Salutations from the Space Coast

[rco3]

Hi, everyone.

I’m Rob. We live in the shadow of Kennedy Space Center, zone 10a, and I’m ramping up some gardening efforts.

As a kid, I was fascinated by Epcot’s “The Land” pavilion and the boat ride through all the futuristic gardening stuff. I’m an engineer, always have been, and even worked on a couple of vegetative experiments that are on ISS as of this moment.

It is perhaps unsurprising, then, that most of my plants are hydroponic or container-based. I’m focused more on Micro and dwarf tomatoes, space-constrained and sustainable growing setups, etc. Naturally I had to include Micro Tina, being bred for ISS missions. Wind took out my larger outdoor stuff in December but the micros outside in containers have been producing uninterrupted since the summer.

Last year I only grew 7-8 varieties; this year I plan to expand that by a lot. More multiflorals, dwarfs, and some more micros as well some trendy indeterminates. I’ve started more Orange Hat and Golden Hour from seeds that I saved last month, and of course I have other things going too. Albion strawberries, some spinach while it’s still getting down into the 60s, dragonfruit from seed…

Overall, I’m expecting to learn a lot more here than I can teach, but I’m happy to share anything I know or learn. I would expect that lighting or process control might be where I’ve trod a less-typical path that others might be curious about; it certainly won’t be tomatoes or growing them in general. I am plotting some youtube videos describing some of what I’m doing with reusing some recyclables for containers - again, nothing earth-shatteringly new, just sharing what i’ve done for those who might be interested.

Hope I didn’t go on too long, kinda surprised how garrulous I was. Happy to be here, really have enjoyed lurking here up to now.

[pepperhead212]

Welcome to the forum!

[AKgardener]

Welcome from Alaska and a micro dwarf grower as well .. still trying the other dwarfs haven’t dabbled to much with those but most definitely doing a lot this year.. good luck this year

[Frosti]

Welcome to the Junction! I had no idea, there was a variety that was bred specifically for the ISS and I'd love to hear more about it. From what I could find it seems like an extra tiny micro. You say you're growing hydroponically, which is said to negatively impact the flavor of tomatoes. Is that the case with your tomatoes as well?

[PlainJane]

Welcome from up the road in N. Florida!

[worth1]

Howdy from Central Texas.

[bower]

Hi Rob!
I think the space friendly take on tomatoes and other foods is super cool. Only recently learned about speed breeding techniques for really fast fruit turnaround - the more temperature and light controlled setups are pretty far from my current situation, but since growing indoor greens in winter has become a must-do for my family, it's really relevant to learn more.
Welcome to the forum!

[Cornelius_Gotchberg]

Welcome from the Land of Cheese & Beer.

The Gotch

[Whwoz]

Welcome to the junction from Down Under @rco3

[MissS]

Hello and a warm welcome to the Junction @rco3. It's great to have you with us. What you are doing sounds so very interesting. I can't wait to hear more. The lighting really has me intrigued.

[FatBeeFarm]

Hi Rob, welcome to the forum from the White Mountains! I'd love to hear what you think about the flavor of Orange Hat. Mine turned out meh last year compared to my regular cherry tomatoes. I just let the chipmunks have my orange hat tomatoes lol

[AZGardener]

Welcome to the Junction!

[Shule]

@rco3
Welcome to TomatoJunction!

[rco3]

Wow, there's a wave of welcome! Thanks, all. I see a lot of TJ regulars, I'm flattered.

I started with a fairly long response, but there's really a couple of topics in there. I'll start some new posts in the appropriate places so they can be found if needed. Then I tried to toss a couple of short answers, and I am apparently incapable of a short answer. One more try....

Frosti, I grew four varieties both in an outdoor soil container using Foxfarms organic fert as well as in an outdoor hydroponic NFT, but I didn't segregate them for tasting comparison. I regret that, you've asked an excellent question. FatBeeFarm (love the name), I have to confess I can't say much about OH flavor vs. other cherries; really it's my middle kid who likes cherries, and she loved the OH but we only had Micro Tina and Blondkopfchen to compare directly. My personal quest is more about tomato sauce, for which cherries are of limited utility. My MIL said she had trouble getting past the color not being red, but she may just have been looking for a nice way to say she didn't like them. She did like the Mini Marzano. I don't feel like that's a very satisfying answer, FatBeeFarm, and I'm sorry.

Lighting - well, all else being equal, free photons are better than buying them. When I grow indoors I use retail grow lights, bought from megainternetretailercorp of your choice, as that's about the most efficient and cost-effective way to generate a usefully broad photon spectrum. If you're buying, look for lights with output between 700 and 750 nm as well as the more typical 400-700nm range; it turns out that 700+ photons do very little by themselves, but replacing ~15% visible photons with far-red photons in the same quantity results in more plant mass. Natural sunlight already has the preferred spectrum. And it's FREE! (with purchase of real estate). Lots of important and worthwhile - though maybe less than rigorous - citizen science is being done re: agriculture lighting by people growing rather more lucrative harvests in their dorm rooms, etc.; we did include far red in the ISS experiments I worked on.

A Heinlein quote from N. Florida - hey, Virginia Heinlein retired to Atlantic Beach after Robert passed, IIRC. No relation, I assume?

Thanks again to all for the warm welcome.

[MissS]

Wow, there's a wave of welcome! Thanks, all. I see a lot of TJ regulars, I'm flattered.

Hmm, and just how long have you been lurking here to know who the regulars might be???

[Paulf]

Welcome from a Nebraska grower who loves to visit our other home in February at Melbourne Beach just a bit south of you. I could never grow anything in the sand and besides we are never there long enough. Post often.

[rco3]

Fair question, MissS; perhaps I should have said, “regulars over the last couple of months”, or “more prolific posters of late?” I saw a few handles I recognized. I guess I’ve been here in read only mode since maybe December?

Melbourne Beach is a little farther than I typically roam, but I’ll count that as neighbors. Howdy! I confess that what I plant in the ground around here rarely thrives either. Sawgrass and Brazilian Pepper seem to be the dominant flora hereabouts.

[GoDawgs]

A gracious good evening and hearty welcome from east central Georgia. Good to have you aboard!

[GVGardens]

Welcome from Central Texas! I'm trying a bunch of dwarfs this year for myself and a couple of micro dwarfs for my friends' kids. Can't wait to learn more about your lighting setup.

[rco3]

I'm seeing some interest in artificial lighting, and maybe some interest in hydroponics. What sub-fora do you folks think these topics might belong in?

To follow up to some above discussion, if it's not too late, I asked my cherry tomato expert what she thought about the Orange Hat in general and what she thought about the differences in flavor due to where I grew them. She says that the Orange Hat is sweet and citrusy, and that it never occurred to her to think that some of the tomatoes tasted differently because of where they were grown. If there was a large difference, she reasons, she would have noticed and wondered why.

I'm also seeing a lot more usage of response emojis than I'm used to, I'll try to get up to speed. Thanks again for all the welcomes! Friendly place.