumer these were originally described as a 'resistant variety') was a really good one.

Here are some more to be aware of...
Courgette DUNDOO F1: "...heavy yielding, highly tolerant to powdery mildew..." Well... powdery mildew hammered my pot grown ones, and I got significantly less than 1 kilo of courgettes before the plants keeled over with the disease and died! The leaves were almost white with the disease.

Courgette BLACK FOREST F1: "...unique climbing courgette, best grown in containers on patio..." Well... you'd at least expect them to be able to climb themselves... oh no! Every few days I had to tie them to their vertical wires. It's hardly as if they were shooting out muscular tendrils to heave themselves up along their growing wires...!!! Unique climber... well er yes - you do all the climbing work for them

Runner Bean WHITE LADY, yes nice smooth longish pods, pretty stringless averaging around 30cm length over the whole harvest period but pretty poor in yield, despite the hype, showing around 65% of Painted Lady's yield in my own pot trials in 2007.

I am sure I'll find a few more examples as time goes by...

[GardeningMike]

Another claim I've found untrue...

RED RUM runner bean... "40 days to 1st harvest"... what a lot of tosh . First yields occurred at the same time as runner beans maturing in 85 to 90 days in the same trial (e.g. Painted Lady)

[sez]

ditto sub Arctic. they were awful

ditto! got blight when nothing else did, didn't grow well, didn't taste good!

[Naga]

I was thinking about Tomato Tomazing but for £10 it's a bit to pricey, can you recommend anything as "sweet" for less £?

[davefromthechipie]

I was thinking about Tomato Tomazing but for £10 it's a bit to pricey, can you recommend anything as "sweet" for less £?

Think they charged 9.99 for 3 plants when i got them 2 seasons ago so for 5 its not bad really for them was worth the money imo ( friend & family loved them ) great tom plant just to sweet for me . Saying that if i had the room/another greenhouse id get some, i bet they would make a great source "umm didnt think of that at the time >.<

[Spiderling]

Oh hells bells..one of the tomato varieties I'm trying this year is Sub Arctic . Pity I didn't have a computer earlier to get on this forum!!!) Incidentally, one of the loveliest toms I've ever tasted, was a variety called Sonato,from Unwins seeds. The trusses were so heavy I had to support them and they were gorgeous. Sadly, I haven't found them again anywhere. has anyone else tried them? Cheers,

[DaveInBraknell]

I agree with a comment made earlier, I am looking at heritage seed variety, Amazon book market place is my friend at the moment. Loads of knowledge from 1940-1950's for about £5 inc postage and packing. They grew then because they had to post war, so they know what they are talking about .

Example from one of the books:

28lbs of Early seed potatoes in 4 30ft rows apparently can produce 150lb of tatties enough to feed a family of 6 for a year in early varieites..

Saves you on the seed packet when you realise its a pants variety.

ABC of Cloche Growing is one good source, another is The Culture of Vegetable and Flowers and the Complete Market Gardener..

Take a look at those old varieties then look at places like realseeds.co.uk etc (A bit more expensive some of them) but you know they'll be reliable. Sure some of them aren't carrot fly resistant etc, but then nature soon catches up with our hybrid tricks..

To me, working in the IT industry what this is about is trying to sell you a feature or a house (as stated earlier) all I want is a carrot. Unless your after something specific a carrot seed is a carrot seed, put some netting over it, or a cloche around it and it doesn't matter if it cost 99p or not.

The only thing with cheap seed sometimes is germination rate, but then go take a look at some of the cheaper seed sites, you can buy 50 seeds or a 100 seeds for a proportional price (Ie 250 cost you say £1. 125 would cost you 50p) saves on the wasteage I am sure we all have when we buy too much.

Sorry for the long rant

Dave

[Sue]

I agree,
As you go on growing you gradually find the varieties that are right for you and the occasional new one gets added to the list every year, last year rejects were the climbing courgette and the dreadful sub-arctic tomato. Last year I found the mini-green iceberg lettuce from T&M, which did really well, stood without bolting and was a good size for one person to eat over a few days.
As for carrots, I had two tubs of carrots, Autumn King and D'Eysines Fat Carrots from Real Seeds. Have just harvested the last of them, every single Autumn King had root fly but the D'Eysines didn't, only a few had rotted, I think due to being near the edge of the tub where it has been getting hot in the recent sun it def wasn't root fly. I checked the Real Seeds catalogue and this isn't listed as a virtue so don't know if it was coincidence or not, the tubs were side by side. So they're on my list again this year.

Sue