Welcome Back to another episode of Lost in the Farmers Market,
where we discuss aspects of gardening from an angle you might not have seen
coming. To be honest half the time we have no idea what angle we’re coming from;
but then that makes each episode more fun than if it had been scripted. For today’s
topic I’m going to answer a common question asked about the test gardens and by
extension settle a long standing quandary of sustainable gardening.
So the one question I get most frequently comes after I run
through the yearly harvest numbers. Visitors to the gardens, market or during
the talks given as part of Sustainable Neighbor’s own events often ask me what
I do with all that produce. The obvious answer is that by bulk most of it does
quite literally get consumed on premises. After all if one went through the
trouble to grow produce, then it makes sense that it should be consumed by the
person behind it provided there is not some amount of surplus. It should be
said that when one harvests several ounces of say cherry tomatoes it’s not as
plausible to eat them all before they start to go bad since the plants will
just keep producing as long as I keep picking and providing for their needs. So
this brings the conversation to other means to enjoy the harvest and extend the
useful life of a given harvest.
I notice it’s often at times hotly debated if canning or freezing
your produce is better, and indeed most gardeners actually should be using both
methods. The fact is canning and freezing both have their strengths and
weaknesses as well as processes that need to be observed to produce better
final product. Canning in common context refers to the preservation of produce
under glass using mason jars. Typically the food is stored with a bit of
preservative liquid or broth and once sealed is generally held to last for a
few years if all processes including sterilization of materials were completed
properly. It should also be said that any food canned and intended for long
term storage should be fully cooked to prevent the unwanted growth of fungi and
bacterium inside the jars. More often than not you will know a canned batch has
gone bad because the pop-up section of the internal sealing lid will bulge out
and the jar may leak around the rims. A bad smell may come from a poorly canned
batch of produce. With that said the chief strength of canning is the longevity
of your product, it needs no refrigeration, it is largely temperature insensitive
and can be as safe as store bought product with the advantage of you knowing
precisely what all the ingredients are.
In respects freezing is the high nutritional value cousin of
canning. The net advantage to freezing foods is that you need less preparation,
sterilization and depending on the food little or no cooking. For instance when
it comes to most fruit you can literally wash it, cut it to size and freeze it.
Once thawed frozen fruit can be used in a given recipe and since it’s been
frozen it’s still in whatever shape it was when you stored it. This makes
freezing the great alternative for storing acidic foods, and is viable for
storing bullion made of herbs or broth concentrates. The down side to freezing
comes with unintentional thawing, if the power is out or your refrigerator
should malfunction you may be in some trouble.
Personally I use both methods but with a slight
modification. Produce from the test garden in late spring through late summer
is frozen and anything else is canned. The intention there is to create a
stockpile of ‘fresh’ food supplies to add to dry storage foods during the
winter. As a trick for this the canned goods are in broth, and that broth is
vegetarian base with extra garlic, oregano, basil and rosemary to increase
preservative effects. Admittedly if I can get it I often include Perilla with
ginger to assist the shelf stability of the canned produce.
That said as some of you might know, I have significant
fruit crop harvests and that goes directly to the freezer for use either in
baked breads or cakes during the winter or it ends up as a component in
brewing. Take for instance this year’s Blueberry harvest, we had a LOT of
rabbit eye blueberries to the tune of two and a half pounds frozen, and then
some wild picked blue berries came into the picture and this was the result.
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| Six pounds of blueberries total produced this color, so hard-core! |
I’ve no idea what this will end up as, but then it’s all
just a fun experiment, and you don’t see many blueberry wines out there either.
Who knows this could be 2014’s slammin-ultra-sensation-libation! Ok…channeled
Macho Man Randy Savage a bit there….apologies in advance if that blew some of
your minds up. But hey how does LITFM follow something that cool up in this
post? I know pictures from the field those are definitely gonna finish up the
brain-splosion effect.
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| Adenium obesum – Desert Rose |
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| Aloe hybrid – Silver Ridge Aloe ‘Rare Flare’ |
For once the foliage isn’t the focus as this aloe is a
summer bloomer and in a shade of red-pink that is worthy of note. I sold
smaller potted plants from this mover plant last summer and it may return for
the summer houseplant season this year. Also some red Gomphrena (annual flower)
and Blue African Basil has sort of crowded into the picture.
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| Ocimum kilimandscharicum × basilicum 'Dark Opal ' – Blue African Basil |
In reading the long Latin name above yes blue African basil
is a cross between Dark Opal basil and Camphor Basil and bears both of their
best traits. This mature specimen is the source of all blue African cuttings I
sold this year and has proven to be the fastest rooting plant in the gel
propagation tests short of chocolate mint. Because it produces so many flowers
the mason bees and other similar insects love this plant.
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| Aloe deltoides – Checkerboard Aloe |
At the corner of the block-row beds, is my Checkerboard Aloe
specimen plant. But alongside you can see Aztec Gold African Marigolds and yet
more red Gomphrena. The combination gives some good color, form shape and
drought tolerance.
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| Miribilis jalapa – Four ‘O’ Clock & Gomphrena globosa – Globe Amaranth (Purple) |
In the bed that had the lupines I planted a number of
gomphreana to hold the soil and keep weeds in check then sowed four o clocks
and cosmos to begin the perennialization of the bed. For note Four O Clocks are
actually perennials in our climate as is the lupines the globe amaranth and cosmos
will self-sow.
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| The treatment of Squash stem Borers. |
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| "He's an ugly little spud isn't he?!" - The Ghostbusters |
Yeah my volunteer gourds got the borers so I went on the offensive.
In the cases of stems I could move I cut the borers out. Note that where a
borer enters he’ll make a gross looking plant seal around the entry hole
composed of its dried feces. Usually the borer isn’t far from that so you can
see the entry hole plug in the first picture hanging off the stem. Inside is a
grub about 1” long that’s all white except its head which is either black or
red. In the case of picture one I pried the ugly thing out and killed it. In
the case of picture two where I could not move the stem I waited until night
and shined a bright LED lamp under the squash stem until I saw a dark mass
inside then drove three old sewing pins through the borer to stop it from doing
any more damage. The next morning I used a small but very sharp 2” folding
knife to cut the now very dead border out of the squash. Needless to say squash borers are little bastards and utterly devastating when your squash is
encouraged to grow up on a trellis. On the ground the squash will root at
intervals making the borders less effective. If this is a regular problem try
butternut squash…no hollow stems plus the borers hat butternut squash for some
reason.
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| Plumbago ariculata – Cape Leadwort |
The word Plumbum comes from the Latin word for Lead,
Plumbum, which is seen on the Periodic table as Leads short hand Pb. It got the
name because of the plants sap creating lead-like stains on the skin leading to
the ancients Greeks and Romans to believe it was a cure for Lead Poisoning. The
blue flowers also somewhat resembled the color of lead under certain
circumstances also. Now keep in mind I got this from the distressed plant bit
at Lowes and this type of plumbago is a hardy perennial. It’s already responded
to its new home quite nicely.
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| Amorphophallus alba – White Voodoo Lily (left) |
So in the category of odd Latin names Amorphophallus comes
from the ancient Greek words Amorphos and Phallus or literally misshapen
Penis. Yes the guys who named plants
totally had sex on the brain ALL. THE. TIME. Now why is it in the test gardens?
Well for one it’s the white voodoo lily and that makes it kind of rare. The foliage
as seen goes well with the Barlowe Double Columbines and has come up thicker
this year than any prior year. The flower resembles a Calla lily sort of but
the ‘petals’ are more cup like and the actual flower, that thing in the center
called a Spadix is sort of well man-bit shaped. It’s one of the few members of
the Arum family that can grow around these parts with no special provisions for
care. When this blooms…oh how the innuendo will fly.
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| Hibiscus coccineus ' Texas Star' - Scarlet Rosemallow 'Texas Star' |
I've had a member of this particular breed in the test gardens for years and as some have you have heard the little old lady used to think it was pot and would call the police on me for "flagrantly promoting drugs!" Well now there's a pair of them in the crescent garden and both are blooming, but the flower is so nice I had to snap a picture of it. It's like the tropical hibiscus but with all the native hardy durability so it's literally the best of both worlds. Did I mention the huge red flowers that bear nectar that can attract humming birds?
But with all the garden silliness and funny names being
tossed about it’s easy to forget that the Fayetteville Farmer’s Market is open
on Wednesdays from 2pm to 6 pm and on Saturdays from 9am to 1 pm. The market is
located at the Fayetteville Transportation Museum and runs all year around.
There is plenty of parting and there are both bathrooms and an ATM on site
within the museum. With every week we get new vendors and the market grows and
now we have a food truck that specializes in burgers. So not only can you get
your fresh produce but you can now get fresh ice cream lunch and keep up with
the best and latest info about the Agriculture scene. But below you can check
out the plant offerings this week at the market.
Southward Skies: A
northern guide to southern Gardening
This is the second
edition of my book, which was published using data compiled from several years
of test garden operations. It’s written to aid gardeners of all skill levels in
successful garden methods that are targeted for the south east but had proven
to be a valued resource for gardens across the eastern coast. It’s certainly a
good gift for that gardener you know or for yourself if you’d like to have a
reliable field guide. The book costs $25.00
and we do take checks for this item, you can even have it signed.
On Sale: (3x for
5.00)
1x Pepper, Jalapeno, 3.5” pot ($2.00)
1x Pepper, Habenero, 3.5” pot ($2.00)
2x Pepper, Sweet Banana , 3.5” pot ($2.00)
2x Pepper, Carolina Wonder, 3.5” pot ($2.00)
1x Tomato, Brown Berry, 3.5” pot ($2.00)
2x Tomato, Martino’s Roma, 3.5” pot ($2.00)
1x Tomato, Rainbow Cherry Mix, 3.5” pot ($2.00)
1x Tomato, Red & Yellow Currant, 3.5” pot ($2.00)
1x Tomato, Reisotomate, 3.5” pot ($2.00)
1x Eggplant, Casper , 3.5” pot ($2.00)
Vegetables
3x Cucumber, Armenian, 3.5” pot ($3.00)
3x Cucumber, Poona Kheera, 3.5” pot ($3.00)
Fruits
3x Horned Melon, 3.5” pot ($3.00)
3x Vine Peaches, 3.5” pot ($3.00)
Herbs
3x Basil, Genovese, 3.5” pot ($3.00)
3x Basil, Thai, 3.5” pot ($3.00)
3x Basil, Cinnamon, 3.5” pot ($3.00)
2x Basil, Red Rubin, 3.5” pot ($3.00)
3x Artemesia, 3.5” pot ($3.00)
1x Fennel, Black, 7” pot ($5.00)
3x Lavender, Hidcote, 3.5” pot ($3.00)
3x Oregano, 3.5” pot ($3.00)
3x Rosemary, 3.5” pot ($3.00)
1x Sage, 3.5” pot ($3.00)
2x Thyme, 3.5” pot ($3.00)
3x Toothache Plant 3.5” pot ($3.00)
Ornamental:
1x Passion Vine, 3.5” pot ($3.00)
4x Baloon Flower, White 3.5” pot ($3.00)
4x Nicotina, Flowering Tobacco, 3.5” pot ($3.00)
4x Rudbeckia, Irish Eyes, 3.5” pot ($3.00)
4x Rudbeckia, Golden, 3.5” pot ($3.00)
Well this concludes another fine and yet somewhat disorderly
episode of LITFM, and there’s just one thing to mention here. In terms of
precipitation and not counting the total rainfall on Thursday, we had 1.2” of
rain spread across two rain events. This is fantastic and a tad ironic because
it poured on Monday right after I used the hose to irrigate. But we need the
rain pretty bad and T-storm rain waters your plants….LIKE A BAWSSS! *
*If you don’t get that
joke look up the lonely Island song Like a boss on youtube, somewhat NSFW.
LITFM does not endorse bombing the Russians flying into the sun or for that
matter doing anything with sewer fish.
