Garden...

kudzu said:
Yeah.. its a great technique.

I am excited and have to brag. I LOVE Morning Glories and Moon Flowers .. and they are so difficult to start... Very hit and miss getting them to germinate from seed.

Eureka.. rub the seeds between two small pieces of sandpaper, dump them in a bowl of warm water and cover with a wet paper towel.. They sprout in 48 hours.
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Sandpaper! I never thought of that! I read to scratch them with a knife, then do the soaking but even then it was hit or miss. So did you get a good crop going? I just love moonflowers. I'll take some seeds if you get any!
 
Phantasmal said:
I prefer gardening in Alaska, I haven’t quite figured out how to do it in the extreme heat.
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Yeah, you sure can't grow the same things in zone 976 or whatever yours is. lol I'm really loving gardening up here ... finally can have pansies all summer instead of two weeks in March. The daffodils last into June! Nasturtiums do fantastic!

In Missouri I had mostly natives like coneflower, coreopsis (tickseed), bee balm, honeysuckle, butterfly weed (asclepias), Joe Pye weed, echinacea, milkweed, various grasses like little bluestem, etc. They can take the hot sun, the heat, the humidity, and even drought. Here's a list of some that might be helpful:

https://mdc.mo.gov/conmag/1997/06/wildflower-favorites
 
Kacper said:
Not a fan myself. Think they taste like grass. My beets are getting close though, so I will be filling jars myself before too much longer.
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That's funny.... it's exactly what Mr. Owl says about green beans as well. I love them; he loathes them.
 
Got the beans done then went out in the heat and picked our first gallon of blackberries. Got a bumper crop this year. Vines are loaded.

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Kacper said:
Well, obviously, Mr. Owl and I have sophisticated palates (if you ignore that we both know what grass tastes like) :innocent:
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LOL -- I asked him that the first time he said it. "I just know it tastes bad." He is one of the pickiest eaters I've ever seen and dislikes almost all veggies. He'll eat them though if disguised in a casserole or stew or stir fry.
 
ThatOwlWoman said:
LOL -- I asked him that the first time he said it. "I just know it tastes bad." He is one of the pickiest eaters I've ever seen and dislikes almost all veggies. He'll eat them though if disguised in a casserole or stew or stir fry.
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Weedeating/mowing is the answer. Do it for very long and you are bound to end up with grass in your mouth at some point.
 
Here are our gardens from this time last year. We have had a cold and slow start to the growing season this year so far; stuff is about half this size.

wkSt8JK.jpg
 
Phantasmal said:
Those are beautiful! Tart or sweet. Blackberries are one of my favorites.
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A mixture of both tart and sweet...a very good mixture. I have some tame ones and my place is surrounded by wild ones as well so every year I put up a mixture of the two. I just freeze them in gallon freezer bags and use them mostly in my breakfast smoothies. I take some out and make jelly as needed. Maybe 2 cobblers a year.
 
ThatOwlWoman said:
Here are our gardens from this time last year. We have had a cold and slow start to the growing season this year so far; stuff is about half this size.

wkSt8JK.jpg
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Very nice. Lovely view too. I love gardening ... and foraging. Those hobbies combined with hunting and fishing means we make few trips to the grocery store. And I know I’m biased but I think my stuff tastes better than the grocery store’s. That’s a beautiful picture
 
leaningright said:
Very nice. Lovely view too. I love gardening ... and foraging. Those hobbies combined with hunting and fishing means we make few trips to the grocery store. And I know I’m biased but I think my stuff tastes better than the grocery store’s. That’s a beautiful picture
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Thanks so much. We love it here. I also go foraging -- leeks, shrooms, berries. I don't think you're biased at all; home grown foods *do* taste better.
 
ThatOwlWoman said:
Here are our gardens from this time last year. We have had a cold and slow start to the growing season this year so far; stuff is about half this size.
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What is the virtue of a poly-tunnel. I have never understood the PT vs. Greenhouse thing as some people have both. Maybe it is because I live in the south where some years I can have garden going in some fashion 365 days and in really cold years 9 or 10 months of the year depending on what the snow does to the greens.
 
leaningright said:
Very nice. Lovely view too. I love gardening ... and foraging. Those hobbies combined with hunting and fishing means we make few trips to the grocery store. And I know I’m biased but I think my stuff tastes better than the grocery store’s. That’s a beautiful picture
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Home grown usually tastes much better. I had a greenhouse in Alaska, grew tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers that didn’t do well in raised beds outside. Root vegetables do very well in Alaska as do cuciferous veggies. Giant pumpkins and zucchini, too. Started all my seeds indoors and transplanted to the raised beds.
 
Sam's has their garden center plants on serious mark down but they haven't advertised that locally or even changed the signs. Bought a couple $17 blueberries that rang up as $6 and change blueberries so ended up buying out all they had--3 pink lemonades and 8 Dukes. If they had more I would have bought more LOL. I love me some mark downs in the garden center. Tomorrow going back with the truck and test driving the fruit trees to see if same thing happens. I can seriously up my permaculture game for a couple hundred bucks if so.
 
Kacper said:
What is the virtue of a poly-tunnel. I have never understood the PT vs. Greenhouse thing as some people have both. Maybe it is because I live in the south where some years I can have garden going in some fashion 365 days and in really cold years 9 or 10 months of the year depending on what the snow does to the greens.
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The hoop houses (PTs) are meant to extend your growing season on both sides. They give you a head start in the spring and allow you to keep warm-weather stuff like peppers and tomatoes going farther in the fall. A greenhouse is usually heated, at least in this climate, and allows you to do some kind of growing most of the year. Or you can let it rest over the winter, and start warming it up in early spring when you start your flats. Because of the winds off Superior, we take the cover off in the fall and put it away. We didn't get it up till late April this year because of the blizzard we had mid-month. I'm pondering though trying to figure out a way to protect it from the winds and keep it up all winter so I can get a bit earlier start. I will still have to start plants indoors though, unless we want to spring for a heat source out there for night time.
 
Phantasmal said:
Home grown usually tastes much better. I had a greenhouse in Alaska, grew tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers that didn’t do well in raised beds outside. Root vegetables do very well in Alaska as do cuciferous veggies. Giant pumpkins and zucchini, too. Started all my seeds indoors and transplanted to the raised beds.
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Alaska is unbelievably *amazing* for gardening! This photo is of my friend's brother's house; the gardens are in the back. My friend was our wedding officiant and we were hitched in these beautiful gardens, up in the hills just outside of Fairbanks. On the other side of their house is a huge terraced veggie garden with 12-foot moose fencing. I took this in 2015, when I went up solo to spend a week with him following his cancer diagnosis. He was gone 3 months later. BTW, his brother and wife built this home themselves.

9i7jHGV.jpg
 
Kacper said:
Sam's has their garden center plants on serious mark down but they haven't advertised that locally or even changed the signs. Bought a couple $17 blueberries that rang up as $6 and change blueberries so ended up buying out all they had--3 pink lemonades and 8 Dukes. If they had more I would have bought more LOL. I love me some mark downs in the garden center. Tomorrow going back with the truck and test driving the fruit trees to see if same thing happens. I can seriously up my permaculture game for a couple hundred bucks if so.
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SWEET! Literally. How do blueberries do in the South? Do you have to grow special cultivars?

I guess I won't tell you about both our driveway and our road. They are lined with wild blueberry plants, the low-bush kind. Small berries, but like a burst of sugar on your tongue. Oh darn, guess I told you. lol
 
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