Yam Berries

Chinese yam bulbils

Several years ago I bought some Chinese Mountain Yam tubers to plant. Chinese yams are an edible perennial that produce both edible tubers and also edible aerial bulbils, sometimes called yam berries. Then I hesitated to plant them because I read they can be invasive. They are the reason I decided to convert my hoop house to place for growing perennials. I chose one of the bordered raised beds and planted the tubers. They are a vine, so the hoop house has been a good place for them. This is the first year they've produced a significant amount of the yam berries.

Dioscorea polystachya (formerly Dioscorea batatas).
They are also called air potatoes or cinnamon vine.

There are other species of dioscorea, but not all of them are edible. According to the Plants for a Future website:

"Edible species of Dioscorea have opposite leaves whilst poisonous species have alternate leaves"

And according to David the Good in his video, "Yamberries on the Chinese Yam," the variety I planted is not the invasive one. Even so, there seems to be a lot of contradictory information around the internet on them. 

The other day, I picked all the yam berries and had enough to try for dinner.

My harvest, washed and ready for cooking.

You can see how tiny they are!

They really do look like miniature potatoes, so the name "air potatoes" makes sense. "Cinnamon vine" apparently refers to the smell of their flowers (which I wasn't watching for and so didn't notice!)

To cook, I tossed them with a little olive oil, salt, and pepper. Then I oven roasted at 425°F (220°C) for about 12 minutes.

Oven roasted yam berries

They were quite good. They're starchy, but not quite like true potatoes. Dan said they reminded him of hopniss. One of these days when I have a few more plants, I'll harvest some of the root and give that a try.

It's fun experimenting with perennial foods. They require care to establish, but once established, they are less work to maintain than annual food crops. While production varies from year to year, they are a reliable source of food whenever annuals do poorly. Plus, most of them are quite attractive and easy to work into an edible landscape. 

One disadvantage is that they aren't familiar foods. They require learning how to grow, harvest, and cook, not to mention acquiring a taste for them. We're all raised on particular foods, and those become the personal standard for our diet. We find them easily in the grocery stores and in the seed catalogues. They are our personal comfort foods of childhood.  
 

We ate this year's yam berry crop, but next year I'll experiment with some food combinations. I think they'd be good with cowpeas or beans, and in soup. 

Is anyone else growing edible perennials? 

Yam Berries © September 2022

by Leigh at http://www.5acresandadream.com

Liberating the Hoop House

My last garden project before picking and processing kicked into high gear was liberating the hoop house.

Left untended, the hoop house became an overgrown mess.

Our hoop house is one of those things that never quite lived up to my expectations. Originally, I covered it with poly sheeting in the hope of extending my fall growing season. But our winters have too many warm days which made the hoop house downright hot under the plastic. Everything bolted. Next, I tried covering it with shade cloth to extend my spring garden. That worked better, except one of our cats liked to use the fabric to climb his way to the top of the hoop house. Nice view, but he tore it with his claws.

Couldn't even tell there were raised beds in there, could you?

Eventually, I decided to use the hoop house for perennials. Some of these are reputed to become invasive, but with my raised box beds, I have a better chance of keeping them under control. To offer a little shade from our scorching summer sun, I planted vining ground nuts to cover the hoop house. That worked even better. (You can see pictures of all my experiments here.)

I used the pulled weeds as chop-and-drop mulch on bare spots in the pasture.

Neglect, however, has a way of making one wish they'd been more diligent with a project. Hence, the hoop house turned into a jungle. I've finally been able to tackle that job, and put my hoop house in order.

I only work in the garden in the morning (before it gets
too hot), so this job was spread out over several days.

Most of what I cleared out were volunteer cherry tomatoes, bindweed (unwanted morning glories) wild lettuce, lambs quarter, sheep sorrel, and wiregrass. Some of those are useful edibles, but they were out of control and shading out things that I want growing. I had to think twice before pulling the tomatoes (because I have a soft spot for volunteers) but Matt's Cherry Tomatoes are very prolific at volunteering, and I have more than I can keep up with anyway. So, with some regret, they got pulled.

After clearing out the jungle, everything got a
good watering, a dose of compost, and mulch.

I made some discoveries as I worked on this:

• I had missed quite a few strawberries that were covered.
• Last year's malabar spinach had reseeded itself and was growing under a layer of cherry tomatoes.
• The no-show bloody dock I planted on March 9th, finally decided to grow. At least some of it.
• My newly planted table grape was decimated by Japanese beetles. Hopefully, neem can save it.
• The Chinese yams were looking poorly.

Everything seems to be responding to my attention and care, except the dock, which got eaten after it was uncovered. I suspect skunks. We have a prolific population of them this year, and being omnivorous, they like to eat things like that.

As far as what's growing in it, there's not a lot to show you. But I'll close out with a few photos of what there is to see.

Hoop house reclaimed. Hopniss vines make natural shade.

Cultivated grape recovering from Japanese
beetle damage. The neem really worked!

The beetles did quite a bit of damage to the Chinese
yams too, but happily, they're recovering as well.

Fancy bindweed, aka morning glories. I didn't plant these! But they look pretty.

Cultivated burdock and volunteer winter squash.

Malabar spinach

Liberating the Hoop House © July 2022 by Leigh

at http://www.5acresandadream.com

Spring Planting & Growing: Early Edition

"All spring, I try to plant something every day "

Carla Emery, Encyclopedia of Country Living

I love that quote by Carla Emery, but I confess I haven't faithfully applied it this year. We've had a lot of rain, so some days it's too muddy to work in the garden. I managed to get my cool weather crops in, and now look forward to our last potential frost date. That date falls in the middle of our spring planting months, and so divides my planting season into early and late.

Planted so far:

• turnips
• kale
• carrots
• parsnips
• mangels
• sprouted pantry potatoes
• beets
• lettuce
• snow peas
• salsify
• pink dandelion
• cultivated burdock
• mizuna
• bloody dock

Of the root crops, only the mangels and burdock have emerged so far. You'll see them with the other spring garden photos below.

I only had a few plants survive winter; the rest succumbed to the cold.

These collard plants are several years old. I don't get huge
leaves from them anymore, but the small ones are tasty too.

One of just a few fall planted kale plants that made it.

Fall planted garlic, multiplier onions, and volunteer potato
plant (the sprouted pantry potatoes haven't emerged yet.)

More garlic

The one that concerns me is our wheat. It's yellowing.

Our fall planted wheat. Yellow from ???

There are a number of things that can cause this: nitrogen deficiency, iron deficiency, sulfur deficiency, fertilizer burn, herbicide injury, moisture stress, plus disease or insect damage. Apparently it's common enough that there are scores of articles written about it and speculating as to its cause. 

We don't use fertilizer, herbicides, or pesticides, so those are out as causes. Nutrient deficiency perhaps. Dan side dressed the rows with compost to see if it helps. Moisture stress is a possibility. Not from too little rain, but because we've had so much. At any rate, it looks like we'll still get a harvest.

It's still going to seed.

Saving for next year's seed will be the priority. We can always adjust our diet to whatever's left over if we need to.

Next are the early spring planted veggies.

Snow peas. No flowers yet!

Lettuce and volunteer dandelion; both salad favorites.

Mangels. These make great livestock feed (both leaves and roots).

Mizuna and violets (of which the flowers are edible)

Now that the swale is in and working well, I'm hoping my hoop house will be more useful in summer. Its raised beds dry out quickly in summer, so that I tend to plant there as a last resort. What I've decided to use them for is perennials, where the raised bordered beds can keep them under control.

Cultivated burdock and volunteer chickweed.

The other thing I planted this spring was the garden swale berm.

Swale berm planted with herbs and edibles.

I made a seed mix of all my old herb, flower, greens, and root crop seeds plus clover. Then I covered it with compost. Because the berm is sloped, much of the seed has washed down a bit, but hopefully enough has stayed put to help anchor the soil. It will be fun to see what grows.

Seed mix sprouting on the swale berm.

Then there are the perennials.

My few asparagus plants were taken over by
blackberries and daffodils, so I liberated them.

I actually gave up on asparagus a long time ago, because the wiregrass kept choking it out. But I have four or five plants that have hung in there over the years. We only get a few stalks at a time and enjoy them greatly, so I think it's time to invest in more.

Strawberries are thriving. My competition for those is slugs, birds, and chipmunks.

Red raspberries are leafing out.

Horseradish. Young leaves are good in a steamed greens mix.

Pear tree, garlic, & comfrey; swale berm in the background.

Pear blossoms. Pears seem to be our most reliable tree fruit.

Cherry blossoms. If I can beat the birds to them, I might get some!

Our last expected frost date is right around the corner. Then we can get to work planting our warm weather favorites. Like every other gardener on the planet, I'm looking forward to that.

How about you? How does your garden grow?

Spring Planting & Growing: Early Edition 

© April 2022 by Leigh at http://www.5acresandadream.com

The Garden at the End of June

It's hard to believe that June is almost behind us.  The fall and winter garden is finishing, and my summer garden is growing well. Challenges have been typically seasonal, with long hot stretches of no rain which means I've been focusing on mulching and watering if needed.

Winter & Early Spring Garden Remnants

Most of my multiplier onions have been harvested.

Celery flowers on the surviving celery base I rooted and planted.

My heat resistant Jericho lettuce is finally bolting, except for the little bit in the keyhole garden.

The romaine lettuce on the right is Jericho. The
others are bolting. All grown from saved seed.

Perennials

I've tried to steer clear of planting perennials in my veggie garden, but these raspberries picked this spot so I've accommodated them! 

Cattle panel raspberry trellis

I've tried for years to grow raspberries, but have had poor success. When they showed up at the end of one of my garden beds, I said 'okay!'

It hasn't been a bumper crop, but I've gotten
some to enjoy on my morning granola!

This shot was taken earlier this month, before I cut the lettuce
for salads. Also in the strawberry bed are violets and an olla.

Little pots for rooting strawberry runners.

For diligent watering, I'm rewarded with
another handful of berries here and there.

Summer Garden

Where should I start? How about tomatoes?

I've had Matt's Wild Cherry Tomatoes volunteer
everywhere. They've been the first to ripen.

My standard varieties are still green. Here they
are with Swiss chard in the foreground.

On the other side of the row is a volunteer squash. I have no idea
what kind. The only flowers so far are male, so bah humbug.

This one is another volunteer on the other side of the garden.
It's probably cushaw, which has always done well for me.

Sweet potato squash is a new variety for me. So far,
so good, except it attracts the most squash beetles.

I was able to obtain some landrace winter squash, so I planted it too.

It started off well, but one of the plants seemed to suffer during our
hot dry spell. I composted and watered it, and new leaves are greener.

I planted melon in one of the hoop house beds. First I tried
Green Nutmeg which didn't show. Then Hale's Best, which did.

In the same bed, I planted something new to me, Malabar
red-stemmed spinach. It's a vining summer type of spinach.

Sweet potato bed with olla and volunteer tomato.

Cherokee flour corn, an heirloom from Virginia, with more volunteer
cherry toms. The sweet potato squash is at the far end of the right bed.

I planted cornfield pole beans in the front porch trellis bed. The cornfield variety don't mind some shade, so they were a good choice for a spot that only gets afternoon sun.

Also in the picture are more volunteer Matt's
wild cherry toms, yarrow, 4 o'clocks, and olla.

Foraging

Lambs quarter has been beautiful and abundant this year.

It's a favorite green, and I've canned more than a dozen pints.

Landrace Experiment

I read Joseph Lofthouse's Landrace Gardening a little too late for most things, so this year, I'm just focusing on landrace cucumbers.

Two varieties of cucumber. You can also see bolting
Jericho lettuce, dried oats, and a volunteer turnip.

Step two in creating landrace vegetables (see all the steps here) is to "plant two or three varieties close together to encourage cross-pollination. Can be heirloom, open-pollinated, or F1 hybrid seed." I had seed from three varieties of cucumber that have done well for me in past years, so I planted them all in the same row: Dar, Straight Eight, and Boston Pickling. Next year, we'll see what we get.

Lots of photos! Hopefully, I didn't go over-board. How about you? How does your garden grow at the end of June?

The Garden at the End of June © June 2021

by Leigh at http://www.5acresandadream.com