Gardening 2011

[FarmerJamie]

Already in the ground, waiting for spring
- onion
- garlic
- asparagus (last year's crop was great and tasty)
- salsify

Just filled out the JUNG order form for
- two heirloom watermelon varieties
- stevia
- several lettuce varieties

Need to go through the seed box to see what I have leftover from last year and what I need to order new.

One "must buy" is a number of Thai chili pepper plants. I splurged last year, paying $3 for only one plant and got about 2 quarts of peppers from that plant. Made the best salsa I ever made using those peppers as a part of the ingredients.

 

[flossy]

Denim Deb, I live in New Zealand.

I forgot to add I planted 80 aspargus seeds in spring too. I know 80, that's gona be a lot of asparagus in 3 years, good thing even the kids like it!!!

 

[Wannabefree]

I have 2 seed catalogs spread out in front of me....I NEED A INTERVENTION!!!!!!!

 

[FarmerJamie]

I have 2 seed catalogs spread out in front of me....I NEED A INTERVENTION!!!!!!!

Ain't gonna happen, you're in too deep.....

yeah, yeah, I'm going.....

 

[Wannabefree]

I have 2 seed catalogs spread out in front of me....I NEED A INTERVENTION!!!!!!!

Ain't gonna happen, you're in too deep.....

yeah, yeah, I'm going.....

Oh so ya give up on me eh?

 

[Homemaker]

The Easy Garden. If you look down at the bottom of the page you should see a link. That's how I found this forum-it was linked to BYC.

Thanks Denim Deb. I thought I looked everywhere for that link too. I figured it had to be on the screen somewhere. Guess I didn't look hard enough!

 

[Denim Deb]

Denim Deb, I live in New Zealand.

I forgot to add I planted 80 aspargus seeds in spring too. I know 80, that's gona be a lot of asparagus in 3 years, good thing even the kids like it!!!

Where about? I'd love to visit NZ some day.

 

[TanksHill]

I'm draggin my feet on the garden plans. Kinda stuck between will I live here to harvest and a full garden will make the house look better.

I have always wanted to plant cuc's and other vining veggies on my fence line. Well when I got one. Now we have the orchard fenced in and I might be moving. Grr.... I will probably plant them anyways.

So speaking of weeds. I have a wild blackberry that will rip you to shreds if look at it cross. What the heck can I do with it. No Free I can't get goats.

I wonder if I could borrow a couple?

It's taking over one of my dwarf apples. I really don't want to use poison. Then I would have to keep the birds confined. Dh wont use the John Deere on it he says it will pop the tires. He's suggesting a bomb.

Any ideas???

g

 

[freemotion]

Ha-ha! Goats would also eat the apple tree, so in this case, even I would not suggest letting them loose on your blackberries.

I don't have blackberries but multiflora was the bane of my existence for the first few years here. But I discovered that if I used great care and took my time, I could cut the canes out one by one and then dig the roots out. None of them came back! I was sure they would. I did the same with some raspberries (wild ones that didn't produce and were taking over my back yard) but I used heavy leather gloves for those and pulled them up by the roots. Those kept coming back but I kept pulling and there are fewer and fewer each year. Now it is just part of my weeding in that garden, and I can pull them without gloves if I get them when they are small and reach under the dirt to grab them where they don't have thorns.

But I haven't dealt with blackberries, so I don't know if this is useful. If you don't have multiflora.....the thorns will go right through the thickest leather glove like it is butter. They are evil.

 

[savingdogs]

Bwa Ha Ha Ha.......only the goat owners have weapons against the Evil Blackberry.

I live where blackberry rules the land. It is very very hard to remove especially once well established. Even goats need assistance around here. We tried physical removal and the use of poisons. We found only the strongest poisons kills blackberries and the stuff just seems too toxic to be a good idea. However, physical removal works best. The easiest way is to cut all the sharp stems off to the base and then work to dig out the clump at the bottom and the roots. Some people around here burn them out. I can't do that where I am though.

Goats really are an effective way of removing them because they eat down all the leaves a few times and pretty soon the plant dies. Then you still have to remove the stumpy part at the base and the old canes, but if you let it dry one season, you can just hack it up and throw it in a bonfire. We have cleared a large area in this way, but the goats did all the preliminary work for us and the chickens helped scratch up the ground. And we still have more of those root clumps to clear.

Then the plant will totally annoy you by sending up new plants somewhere the birds must have dropped seeds....like your new flower garden or such! Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr