I potted some of those into double Solo cups today,
and found this helpful.
moving seedlings from a hydroponic system to a soil based system
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I didnât realize that fava beans were such pretty plants.
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The raised garden has been covered with frost cloth for a fair part of the winter. Pulled the cover off a couple of weeks ago, and decided to trim back the two eggplants, which survived but had some frost damage on the outside. While doing that, I started seeing litle bitty eggplants so I decided to pick them and try them out. I ended up with nearly two dozen of them, from ping pong ball to baseball size! And they were really good and sweet. Kinda hard to get out of the skin at that size, but I was surprised that they apparently kept on producing during the cold weather.
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Almost forgot- and then I found weird little cystic-like structures inside a few of the fruits, so I popped one out and it looks for all the world like a wee tiny eggplant. Anybody seen anything like this?
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I planted a bunch of fava beans, carrots, spinach, chard and beets a couple weeks ago, and some more spinach, carrots and beets yesterday.
Chances are they wonât come up. LOL. I keep replanting every week or so.
We have frost until late May, but you never know!
Some oregano, parsley and kale from last year is starting to grow again.
I bought a grow light. Here are some flowers:
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Wouldnât it be great if every flower made a nice, fat fava pod? 
Thatâd be a lot of yum!
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Thatâs a new one for me. It does look like a triple ovary led the way to internal fruits. Fused ovaries can happen with tomatoes when theyâre really wet, but thatâs usually a clumping together on the outside, making a super-big fruit. Strange things, these plant beings.
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Still waiting for the snow to melt. Sigh.
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Do you know how many âgrowing daysâ you have where you garden? Apologies if youve told me bef.
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I probably havenât, because I donât know. Sunset zone 12, USDA 9b. And you?
It gets squirrely here, especially the last few years. And in June it gets upward of 110 for days at a time, I think one year it was 100 days over 100 degrees, and dry as can be. Not only is it really rough on plants in general, itâs no fun watering outside in that weather.
Daves Garden says;
âEach winter, on average, your risk of frost is from
November 28 through March 10.
Almost certainly, however, you will receive frost from December 19 through February 7.
You are almost guaranteed that you will not get frost from April 11 through November 7.
Your frost-free growing season is around 263 days.â
National Gardening Association says
âOn average, your frost-free growing season starts Mar 31 and ends Nov 13, totalling 227 days.â
But the frost usually only lasts a few hours and thereâs always something I can grow outside here, and heat is sometimes the limiting factor. We get 91 to 120 days over 86, and 35-42 days over 100 degrees Fahrenheit over the last three years.
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Thatâs good to know, and sounds accurate. Thanks for looking it up!
Just to be clear, that was for where I live. I plugged in my zip code.
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Wanting to grow summer squash this year! I have not grown it before, as we are not fans, but Iâd like to try chayote ; in laws call it âcho-choâ and Iâve seen it called mirliton.
and one of the round varieties I see in Mexican markets.
Anyone have experience with these?
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Yes, I tried growing chayote (Sechium edule) years ago. The vines did very well but didnât make flowers until it was too late to mature fruits. I suspect the variety I had, from Peru, was short-day photoperiodic. The vines got huge. The other cucurbit from Peru that had the same late flowering was Kaywa, Cyclanthera pedata. There are probably varieties which would produce here. I suspect CAâs longer growing season would greatly help.
The round squash, Cucurbita pepo, tastes like zucchini to me. Iâve grown a couple varieties which came from Italy. Theyâre slightly nuttier-tasting. The ones I grew were not long vines, but bushier plants. Ronde/Tondo di Nice is a good one. Tondo di Piacenza is similar.
The Italian squash, Costata Romanesco, was the firmest, nuttiest of the C. pepo, zucchini-like squashes. They get to be very large plants, short vines with huge leaves. It makes a good tempura and the very young fruits are delicious. âSmaller than zucchiniâ depends on when you pick it! They can get huge.
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Iâve grown some round Italian zucchini. Theyâre nice for stuffing.
Iâve grown some Italian zucchini that are variegated, as well. I like the look of them a little more than the dark green ones. I canât tell the difference in the taste.
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Thank you @bogman and @Phoenikia !
I find chayote less watery than the typical summer squash around here, and I think I saw one of the round summer squash on a Mexican cooking show, and it was described in some way I found interesting. I canât recall why. 
ETA I think it was Rick Bayless
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Love the round zukes, they make great pan fried patties and the scraps go to the soup bag in the freezer.
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