[garlic, amaryllis, blueberry]
I may have committed sacrilege with the “stinking rose” last week: I planted it. The stinking rose is another name for garlic, and the recommended time for planting is around the time of autumn’s first frost, which hasn’t yet happened and isn’t in the immediate offing. In fact, to my way of thinking, I got my garlic in a little too late this year, only because I couldn’t decide where to plant it.
Once a garlic clove is planted, it starts to grow roots and usually pushes a few leaves up out of the soil. Come winter, those leaves might die back; then again, with snow cover, they might not. Other gardeners fear that dieback of leaves in winter will hurt the plants but I’ve never noticed any such bad effect. A little mulch over the plants in early winter should allay any such fears.
The more leaf growth you get from garlic before long summer days initiate bulbing, the bigger the resulting bulbs. And the more root growth that garlic makes, the more nutrients can be taken up to fuel more leaf growth. That’s why I plant garlic as early as possible, often in August. I want my plants to get started making roots as soon as possible.
Come spring, roots are in place and ready to nourish new leaves. The earlier I plant the year before, the more roots the cloves have in spring and the bigger the bulbs I harvest in summer.
*************************************
Speaking of hardy bulbs possibly brings me to amaryllis, that gaudy, humongous flower more correctly called by its true botanical name, Hippeastrum, and so popular around Christmas-time. About now is when we are directed to let our potted amaryllises (I might as well use the common name) dry out and experience some cool temperatures for a few weeks. Kept thi way for a few weeks, the bulbs can be awakened in a couple of months with warmth and water to bloom again for Christmas.
Amaryllis Myth Number One is that the leaves dry out once watering ceases. The leaves never dry down, despite the assertion of so many “authorities.” I’ve let my amaryllises go without water for weeks; the leaves become flacid but remain as green as ever.
I learned what seems to be Amaryllis Myth Number Two when another gardener recently showed me his lush-growing amaryllises growing as perennials amongst other greenery blanketing a slope. Amaryllis is not supposed to be hardy outdoors where winter temperatures drop lower than zero or 10 degrees F. These were (and true Amaryllises, as opposed to Hippeastrum, definitely are). Ground cover, whether snow, mulch, or other vegetation, as well as microclimate can have great influence on how cold temperatures plummet to just a few inches below the ground.
I’m not a big fan large-flowered amaryllis so am more than willing to risk planting mine outdoors. I have a bed along the sunny, south wall of my house which has become a dumping ground for miscellaneous plants. Perhaps I’ll plant it there. Perhaps I’ll plant it in my blueberry bed in which also allegedly non-hardy gladiolus bulbs have been coming back year after year for over two decades. Either way, I won’t be seeing those gaudy, large amaryllis blooms at Christmas-time; if they survive, they’ll bloom in spring.
************************************
I had pretty much given up on fresh blueberries for the season — after all, it’s past the middle of September. And especially this year, since everything began early, with the first blueberries ripening about the middle of June. Yet Deb came strutting into the kitchen this morning, especially proud of the overflowing bowl of blueberries and raspberries she was carrying.
The blueberries were of the variety Elliot, and they were delicious. The secret to nonstop blueberries all summer long is to plant a few varieties ripening at different intervals throughout the season.
I’ve sometimes asserted that anyone with some sunny ground who does not plant blueberries is a fool; I’d like now to extend that assertion also to raspberries. Like blueberries, the raspberries you can grow taste better than any you can buy because they can be picked truly ripe and can be of varieties selected for flavor rather than for commercial attributes. My favorite varieties are Caroline, Fallgold, and Cuthbert. Another plus for backyard raspberries and blueberries is that they needn’t be doused with the pesticide sprays to which most commercial raspberries and blueberries are exposed.
One more reason to grow raspberries and blueberries: They’re easy. Mine get mulched in autumn and pruned in spring. To fend off birds, I also cover my blueberry planting with a net, which I’ll remove within a couple of weeks, by which time I expect the blueberries really will be finished for the season.
[grapes, hornets, bibi mazoon]
Hot and dry — what great summer weather we’ve had for grapes. Every morning for the past few weeks I’ve gone out and picked bunches for fresh eating, and I’ll continue to do so for weeks to come. The bunches aren’t those of just any old varieties; they are varieties chosen from among the 5,000 or so existing grape varieties.
Well, not really. I couldn’t choose from among all 5,000 varieties because many varieties would not grow here. The grapes that grow best here are those derived from fox grapes (Vitis labrusca) and other species native to this part of the world. Concord is the archetype fox grape, with a slip skin, a jelly-like flesh, and that distinctive, foxy flavor. Muscadine grapes (V. rotundifolia) are native to the Southeast, so aren’t hardy here. European wine grapes (Vitis vinifera) also can’t stand up to our winter cold, and if that doesn’t do them in, grape diseases (such as black rot) and insects (such as phylloxera, as bad as it sounds) found in the Northeast do.
Still, breeding and selection have resulted in plenty of grape varieties adapted here and everywhere, and, over the years, I’ve planted some of the best candidates, ripping out any that didn’t make the grade and planting new ones. Many of my favorites come from the amateur breeding work of Minnesota dairy farmer Elmer Swenson: Edelweiss (very foxy, and pictured at right); Swenson’s Red (crunchy, sweet); Swenson’s White; and Brianna. My garden is in a cold spot, so my Vanessa vine froze back this year, but this variety, which also happens to be seedless, is so delectable and beautiful, that I have the new sprouts in training again for, hopefully, return engagements. Campbell’s Early is similar to Concord, but much earlier, with robust leaves, stems, berry clusters, and flavor. And finally, Alden is a favorite for its sweet flavor and meaty texture. Just about all these varieties have some amount of European wine grape in their predominantly fox grape heritage.
This year was the last chance I gave Duchess and Winchell grapes. Both are reasonably good but Duchess died back this winter, and its new sprouts are not going to be back in training, Winchell berries are too small with seeds too large. Their space along my grape trellis could be better used by some better grapes.
I’m looking forward to next year, when some newer varieties should come into bearing. I have high hopes for Mars, Somerset Seedless, New York Muscat, and Reliance, and am hoping for a similar hot, dry, grape-friendly summer.
******************************************
Where there are grapes, there are bees, and bald-faced hornets have been having a grand old time with the grapes this summer. Every time I reach into the foliage to pick a bunch I’m also expecting to get stung. So I was relieved to discover yet another use for one of my pruning tools, the ARS Rose Pruner with Branch Grip.
I am generally a big fan of ARS pruners, both for their design and for the quality of their materials and workmanship. Their Rose Pruner with Branch Grip has a 2-foot-long handle that’s useful for reaching into a bed for a flowering stem — even if its not a rose — to snip it off and then hold on
to it.
That tool is, I’ve discovered, just what I need to pick and hold bunches of grapes without fear of getting stung. An added benefit is that I can more easily pick off bunches buried deep within the foliage as well as some of those on my arbor for which I would otherwise need a ladder.
*****************************************
The hot, dry weather this summer has also been kind to plants other than grapes. One recipient of this heavenly beneficence has been Bibi Mazoon, a modern rose with old fashioned charm.
Bibi Mazoon has sat on the north side of the rustic arbor entry to my vegetable garden for over a decade and, in all honesty, hasn’t done much. Some years she hasn’t bloomed at all. Other years she coughed up perhaps 2 or 3 blooms.
I’ve kept Bibi Mazoon around because every bloom that does appear is so glorious. Each bud expands into a ball of petals that slowly unravels into a loose, open blossom in a soft shade of pink. The aroma is pure rose, leaving nothing olfactory to be desired. (I also keep Bibi because I subsequently planted a polyantha rose right against her, so even if Bibi does nothing, the polyantha fills the space with its abundant small leaves and pink blossoms.)
This week, 3 tall shoots of Bibi Mazoon reared their flowering heads above the polyantha rose. I might use my ARS Rose Pruner with Branch Grip to pluck off one of those blossoms for a vase indoors.
[best tomatoes, fruits ripening, knapweed and ny ironweed]
And the winner is . . . Cherokee Purple. At my recent tomato growing workshop, we also did a tomato tasting. I cut tomatoes, passed out slices, and everyone rated each variety on a scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being best. The rating was strictly for flavor, to me the most important quality in a home-grown tomato. I try to grow only the best-tasting varieties each year; we tasted some of these varieties as well as a few others I got from Four Winds Farm in Gardiner, NY, a farm that specializes in heirloom varieties.
Here are the ratings, representing a rough average of workshop attendees’ opinions with, I admit, a heavier weighting from me, because I plan to use the ratings to determine which varieties to grow and not to grow next year. Soldacki and Yellow Brandywine: 3; Carmello: 5; Goldie Yellow and Krim: 6; Blue Beech and Belgian Giant: 7: Black Brandywine, Prudens Purple, Rose de Berne, and Black Cherry: 8; and Anna Russian and Cherokee Purple: 9.
Next year, I am only planting 7s or better. Why 7s and 8s, and not only 9s? Because I know that Blue Beech (7) makes a very good sauce and the Belgian Giant (7) we tasted was perhaps not quite up to its usual snuff. As for the 8s, they might not be quite as good as the 9s but they are nonetheless excellent varieties. I’ll also grow Sun Gold cherry tomato, which is so good as to not even require testing, and San Marzano, which I know tastes awful fresh but is heavenly cooked. I’ve grown Amish Paste for years but, for some reason, forgot to include it in this survey. No matter, it’s a flavorful tomato both fresh and cooked.
This informal survey does, of course, reflect opinions. Interestingly, the testers were divided into those who enjoy sweet tomatoes and those who enjoy tomatoes with more of a bite. I’m mostly in the latter group.
***************************************
It’s becoming a fruitful time of year in the garden, literally. The second crop of Caroline “everbearing” raspberries started to ripen around the middle of this month. (So-called everbearing raspberries, in fact, bear two crops each ear, the first one on 2-year-old canes in midsummer and the second crop at the ends of new, growing canes in late summer and on into fall.) In the greenhouse, figs also have begun to ripen. This crop is the first and only one for Brown Turkey and Kadota figs, and the second, or main crop, for Green Ischia. Fig ripening will continue through September.
Everything got off to an early start this year, and ripening has been hastened by abundant heat and sunlight, so other fruits are ripening earlier than usual. Grapes, including Swenson’s Red, Alden, Briana, Campbell’s Early (of course), and possibly mislabeled Lorelei and Reliance, have begun ripening. We have even been eating our ripe first apples of the season, the variety Ellison’s Orange, which originated in England about 1890. The flesh is a bit mushy unless picked just before full ripeness but has a very pleasant, yet not overpowering, flavor of anise in amongst its sweet-tartness.
We also had our first good pear of the season, the variety Harrow Delight, which it is. (Harrow is an agricultural research station in Canada.) The flavor is very similar to Bartlett, which ripens 2 weeks after Harrow Delight. In previous years, we have had pears in July, from Doyenne du Juillet, but those pears were tiny and mostly of interest for ripening in July.
****************************************
(This) man cannot live by bread alone, so I was pleasantly surprised when mowing the lawn, something I haven’t had to do for weeks, to come upon some spotted knapweed (Centaurea maculosa). It was as if someone had dropped a large patch of fresh-looking, pale, pinkish purple blossoms with feathery petals right on top of the browned grass. Okay, it’s a weed, described as an “aggressive,
introduced weed species that rapidly invades pasture, rangeland and fallow land and causes a serious decline in forage and crop production.” But that description was from North Dakota and I’m not interested in forage and crop production from my lawn.
Nobody has anything bad to say about New York Ironweed (Vernonia noveboracensis), which is not invasive here in New York or anywhere else. It’s a tall weed branching into many stems, each capped with pretty tufts of deep purple flowers. The plant is growing in a wet area home to another another purple flower, purple loosestrife, which is invasive. I’m proud to have New York ironweed growing here because although widespread, it’s not common, typically showing up in patches here and there across its native range throughout eastern U.S.
