Posted on 04/26/2013 12:37:55 PM PDT by greeneyes
The Weekly Gardening Thread is a weekly gathering of folks that love soil, seeds and plants of all kinds. From complete newbies that are looking to start that first potted plant, to gardeners with some acreage, to Master Gardener level and beyond, we would love to hear from you.
This thread is non-political, although you will find that most here are conservative folks. No matter what, you won’t be flamed and the only dumb question is the one that isn’t asked.
It is impossible to hijack the Weekly Gardening Thread ... there is no telling where it will go and that is part of the fun and interest. Jump in and join us!
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Turkey vultures aren’t regular visitors so I grabbed my camera when I found them strutting around my yard one morning.
We have so many White Wing doves here now. There are still a lot of Mourning doves here, but the White Wing have really taken over. I use a pellet gun, clean 'em and put 'em on the pit.
Do you use it? Is it just a matter of drying it or steeping it and using it like the store bought sweetener?
Yes, I use it. I have used it dried, and just steeped it along with my tea leaves in a teaball.
I didn’t harvest much, because it was a small plant, and I wanted to let it get established and then do some root cuttings to see if I could get several plants going.
You can get a book “Growing and Using Stevia” for about 10 bucks. You can dry it and make a green stevia powder, but it doesn’t work in all recipes due to the distinctive taste. The book tells how to process and has some good recipes.
I have stevia packets that I sometimes use in lemonade, but I got those a long time ago in health food store, and it’s white so it is highly processed. Mostly I don’t add sugar to anything except at Christmas when I bake cookies and cakes and stuff.
Many years ago, I bought some stevia powder (white in color) that was to be disolved in with water for use that tasted fine. But it was pricey.... Ok, found the bottle in the cabinet which says it’s 100% pure concentrated extract of Stevia and has no other ingredients.
A few months ago I tried Truvia which has Erythritol added. I’m guessing it’s the Erythritol that makes it tastes so awful.
Then I tried Only Sweet which only shows the only other ingredients as “Natural flavor” but on the front label states it’s stevia mixed with “maltodextrin and natural flavors”. Maltodextrin is also mixed with Splenda (yeah, I know Splenda isn’t stevia). Only Sweet tastes ok but I don’t want the maltodextrin.
Right now I’m trying Stevia in the Raw in some coffee. It is stevia mixed with dextrose (also in Splenda). It tastes ok but again wanting to get away from dextrose. Why? I dunno, just because.
I guess I just want to get away from all those extra ingredients and I can’t see spending $6 for a wee little 2 oz box of sweetener if I can grow it in the garden. Ok, I can see steeping the home grown stevia leaves for tea but I’m guessing powdered dried stevia would be green/brown and not so pretty in cooking. I’m guessing the store bought stuff has been steeped in water and then dehydrated or crystalized somehow and maybe bleached to color (or would that be de-colored) it white.
Bottom line, if you experiment with it more, please give me a heads up.
Thanks.
Thank you. Never heard of a cynch trap, but will be looking to buy one or some. It appears to be doing exactly what I need it to do.
Okay. Yes I would like to avoid additives if possible. Most of the sugar in the USA is made from sugar beets and a lot of the commercial sugar beets are GMO, which is not something I am fond of partaking in.
Like I said, I now just don’t add sugar to any thing anymore if I can avoid it, more for health reasons than additive reasons. My taste buds have reset, and now I don’t even like stuff that is really sweet. When I drink a cola, I cut it with club soda, because the soda is too sweet.
I drink tea with lemon and no sugar or stevia added.
The book does have recipes to use the green powdered stevia that you can make yourself.
I will be trying it again, but I’ll be ordering a plant to get started faster. Will keep you posted, but it will probably be a long time before I have enough crop to try any of the recipes. I am adverse to the high prices too.
“We have a bunch of Stumps left from cutting trees to get more sun. So I am going to lay down a perimeter of edging around the stumps, turn under the grass and cover it with cardboard or newspaper, dump some good soil on it and plant the tall ancient grains around it, and then the edilble flowers at the edge.
It should hide the stumps during the summer, and provide some food this year and going forward with little or no maintenance perhaps.”
What a great idea! Darlin and I just cut down a very scraggy red bud, and it is in a good area of the yard to receive some planting. I have 5 of the plants from your seed list. I sprouted some amaranth that I had bought from the health food store as one of my whole grain cereal grains. They’ve been growing like crazy, and I’ve been wondering where to put them. I also have some of the red amaranth that I now may sprout as well to use in a similar manner as you describe.
I have some privet hedge that volunteered in one of my beds a number of months ago, and I had not realized how it had taken over. It’s gonna be a job getting it cleared out so that bed can be reclaimed! I’ll have the challenge of not disturbing the day lilies that I transferred there several months ago.
I bought some Appaloosa, Anasazi, and Cranberry beans to have on hand, and set aside some for trying as garden seeds. Also bought some black turtle beans for same reason, but they aren’t as pricy as the other 3.
Pulled out my large pots from the back yard and brought them around to begin prepping them for the container portion of my garden. Not fully decided what goes where, but am in the fun part of “figgerin’.”
Still wondering when our local wizards will give the all clear in our area to start planting without fear of freezing.
Managed to snag a few more milk jugs to make into wall-o-waters and finished planting the back garden this week. Haven’t planted the bigger garden out on the land yet, but I want to get the fence up first.
I was planning to go out there today, but when I stopped for gas before leaving down, I discovered that my truck’s gas tank has sprung a leak. And a big one, judging from the “waterfall” just after filling it. Yikes!
Any advice welcome:
I’m looking to buy a small cultivator/tiller, and I don’t want to pay more than about $300 for it. I’m new at in-ground gardening (built containers last year), so the ground hasn’t been touched yet. I really don’t want to over-buy, but I’m a little worried about how hard it’ll be to loosen up packed dirt.
1) Can’t i just go rent one of the big machines at first to loosen up the dirt instead of buying something bigger than what I’ll need in the future?
2) Gas or electric?
3) What brands are good and which ones should I stay away from?
Thank you for any advice you can give me!
“down” = town.
Don't give up on your garden. Weeding and cultivating veggies is so relaxing and takes away some of the stress of the world we are now living in. I feel your pain because the growing season where I live is short and a week or two one way or the other is crucial to whether we get even a handful of tomatoes or the cold fall weather nights don't kill whatever is left to be harvested.
Thanks for the suggestion. I bought two of them today. Wouldn’t have known about this if it hadn’t been for you!
They are hard for me to set as I have some arthritis in one wrist so I set them in a vice in my work shop and then “Plant” them in a run. Use a screwdriver to probe for the run.
That looks like SuperMax for strawberries. Just wow. How did you construct the frame thingies? Are they moveable or just open and closeable? Do you rotate your strawberries every 3 or 4 years like the books say you should? Inquiring and interested minds here. I’m thinking of a ‘honey do’ project having seen those nifty strawberry protectors!
Thank you. That’s helpful because we’re unfamiliar with them and I had a plate surgically installed in my wrist after a nasty fall (gardening of all things - and tripping over a very large rock) last year shattering bones and chipping one off a bit.
Our strawberries have been going strong for about five years. We keep buying more each year to ensure continuous crop.
The frames are 1/2 inch square tubing welded together and the wire is 3/4 inch aviary covering. My son owns a automotive repair facility that does lite duty welding and the cages ARE a little awkward to move but its worth the effort. You may be able to use 1/2 electrical conduit by cutting and bending and having a shop weld them together
Cool. Let me know how your Amarath experience goes. The light colored seeds are the ones that are good for grains. They are all supposed to be good for cooked greens, but maybe not as fresh greens. At least that’s what I got out of what I read.
My car’s in the shop, and no one has the parts in stock. It’s going to cost about 400 bucks to get it fixed. It also needs some muffler work, but I don’t have the money for that, and I still have a year before safety inspection and license renewal to save the money for that.
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