A Seed Saver's Garden

[heirloomgal]

The clarkias are in full bloom.

Garden salad today. But I didn’t grow the cabbage.

Echinops crop is big this year. Need to find the seeds.

Wild sunflowers are blooming. Smells like chocolate.

 

[heirloomgal]

@heirloomgal, I have not heard of clarkias before. They have splendid flowers.

They're like little mini hollyhocks. Works very well in a 'cottage style' garden!

 

[heirloomgal]

One of the corn plants is giving an interesting surprise, two ears of corn, coming out of the SAME joint. They're not conjoined cobs

Are these conjoined or coming out of the same joint? One of them has 4 cobs growing from what looks like one place.

 

[Pulsegleaner]

I'm not enough of an expert to tell/ They SEEM discrete, but until they are harvested, there's no real way to find out.

 

[ducks4you]

Usually the extras are very small. You could cook them up or eat them raw in a salad. They are very tender.
Never Did get my corn planted this year, so congrats!!!

 

[Pulsegleaner]

Usually the extras are very small. You could cook them up or eat them raw in a salad. They are very tender.
Never Did get my corn planted this year, so congrats!!!

If you are growing sweetcorn and harvesting it for corn on the cob, yes. If your corn is grinding type, like mine is, then I'd imagine that, unless you have a deft enough hand to pull off the smaller cobs early WITHOUT damaging the major one, then, by the time the corn is ripe, the smaller ears will be too woody and dry to cook or eat.

 

[heirloomgal]

Golden sesame is finally getting pods.

Basil is almost ready for seed harvesting. Still smells amazing.

Mexican Tarragon actually bloomed. I’m surprised, it took nearly all summer. The foliage tastes great.

Chufa nuts are bushy this year.

Did some deadheading today.

Pretty, fuzzy foliage of Velvet Yellow cherry tomato. This is a late bloomer for sure.

So yummy.

One of my fave geraniums this year. Forget the type. Gonna overwinter it.

Another one I like, petals are unique.

Zinnia variety. Grows to about 8 - 10 inches tall. Only 1 seed sprouted from the packet so I hope I can save these seeds.

 

[Pulsegleaner]

Looks like I may be falling into the same trap as so many previous years. I give all of this prime space to the herbs, and then never actually USE any of them due to either forgetting they're there when I cook, never getting the other ingredients I need in a quantity I would use them for (for example, the Cuban oregano is there each year JUST so I can make horatiki once the heirloom tomatoes really start coming in, but between the delayed local supply (my own supply could NEVER meet needs; one one person serving would need every tomato I harvested for the whole YEAR) and the other needs we have for tomatoes, I don't ever actually get any, and the oregano just stays there until the frost kills it.
There is also the fact that at least half are in bloom now, and I don't like chopping them when they are flowering (I WANT them to drop seed, so that hopefully the next year I don't have to pay money to buy a replacement plant.)

And a few are tough uses, like the Syrian oregano (when the flavor of your oregano is so strong one leaf would overpower a whole pizza, finding uses for it are tricky).

At least this year the Hooker's chives took, unlike last year (though I should probably check if they, like conventional chives, can come back after the winter, or if I need to bring them inside).

 

[ducks4you]

@Pulsegleaner ,Do you have ANY space to take some rubber bands and tie cut herbs up to dry?
How about the curtain rod in your kitchen window?
They will dry out, even in a kitchen.
I have the cunundrum that eldest DD will buy fresh herbs from the grocery store and I haven't figured out how to successfully grow them inside during the winter, although there is one trick I haven't tried yet.
Burns me up that she doesn't like the dried herbs that I have grown!
Except for dried sage, and I often pick from the one surviving plant north of the garage. Apparently, I picked from it enough to successfully make it bush and grow fatter leaves.
I am rooting for you!!
This year my harvest will be much more meager than in year's past, what with interruptions.
We've ALL been there!!

 

[Pulsegleaner]

@Pulsegleaner ,Do you have ANY space to take some rubber bands and tie cut herbs up to dry?
How about the curtain rod in your kitchen window?
They will dry out, even in a kitchen.
I have the cunundrum that eldest DD will buy fresh herbs from the grocery store and I haven't figured out how to successfully grow them inside during the winter, although there is one trick I haven't tried yet.
Burns me up that she doesn't like the dried herbs that I have grown!
Except for dried sage, and I often pick from the one surviving plant north of the garage. Apparently, I picked from it enough to successfully make it bush and grow fatter leaves.
I am rooting for you!!
This year my harvest will be much more meager than in year's past, what with interruptions.
We've ALL been there!!

I do, and I do dry some, like the catmint and cat thyme at the end of the year (though probably not the cat thyme this year, according to what I have read online, that should be perennial here, and I think putting it directly into the ground to give it more space might accomplish that, so it will need it's foliage to survive the transition*)

Cuban oregano is basically impossible to dry; it's a succulent (that's why I use it, so that the flavor is in juice form and can integrate into the salad faster.) Alas, it's also not freezable; what you get back is a watery mess that collapses as soon as it thaws (and doesn't taste very good. And brining the plant in over the winter is a no-go as well, it lives indoors, but stops growing over the winter, so you can't keep using it.

The Syrian I COULD dry, but given how strong it is I'd have to get a LOT better at tiny pinches before I could use it.

The mint is dryable as well, so I suppose that is a possibility, Ditto the Juniper thyme, if it tastes good (I haven't tasted it yet) Same with the Southwestern oregano, have to taste it first.

And the tropical sage isn't edible, as far as I know, it's grown for the flowers (which it still doesn't have.) That I may HAVE to bring in (they're VERY expensive plants, and I'd prefer not to have to buy a fresh one every year.)