Category: Garden

Another one gone to seed

On By CarynIn Garden
Carrot blossoms and unripe seeds

I now have a carrot that has gone to seed. It somehow escaped the harvest (which was rather a sad harvest, as I planted carrots just to see what happened, but didn’t prep our hard clay soil for carrots, so the roots were small and stunted). As it grew up tall and lush with the spring rain, I decided to just let it do its thing. The flowers are impressive bundles of white! I have since been reading more about carrot seed collection (this is a good article), and it will be interesting to see what, if anything, will grow from the seeds. This is a longer experiment; I need to wait until the end of summer when the flower heads turn brown, then collect the flower heads and let them dry completely before collecting the seeds.

Garden sack experiment

On By CarynIn Garden

I filled up the chicken feed bucket and had an empty feed sack. I had some dirt left over from the strawberry planting project. I had some carrots that were getting leggy in the fridge. I’ve seen some posts on planting potatoes in sacks. Why not? I’ll try planting carrot tops.

Carrot tops planted in a feed sack

I folded the top of the feed sack down to the base, to form a double walled container. I cut some drainage holes in the bottom of the sack and filled it with dirt. I cut the top inch or so off the carrots and planted them in the soil with just the tops showing, then gave them a good water. In the photo, behind the feed sack, you can see I’m doing a similar experiment with green onions. My basil is doing well (right side of photo), and I even have some watermelon sprouts (left side).

Nasturtiums

On By CarynIn Garden
Yellow Nasturtium

My nasturtiums bloomed! However, they are not climbing nasturtiums. I was rather hoping for a nice shady vine to climb up the chicken coop, but alas, no. These are about 18” high with no signs of tendrils or runners. I’ll have to try for something vining next year. However, they are pretty and smell nice. They don’t taste of much, though. The leaves remind me of lily pads.

Orange Nasturtium

Impromptu basket

On By CarynIn Craft, Garden

Waiting for the outside cat to finish her dinner (she needs a guard while she eats because of Big Orange Tom), I was distracted by the honeysuckle runners reaching into the grass. So I grabbed a knife and trimmed the stems that were going out of bounds, which left me with a dozen or so long bendy pieces. The cat was still eating, so I made an attempt at a basket. I laid out six of the thicker stems as my spokes and used the other stems to twine around the spokes. When I ran out of material, I wove in the tops of the spokes. Huh. I can make a basket. There we go. The cat was long gone, at this point.

Fresh honeysuckle vine basket

It is a rough little basket, but was straightforward enough that I looked up honeysuckle basket making online for more information. It turns out the best recommended time to harvest honeysuckle vine is in the fall, and once harvested, the vines can be stored. Then the traditional method is to boil the vines to kill any bugs, assist in removing the bark, and make the vine more pliable before making a basket. So I’ll give that a try this fall.