Can anyone provide me with a link to a high quality heirloom seed company?
Also, can anyone recommend heirloom varieties of:
Largest, meatiest tomatoes.
Watermelon. They have to be fast growing as I have a short season and I have had limited success with large oval varieties. (Unless you know a fast growing large oval variety that will mature quickly in a short season).
Largest, sweetest strawberries.
Brussels sprouts
Cauliflower
Lettuce.
Thank-you.
https://www.rareseeds.com/ - Baker’s creek Seeds.
Mortgage Lifter - Big Tomato or Cherokee Purple
Watermelon - Sugar Baby maybe
Lettuce - Little Gem, Tom Thumb, Winter Density, Black Seeded Simpson, maybe Artic King.
Greeneyes has given you an excellent list in post #17
Your success at gardening is dependent upon your horticulture zone location, altitude, climate, soil type, plant selection, etc., etc.
Also, how much time you are willing to devote for success, and how much information you can glean from others who are successful gardeners in your geographic area.
A good source might be to contact your local Co-Operative Extension Office, and/ or Farm Bureau.
A soil analysis would be a good start to see the condition of your soil, and determine which soil amendments you could add to increase fertility and production.
Baker Creek and Seed Treasures are both good heirloom companies: https://www.rareseeds.com/ and http://seedtreasures.com/
For large tomatoes, I’m fond of Climbing Triple Crop. It’s probably the biggest one I grow. I test a few more varieties every year.
Watermelons, look for Blacktail Mountain. It has a very short growing season.
With strawberries, I’ve never managed to grow big ones. Ozark Beauty has good flavor though, as does Sparkle.
I don’t grow the others on your list, so I can’t say.
I used to work for the Seed Savers Exchange. Best 8 (working) years of my life!
These are suggestions of varieties I’ve grown in the past. Not ALL are heirlooms, but you can never go wrong with AAS Winners for production and disease resistance.
https://all-americaselections.org/winners/
Watermelon: Moon & Stars or an ‘icebox’ variety. We have very poor luck growing melons here in SW Wisconsin, so I have never had any HUGE successes in this area, other than Moon & Stars. :(
Largest, sweetest strawberries: Honeoye or Ozark Beauty
Brussels sprouts: Franklin
Cauliflower: Amazing or Snowcrown
Lettuce: I have about 3,000 ‘favorites’ in that area, LOL! If you want ‘heirloom’ go with Jung’s ‘Heritage Mix’ or, ‘Black Seeded Simpson’ or ‘Paris Island Cos (Romaine)’
Seed Saver Lettuces; I’ve grown them all, was a Test Garden for them for many years. Start here:
https://www.seedsavers.org/quick_find/lettuce-looseleaf
Good Luck! :)