I’m going to give it a try.
I will do a grow out of extra early long necked varieties for the 2026 season. Would be interested in discussing this here as per **Malte Rod’**s suggestion. It only makes sense to somewhat aggregate relevant information on specific projects under a common thread. Both for our own future reference and for newcomers alike. I will scatter photos of some of the seed stock I think could contribute immensely to this effort, as a cunning way to invite participation of the respective members, both with seed and ideas… also, it serves as a way to acknowledge the work of some of our fellow gardeners, excite the realm of the possibilities and makes this post seem less dense and more reader friendly.
So to be really precise, the idea is to work towards establishing an extra early long necked open pollinated Moschata population. I am volunteering to grow and intercross a selection of promising varieties, lines, landraces and individual plants, that could strongly contribute to this population during the 2026 season. The resulting grex will be distributed with participants for the 2027 growing season.
Some general lines of thought that are guiding my reasoning so far:
-Palatability of immature fruits and extending the growing range further North as the two main general criteria to select for. Many individual traits contribute to these and should be heavily present in the original mother population.
-”A highly curated handful of really promising parents/landraces and trying to get all the possible crosses among them, ideally including two way crosses both as pollen donor and fruit producer”. Due to the exponential nature of the number of individual crosses to be made each time a new variety is added, and the increased complexity of all the logistics involved, I am considering that the earliest 5 individual plants (from different accessions) should be the ones selected for the hand pollinated grex. If manageable, this would amount to 20 individual crosses: 4+3+2+1=10 times 2, for two-way cross =20
- The remaining plants, as long as they align with the general “extra early long necked open pollinated Moschata” objective, will also be screened and evaluated for relevant traits and the seed shared with members. Exceptional plants originating in grexes, landraces, F1 hybrids or otherwise unstabilized accessions, will be self pollinated if feasible, in order to stabilize desirable traits.
- Plants will be grown in existing trellises with enough spacing per accession for easy identification.
- If seed amount permits, they will be sown earlier than normal (the first of April if soil workability permits) in two different settings: both direct seed in the soil and in 1 liter plastic pots in a protected but roofless nursery house. The in situ plants will help inform propension for cold soil germination and cool weather development and will be tended and maintained to the end of the season. The potted plants will be transplanted to a different section of the trellises and will provide another setting for the comparison among accessions as well as the population from which to select the lines to be hand pollinated.
- No other Moschata will be grown in the 2026 growing season in the near vicinity (at least a 200m radius)
Would like to hear constructive feedback on how to make the most of this grow out.