The plot holders at O'Connor COGS community garden share plants and produce and advice. Last week we mentioned a Gigantomo tomato grown there and now we have spoken to the couple who sourced the seed. Giovanni and Rosetta Andriolo saw amazing tomatoes growing on a visit to Italy but could not bring seeds home due to Australian customs regulations.
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On their return to Canberra they found online suppliers, placed an order from the factory in England and three weeks later, last winter, an envelope arrived containing 12 seeds. Gigantomo is an F1 hybrid "outstanding beefsteak type" of tomato with "superb texture and excellent flavour with 10 fruits per plant". In 2015 at Harrowgate Autumn Show in Leeds, Joe Atherton won 1000 pounds for growing the biggest Gigantomo tomato in the United Kingdom. It weighed 1.75kg.
One O'Connor grower sent an email to plot holders showing "facciamo la passata di pomodoro" - a thick "river" of bright red tomato puree coming out of a Fabio Leonardi manual tomato machine. It separates seeds and skins from tomatoes. They are cooked and preserved in a Vacola jars using a pressure canner, a new Presto canner these days which is suitable for induction cooktops. She has been canning for 45 years and, this season, used 99 percent San Marzano variety tomatoes raised from seed in a glasshouse at home.
The worm turned
In this writer's garden the possum has denuded plants throughout the courtyard but there was a new problem. My two Amish paste tomatoes, one a gift from Jim purchased as a seedling from Marymead sale, the other raised by me from seed, had reached the eaves of the house. The variety originated in the Amish community in Wisconsin, United States. World heirloom tomato expert David Cavagnaro rates them 100 percent like Grange wine. As I was about to pick my first red tomato, out of a neat hole wriggled a fat green worm - drunk on Grange?
The gardeners of O'Connor came to the rescue. Their view was that the culprits are tomato grubs coming from a moth that flies only at night. Dipel was recommended to eradicate them. These "bud worms" are now dealt with by tying gauze bags around each truss of tomatoes.
A celebration
Readers will remember our Kitchen Garden column which featured 99-year-old keen gardener Veronica Dunphy. To celebrate her 100th birthday, the Canberra Organic Growers Society in Dickson is inviting current and former members to visit the community garden on March 19, from 10.45am (following a working bee).
Michele England, who also has a plot at COGS Dickson, has written about Veronica in the current Autumn edition of Canberra Organic, the quarterly publication of COGS.
Convener of COGS Dickson, John Robertson of Ainslie (Kitchen Garden, June 7, 2022), has invited me to the event where the ACT COGS executive committee and other guests will celebrate Veronica's amazing achievement and sing Happy Birthday.
Readers may recall that John was growing 123 edible plants in his garden when we visited it last winter. He now reports that he visited the garden of Dr Mark O'Connor about whom I had written and Mark gave him a Saskatoon berry, babaco, casana, American paw paw and Chilean guava plants. John has added a jaboticaba and a Cavendish Williams banana to his garden so now has more than 140 edible species in his garden. His turmeric is "going gang busters" but his ginger was very slow getting out of the ground.
Yates hamper giveaway
For decades, Yates has responded to what they acknowledged as an enthusiasm for gardening in the ACT district. Radio and television presenters, members of the many local gardening clubs and newspaper gardening columnists were invited to see new products over lunch at the botanic gardens, Lanyon, restaurants and nurseries.
Angie Thomas, longtime horticultural communications manager, upon hearing about my 40 years of weekly contributions to The Canberra Times, offered a hamper as a giveaway through this column. It includes a 30cm diameter Yates pot filled with the current edition of their Garden Guide, specialty potting mix, a book for the Top 20 Indoor Plants, and packets of seeds for sowing now - broad beans, snow peas, baby beets, radish and dwarf peas. Value is about $100.
The hamper will be sent to the winner direct from Yates so please send me your name and address with your entry to: bodenparsons@bigpond.com
The topic is "From woe to wonder" - tell me in 25 words or less what edible has failed and made you sigh in despair or been a favourite on the table at your place this summer-into-autumn season?
