We always grow lots of spinach and tomatoes cause they are pretty easy to grow and don't really need much care. We completely ignored our spinach over winter and it was still fine the next summer. I've found lettuce and carrots a bit hard to get right, tried a few years but never really worked. Any suggestions for next year?
sprouts, and you dont have to wait until next year. and you can grow them beside your sink in the kitchen!
what works best for sprouts? I'm starting a little garden (it's going to have to fit on top of my bookshelf! ), and would love a few. Jar with a damp papertowel in it, right? Any particular beans (etc) that you would suggest?
mung beans, alfalfa, clover, radish are all easy to sprout. herbs too can be grown indoors year round.
here's a link to an entire thread about sprouts: http://hipforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=164264 ps, in the outdoor garden, you might want to try kale, turnip greens, chard, beets, and green leafies like those ones. they do well in cooler weather for a fall garden. what kind of lettuce were you growing? i've found that leaf lettuce and mesclun mix are super easy, you can keep trimming the outside leaves and have a continuous harvest
cool! thanks folks! yea, herbs are the plan... i'm excited to wake up with mint leaves, rosemary, etc next to me fresh mint leaves for tea in the winter! yum!
The easiest thing I have found to grow is squash (especially zucchini). Just a few plants and you end up with more than you can use (then you can share with others).
A big Amen to that, plus endive, arugula, radishs and lots of herbs. A couple things I like about growing herbs... most are easy to grow, most are perennials and if you grow a lot, they're good bartering material. I've traded a couple hand fulls of basil and sage for a bushel of beans, etc. Point is, grow extra of what grows well for you and trade for what else you need. That's cheap, easy and helps everyone. As to lettuce, have you tried sequential planting.... plant a couple varities of lettuce and plant some every two weeks. Start a little before you think you should and keep planting past when you think you should. It help you "find" the actual season that works for you , where you are. Peace, poor_old_dad
What is easy to grow depends on the alot on climate that you live in. I have found tomatoes, beets, pumpkins, corn and beans to be about the easiest. As for herbs, basil, parsley, oregano and rosemarry.
I can't remember, but lots of insects and bugs kept eating them so we gave up. Same with brussel sprouts, we tried scraping the caterpillars off them once and we filled 1 1/2 jam jars full of them from just a couple of plants! But i we don't really like using pesticide so i don't know what to do..
You may want to try Bacillus thuringiensis. It's is totally save & organic. I don't know a supplier in your area, but if you like I can help find one. For more info check here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bacillus_thuringiensis And please also come to the Gardening sub-forum. You'll find lots of gardeners, including from England, who'll help too. It's in the "Alternative Lifestyles" area. Always seems to me that all except gardening is an Alternative Lifestyle, but that's just me. Peace, poor_old_dad
Carrots do better in a poorer, sandy soil. Forked carrots (and parsnips for that matter) are a result of too much nitrogen. The usual reason carrots fail to germinate is that the covering soil crusts over. Solution: after preparing the soil push the first digit of your finger in the soil to 1cm wher you want the carrots to grow. Put one seed in each hole and fill in with sharp sand.( The type used to make concrete.) Then give a light spray of water each day. I have never grown lettuce, so I cannot answer on that one.
i agree that it really depends on your climate and soil. We've never been able to grow spinach or eggplant and my strawberries really suffer. However, we can grow green beans, soybeans, potatoes and leaf lettuce with little effort. i have to pick the mexican bean beetles off the green beans, but otherwise they require little care. The leaf lettuce spreads itself and comes up all over the yard, in the compost...even in our fire pit. lol. Basil, lemon balm, mints, yarrow and comfry grow like weeds here...yet rosemary doesn't grow without alot of help. We also do okay with tomatoes and squash, but have alot of clay in the soil and so we are still working on better drainage. This year, we had really bad powder mildew on all the squashes and they didn't produce much at all. Carrots and onions do okay, snow peas do well. We have wild blackberies and black raspberries that grow everywhere, many folks around here consider them weeds! That blows my mind, we love berry picking. So we planted 6 12inch red raspberry shoots this spring, and they went crazy, sent out runners and have already established themselves as a nice raspberry patch. They are everbearing and we are still getting fruit off them even though it's pretty late in the season. So apparently our soil is good for berries. What is the trick to growing dark leafy greens...spinch, kale etc. ? Mine never does anything! It grows about two inchs and then goes straight to seed. great thread!
Ooh that sounds great tree. I don't know about spinach, we just stick it in the ground (which is horrible with lots of clay) and leave it alone and it keeps on producing more and more. Hmm if someone could answer this.. where in the world would you say is best for growing a 'balanced diet'? Like a bit of everything.. some fruit, some grain etc?
I really like a good thought provolking question, and your's is a great one. HMmmmm ... let's see. First of all, I don't think there is "a best" place. I think there are many places where growing a balanced diet can be done, and many more that can be turned into such a place. Basically all that's needed is water, workable land, a long growing season with mild winters, plus time & effort. That's part of the reason my little farm is where it is. Even if I have to buy some of my water from the local water company, it's reasonably priced & plenty of it(I still conserve and use as little as I can). The land is somewhat acidic, but correctable. Part is on a slight hill side with some clay, sand and gravel - perfect for most herbs. My veggie garden is half a bowel shape, south facing, loam soil a foot deep with no gravel, rocks, or anything else.... so it's very workable. My growing season is 240 to 250 days long and in the winter the temperature seldom gets down to 20F, and if it does it's only for a day or so. Every year in early May when I'm already picking things like peppers and tomatoes, I think of those folks who are trying to garden and farm in cold climates. Oh, I wish them luck, but I wonder why they started out with the deck stacked so very much against them. There are a few varities of some types of fruit that won't produce here, they need more cold (chill hours) than locally available. But for the most part, I can grow as much as I want of anything I want. Well, not just me, all of us around here. There were other things I considered. Being poor and wanting to have a self supporting farm, I also looked for land I could in fact buy, but with a large local market. From previous experience I knew that being in an mostly agricultural area would also be good. Land where I am is very affordable, plenty of it in small enough peices, and very easy to buy. Within a 2 1/2 hour round trip drive there are well over a million people, and for many miles there's nothing but agriculture. And no big corporate farms, none, but there are some good size,old family farms. So if there is a place that is "the best" for growing a balanced diet, I don't know where it is. But it's very do-able right here in central Alabama USA. Peace, poor_old_dad
