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Photo Credit: Rob Cardillo

Burpee’s new ‘Sweet Seedless’ Tomato is sure to be an interesting addition to your vegetable garden.

Amazing! Biggest yet! Sweetest! These superlatives (and more like them) are just some of the words you’ll find describing many new and fabulous plant varieties for home gardeners to try. With every plant catalog page we gardeners turn and with every picture we see, we want to believe those rich bits of descriptive prose we read. Then we faithfully fill out our seed order, mail it in and wait.

But we gardeners in Southern California have to be a bit more judicious than the average American about choosing which veggies and flowers to grow in our gardens. We have to remember that if we order cool-weather flowers (or even some of the vegetables that do best in winter), it’s okay to have the seed on hand, stored in a cool, dry place for planting in fall. Of course, we can use most of the summer-planted flowers and vegetables. But we have to choose carefully: Some will do well in our many mini-climates, and some just won’t.

After years of reading catalogs I’ve learned to be careful and try to use good judgment in ordering. I get my catalogs early from the major seed houses, and I usually spend a couple of weeks going through them several times to evaluate the “new” items. (Sometimes the seed companies send me samples to try out the year before introduction, and that helps.)

At the end of the day, one lesson I’ve learned is that just because something is labeled “new,” it doesn’t mean that it’s better. But I have been able to pinpoint a few new varieties of flowers and vegetables from seed that I think will do well in Southern California. Here are my 2009 picks…

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Photo Credit: Rob Cardillo

‘TigerEye’ rudbeckia is a tough, hardy plant that grows well in hot weather.

Burpee’s offerings:

‘Sweet Seedless’ tomato – Described as an early tomato (68 days), this may be the first seedless tomato to get good recognition and to produce well in the garden. There have been seedless tomatoes around before, but they weren’t good size, they weren’t that seedless all the time, and they didn’t grow well. But this one just might be what we’re looking for in a new tomato in the garden.

‘Diana Blueberry’ hybrid dianthus – Dianthusisone of the most rewarding of the small bedding-type flowers. Those of us who are over 39 remember the “pinks” that Grandma grew in her garden – charming little flowers with a heady scent. This new dianthus has a color not usually found in the class – almost a true blue – and it’s a strong and reliable grower that’s best for a massed bed or an edging. The catalog description says the plant will take summer heat, but I’d be cautious. (Mine will be planted in a spot that has a little shade during the hottest part of the day.)

Rudbeckia ‘TigerEye’ hybrid – All of the rudbeckias, including such well-known ones as gloriosa daisy, are perfect for Southern California. They tolerate heat, they bloom and bloom, and their colors are magnificent and strong. ‘TigerEye’ is a hybrid, so it’ll be vigorous. Its main attraction is the production of lots of golden yellow, 3-inch blooms. All rudbeckias are easily grown from seed, and this is one class Southern Californians can start in fall – or in early spring in frost-free areas.