Thanks! Hyssopus does bloom the first year and is semi-evergreen depending on how cold the winter is. Wish I would have had better luck with Bunnytail Grass germination, but only got a few to plant in mixed containers. They would make a nice border I think. My Gaillardia aristata 'Burgundy' is much taller and lankier than Gaillardia x grandiflora 'Burgundy, but if you plant other stuff around it the long flowering stems have a place to weave in and about. All Basil I've ever grown are usually easy to grow, but this year the ones planted in the ground are just bait for earwigs so they haven't had a fighting chance to gain much ground. Even though I do everything I can to make make my garden not so habitable there seems to have been another population explosion...it got better for a few years DANG!!! I have to move my container grown plants every few days around otherwise the earwigs set up camp and have little earwig children LOL! Peppers are doing great!! So far I've got fruiting on all the Jalapeno, Bolivian Rainbow and Turkish Cayenne. Still waiting on the Pinnochio's Nose and my 2nd year Habanero to start.

Galiano, are you looking at the pic above or below my 'unknown beefsteak' comment? The one above is brandywine, but the one below (the unknown) actually has regular leaves, which might not be clear from the pic. Just have them in regular old triple mix. My 'seedlings' were large when planted (if I plant small seedlings, they just don't have enough time to produce a lot of fruit in my short season). I use dilute MG from time to time, some high P initially to help roots, then some high N to get the plants going a bit, then more high P later to promote flowering. I apply a lot less than the directions suggest. Also mulched this year for the first time. Other than that, we have not had a lot of rain so I have been able to control the water, and despite the cool weather there has been a fair bit of sun. However, despite the attractive plants, fruits are still at least 2 to 3 weeks behind where they normally are. Star stuff, the typically relied upon last frost date is around May 24 (which coincides with one of our statutory holiday weekends), but for the last few years the weather has been far too cold to plant on that date. We had frost near the end of May this year, and in the first week of June last year. So, end of the first week of June was when plants went in the ground for me. Won't get frost again until end of Sept. or maybe October, but I have found that fruits that I harvest after the end of August tend to be a bit sub-par in terms of texture and flavour. With ideal conditions I would usually be harvesting great fruit from the middle of July to the end of August, with a few outliers coming early, and plenty of second-rate fruits in sept and into oct. Humidity finally starting to show up now, along with some warmer nights, and a few more months of this should help the fruit grow nice and big. Of course that weather tends to wreak a bit of havoc on the foliage, but thats ok as long as I get to start eating tomatoes soon.

HighlanderNorth, where are you located? I'll be right over to eat that ugly tomato for you! I'll save you from it! Seriously, that tomato sounds just right, and I would not have hesitated to eat it. The first slice would have been nekkid, the second salted, and the 3rd in a luscious BLT! Dang! I made myself hungry for a nice ripe warm tomato from the garden and all I have are greenies! (And that doesn't mean green when ripe.) **Betsy sternly points herself back to task at hand.** There is some variation in color on Cherokee Purple, largely due to where they are grown. It seems if they get more sun in a hotter area, they tend to be darker in color, or more "purple." I get variation between tomatoes in the same season, but seem to have more variation from season to season, just like we do with flavor. Southern CPs are generally darker than northern ones. (The same tends to hold true for other "black" and "purple" tomatoes. I've included a Google image search link below so you can see the variations in colors. Betsy Here is a link that might be useful: Images for Cherokee Purple

Mine look just like that before they ripen, I think, but they ripen to a dark purpley red. So see how they ripen up first. I would post photos but I ate the last ripe CP yesterday. I will have to wait to more on my counter to ripen. Unless I am mixing up my varieties. German Johnson, Cherokee Purple and Early girl are the only "large" ones that have ripened to eating stage for me yet. Sue