A Seed Saver's Garden

[Pulsegleaner]

So neat! I love all the impersonator plants, and the jokester plants. I'd like to collect as many as possible. DD had great fun bringing little bouquets of electric daisies in her school lunches. Did you get the seeds from overseas?

Sort of, they showed up from time to time in bags of coriander that would come in from India*, along with another medicago, Medicago polycerata (now known as Trigonella polycerata, I think, I guess it's sort of on the border as to whether it's an alfalfa or a fenugreek relative.)
I'm not sure that it shows up anymore, as it's been a while since I did some Indian coriander (I seem to recall "stuff" getting a lot rarer after a while, and, in any case, most of the coriander I go through now is Moroccan or Middle Eastern (you can tell by the seed shape, Indian is bigger, yellower and more oval.)

I MIGHT still have a few pods somewhere, but to be honest, it never did well here (I think it likes a drier climate than I have, here, it got pretty spindly and pretty moldy, I'm not even sure the pods had any mature seeds in them. Same goes for the other one.

*Back in college, they were in the top five commonest weeds I'd find, along with Vicia sativa (common vetch), Vicia hirsuta, and some kind of pimpernel. Everything else was kind of rare, so I don't really remember most of it.

 

[digitS']

This "gleaner" ... @Pulsegleaner is here to surprise us.

Set in concrete, I see those pictures of a plant having such a strange appearance. PulseGleaner refers to finding seeds in coriander. My first reaction "Coriander! Where??!"

I'm so startled by this mystery within a mystery. Then. Reference to the commonplace alfalfa – nearly a weed here and the funny, childish character in Our Gang comedies. Then, the mystery of finding pimpernel. The Scarlet Pimpernel? A secret identity! I'm so lost I can't draw the relationship of Coriander and Cilantro! Investigations ....

I'm Steve

 

[Pulsegleaner]

Well, I never actually grew any of the pimpernel, so I have no idea if it was the scarlet one (the default color for the flowers of most of the species is blue).

To make things even more confusing, Scarlet Pimpernel isn't even scarlet; the flowers are orange (though, I admit, seeing a low growing weed with bright orange flowers is pretty eye catching in an of itself (I've seen it growing wild in a few places from time to time.)
There was a time when the coriander finds could be quite weird; extra tiny peas so small I thought thew were vetch seeds until I looked at the hilum, odd brown bumpy ones that looked like what I imagine the wild ancestor of fava beans must have looked like, a fully mature soybean smaller than a beluga lentil. Plus, I'm fairly sure that that is where those two odd looking ladybugs (black wing cases with six pink spots) came from. And, of course, there was the Thai coriander with all those hemp seeds in there......

 

[digitS']

 

[Beanmad Nanna]

I stumbled across a plant I'd never heard of before yesterday while browsing '100 Vegetables and Where They Come From'. It's edible and really caught my attention because of how it looks; I've grown a similar plant called Caterpillar. At first I thought they might be related, but no.

Medicago scutellata aka 'Snail Medic'. They really do look snail-ish. I'd love to get seeds for this Southern European plant. I suspect it's also nitrogen fixing like Caterpillar. The greenery of the plant looks very similar. They've been in America for a long time it seems, the 1700's, but it does not appear anyone is offering them. I guess I can only hope that Richter's might have this one on their 2024 list.

View attachment 62282

The dried seeds look equally cool.

Although it is clearly so widely widely grown, globally speaking, I can find no source for it. It is likely one of those plants international agriculture advisors have taken around the world as herbal ley/ fallow/ soil improvement. Its naturalised in Australia (endemic to southern europe? mediterranean borderlands?, possibly into eurasia).

I'm now obliged to look for the spikey types too. ^ from @Pulsegleaner . M muricoleptus etc.

those do look fascinating

 

[heirloomgal]

Although it is clearly so widely widely grown, globally speaking, I can find no source for it. It is likely one of those plants international agriculture advisors have taken around the world as herbal ley/ fallow/ soil improvement. Its naturalised in Australia (endemic to southern europe? mediterranean borderlands?, possibly into eurasia).

I'm now obliged to look for the spikey types too. ^ from @Pulsegleaner . M muricoleptus etc.

those do look fascinating

You could very well be right about that @Beanmad Nanna; it certainly is an interesting question. I wonder too if like @Pulsegleaner has described, odd seed has found its way into countries through food shipments and especially grain shipments that were intended to go directly into fields as oppose to human consumption. It's a topic in and of itself, all of the plants that grow in North America as a result of global trade.

I'm surprised for such a darn cute little plant, that nobody is offering seed for it.

 

[heirloomgal]

Hip hip hooray, seeds arrived

I never make butter tarts, maybe once every 2 or 3 years. But I made some today to celebrate that special moment of writing down next years grow out list.

 

[Pulsegleaner]

You could very well be right about that @Beanmad Nanna; it certainly is an interesting question. I wonder too if like @Pulsegleaner has described, odd seed has found its way into countries through food shipments and especially grain shipments that were intended to go directly into fields as oppose to human consumption. It's a topic in and of itself, all of the plants that grow in North America as a result of global trade.

I'm surprised for such a darn cute little plant, that nobody is offering seed for it.

If you are referring to mine, the pods my be pretty, but the plant isn't all that attractive, it's a lot taller and ganglier than domestic alfalfa, nor does it have the nice floral display (they may be small, but I have seen alfalfa plants with flowers of truly GORGEOUSLY intense colors). If I recall, the flowers on mine are yellow.

Ditto the other one. The pods may LOOK like tiny fenugreek pods, and the seeds like tiny fenugreek seeds, but it's not like they SMELL like fenugreek.

And yes, the plants that have come over would be a long topic. I remember reading in some book the line "If Russian Thistle (tumbleweed) had arrive in the 1950's as opposed to the 1850's it would probably have been labeled a Communist plot." Our history is littered with invasives we brought over ON PURPOSE, Kudzu (for fodder), Japanese Knotweed (for ornamental purposes), water hyacinth (water purification), SOMEONE must have brought over Japanese wineberry for the fruit. History is littered with cases "It seemed like a good idea at the time."

 

[heirloomgal]

If you are referring to mine, the pods my be pretty, but the plant isn't all that attractive, it's a lot taller and ganglier than domestic alfalfa, nor does it have the nice floral display (they may be small, but I have seen alfalfa plants with flowers of truly GORGEOUSLY intense colors). If I recall, the flowers on mine are yellow.

Ditto the other one. The pods may LOOK like tiny fenugreek pods, and the seeds like tiny fenugreek seeds, but it's not like they SMELL like fenugreek.

And yes, the plants that have come over would be a long topic. I remember reading in some book the line "If Russian Thistle (tumbleweed) had arrive in the 1950's as opposed to the 1850's it would probably have been labeled a Communist plot." Our history is littered with invasives we brought over ON PURPOSE, Kudzu (for fodder), Japanese Knotweed (for ornamental purposes), water hyacinth (water purification), SOMEONE must have brought over Japanese wineberry for the fruit. History is littered with cases "It seemed like a good idea at the time."

I was thinking of tumbleweed when I wrote that, since it was one of the first plants that I learned was imported to the continent. I always thought they were just a part of the south's flora, being such a fixture of cowboy flicks. The I read about 'Canada Thistle' which isn't from Canada, so such a strange name. Daisies, another one that surprised me.

I meant to say the buds are so cute, not the plant. I remember the Caterpillar plant foliage - not attractive at all. Looks like a roadside weed.

 

[Branching Out]

If you are referring to mine, the pods my be pretty, but the plant isn't all that attractive, it's a lot taller and ganglier than domestic alfalfa, nor does it have the nice floral display (they may be small, but I have seen alfalfa plants with flowers of truly GORGEOUSLY intense colors). If I recall, the flowers on mine are yellow.

Ditto the other one. The pods may LOOK like tiny fenugreek pods, and the seeds like tiny fenugreek seeds, but it's not like they SMELL like fenugreek.

And yes, the plants that have come over would be a long topic. I remember reading in some book the line "If Russian Thistle (tumbleweed) had arrive in the 1950's as opposed to the 1850's it would probably have been labeled a Communist plot." Our history is littered with invasives we brought over ON PURPOSE, Kudzu (for fodder), Japanese Knotweed (for ornamental purposes), water hyacinth (water purification), SOMEONE must have brought over Japanese wineberry for the fruit. History is littered with cases "It seemed like a good idea at the time."

I knew nothing of Japanese knotweed until a few years ago, but since then it has become a source of nightmares for me. Scary plant. I shudder to think that it was imported intentionally. Almost no one around here knows about this 'ornamental' Little Shop of Horrors cultivar.