Some Like it Hot Sale is May 5

Windsor Garden Club is holding a "Some Like it Hot" flower and plant sale from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Windsor Town Green Community Garden on Sunday, May 5. Plant prices are $3 each for 4-inch container. Buy 4 or more at a discount of $2.50 each

Up for sale are veggies and flowers that are truly too tender to do very well if planted before the nights are reliably in the 50’s. And we are offering our “Some Like It Hot” plant sale along with tours of the Town Green Community Garden as part of the Windsor Days celebration and the town's Cinco de Mayo celebration on the green.

I hope you come down to see us and get healthy plants grown from seed by the club. All proceeds will go to support the Town Green Community Garden, our SRJC scholarship fund and our other projects. See you Saturday at the Garden!

What's for sale? Scroll down for our varieties of basil, eggplant, tomatoes, peppers, watermelon, tomatillos, zinnias, sunflowers and more!

Veggies

Sweet Basil

The epitome of a "Some Like It Hot" veggie. PD food writer Anna Michelle Jordan wrote in her last column that it is said that one should not plant basil until you can be comfortable laying down naked on the ground. Well, the predicted lows for the whole week of the 7th are in the 50's. Let the basil planting and the naked ground laying begin!

Sauce and Paste Tomatoes

Cour di Bue

Italian bicolored meaty oxheart, red/pink with olive green shoulders. Real tomato taste, like your grandparents grew, excellent fresh and for sauce. Large vigorous plant, heavy early producer. Tags: Type: Indeterminate, Harvest: Late, Color: Bi-Colored, Size: Large, Shape: Oxheart, Specialty: Heavy Producer (Have not grown at home. Seed catalog description)

Amish Paste

Another paste tomato that is tasty fresh as well. Medium sized and juicy. An Ark of Taste selection. Grew them last year and they were very disease resistant and productive. No blossom end rot and little blossom drop. Medium sized indeterminate that came a little after mid-season. Very pretty and shiny on the vine.

San Marzano

The Italian tomato that is considered the best sauce tomato in the world. Productive but prone to blossom end rot. Important to enrich the planting hole well with calcium and nutrients and keep to a regular watering schedule. We will have Matt Erickson's planting hole magic recipe at the sale. He has planted heirloom tomatoes in his bed for 9 years in a row and has no disease problems. Steve Albert also enriches with lots of compost and takes care of his soil and grows tomatoes year after year in the same sunny spot. This one is for the dedicated gourmet kitchen gardeners in the crowd. Large indeterminate. Needs a big cage.

Roma

A compact determinate tomato hybrid that is disease resistant and heavy bearing. Meaty with few seeds. The most popular sauce tomato in America.

Millionaire Japanese Eggplant Hybrid

Prolific hybrid eggplant that was requested by our gardeners due to outstanding performance last year. Great choice for a small kitchen garden. More productive and does not need peeling or salting. Loves heat so it is great for the southwest side of the bed.

Cucumbers

Lemon Cucumbers

The popular vining cucumber for eating out of the hand or in a salad. One of those varieties that do not ship well so they are a home gardening delight! Train them up a slanted trellis. Vines grow about 4 feet.

Straight 8 Cucumber

The most popular slicer. Thin sweet skin on a vining plant to 6 ft. Grow up a trellis for straight fruit. This variety has been delicious and productive in our community garden.

Armenian Cucumber

Long light green tender cucumbers on a vining plant. Very productive and reliably sweet. Another success in the community garden.

Homemade Pickles Cucumber

Productive 5 foot vining plant. Pick small for baby pickles or wait until 5-6 inches for great pickles. Harvest promptly for crisp juicy pickles. We will have mammoth dill seeds to share for those interested in pickling.

Parisian Gherkins 50 days. Gherkins are tiny cucumbers used for pickles. Pickle them at 2" for French cornichons ("little horns"), or at 3"-4" long at maturity. Also enjoy whole in salads for a unique presentation. 24" semi-vining plants are ideal for small garden spaces and containers. Excellent disease resistance to scab and cucumber mosaic virus; tolerant to powdery mildew. A 2015 All-America Selections winner. Something new for us to try.

Peppers

Peppers are heavy feeders that like it hot but prefer consistently moist soil. Pinch your peppers to create a bushy strong plant. Sometimes the branches can be brittle so a small tomato cage support is advisable. One of our very experienced gardeners weaves twine on either side of his row of peppers to create a Florida Weave to support his peppers. It is a great way to grow lots of peppers in a small space. Check out bed # 12 later in the year to see how.

Jalapeno

Super productive pepper you need for salsa through the summer. Runs mild to medium hot. Easy to grow.

Serrano

Hotter pepper than jalapeno and just as productive. Easy to grow.

Pasilla

The pepper used to make mole. Both mild, sweet, and hot! Maturing from green to brown, Pasilla Bajio can be used fresh in enchilada sauces and salsas while still green; once they turn brown they can be dried and ground into a powder to be used in Mexican mole dishes. Wonderfully tasty! I have had them at The Barrio taqueria in Sebastopol in a fermented veggie topping and they are delicious that way as well.

Padron

The popular tapas pepper. Fry them up in a nearly dry hot skillet with the tiniest bit of oil . A super snack salted. They vary in heat on the same plant so once in a while you get a hot surprise.

Poblano

The classic chili relleno stuffing pepper. This is a great variety to grow but does not produce a ton of peppers like the serrano and jalapeno so plant more than one if you love them as much as I do for cooking. Adds a sweet mellow heat to any dish. Just roast it and chop it and add it to rice or potatoes or anything you want to give and added deep and complex flavor.

Jimmy Nardello's Pepper

A super productive sweet/hot Italian frying pepper that ripens early and keeps on going. A very disease resistant and tough heirloom favorite. If you want that sweet/spicy pepper flavor to add to your onion saute as the base in any dish this is the one to plant for continual pepper availability. These give you non-stop peppers once they get going.

Yellow Banana Pepper

A prolific sweet pepper that is good fresh and for pickling. Nice to have a super productive plant in a small kitchen garden! This pepper, a Jimmy Nardello's, and a jalapeno or serrano will keep your kitchen rocking with flavor all season long.

California Wonder Bell Pepper

This is the thick walled pepper we all love. Even more incredibly sweet and crisp picked from your own garden. Not super productive or early like some of the other peppers but I have yet to find a sweet pepper with the thick juicy meat of a bell pepper. (If anyone has a candidate let me know.) If you want a big harvest plant more than one. Want a green bell pepper for adding to your food? Just pick this one green. They are not different varieties.

Watermelons

Sugar Baby Watermelon

These melons are about 10 pounds at most. 2x4 foot space and 75 days to harvest. Sweet and crisp. Check out this link to learn when to harvest your very own watermelon.

Ali Baba Watermelon

Considered the best tasting watermelon in the world by passionate melon growers. I bought one at the heirloom festival and that is why I started these seeds. I could not believe the flavor. Also learned that seeded watermelons are naturally sweeter than seedless. This one does not have a tremendous number of seeds though. The fruit can grow huge-up to 40 pounds and the plant requires a 6x4 foot space and is 100 to 120 days to harvest. Plants are large, vigorous and give heavy yields of oblong fruit which do well in many conditions. The flavor is superb, being very sweet and luscious; and the texture is very crisp. Bye-bye front lawn! (Don't tell my husband.) I will let you all know when I have a ripe one to share down at the garden.

Tomatillos and Ground Cherries

Tomatillos Sprawling tomato-type plants that are a must for green salsa. Harvest when they drop to the ground. Plant two to insure fruiting. If you are in the community garden this is probably not necessary as there will be other plants nearby. I went one year without fruit at home.

Aunt Molly’s Ground Cherry

Angelita and Letitia say ground cherries are absolutely delicious so I had to start some seeds. Especially since I weeded one out of Angelita's bed during fall cleanup thinking it was a tomatillo. A sprawling plant that will require some space. Probably 3-4 feet. Much loved for their sweet pineapple flavor. Reviews seem to suggest that the flavor is variable from plant to plant and season to season so I hope we got good seed! Let's compare at harvest time. I like the idea of having a little snacking fruit growing in my garden. Supposed to be good for jam too. The starts look beautiful, healthy and sturdy and my research says ground cherries are self-fertile, so unlike tomatillos, only one plant is needed for fruit. Here is a link about growing ground cherries.

FLOWERS

Flowers for Butterflies, Bees and the Vase!

Blue Hyssop (Agastache) Hyssopus officinalis) Excellent for attracting bees and butterflies, bright blue flowers, drought tolerant; a superb antiviral plant that many use to treat the flu, etc. This seed was given to me for free at the Seed Bank. They look healthy but most often are sown in the ground rather than as a transplant so be gentle!

Asclepias Tuberosa

( Milkweed for Monarchs)

I have about 75 milkweed starts to give away to the public at the June meeting on Butterflies and Caterpillars. I will have some to sell at the sale if you want to get started now but they are kind of small now.

Zinnias Specially grown Zinnia varieties for large cut flowers all summer long. Average water and good air circulation needed. Attracts clouds of butterflies when planted in mass. Transplant gently as double varieties may revert to single blooms if you tickle the roots or disturb them too much. Harvest Tip for the Vase: Grab stem about 8 inches beneath the bloom and shake. If stem is droopy or bends wait a while. If the flower stays erect it is time to harvest. 7 to 10 days in a vase. El Dorado Zinnia

My favorite from last year. Seed available for sharing. Beautiful with blue salvia in a vase.

Benary's Giant Wine Zinnia

Benary's Giant Zinnias have the largest blooms and may grow 4-5 feet tall so put them in the back of a bed. Professional florist favorite. A deep red that I was missing in my garden last year. Like it better than the orange/red.

Purple Prince Zinnia (Dahlia type)

Very productive and the butterflies seemed to prefer it last year. I had clouds of them in my garden above the zinnias.

Benary's Giant Salmon Rose

Another Benary’s Giant Selection.Can't wait to see these in bloom!

Cherry Queen Elegans Zinnia

3-5 inch blooms. 30 inch height. Put them in the front or in a smaller space.

Dinnerplate Cactus Dahlia

That is a person hiding from the camera behind these blooms. They are as big as her face! We will be offering plants grown in pots from tubers donated by Patrick Llerena. I also have 3 tubers that are sending up shoots now. What wonderful bouquets these will make! Great deals on great beauty! Display these stars solo in a vase or with a bit of subtle greenery so they can really shine.

Sunflowers

We have planted our sunflower seeds in deep vineyard containers so you can cut them open and lay them in the planting hole. Sunflowers have a deep tap root so dig your hole and plant gently ! A must for anyone with children to impress-adult or otherwise.

Cutting Tips for Vase: Harvest when the first petals are starting to open and strip the leaves from the bottom 3/4 of the stem. No flower preservative is needed.

California Grey Stripe

6-8 feet tall-Top choice for seeds.

Red Sun

5-6 feet Branching. Pinch off buds for a single long stem if desired.

Giant Sungold

5-6 feet. Branching with very little pollen. Large head with long stems. Starburst Panache Sunflower

4-5 feet and branching.

Erin Benzakein of Floret Farms writes of this sunflower saying, " I've grown dozens of sunflowers over the years, and none has ever outdone this one. Its ultrafluffy, shaggy petals and dark green-brown centers make for the most fantastic display." I have seed from our very own sunflower expert Tom Gulya to share if you would like some. I am growing it for sure!