Garden Gab

Taking cuttings from your plants or dividing perennials to make a personal, thoughtful gift for friends can seem daunting but it is actually very simple and can be done with just a few basic tools and a few minutes of preparation.

Taking Cuttings

To take cuttings you will need:

• Seeding soil (this is the best mix to give young cuttings for quick growth and to eliminate the risk of disease)
• Sharp garden clippers (dull clippers will crush the plant rather than making a clean cut)
• A warm, moist container such as a terrarium or cloche

If you are new to cuttings, start with either a houseplant that has long thrived under your care or a plant with a semi-woody stem, as these will give you the most success. A plant that is losing its leaves or is long and lanky rather than bushy probably will suffer if you take a cutting or the cutting could be malnourished or diseased. Woody stems are harder to crush and usually snip easily.

Look at the top or newest leaves of your plant. About 1/4 to 1/2 of an inch below the leaf node, or where the leaf seperates from the stem, snip the plant stem. This is your cutting. You can place it in a glass of warm water for a few hours to stimulate it, but don’t leave it longer, as new roots formed in water will experience root shock and collapse when planted. Plant your cutting in loose, very damp soil. Place in a warm sunny place and cover with a cloche (or plant inside a terrarium).

Roots should begin to form within 1-2 weeks, but slow growing plants may not be ready for transplant for a month.

Dividing Perennials

To divide perennials you will need:

• A flower pot filled with soil or a hole in the garden for the new plant to go (do this before everything else, you want to get the plant into soil as quickly as possible
• A cutting or prying tool, such as a hand axe, saw or pitchfork
• A sharp spade or shovel

When a perennial has outgrown a pot or space in your garden, or when it develops a dead space in the center of the plant, it is time to divide it. Not only does this make another plant, it also helps both halves survive longer and be more healthy. The day before you decide to divide the plant, cut back the leaves about halfway (this will make the newly divided plant do less work to maintain itself. This is also why some gardeners prefer fall as a dividing time, because they will be cutting back leaves and tidying up anyway) and really soak the roots.

On the division day, try to start in the morning when the day is still cool, the exposed roots will dry out much slower than in the afternoon (even crisp fall days can turn hot in the afternoon). Starting in a wide circle around the base of the plant, roughly 4 inches out from the base, cut the soil about six inches with a sharp spade or shovel. Once you have completed cutting the circle, gently insert the shovel on an angle and try to lift the plant. If it is somewhat loose, work it out of the ground and lift the plant clean to the top of the soil. If the plant really resists, try digging the circle a little deeper, you want to get as much of the root ball as possible. Don’t shake out the roots, try to keep as much soil as possible around the roots to keep it from drying out.

When the plant is out of the ground it’s time to cut it in half. If the plant has especially woody roots, you may want to chop it with an axe or saw it in half. Plants with softer root balls can be prized apart with your hands or with a pitchfork. You may want to get a partner to hold one side while you pry the other side away. This process may take some time, but be patient, it will come apart. When your plant has been divided into as many pieces as you like, immediately replant or repot both plants and water. If you are doing this in fall, covering with a small layer of mulch can keep the moisture in the root system, if in fall, starting the plant in a shady area and then transplanting to a more sunny location can help the perennial regenerate faster.

Some climbing plants would not survive a harsh winter without help.  When the climbers you have worked so hard to entwine and encourage to grow up your trellis structures need to be protected, how should you proceed? In this post we’ll discuss the steps you can take to preserve your plants.

More than the actually cold temperatures, hungry rodents and dehydration are your plant’s enemies.  You have two optioons to deal with dehydration and freezing cold.  For dealing with rodents, any young trees or woody climbing plants (such as rosebushes or grapevine) should be protected with a circle of wire mesh or flexible, sturdy plastic.  Many greenhouses and garden stores will carry plast sleeves to protect tree trunks and any hard ware store should have wire mesh (the net needs to be close enough that  a small mouse or mole can’t fit through.  Either mesh or plastic sleeve should be long enough to circle your plant’s trunk and leave about an inch of space between it and the plant.  It should also be about 6 to 8 inches tall. Dig a small ring around your plant’s trunk.  It doesn’t have to be wide but should be 2-3 inches deep.   Place your protective sleeve inside the ring and fill in the trench to bury and anchor the bottom part of your sleeve.  This should prevent hungry rodents from resorting to your plant’s vulnerable trunk for winter food.

To deal with cold and dehydration, you can choose between two options.  The first is to get a large sheet of clear plastic, the same thickness as you would used to winterize your exterior windows (this can be found at many hardware stores).  Leaving the climbing plant in place on the trellis, wrap your trellis and plant with the plastic.  You should tightly secure the plastic with wall staples or tightly tied rope.  Make sure there are no big gaps as the arid winter air will draw moisture away from the plant through these gaps. Cover any exposed branches or roots with soil or mulch to further prevent dehydration and freezing. This plastic can be easily cut away when spring comes and will not require you to retrain your plant to the trellis.  If you are expecting a very cold, dry winter with little snow, you may want to consider the other option.  This requires a little more work but will protect your plant from severe winters much better than the first method.  You will need to remove the plant from your trellis, so the first step is to unwind or cut any clinging tendrils from the trellis.  Many climbing plants enjoy better growth after fall pruning, so don’t worry if you need to cut several vines.  After removing the plant from the trellis, gently lower it to the ground.  Cover the entire plant, root to tip with 2-4 inches of soil.  You can use soil from your garden, compost or potting soil is also fine.  The point is not necessarily to nourish the plant but to hold moisture in.  After you have covered the plant with soil add another 2-4 inches of mulch or straw.  If you remove the trellis for winter storage, remember to mark the spot where you have covered the plant so you don’t accidentally mow or plow over it in springtime.

Like many Americans this week, I’ve been thinking about the history of Thanksgiving.  But not the feast part of the story, instead, I was thinking specifically of the gardening part of the story.   No matter whose version of history you choose to believe, the act of teaching someone how to produce their own food is about the most valuable gift that can be given.

We think we are in an era of unprecedented technology, where knowledge is worth more than anything else we can have access to.  But this week, as I think of that humble crop that kept the settlers going, of the knowledge it took, the generations of experimentation and risk to create what we know as corn, and of the effect that just this one crop has had on the entire world, I can’t help but think that the technology and knowledge passed between peoples almost 10,000 years ago is as impressive, or more so, than what we have in the computer age.

Genetically modified crops are older than you think

From Teosinte, smaller than a human pinky and containing barely enough grain to be worth gathering, our ancestors, over thousands of years of selective breeding led to modern day corn.  It’s one of the oldest genetically engineered crops in the world.  Its a long story, how a crop becomes domesticated, but it starts slow: a community eats the sweetest, fattest, most tasty fruits of a plant and plants the seeds (either purposely in gardens or fields or opportunistically in middens or other waste piles) so that the best of the crop has a better chance to grow than the weaker plants.  At first this may be unintentional, but at some point, humans start to notice and plan, being ever more picky about which plants they will take seeds from.  Big deal, you might say, how hard is it to pick the best ones and replant them?  But it took thousands of years and many, many trades of knowledge and seeds to get to the settlers on Thanksgiving Day.

Give it to Mikey.  He’ll eat anything.

You also might consider originally poisonous species, such as almonds.  Wild almonds are fatal if consumed, carrying tannins that make them bitter and dangerous.  Yet we have domestic, safe, sweet almonds today.  How did it happen?  Someone, somewhere had to experiment and slowly breed the less poisonous seeds, every generation of trees having fewer and fewer tannins in them until today.  In this case, not only did it take thousands of years, it most probably took several lives to create the crop we enjoy now.

Consider then, the many lifetimes worth of knowledge that gets traded when gardeners exchange simple tips, a packet of seeds, a plant clipping.  If you tried to do that with anything else, with secret family recipes, manufacturing processes, new bits of technology people would think you were crazy if you didn’t get any monetary gain from it.

No matter which version of the pilgrim’s story you read, no matter where you stand on the morality of the interactions between indigenous people and English settlers, the natives who taught the pilgrims how to plant corn and survive that winter so long ago, did it primarily out of kindness.

Late one night on NPR I heard an interview with a songwriter who was talking about love (I wish I could remember who it was, if anyone knows, shoot me a note!) and he said, “Deep down, we all know we don’t deserve love, not one of us.  But then someone comes along and gives it to us anyway.”

Seeds of Love

Gardening is a lot like love.  There is nothing you can give back that will be equal in value to the millenia of sweat and heartache and hard living that went into that tiny seed in your palm.  It lies there cool and silent, not asking anything because it knows you haven’t got anything close to it’s actual value.  And if you’re lucky it grows anyway.  Teaching someone to plant or fish or hunt or otherwise provide for themselves will always be an act of pure charity from the kindest part of the heart.  It means that whoever you just taught will be equal to you in the most basic human way.  When you’ve been given that piece of knowledge or seed or clipping the only way to pay it back is to pass it on.  Don’t be stingy with your gardening advice, don’t hold back that great planting technique.  Not only did it take thousands of miles and lives to get to you, you never know how the next person will improve it, what the next generation will do with it.

So, for all the gardeners I’ve ever gotten advice from, all the kind farming souls who’ve passed down those little shards of love I plant every year in my garden, that feed my family and my friends- I say thank you from the bottom of my heart.  Happy Thanksgiving everybody.  Don’t forget to pass it on.

Go here to donate a cup of food to the hungry. It costs nothing but a few short seconds.

You think this is weird? You should have seen when I tried to stuff a pumpkin in too.

Don’t think I don’t appreciate a post-apocalyptic survival scenario as much as the next gal, but if that’s all you are using your root cellar (or plain old ordinary cellar) for, then you are missing out on great storage space for your surplus vegetables and fruits. 

Storing produce has always been a sort of countdown for me, a crossing off of days (or potatoes) until spring.  By the time you get to March, even the best potatoes will start to look shrunken and feel a little soft, and your apples are going to be wrinkly and maybe a tiny bit dry.  If you’ve never stored garden surplus all winter, you’re probably thinking, “Oh that’s disgusting! Why would I eat that . . . unless it was the end of the world.  Which of course is what root cellars are for, which is why I need a stack of twinkies, canned meat and bottled water, not fresh produce.”

But it’s not true.  And if you are serious about preparing for the end of the world (or a power outage) you should always keep bottled water, good thinking.  But forget the twinkies, properly cured squash, jarred preserves and pickles will last much longer.  And it’s not disgusting, those extra sweet, wrinkled apples and extra soft baked potatoes tell me it’s almost spring during those dreaded ides of March, when I most desperately need to be reminded that, yes, spring will come around again.

The Beauty of Postapocalyptic Pickles

Besides, your produce only gets shriveled at the end.  An entire winter stretches out before you with only dull, flavorless grocery store greenhouse produce to look forward to.  If you shove your canned meats and protein bars into the corner of your cellar though, and put off thinking about the end of the world until springtime, you can have delicious, homegrown produce and preserves (and lets not forget the pickles.  The longer they stew, the better they taste! I think I actually have a jar on the back shelf of my root cellar my mother made the year she was pregnant with me.  And no, I don’t know how they escaped this long) well into the winter months. 

There are all sorts of experts on building root cellars, in fact there is a very good article here on how to convert your cellar into a good storage space for your produce.  But the basic things you need are actually very simple:

• A space that stays cool but does not freeze
• Some kind of exhaust vent or release
• Storage bins, hooks and shelves for your produce

If you have a finished basement, you will probably not want to use it for storing your produce, because it will be too warm and your produce will rot.  But the basic idea of a cellar is key.  Underground spaces stay cool year round, but are insulated enough that they will not freeze.  You can use some above ground structures too as long as they are insulated.  A garage, a screened in porch (winterized with window plastic) or even a shed can all be good spots for your root cellar.  My favorite is the shed.  Since I keep wood for the woodstove in my shed, quarters are cramped with extra vegetables, but the firewood makes a natural insulation and it doesn’t freeze even in February.  You can also use stacks of straw or hay or you can use standard fiberglas insulation.  The key is not to let your veggies freeze. 

Moonshine is still illegal you know

The reason for the vent is that try as you might, some veggies and fruit are going to slowly ferment in storage.  If the ethylene gas that this process releases is not removed, it will speed the deterioration of all of your produce.  Ventilation can be as simple as a fan aimed out a small window, two pvc pipes exiting an exterior wall to as complex as an exhaust structure similar to those found in restaurant storages.

And by the way, if you were planning on spending the end of the world in your root cellar, you should probably have some ventilation anyway.

Why Banana Hammocks aren’t as stupid as they sound

Lastly, the issue of how to store what.  At first this can seem really complicated and a lot of hard work, but really there are only a few simple “rules” to help you sort it out.  Preserves, pickles and wines or ciders all need to be turned (that is, their containers need to be rotated) every six months, so any kind of wide shelving so you can reach each jar or bottle is going to help you immensely (by the way, not turning them will lead to separation and decay of your hard work, i.e. wine and cider turn sour, jams and jellies get a crust of sugar at the top while the fruit ferments and rankles at the bottom.  Except for pickles.  I don’t think anything can kill pickles).  Root vegetables, like potatoes, carrots, turnips do best in their own element.  That means don’t wash them (I know it’s hard to resist, you want a clean cellar and all, but really, they will last much longer in their own dirt) and don’t expose them to sunlight.  In potatoes sunlight exposure can actually be dangerous, as it produces a toxin.  If your potatoes have been out for a while and are turning green, it’s time to toss them.  You can keep your root vegetables in bins of sand or you can give them a well ventilated, airy bin or crate.  The important thing is that you don’t want too much moisture building up on their skins.  Some moisture is good, but if your produce starts feeling slimy, you’ve got too much, stop breathing so hard.  You’re going to fog up the end of the world shelter.

Garlic and onions need to be left out for a few weeks before storing them in the cellar.  People love the braided look of onions and garlic.  I love it too.  I’ve just never been able to manage to do it correctly.  If you can do it, more power to you, come teach me how so I can have pretty strings in my kitchen too.  I just throw them in an onion basket or even one of the storebought onion bags.  After 2-3 weeks, they will be ready to put in the cellar.

Squash, zucchini (and seriously, how much do you have anyway?) and pumpkins will go bad quickly if they are placed on hard surfaces.  You can make a pumpkin pillow with one of those eggcrate thingies you use to delude yourself that the ground isn’t hard while you are camping.  Or you can hang them in old pantyhose from a hook.  And yes, I got weird looks from a friend while I was taking this picture.  You are welcome.

Fruit needs to be preserved through canning, pressing or drying.  Hard fruits, like pears or apples can be stored over the winter, but they need lots of air.  Milk crates work very well.  I was thinking of trying to use my old hammock now that it’s inside and throwing the apples in there to see if that will work too, but I’ve never tried.  I’ll let you know how it goes.

Periodically, you need to check for any rotting produce and remove it.  You know that saying, one bad apple ruins the barrel?  It came from someone storing produce in a root cellar.  As your produce supply dwindles and eventually grows sprouts or wrinkles and drys up, try to realize a life truth in both it’s positive and negative light: Spring will always come again and nothing (not even potatoes) last forever.  Except for pickles.

If you, like many of us, dread being cooped up in winter and experience seasonal blues, you should consider container gardening through the winter.  Just the act of gardening itself, scientists say, has beneficial effects on brain chemistry.  What you grow can have an even bigger impact.

From the Ground up

If you are thinking of gardening with only potting soil or sterilized mixes you might want to reconsider.  As early as 2006, researches found a cheerful little bug that naturally occurs in soil called Mycobacterium Vaccae.  This tiny bacterium literally infects people with happiness.  Once M. Vaccae gets under your skin it boosts your brain’s seratonin level which is one of the chemicals that elevates mood and helps your body’s healing processes.  In fact, M. Vaccae is so effective that it has been used to help cancer patients bounce back from chemotherapy and treating fibromyalgia.

These bacterium are harmless except for infectious good cheer

  Just the normal activity of planting or repotting can help this little bug enter you It exists in soils around the world and has no harmful effects.  But you won’t find it in sterilized soils and potting mixes.  So go get some soil from your yard or garden to mix in with your potting soil.  Right now.  Before it freezes.  And then come back to see what else can help.

Superplants

Lots of depressed moods can come from imbalances in diet.  While all of these items are available at your grocery store, planting them instead will not only infect you with M. Vaccae, but will mean these fruits and veggies will be on hand for those days your bathrobe looks more comfortable than a trip to the store.  Some of them, such as herbs and citrus also do half their anti-depressant work with their pleasant and stimulating odors.  Growing them yourself will give you the benefit of these odors for many days before they are ready to eat or use.  Growing alfalfa, broccoli, green peppers, tomatoes and black beans can all be done in containers indoors.  Tomatoes can be hung in baskets to leave room for other plants while all of these other veggies can be planted in a long window box or deep tray and thrive.  These veggies have the same chemicals that make people reach for carbohydrate complex starches and desserts.  They will lift your mood without making you adjust your belt, which can be the key to avoiding the infamous holiday calories.  You can also grow dwarf citrus trees in a large pot indoors.  While citrus fruit does not directly affect brain chemistry, it helps your body absorb nutrients that do, such as magnesium, iron or thiamin. 

Your indoor herbs can also help adjust your mood while being useful in the kitchen or as an aromatic.  Lavendar, rosemary and basil are all excellent for reducing stress and elevating seratonin.  In fact, studies have shown that mediterranean diets which rely on tomatoes, rosemary and basil in a lot of dishes can have an enormous effect on mood.  Another aromatic that can help is jasmine.  Most jasmine varieties are large and utilize climbing trellises, however, the sambac variety is  easy to grow and manageable indoors, they are also easy to find at garden supply stores.

These are just a few of the beneficial plants you can grow indoors.  Of course, none of these can substitute a regimen planned by your doctor, but if you or your physician notices something lacking in your diet, consider planting a supplement rather than purchasing it.  Not only will your wallet be fatter, you will get the benefit of m. vaccae and lots and lots of sunshine.

Sunshine come on back another day

The third benefit of maintaining an indoor garden is exposure to sunlight.  Sunlight is one of very few ways our body absorbs vitamin D.  Lack of vitamin D can make us feel a little down or can be serious enough to cause seasonal affective disorder.  In the winter, even enthusiasts aren’t spending as much time outdoors as we do in summer.  So every bit of extra sun can help.  An indoor garden means you will be spending more time in front of sunny windows, inside a bright sunroom or greenhouse.  Take time not only to work on your indoor garden but to relax in it too.  If at all possible make it into a comfortable spot.  Add a chair or sofa, some blankets if it gets chilly, even a small breakfast table.  Make your indoor garden the new leisure center for you and your family so you will get the full benefit of aromatic plants and extra sunshine. 

An indoor garden need not be huge or complex, it can be just a few key plants, but it will help make  a happier, healthier you even in the greyest, coldest days of winter.

Domesticated over 5000 years ago and growing today on six continents, garlic has become a staple not only in world cuisine but also for medicinal uses.  Cloning itself from just one clove, garlic is also one of the cheapest and easiest crops to grow. 

Timing is everything.  For regions that have ground freezes over the winter, garlic can either be planted in the late fall just before the first major freeze or in the early spring when the ground is just workable (about the time you would plant your beans), you may end up with smaller-than-spectacular bulbs.   For those gardeners who live in warmer climates, garlic should be planted anywhere from late fall through midwinter.  It seems contrary to the regular order, but the cold weather actually stimulates the clove buds.  This can happen in early spring, but you will probably be left with smaller bulbs at the end of the growing season.  The garlic will continue to grow very slowly over the winter meaning you get an extra long growing season for the bulbs that you won’t get planting in spring.  The garlic will need 2-4 weeks before the ground experiences its major freeze for the winter in order to establish its starter roots.  The freeze won’t kill the garlic, as it is a winter hardy crop, but without those starter roots, it will be as if you did your planting in the spring.  On the other hand, if you plant too early and start getting lots of large green shoots, the leaves themselves will suffer frost damage.

Send in the clones

With your fall tilling probably finished by now, it is the perfect time to plant your garlic in order to get those large, full flavored bulbs next fall.  It is important to make sure your soil is loose and well draining to prevent the garlic from rotting.  Your cloves should be planted with the pointy end facing the sky (that is the part that wasn’t connected to the root or neck of the original plant) about 4-6 inches apart.  If you have several rows of garlic, you will want to keep the rows at least 6 inches apart as garlic is a very poor competitor for resources. 

It’s important to remember that the bulbs you will be getting are basically clones of the original clove that you planted instead of the result of breeding two plants together (I know, it’s been a long time since biology class, basically the bulbs you get, barring unforeseen mutations, will be copies of the original rather than bigger, smaller, or different flavors), so you will want to pick the most flavorful variety (Chinese varieties have more heat while hardneck varieties vary from mildly hot to sweet) and the healthiest, fullest cloves to plant.  Try not to remove the cloves from their neck (or stem) until you are ready to stick them in the ground.  The root needs to stay moist in order to grow, and after a few hours separated from the neck it will completely dry out.

Where did I bury that again?

After placing your cloves you will want to cover them with about 2/3 of an inch of soil.  Covering this layer with an inch or two of mulch, compost or fertilizer to keep the garlic nourished and growing throughout the winter.  If you are expecting a particularly cold and dry winter (how will you know? we like the Farmer’s Almanac there’s a link in our blogroll), adding a layer of straw or newspaper will help keep the moisture in the garlic bed. 

If you are anything like me or have an overzealous gardener tilling your garden (also like me), by springtime you will have completely forgotten which rows you planted with fall crops, so take the time now to add a stake or distinctive stone or sign at the end of your rows to jog your memory. 

Just a small amount of work this fall will give your neighbors bulb envy next year.

An innocent looking cucurbit

The week after Halloween has always been a blue one for me.  It’s the jack o’ lanterns really, their faces caving in from frost and rain, their bright yellows and oranges fading or turning dark brown.  But then, next year’s garden will need something for compost! And it always makes me feel better to save pumpkin seeds for next years crop.

The basic procedure once you have collected your seeds is fairly simple: they need to be thoroughly rinsed in water to get all the stringy pumpkin threads off and then completely dried so that they don’t mildew.  In fact, after they are completely dry, spread them out on a screen or cloth for a month in a cool dry area to make sure they are absolutely dry.  Moisture will also cause rotting while you are storing your pumpkins, so it’s important to store them in a cool, dry place (like your wood shed, covered porch or cellar) in a “breathable” material.  I prefer cupcake liners because I keep my seeds in a box and they act as breathable cups, but a paper envelope or paper bag will work just fine.  Closed jars and plastic bags tend to promote rot no matter how hard you try to keep them dry.  So that’s the simple part.  The hard part is selecting the right seeds.

Put that down.  You have no idea where it’s been.

You’d think choosing seeds would be the simplest procedure ever.  Just scoop them up out of the nearest pumpkin right?  Well, if all you want next year is random squashlings, then yes, have at it.  The scandalous truth is that pumpkins (and squash) are the rabbits of the plant world.  These orange minxes will cross pollinate with any nearby Cucurbit that happens by.  If you grew your own pumpkins, you’ll want to pick just one or two of your very best to collect the seeds from.  This will ensure you get pumpkins similar to the best of the crop this year.  Choose the pumpkins that look best to you.  If that’s the largest or the roundest or the most orangey is up to you.  If you are trying to harvest seeds from a pumpkin bought from the store (even an organic one) you’ll be playing the Cucurbit lottery- which can be loads of fun for the adventurous, but disappointing if you are trying to win the blue ribbon for fabulous pumpkin at the fair.  You just don’t know where that pumpkin has been!  And these seeds can produce anything from a perfect pumpkin to a pumkin/gourd/cucumber hybrid monster (which admittedly would make a pretty interesting jack o’ lantern).

In the spring, you are also going to want to make sure your pumpkins, gourds, cucumbers and zucchinis are spaced widely apart for the same reasons.  What to do with all the seeds you don’t save?  Why, roast them of course.  Just coat the seeds and a cookie sheet with about a tablespoon of olive oil and spread the seeds all over the pan.  Sprinkle with salt, garlic powder, or any popcorn seasoning and bake at 325 until the seeds turn light brown for a delicious and healthy snack.