Anney, thank you. I actually have that catalog, and will order some Merlot. Oilpainter, I liked Red Sails too, when we lived in upstate NY. However, here in Texas I had no luck with it--it didn't like our heat/humidity, I guess. I agree, the mixed lettuces are good, too. I have put some in a container for the patio to have "instant salad." Thank you for reminding me. I'll get out my wide container and prepare it for some mesclun!

Fast Forward : A Year Or So Later. On the plant spacing I have done some improvement and have become more generous : -) I have allocated about 3 sq-ft per plant. that is 20% increase. I must say that, this just give more head room and air space. Even in 2.5 sq-ft area the roots will have more than enough soil volume ; Almost 16 gallons. OTOH: if the real estate were no object , I would give each plant a 3ft by 3ft area, ie, 9 sq-ft. An then put a nice big cage around each. ON THE VARIETY: I am growing ONE Old German plant ( as in OP ). My OG, seems to be one of the slow growing indets in my garden. It is also very slow in getting into sexual phase. It has just few tiny buds, where 50% of other varieties are setting fruits an the rest have flowers.

Thanks all for your inputs. That is encouraging to hear about Macoun and King David varieties, as I've never had one, but they sounded like quality apples. My apple palate isn't as refined as most folks, I guess my favorite over the years has been Gold Delicious. I prefer apples to be firm, tart and have some sweetness to balance that acid. We picked a bag of Macs up at the local Kroger, and I thought they were pretty good, with all those attributes. To be honest, other than store bought Macs, I don't know how they'd compare to fresh off the tree. But, I would venture to say a store version is prob a poor to fair representation of what a fresh apple would taste like. I'm sure it's not like that all the time, but I would guess most of the time. I spent almost 30 years in Texas, and you just don't get fresh apples there like you do in more northern areas. Peaches, pecans, yes, apples, not so much. So, I had to rely on store bought. Three of my selections are Mac offspring, so I think those ought to be good apples for us. Especially the Macoun, I've heard and read many good reviews of it. A lot of my tree selections, to be honest, were based on what other folks had written about them. A lot of my decisions were based on the orangepippintrees website, and their descriptions, and I wanted trees that had average to good disease resistance. Grimes are popular in these parts, so I got a couple of those, since it's also a Golden Del parent. But, our trees are still just whips with some leaves and a few small branches, so we'll have to wait at least a couple of years before we can sample any of them. All of them are about 50% of standard or smaller, so I'd think we ought to get some fruit in at least three years. So, until then, we'll have to settle for some local orchards to provide us with what we want. There is an orchard within an hour of us over near Paris, KY, called Reed Valley, that is growing 8 of the same apple varieties we are, and both peach varieties we have. So, I'm excited to check them out later this year. Plus, there's tons of orchards up in Ohio that I'd like to visit as well. Right now, my biggest concern is keeping the varmits, mostly deer, off my saplings. I have them all protected with circular fencing, so that should keep them at bay for now, but I'm going to have to beef that up when the trees start growing up over their protection. At least this will keep them off the lower parts, and since the fencing has 2*4 inch spacing, it ought to keep out the rabbits. But, our next chore is to get our 70 tomato and 20 pepper plants in the ground soon. It's been so cold and rainy this month, it's put that part of our gardening way behind schedule. We've already got corn and potatoes growing, though.

I grew Kelloggs in the orange year. It was pretty good (Jubilee and Juane Flame won that year) I've eaten Mortgage Lifter, and it is also pretty darn good. I'm trying something new this year, so since you only have one space, maybe experimeny with it too. Twinning. If you have a structure that can handle it, grow 2 different kinds together in one spot and treat as one large plant. What else has your sister already started? If there's already a lot of slicers, I'd do a pair of the Bonnie Best. If there is already a nice variety of what you want toms for, then go for visual impact and plant two colors together :) I've settled into my processing tomatoes I grow- 4 plants. A pair of Italian hearts, and a pair of German meats. So two twins this year. I do some canning, but different than I used to. I can some finished tomato products like salsa, sauces, and smoked tomato juice. I tend to freeze a few bags for later. And I dehydrate a lot more than I can or freeze. Mostly fresh slices, and also the stuff left over from other processing. Like the solids from tomato juice or skinning frozen tomatoes often gets dehydrated and turned into powder. In a final trick. I will take my canned salsa or sauce and later dehydrate it to powder down to add into other. Kick up that guac with a dry spoonfull instead of a wet one, or the extra in beans or enchilada soup.