11/9/2023 0 Comments Pictures of okra seedlingsShortly thereafter, I hosted a Nationwide, Heavy Hitter Okra Growing Contest. Just another photo of the 'nubs' left by pruning the lower leaves for better airflow and better vision of my surroundings. (My Wife still makes fun of my skinny, white, legs leaping through the air, as I flailed the corn stalks wearing a pair of cut off blue jeans). ![]() I ended up chopping several plants down, just trying to find that thing to kill it. I once had a Water Moccasin strike the handle of my hoe so hard that it nearly took it from my hand as I was weeding my corn. I like to see where I'm stepping, as I've had way too many close calls. I plant my rows pretty wide because of that. This photo shows how I like to keep the ground clean around the plant bases, due to the tendency for Water Moccasin Snakes and Copperheads to seek out cool refuge under my okra plants during hot summer days. This is just a photo showing the branching characteristics and the spacing of my plants. I do this each year, to promote more branching. This photo shows some of the 'nubs' left from leaf removal with a pair of pruning shears. (Notice the 'nubs' from leaf removal along the sides of the bottom branches. Since it was such a warm Spring, these plants really put on a lot of foliage that needed to be pruned back before pod production had begun. These photos were taken in late June, about 10 days before pod production. I was using white plastic that year, due to a very warm Spring planting. Here are a few photos of Heavy Hitter Okra, being grown in my garden in 2015. Here is the link to a short clip of a team of Haflingers mowing hay, the way we used to do it here. The two of us (Bill and I) used to break gardens on 5 different farms each Spring, using a team of Haflinger horses and a mixed team of mules. Bill Trammel is shown here, busily breaking my garden with his old mule named, Earl. This photo was taken in February of 2011. The resulting 23 degree temperatures and gale force winds, for the next six hours froze every seed pod. The fire was inside a semi-truck tire rim, which was full of oak coals, burning inside the hoop house when high winds ripped the plastic off the end. I had been spending the night out there on a cot, tending the fire. High winds ripped the end off the hoop house and blew my fire away. (It was to no avail though) a freak storm destroyed the hoop house about a week after this photo was taken. ![]() I only had supplies to build one small hoop house, so I chose this single plant to protect. like I said, deer had eaten so many of my plants in that year of drought, that they were spaced too far apart to try and save more than one plant. By that time, I had built a small hoop house over this single plant, to help protect it from frost. This is a photo of that very same plant taken in October, 2011. For that reason, I harvested okra from this plant right up to the end of the season. I was picking okra for the Farmers Market that year and had been nearly wiped out by deer predation, so my plants were spaced as far as 20' feet apart. The pods are shown on display at the bottom of the plant. ![]() I had harvested 44 tender pods of okra, from this single plant that day. ![]() It was the first photo I ever took of the Heavy Hitter Strain of okra that I was developing at the time. At the suggestion of a couple of my good friends, I've decided to start a Heavy Hitter Okra photo thread, featuring photos, past and present, to kind of make it easier to find the old photos.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |