What is your best 'bang for the buck' plant? ie, zuccini...
juliamay
15 years ago
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mudsnake
15 years agoRelated Discussions
your best (and worst!) cheap, thrify, and diy garden tips?
Comments (72)One good tip I learned (from trial & error, then much research) is to plant and harvest things at the proper time for your growing zone- even in places like california where people might tell you "oh you can grow anything there all year round"... not true! some plants are warm season, some are cool season, some like to overwinter, some are annual, some are perennial, some are biennial, etc. Research each plant, and also don't assume plants that seem similar will have the same needs, for example peas and beans both come in bush and vining varieties and grow in pods, but peas like cool weather while beans like it hot- except for a few certain beans that actually do prefer it cool... Also, potatoes can tolerate cool weather while sweet potatoes don't. Kale & lettuces grow best in cool weather while chard seems to do fine in hot or cool. You get the idea. If you plant things at the wrong time you'll be wasting your time and the seeds- I tried lettuce when it was too late to be planting it and in the heat of summer it went straight to bolt. I've planted zucchini and tomatoes when it was too cold for them and they grew poorly and didn't produce fruit. Harvest times are just as important as planting times- I planted radishes once and they didn't seem to get big enough by harvesting time so I thought I could just let them keep growing for a while longer- but found out that if you leave them in the ground too long they get tough and too spicy and shrivel up instead of getting bigger! Also it may be tempting to let a zucchini get huge, thinking it will just provide more food when you let a fruit get 2 feet long... No! Harvest them young & tender and about the size they sell them in the grocery store (or smaller), any larger and you get a hard shell, lots of seeds, and very little (and quite tasteless) flesh. Moral of these stories is to research each fruit or veggie you want to grow & follow the "directions", it will mean the difference between success & failure! Also- healthy soil is #1 important thing for plants - no chemical fertilizer! Compost is your best friend. Mulch is your other best friend- use what is available & free- leaves & pine needles are what I use. Good luck!!!...See MoreWhat gives you the most bang for the buck?
Comments (7)Well you HAVE to grow tomatoes if you like eating them fresh. The supermarket tomatoes are not only overpriced, they're completely unripe and flavorless (picked barely yellow and gassed into redness). Basil and rosemary ought to be grown because they're only good fresh, and far too expensive in the grocery store. Likewise cilantro. Most other herbs are decent in their dried form, or have acceptable dried seeds or substitutes. But not those two. I grow Hungarian sweet paprika for both the quality and cost. It's better than buying those pricey tins of Pride of Szeged. Fruit-bearing vines and bushes are absolutely wonderful. They're more FAR flavorful, practically free, and you can get all sorts of varieties you'd never be able to get in grocery stores or even farmer's markets! Currants, gooseberries, raspberries, grapes, mulberries, blackberries, raspberries, black raspberries, strawberries, blueberries, loganberries, huckleberries, keriberries... The list goes on and on! Do you research and you'll be able to plant varieties that ripen in a staggered pattern, so you'll have fresh fruit from June to October! A gallon of berries for practically nothing, or $3.00 a pint at the grocery store. Hmm.......See MoreVegetable Bang for Buck
Comments (34)This question can be approached on several levels. One, YIELD per square foot, and there are several searchable sites that can be explored on that. Two, TASTE, which is subjective, but folks generally seem to agree that tomatoes always come out on top in the homegrown vs storebought comparison. Then there's COST: another variety of factors comes into play here. Factors influencing cost include: seasonality (almost reduced to nonexistant due to air shipment in off seasons); transportability, the more delicate bruisable stuff have highest loss rates; perishability, short shelf-life; and overall exoticness. For example, very unusual tropical fruits will have less availability and be costlier than, say, apples which grow almost anywhere in the US and have good storage capability. Artichokes need a very long season but can't be grown reliably in zones colder than zone 7 and their cost reflects that (but cardoons, same family and similar in taste, can be grown much further north). Asparagus are pretty hardy growers but short harvest season in most of the US, so imports are available year-round. But if you want white or purple asparagus, you have to pay the piper. Iceberg and other more common lettuces are fairly inexpensive, but get into the fancy shmancy stuff and you're shelling out dough. So IMO, it's kind of like creating a matrix of yield vs taste vs cost and deciding what floats your personal boat....See MoreBest soil and pH for different roses & plants & your goals and plans
Comments (32)Just went out to check all my leaves. The disease-resistant roses with glossy foliage all have 7-leafets: Kordes Flower Carpet, Pat Austin and Tchaikovsky. Kordes Flower Carpet doesn't have mildew in shade, but Knock-out (5-leaflet) has mildew. Other DISEASE-RESISTANT with 7-leaflets: William Shakespeare 2000, Duchess de Rohan, Excellenz von Schubert, Annie L. McDowell, Blue Mist, Poseidon, Cloudert Soupert, and Crown Princess Mag. ... all have leaves in set of 7. These can take wet soil well, like multiflora rose thriving in wet lands. But the blackspot-prone roses: Comte de Chambord and hybrid teas have leaves in set of 5, and much larger & round leaves. These prefer well-drained soil, and tend to blackspot with prolonged wetness & acidic rain. Multiflora-leaves are clearly a set of 7, see below pic: http://na.fs.fed.us/spfo/invasiveplants/factsheets/pdf/multiflora-rose.pdf "Each multiflora leaf as 5 to 11 one inch-long oval leaflets with toothed margins. The undersides of the leaflets have tiny hairs and are paler than the upper surface. The base of each leaf stalk has a characteristic stipule (green, leafy structure) with hairs or a comb-like fringe along its margins. Flowers. As indicated by its scientific name Rosa multiflora, this plant has abundant, showy clusters of flowers which typically are white, though sometimes slightly pink." Below is Austin rose William Morris, which did terrible in slightly acidic wet & peaty potting soil, then finally died when I put in my wet clay made acidic with cracked corn. Note the leaves are in a set of 5, which means it prefer well-drained & loamy soil, and CANNOT take acid & wetness like those of set-7 leaves. Folks complain about WM being stingy and rust-fungal-prone. The drought-tolerant & disease-resistant Rugosa has rounder leaves in set of 9, plus very bristly canes full of thistles, see below:...See Morehepatica_z7
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