Sticker Shock!

[Killerbunny]

Was in Home Depot for a water heater timer and thought I'd pick up some cabbage and brussels plants. Yikes Cabbages (quite well grown $3 EACH and some iffy Brussels $4.98 for a pack of 6) Cashier seemed put out when I said no way!

[labradors]

Holy Molee!!!!!

[ross]

Hang onto your wallet the price of everything is going up . Even the price of down is going up .

[chicken]

I was noticing that too, even seeds are high priced.

[lolotsung]

I saw $5.99 for 3 peppers and thought... I don't like peppers enough to spend $2 on one pepper...also we decided to try Food Basics (opened last year) .. And it's a good place to shop... We have a Longos and Fortinos but both are quite pricey.... I'm kinda fresh obsessed so that's why I like Longos and Fortinos.. I think the best thing to do is buy most of your food at Food Basics and add in some higher priced special food from other places. . I saw seeds and thought... Maybe next year...not so sure I'll have time to prepare a vege garden this year...

Off topic but I'm trying to improve my coffee making skills using YouTube videos and it's very confusing because people are telling you different things! I did learn quite a bit after watching the videos... One thing was keeping the unit clean with a special white cleaning power and a special curved brush . And to compress the grinds so they are level... Need to hit the filter on the side and tap it on the table and then push down with the tamper... and match grind size with your with time to extract.. If you use eg 16 g of coffee then you should create 30 g of ezpresso... In 30 secs... I'll give this a try tomorrow.... I also caved and bought one of those boxes to knock the coffee puck out... I kept on saying I was going to build one and it wasn't getting built... LOL... I brought my machine in to get it fixed and the repair person said it's working?!?! Cost me $95. The repair person cleaned it inside out and changed the gasket and its working great now so I don't mind paying the money...

[labradors]

Speaking of pricey seedlings. Our Horticultural Society had their plant sale yesterday and I took some of my "extra" tomato seedlings along. Because they were "heirloom", they charged $6 a pot!!!! I thought that was a bit steep, but they all sold. (Some hybrids cost $1 a seed these days, so it's worth it to save seeds when we can....)

[lolotsung]

I never really understood why people bought petunia seeds when you can get a kabillion of them from one plant? Am I missing something? Same with tomatoes. I can see a person buying them because maybe they can't get the seeds when they need them. My dad literally takes seeds from any tomato he likes the taste of and grows the plant the next year. So why not just buy a tomato and put some seeds in soil? We used to put all kinds of seeds into soil to see what would happen. We had oranges then put the seed in soil and had an orange tree. We had avocado. Just about everything would turn into a cool looking plant. LOL

[labradors]

Most plants come true from saved seed - except when they are hybrids!

Your dad may have liked a grape tomato from the grocery store, and saved some seeds. However, he might have been very disappointed to find that he had grown a great big beefsteak with tough skin (which took after one of the parents). That's why it's important to know the variety and check to see whether or not it's a hybrid before saving seeds.

I like to save my own tomato seeds and grow mostly O.P. varieties, but there are some excellent hybrids out there - e.g. Sungold - the taste of which cannot be duplicated, even though many people have tried unsuccessfully to de-hybridize it over the years.

Petunias can be the same. If the purple petunia seeds that you saved were hybrids, you may find that they grow in other colours or patterns :).

[lolotsung]

He has cherry tomatoes and he medium tomatoes he call Costco tomatoes (recent addition) and a giant 6 foot tomato from when we were kids...

Since I like all colours, I guess that would never be an issue with me. This is a great point though. If you want light purple petunias and you get bright red. You would not be a happy camper. LOL

[labradors]

Lolotsung, if your Dad likes the Campari or Certo tomatoes (from Metro), they apparently grow true, but are assumed to be hybrids. I grew Certo one year and they were great compact plants with perfect clusters. However, much as I enjoy these varieties in the winter, there are better varieties out there for summer-growing.

I find genetics fascinating and wish I'd got into it when I was younger.