2023 & 2024 - Aubergines

2022 Thread at https://gardenandgossip.org/showthread.p...=aubergine

We've had some Love or Hate chat about growing Aubergines recently so I've dug out my Aubergine seeds to see if anything tempts me to try again. 
Interestingly, there are a couple that are described as Thornless. One is "Ivory" which is a white one. Orlando is "virtually spineless" and has 2" (?diameter), finger length, bitter-free fruits.

The other advice I read was to pick them small before they start to change colour as they turn bitter when they change (which indicates that their seeds are ripening).
White ones turn yellow, purple ones turn brown - pick them before they change. 
I've always been unsure about when to pick them, as I've only seen shop ones that are huge compared to anything I've ever grown so I've been leaving them as long as possible thinking they would grow bigger.........and been disappointed

The happiness rule seems to be, pick them small, young and at the right colour. 

I have seeds of :-
Ivory (white)
Clara (white)
Miranda (deep purple)
Kermit (green golfball
Orlando (dark purple )
Viserba 3 (long, purple - bitterfree flesh)
Long Purple (deep violet)
Rosa Bianca/Rotada Bianca Sfumata do Rosa (white turning purple with rose pink stripes - said to be non-bitter)
Black Beauty (dark purple)
Turkish Orange (Orange!! pick young to avoid bitterness).

 Decisions, decisions!!

I’ve grown 
Kermit ( thanks to you   ) . Very productive, big golf ball, small tennis ball size. 
Long purple they were quite productive but because they were so skinny ( fat marker pen ) you needed a lot for a meal. 

I have black beauty not grown yet.

This is Real Seeds page for Aubergines - varieties, seed sowing and seed saving advice.
https://www.realseeds.co.uk/aubergines.html

I have seeds for a small purple one called Topan so I'll be trying that this year.

I didn't grow any last year ........will I this year?
Did you? Are you going to?

I didn’t last year either. I’d like/ hope to this year.
I have some new varieties to try and I’d like to get the lovely Kermit growing again.

The only thing I grew successfully when I tried chillies, peppers and aubergines were greenfly. I spent hours squishing. I'm not sure I can grow enough fruit to justify the time for pest control. So probably not.

Hopefully I'll be growing them again this year. They did quite well last year (it is last year now). The plants grew very well and looked really healthy but the fruit were quite small and didn't seem to want to grow big. Long purple seemed best able to fight off greenfly, it's leaves are a lot smaller than most and it grew quite tall.

Sown my 2024 Aubergines:-
Kermit F1
Miranda F1
Pinstripe F1
Slim Jim
Black Beauty

I have a possible cunning plan. Since I can't save seeds from the 3 x F1 Aubs I'll grow them in the same GH. The other 2, Slim Jim & Black Beauty can be isolated in their own personal GHs. That's the plan anyway. There's nothing like planning ahead when you've only just planted the seeds.

I’ve been putting off sowing some & pretending I don’t want to. But after seeing a few posts saying aubergine have been sown. I’m doing it. Monday I’m sowing aubergines.