June 8th, First Harvest

Well, not exactly.  This was the first non-leaf harvest, a strawberry and a purple radish.  Yum!

Links

Some friends have sent me a couple of links that may be of interest to you, so here they are.

From the medieval gardening yahoo group, one of the members has posted an article about Quince , here:
http://baronessys.zohrarawling.com/?p=188

This one from a friend in conneticut who says they have some good information about Mary Gardens and Hospitallers Gardens. 

Thank you for sending these, I hope you enjoy them.

Mower Nightmare, Gardening Joy.

My lawn is cursed.  That's the only thing i can figure.  It eats lawnmowers.  *sigh*  but enough of that.  The corn, beans and melons have all broken ground, so that's good.  The basil has some brown spots on it, but for the most part survived the transplanting out of the shoprite pot.  I've managed to collect enough grass clippings to use as mulch underneath the aforementioned plants, but currently only the push mower that Bev gave me is running.  Had to hook Thag up to the jeep and take the cub cadet to Mower Mike for an oil leak repair.  Cub Cadet, what an awful name.  Baby Amateur they may as well have called it. 

So i'm committed to having an herb garden at East Kingdom Royal encampment this coming pennsic.  Not sure what all i'll have, or who i'll get if from NJ to the site in western PA, but cross that bridge when I get to it.  Sage, Rue, and Balm most likely as they are either already in pots or well suited.  I've got to get up to Well-Sweep farm soon to flesh out my collection for this year.  I'm also waiting to hear back from the cook for the State Dinner that will be on the second monday.  It would be really nice to bring something that will be used in the dishes, and I may be able to provide something particularly unusual, say skirrets for instance.

Pictures!

So here is the main bed, lettuces in the fore, chervil, strawberry blite, chard, thyme, st'john's wort and a lavender in the distance.

One thing I like about medieval gardening is plants that people these days don't know about.  So here follow some close-ups.  Hens and Chicks, called houseleek back then, with some chamomile flowers muscling into the scene.  the Chamomile is self-seeded from several years ago.  I get plenty if i can keep the deer from it.

Here is Chervil, which I had heard of but not actually seen before.  I haven't tasted it yet.

This is meadowsweet.  I have no idea what to do with it. 

Here is a nice foxglove that reseeded itself from somewhere.  Lovely flowers.  i'm not going to be eating this.

This is St John's Wort, leaf color varies red to green on this guy, i expect that is due to conditions of this particular spot.  It has a lovely fresh scent, but fairly faint.  Tiny leaves, too.

Strawberry Blite here, also called strawberry spinach (and here we begin to see the problems of nomenclature in any study of gardening)  This plant was reportedly 'rediscovered' in 13th century french monasteries.  The leaves are quite tasty and would make a good pot-herb.  It gets these odd little red berries on it's stems which are also edible but don't taste like much.  I did manage to grow this last year, but it failed around the time the tomato blight came through.  Hopefully this guy will be more productive.

And this is my regular strawberry bed, consisting of some modern variety, and the Alpine strawberry.  Alpine strawberries are quite small but they have such a wonderful rich flavor.  If any of these make it all the way into the house, it's a surprise indeed.  These are thought to be very much like medieval strawberries, at least what they are able to discern from surviving artworks.

Here is the white peony.  I've three peonies, two whites and a red, and their blooming is staggered.  The other white one is done already and the red is not yet out.  They don't last long especially when it rains, but they are a big lush flower.  There is an european peony but there are also asian varieties, and I don't know which these are, they were at the house when we bought it.

lastly this is by the cellar window.  I do like the old stone foundation, twenty inches thick.  the yellow flowers on the left is Rue.  The leafy shrubs in the foreground are azalea, which originates in asia, and the purple flowers are spiderwort. 

Thanks for reading.

June 2

Written on june 5, b ut it's about saturday.

Finally a weekend day to work around the house.  Added a row of Charentais melon to the garden, and pole beans as well.  I know they aren't medieval, but the wife likes them and I like to make her happy.

Did a fair bit of weeding, and started harvesting chard leaves.  Also purslane which is in my salad right now, for lunch.

Basil

So rather than plant basil from seed, which i am admittedly not terribly good at, or buying plants already started from the plantfolk, i just got a pot of it at shoprite.  They plant maybe 30 seeds in a 10"pot, so the poor guys get pretty crammed pretty quick.  So I got one and broke it up and filled a bed with them.  Got them in just before the rain tonight. 

Yesterday, or perhaps wednesday, I put in a few seedlings of acorn squash in a row.  Today added a bunch of corn seeds along with the squash.  Three sisters and all that.

I'll try and get to those pictures i mentioned last time....

Much planting

Mothers day is often about plants, because mom's like flowers but also because by now any danger of frost is passed (at least around here)  So we went shopping.  From Tony at New Horizon plant farm, and also Cy at Well-Sweep Herb Farm.  Below is a list of what we picked up.  Nancy also picked up a couple of mints and some flowers for the pots on the deck.  I'll take some pictures of the beds, hopefully today.

calendula
chard
chervil
cucumber
foxglove
hens&chicks
hollyhock
lavender	grosso
lettuce	green ice
lettuce	green towers
lettuce	mesclun mix
meadowsweet
parsley
rocket
savory	summer
shallot
skirret
squash	summer
st john's wort
strawberry
strawberry blite
thyme	english
tomato	better boy
tomato	cherokee black
tomato	sweet bell pepper