ripe

went out to the garden after work today to water and while i was tramping around the garden i found that some of the potato fruits i had netted to keep the critters off had softened, ripened and begun to split open in what must be the potato fruit equivalent of seed head shattering in other plants...you can see the seeds through the split in the fruit in the bottom photo and when i cut them open i noticed two things immediately...first the solanine positively reeked and second, the seeds were literally oozing out of the fruits as the mucilage was far more liquid in these than it is in the fruits i soften by leaving them to ripen in paper bags...it has very different qualities...after the first fruit was processed the water had turned cloudy...by the time i had done the last one it was difficult to tell if there were any seeds in the water...compare the photo of today's finish ( third ) with the photo of the seeds i processed from bag ripened fruits two days ago ( fourth )..i wonder if the vine matured seeds have a higher germination rate ( i sense an experiment coming on ) than the bag ripened ones...the ones ripened in paper sacks are viable...all the plants i have grown from seed have come from that type...but there was never a 90% germination rate in those...more like 60% or 70%..after theses dry i do believe the gibberellic acid and clay pots will come out...a bit late in the season but there are always lights in the plant room.