Megs gardening?

[not2late]

Well, my seedlings survived the frost Friday night :grumble

I planted basil, chives, arugula, and turnips. I also cleared up some garden spaces for my tomatoes, beans, okra, squash, peppers, and assorted greens. The weather is supposed to be in the lower 70s this week...so hopefully the ground temps will be high enough for me to do some more planting this weekend.

[2big4mysize]

Megs glad they survived. if you place clear plastic on your ground you can raise the ground temp sooner. Just remember to take it off and leave it off when you plant so you don't bake your seeds.

[Heidi3]

bumping gardening to try to fish Megs out??????......my garden is amazing right now ..not with veggies but my garlic and strawberries are looking amazing it is almost time to pick my galic flower tips (I am not sure what you call those curly things that make the flowers but I snip them off and stir fry them).....herbs are insane my cardoon has thistles growing on top and is almost 8 ft high!!!!!.....I hired some guys to help me this place just over grew while I was binge working so they cleaned my tiers off and dug out the running bamboo.....(we have three kinds of bamboo here it is beautiful but so invasive!!!!)....so the yard looks so clean and nice and they will come and help maintain it for a while so I can overwork!!!!.....so Megs where the heck are you?.....how is your garden and everyone elses growing???

[MotherOfGizmo]

I love bamboo, especially Black Bamboo.

[Heidi3]

I have a small clump starting of black bamboo ..I snagged a snip from my friends work ..do you know that stuff is 90 bucks a clump????? I also have the notorious golden bamboo and some of the bushy clumping type..the golden is awful to keep down but such a beautiful fence!!!!..and it sounds so nice with the wind blowing through it ..we need to bury cinder blocks to stop the golden bamboo from running so fast!!!!...

[not2late]

The sugar snap peas are still morons...A few weeks ago we had a hail storm and it knocked the growing tip off one of the peas. I didn't rip the pea out of the ground and let it continue growing to see what would happen. Well, it developed new shoots. So I lopped the tips off the other peas (and had a really yummy stir fry with those pea shoots that night for dinner). The more shoots I remove the more the plants put out, so I've been doing that lately. And considering how expensive I've seen pea shoots go for at the Asian market, I'm pretty happy trimming them.

The basil is growing well. I had to thin out my box over the weekend and so I have a nice tomato-baby mozzarrella-basil salad for lunch today.

My lettuce is growing too. I have some baby romaine that needs to be harvested this week. The spinach, unfortunately, didn't do so well because the weather here has been wacky---too cold. Arugula was good and I'm waiting on another crop to grow to eating size. The watercress I planted is thriving. Scallions are growing well. I've had to replant my chives because they didn't grown. My cat developed a taste for radish tops, so he was able to enjoy the radishes I planted.

Let's see...the strawberries are producing and I have a 1/2 cup of out-of-the-garden strawberries almost daily for dessert. The dwarf blueberries I bought this spring haven't died yet, so that's a good sign.

Tomatoes are still tiny, again due to the unusually cold weather we've been having. Ditto for the cucumbers and peppers. I'll have to replant my okra, beans and squash because they haven't done much.

I did have a bumper crop of broccoli rabe (had to freeze most of it) and my Swiss chard is doing okay.

For the new plants, I was able to get a few lemon balm (bee balm) seeds to grow so I'll transplant them when they get bigger. I bought an unusual heirloom edible plant called a "beetberry" and it looks like that's growing (unless a weed invaded the box). I'm planning to plant some mountain orach--mainly for the color because it's supposed to have deep purple leaves, but it's edible too so if it grows I'll tell you all how it tastes. I also planted an edible chrysanthemum. The leaves and flowers are edible---so when it gets to my table I'll report on the taste.

For the fall, I've have mache (corn salad), snow peas (hopefully they won't be as stupid as the sugar snaps), more lettuce, spinach, broccoli rabe, arugula, maybe radishes (if Hairy stays away from them!).

Nursey, is your bamboo edible? I had a Chinese friend who grew bamboo simply to harvest the shoots. I have to say, the fresh bamboo shoots are alot better tasting than the canned variety.

Speaking of which, my daylilies are beginning to bud, so I'll be picking and eating them---they're nice in stir-fries.

[Heidi3]

Megs I have serious abandoment issues you know urplequ:

[Heidi3]

I am not sure about the bamboo being edible I would imagine it could be....is any bamboo poisonous?...I would try if I knew what to do with it?....hmmm now you got me thinking...I buy fresh ones at our local market ..they are wonderful!

[not2late]

I am not sure about the bamboo being edible I would imagine it could be....is any bamboo poisonous?...I would try if I knew what to do with it?....hmmm now you got me thinking...I buy fresh ones at our local market ..they are wonderful!

I'm not sure if there are poisonous species or not....

[MotherOfGizmo]

Edible - All bamboos are edible. The Phyllostachys are most commonly used for eating because the shoots are large in diameter. The best choice is Phyllostachys dulcis (Sweetshoot bamboo) which has a sweet, nutty flavor with no trace of bitterness

http://www.newengbamboo.com/bamboo/about.htm

Edible bamboo

The young shoot of the culm is edible when harvested just before it emerges from the soil.

The shoots are harvested in the morning. A special tool is used to cut them off about twenty cm below the surface. Depending on the species, the shoots appear in spring or fall.

Because the outer sheaths are hard and fibrous, like those of artichokes, the shoots must be boiled, sautéed or roasted and then the sheaths removed to reveal the tender heart. The shoots are also sold pre-cooked in cans. They can be added to different dishes as a vegetable, or eaten cold in a salad.

http://www2.ville.montreal.qc.ca/jardin/en/chine/bambou/comestible.htm

[Heidi3]

I wish I could find out more about when to harvest them and then do I blanch them???? or just leave them raw or what they seem like they have been at least blanched with I buy them at the store...I tried to google it but did not find anything...of course I am at work and have no time to do intensive searches!!!!

[not2late]

This guy is really into bamboo shoots (even has graphs on his site!_ :yikes )

http://www.dogscooter.com/bamboo/bamboo_shoots_in_nw.html

The Royal Horticultural Society's instructions

http://www.rhs.org.uk/Learning/publications/pubs/garden0603/bamboo.asp

And another one

http://www.americanbamboo.org/GeneralInfoPages/BarnhartIntro.html

I'll have to e-mail my friend about how she does it.

[MotherOfGizmo]

http://www.americanbamboo.org/GeneralInfoPages/BarnhartIntro.html

on that site you can go here to the section about eating bamboo, and there is a link there to a pdf file that may help you out nursey

http://www.americanbamboo.org/FAQ.html#CanIEatTheShoots

[Heidi3]

http://www.americanbamboo.org/GeneralInfoPages/BarnhartIntro.html

on that site you can go here to the section about eating bamboo, and there is a link there to a pdf file that may help you out nursey

http://www.americanbamboo.org/FAQ.html#CanIEatTheShoots

OMG thanks so much how cool is that is it from Washington St U!!!!! I am printing studying and getting back to you on this one !!! as soon as I have one to eat I will let you know!!!!.. :hug

[not2late]

WooHoo! I have sugar snap peas---about 5 of them, but the other pea plants are flowering!

:icondance