Archive for Easy Edibles – Page 5

Attention Blueberry Lovers: It’s time to plan ahead!

Posted by Carol 
· March 20, 2013 

Attention Blueberry Lovers: It’s time to plan ahead!

If you’re like me, you can’t get enough blueberries. If you are thinking, “Hey! I could grow blueberries, they’re easy,” you’d be right!

Blueberry cluster Portland Landscape Design

Purchasing a large blueberry plant means you are buying time.

So now’s the time to take a minute to plan ahead for next season’s blueberry goodness.

Spartan blueberries are my absolute favorite for flavor. In the old days (10 years ago), when my client Diane in NE Portland,  ordered a Spartan blueberry, she got a little stick with roots on the end. She is a plucky gardener, but this was very discouraging, especially when someone stepped on the poor Spartan before it was big enough to defend itself.

Making the Tradeoff: Price Versus Instant Gratification

Buying a big plant is buying time. It’s easy to buy blueberry plants that are at least 30 inches tall and wide. Using Spartan blueberries as an example, you can spend about 40 percent more  for a one-or-two-year-old plant, but you’ll get that fruity deliciousness three years sooner.

Choosing the Right Variety

From March through July, Portland’s full-service nurseries offer plenty of nice, big plants and many varieties. Try these tips for the ultimate blueberry experience:

  • Don’t rush your choice. I can’t say enough about taking your time when selecting an edible. There are so many varieties to choose from, that it’s just plain smart to take your time. You are buying more than food, more than an  ornamental plant. You are buying memories as well as pleasure at the moment of harvest. My criteria for selecting a blueberry variety: totally delicious taste, convenient harvest time, plant sizes and shapes that are right for my garden, and gorgeous fall leaf color. Are you ready to pick out your favorite blueberry variety? If not, maybe this year will be about sampling berries at farmers markets and then buying your plant in the early fall.  What fun that will be!
  • Protect your plants. You won’t be the only one wanting blueberries. Birds and your dog will steal as much fruit as they can get away with. Be sure to leave lower branches for your dog to nibble on. If you use nets, check them often, or you will find little bird corpses tangled in the netting.
  • Think about the timing of the harvest. If you are always gone in July, select varieties that ripen in August.
  •  Buy companion varieties to maximize your crop. Remember to buy two
    different varieties that ripen at the same time. They flower at the same time, and the bumble bees can cross-pollinate the bushes to give you a better crop. Bumble bees vibrate the pollen off their feet and bodies from one flower to another and that is how they cross pollinate.  It’s primarily bumble bees that cross-pollinate blueberry plants.

    Dragon Fly visits blueberry plant in Lori's garden

    Dragonfly on green blueberry cluster-another great reason to shun pesticides in your garden. Photo from my client Lori Aveling.

    Don’t use pesticides on any plants because they harm and kill the bees.  Blueberry plants don’t have many pest problems.

  • Consider the newer evergreen varieties for the front yard. For example, ‘Sunshine Blue is a variety that local edibles expert Vern Nelson and I really like. ‘Sunshine Blue’ is evergreen, so the leaves stay on the bush year round and it’s small, say 3 by 3 feet. This way, you can have edibles in the front yard without going totally  “Urban Homestead”. (Portland has many new landscapes that are  completely given over to growing edibles. It’s an exciting, fun idea but not for everyone.)

Next time: More about blueberries, specifically a chart of never-fail varieties.

Categories : Easy Edibles, Garden Tips
Tags : , , , ,

Pick Dwarf Fruit Trees To Fit Your Yard

Posted by Carol 
· January 15, 2013 

This time I’m engaging in one of my favorite activities: Myth Busting!

It’s amazing how much flat-out misinformation is available online to gardeners of all levels of experience. The worst of it occurs when the misinformation makes gardeners reluctant to try something new or choose the wrong variety for their situation. The negative effect of misinformation is especially bad when the topic is fruit trees.

Just Give Me the Fruit, and Be Quick About It!

You want a few trees, and some homegrown fruit, not an orchard.

I bet that you just want a few fruit trees and home-grown fruit, not an orchard. And, that you don’t want to spend countless hours learning the whole Horticultural Science thing. If I’m right, here are three myths that can affect your fruit tree success:

§ Myth #1: Dwarf fruit trees won’t grow enough fruit. This is so wrong, I could start laughing and never stop. Please forgive me and then believe me: dwarf trees have been developed to put out a lot of fruit! How? They are grafted to a root stock of a compatible but different much smaller tree. This means your selected fruit tree is using the root system of the smaller tree.  This inhibits size and can also add many wonderful attributes to your tree and fruit.

§ Myth #2: The root stock name doesn’t matter. If you are at a nursery where the plant tags ONLY say mini or dwarf apple,  walk away.  Just as you would probably avoid buying a car that gets ten miles to the gallon of gas,  you want a high-performance fruit tree.  You don’t just want a dwarf fruit tree. You want one that is grafted to a new, super-cool, disease-resistant, clay soil-tolerant root stock, which can help you avoid or overcome serious obstacles to success. There are many to choose from, it can get a little overwhelming until you understand what the different root stocks do and can sort through the options by how you want your trees to grow. See the link in my next blog for the root stock list.

This drawing illustrates fruit bearing wood on a dwarf apple tree

§ Myth #3: We must endure making mistakes as an inevitable part of learning gardening skills. Wrong! You don’t have to make all the typical beginner mistakes, even if it does produce what our parents call character. Helping you avoid character-building pain is what people like Vern Nelson (and even me) are for. We are here to help you get satisfying results on your first try. Vern Nelson, The hungry gardener, is the edibles genius I turn to for straight talk and he also teaches hands on classes at his private garden.

Next time: Four excellent ways that dwarf fruit trees grown on special root stock add pleasure and convenience to your gardening experience.

Categories : Easy Edibles, Garden Tips, Plants I Recommend, Tree Selection

Apple Tasting at Portland Nursery

Posted by Carol 
· October 25, 2012 

 

Designer Carol Lindsay with her grandboy Becket at apple tasting event

Landscape Designer Carol Lindsay, (with nicely chilled grandboy Beckett) samples heirloom apples at Portland Nursery

I am sharing my top three apples out of 50 selected at Portland Nursery’s 25th Apple Tasting Celebration.  A  garden tip is to research (hint taste)  and plant special varieties of edibles in your garden, not common types.  The Peoples Choice apple this year  is Ambrosia which is wonderfully sweet and fresh tasting.   David, a mid sized red is a different sweet tasting apple but like Ambrosia it will not keep for months in a cool place.  But you don’t care about this!!!  Buy em when they are in the stores and enjoy!   My third apple, Ashmeads Kernal, a late season apple, will keep til January or longer if properly chilled.  Liberty  (not in my top three),  is very good and the plant is mildew and apple spot resistant so great for the home gardener.    My grandboy, Becket is a serious apple connoisseur so this was the perfect event us. The price for apples?  99 cents.

Categories : Easy Edibles, Fall Gardening
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Easy Edible Plants: Blueberries

Posted by Carol 
· February 15, 2012 

Blueberries very easy edible plants. Blueberries are great for your brain. Did I mention easy? Once your plants are established, the trick to growing blueberries is proper pruning. We want to encourage new growth and to do that, we have to remove some of the old growth. This is a great thing to do together on a garden coach appointment. Do mulch around your plant periodically with coffee grounds to increase acidity in the soil (any time of year works for this – you could do it up to ten times per year! ) Don’t use peat moss even if other experts say to do it.

Categories : Easy Edibles
Tags : , , , , , ,

Grafted Tomato Test Results

Posted by Carol 
· July 26, 2011 

Bob harvest tomatoes from our canoe

Bob harvesting tomatoes from our canoe

Ok, so I tested the new grafted tomatoes. I forgot about having too many variables, so I also tested a new potting soil which totally goofed my test.

I can tell you though, that the tomatoes in the fancy slow release fertilizer planter did the best. One was a grafted cherry tomato. It was and still is Amazing! It was the first to set fruit, and the first to put a big goofy grin on my face (July 14th) when I tasted my first one.

The flavor and the early harvest are the amazing part since June was pretty cool I didn’t expect the flavor to be as dramatic.

All the tomatoes, grafted and otherwise, did better in the slow release fertilizer side of the planter. It was an encouraging first year crop of tomatoes.

I loved picking the fresh tomatoes with bits of my rosemary for my breakfast scramble. Very satisfying!

Categories : Easy Edibles, Garden Tips
Tags : ,
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