Happy New Year! Winter is a time for gardeners to take a well-deserved break, but it’s also a time for making decisions about the upcoming growing season. Seed catalogs have been piling up for weeks, and the sheer variety of vegetable and flower seeds available can be overwhelming. Here are a few suggestions from the experts that may help you choose the best of the new and familiar vegetable and flower varieties for your 2022 garden.
The Cornell 2021 Vegetable Varieties Trial Garden Annual Report is out. Last year, 24 counties around New York State participated in the Garden Based Learning Vegetable Varieties trial by growing either a nine-bed or five-bed garden. Varieties were rated based on categories similar to what would be collected in grower field trials.
Program Coordinator Laurie VanNostrand reports that the trial’s purpose is to find vegetable varieties that work well in varying conditions across NY State. The 2021 trial was supported by Harris Seed Company through a donation of seeds and a presentation to staff, which provided more detail about each of the trial varieties.
Vegetables with the highest ratings included Tomato ‘Sparky,’ Kale ‘Lancinato,’ Radish ‘Amethyst,’ Pepper ‘Aji Rico,’ Winter Thyme, and Spinach ‘Acadia.’
Cornell also field trials flower varieties. The best from 2021 include Cyperus (sedge) ‘Graceful Grasses Prince Tut’ (Proven Winners); Solenostemon ‘ColorBlaze Torchlight’ (Proven Winners), a striking coleus; pastel Petunia ‘Dekko Sorbet’ (Syngenta Flowers); Verbena ‘Meteor Shower’ (Proven Winners); Portulaca grandiflora ‘Sundial Pink’ (Benary), which Cornell noted did remarkably well even in extremely wet conditions; Dahlia ‘City Lights Neon’ (Select One), which features dark leaves and bright magenta-colored flowers; Bracteantha ‘Granvia Gold’ (Suntory Flowers), a striking strawflower with large yellow blooms; and Salvia ‘Unplugged So Blue’ (Proven Winners).
All-America Selections has already picked some winners for 2022. Included are two beautiful tomatoes with distinct striping. Tomato ‘Purple Zebra’ F1 has a high disease resistance as well as rich and complex flavors that are both sweet and acidic, but leaning to sweet. The texture is moderately firm. ‘Purple Zebra’ features a deep red flesh with bright green striping. Tomato ‘Sunset Torch’ F1 lives up to its name with bright yellow-orange flesh and strong, dramatic, bright green striping. It has a mildly sweet, fruity flavor and, like ‘Purple Zebra,’ is disease resistant.
If you enjoy growing sunflowers, you may want to try ‘Concert Bell’ F1, with bright golden-yellow blooms. The flowers are in multiple clusters of 10 to 12 blooms on a single, strong, erect columnar stem. ‘Concert Bell’ grows five to six feet tall and has excellent seed germination. One cut stem can make a beautiful bouquet.
If you plan to grow zinnias from seed, check out the 2021 AAS Gold Medal Winner ‘Profusion Red Yellow Bicolor,’ a new bicolor addition to the popular Profusion series. The Profusion series now features a range of ten colors that provide proven garden performance even during the intense heat of late summer.
