Nasturtiums: A great addition to summer salads!

Here’s an easy to grow plant that can be started anytime in the spring or summer. It produces beautiful flowers that will add a splash of brilliant color to any garden. The really good news, however is that both the leaves and flowers are edible.

For years now, I’ve grown this plant as a colorful addition to my summer salads. I use the leaves also which add a light peppery taste to the salad mix. The seeds are readily available at most seed stores.

The rains have begun to let up and it’s actually warm outside!

After what has been a very wet beginning to the growing season, (two feet of water in the last six weeks), things are beginning to look up here in my little corner of southwest Missouri.

Even during the wet and cool days of the last few weeks, my raised beds plantings have done OK. The fact that they are raised up above ground level a little has probably helped a lot. Now, the weather service is beginning to call for somewhat dryer conditions and much warmer weather. Bout time!

One of the first to respond has been the zucchini plants that a friend talked me into planting. I think there are two varieties, a gooseneck and a regular zucchini, although I could not swear to it. (In years past, I could have told you the exact variety, when it was planted and how much water the darn thing had received. That was when my OCD reigned supreme. Now, I intentionally just let go and have fun). This will be my first year at trying to grow this vegetable. I’ve also never tasted it and look forward to the experience.

Kale now making new little seeds!

After harvesting kale leaves all winter long from a single planting I made in 2010, I decided to let the plant go to seed the following season. It put out beautiful yellow flowers in the spring which attracted bees in the area. Then, through the miracle of pollination, small pods began to develop. I was interested to learn from reading another blog that even the flowers and immature seed pods are edible. I tried a few pods as part of a garden salad for my lunch and can report that indeed they are a nice addition, adding some ‘crunch’ to the fare. Alas, it was too late this time around to harvest any kale flowers, I’ll try that next spring.

Moringa plant update for May 2011

It’s been close to a month since my last Moringa plant update and I have an admission to make. There are actually two plants. One was started in early March and the other a few weeks later. The later plant was sickly and I didn’t think it would make it. So far, it’s proved me wrong.

To help keep them straight, I’ve decided to call one Berta Bush and the later plant, Mr. Floppers. I came up with these names as they describe them rather well. Bertha has become all bushy like while Mr. Floppers earned his moniker by flopping over dead every time I initially took him outside for some fresh air.

I’ve come to realize that each Moringa that I’ve grown from seed, so far, exhibits characteristics that make each unique. Like people, they can be tall and skinny or fat and…well, bushy. They also do not tolerate cold weather at all. My original starts that were grown in the winter months quickly succumbed to mites. Bertha and Mr. Floppers, however, seem to be doing just fine. I’ve made sure to bring them inside on cold nights and have limited their exposure to direct sunlight so far. Now, as the weather warms, I hope to leave them outside more and more. Bertha is even beginning to show some toughening of her lower stem. (These plants are trees after all)!

My plan, at this time will be to eventually transplant Bertha into a larger ceramic pot where she will be maintained while Floppers will go into the ground outside next to my garden. (I’m, not sure how he feels about that idea at this point).  Moringa’s are said to be quick growers in their native county of India. Some can grow over fifteen feet in just one season! Time will tell as to how well these two do.

A plant of many names!

Known by names like Air Plant, Life-plant, Cathedral Bells, Floppers (?), Mexican Love Plant, and the Mother-in-Law Plant, this succulent is very easy to grow and typically puts out some rather interesting long lasting pink flowers in the late spring and early summer.

The plant is a member of the Crassulacea Family, Genus Kalanchoe. One of the traits of this family is that it readily produces new little plants from any leaves that fall onto the ground. This is pretty cool and that is the way I am starting my own plant from a leaf that was donated by a neighbor. Actually, it’s so easy to grow that in Florida it is listed as a Category Two Invasive by the Florida Exotic Pest Plant Council (FLEPPC). This plant is spreading in natural areas in central and southern Florida and the Keys (zones 9a through 11), but is stopped in areas that see temperatures that fall to or below 40F.

It grows best on a loose soil that is high in peat (good drainage). I’m told that too much water will kill it, so I will try and keep that in mind as I monitor its progress. I hope to do a follow up on this rather interesting plant later this summer. If this plant gets big and anyone wants some leaves from it, please let me know.

A spring salad at low cost!

Even though it has been a mite cold lately down where I live in southwest Missouri, the volunteer lettuce has done well. Overnight, the thermometer got down to 39 degrees which was a little on the cold side if you asked me. I waited for things to warm up before venturing out into the garden to harvest a small head of romaine and a single small carrot bit of which had survived the winter in good fashion.

Produce in hand; I decided to also grab a small amount of chives making sure to get a few flower tops while I did so. I had it in my mind to make a salad using whatever was leftover in the fridge.

After cleaning the lettuce and small carrot, I took a look in the fridge and found some iceberg lettuce, a stalk of celery and a small bit of bell pepper all of which had been purchased at the local grocery. The lettuce is running somewhere between a buck and a half and two bucks depending on which store you shop at. And, the bell pepper was something like $1.79, a luxury I will not be able to afford very often. Thankfully, I'm growing my own.

For a dressing, rather that store bought, I mixed up equal parts of ketchup and mayo to make a simple Ranch style mix. To this I added a little water, mixed it up and then poured it over the salad. The end result was pretty darn good for an old country boy.