Jennie&Tim on 16/11/2006 at 23:08

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Only unimportant stuff ITT, if you don't mind.

Today I chopped up some of my very first garlic harvest. Yes, it's amazing that it took until the forth decade of my life for me to grow this modest vegetable; but what's done is done and the past cannot be rewrit. Things I learned from this first attempt: 1. Water garlic if you don't get rain, I ignored mine this Summer because my hose was too short and I'm too lazy to use a bucket. 2. Cut the flower buds off, the bulbs from those I trimmed were twice the size of the ones where I didn't. 3. You can use those trimmed buds like garlic-flavored green onions. For that matter you can use the leaves like garlic-flavored green onions. Tasty. Next year I will have my first garlic from garlic I grew myself. Mmmm, mmmm, good.

If you can, grow rosemary, the fresh herb is magnificent. I have only one big bush now, the other succumbed to our very wet winter last Spring. However, it is big enough that I'm considering making little rosemary wreaths for my family as christmas decorations. Not that I know how to do such a thing, but I can probably stumble through an attempt and learn something.

If you like juicyfruit gum, grow pansies. The leaves taste just like juicyfruit to me. Yes, they're edible, just like violets. And roses. And daylilies (which have an oniony flavor to their leaves).

I am currently in search of a gardening fork. I was prying up a Himalayan blackberry earlier this week and the handle snapped. I will probably replace the handle next Spring; but I'd like a second fork anyway, it's my most-used garden tool. Great for fluffing up soil, digging where rocks and roots make shovels a matter of brute muscle, and for moving around half-composted mulch. I loved it, but I broke it :( . Now I'll get a better one.

My huckleberry bush still has good huckleberries on it. I meant to propagate it this Summer, next year I really will.

And for a final tip: when putting metal roofing on a building during high Summer, do not sit down on the ripped place in your jeans. Ow!

pavlovscat on 16/11/2006 at 23:57

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Our new house was landscaped when we moved in, but we are not yard people. I can kill anything, even cactus. We mulched the garden with rubber mulch made from recycled tires. It looks great & will last many years. The wood mulch barely made six months here, so this stuff is worth the extra money. And, it's great to have another use for old tires besides matress stuffing.

Scots Taffer on 17/11/2006 at 00:29

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HOLY COW

TEXAS

Aerothorn on 17/11/2006 at 00:37

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My mom's a garden designer and passionate about environmentally-friendly gardening. I'll have to ask her about this tire-rubber mulch.

Jennie&Tim on 17/11/2006 at 00:58

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Garlic will be fine in your vegetable plot, as will basil (get a few kinds and go wild with spaghetti); but be careful to put your sage, thyme, rosemary, etc. in places where they can stay for years (not where you want to till every year for your veggies). They like sun, good drainage, and not too much in the way of good dirt. There's a nice trailing rosemary that looks beautiful falling down a stone wall; wish I had a stone wall to use it on. Herbs are really easy and carefree, moreso than cactus, if you ever get the urge pavlovscat. Oh, and be a bit careful with mint, lemon balm, and chives; they tend to be invasive; I should plant some mint in pots, as I like mint teas.

I've never been very good at vegetables, either the slugs eat them or I forget to pick them. My best attempts have been the sugar snap peas, tasty and they like our cool weather. My dog loves them too.

My Bramley apple made it's first apples this year, very nice cooking apple; tart and firm. Yum. I hope it makes more than two next year. They're huge, probably a pound apiece. The Liberties were good eating apples, again I only got a few as the trees are still young. And the Morello cherries made a really good sauce for vanilla ice cream.

I envy your flamethrowers, I have horsetail along my driveway, I had high hopes when they turned brown and withered this Summer, but they're green and growing again.