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#1
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cut and-come-again crops
http://www.google.com/search?q=cut%2...&ie=utf-8&oe=u
tf-8 or http://thurly.net/08lv Not perennial but not your usual one harvest either. ...... From http://eap.mcgill.ca/CPLV_3.htm "GREENS THAT GROW back after you pick them save time, effort and garden space. Swiss chard, New Zealand spinach, Chinese (or vegetable) amaranth and other leafy green vegetables all stars producing when they're very young plants--and then continue putting out food over a long season. You get a two, three and often up to six harvests without having to work the ground again and again or raise more seedlings. Because you eat almost everything the plants produces, these vegetables are very space efficient. And all of them Ire among the most nutritious vegetables you can put on the table. They are the richest sources of vitamin A and calcium that you can get from the mid- and late-summer garden. People often refer to these vegetables in ways-that call spinach to mind. They look and cook like spinach, but the similarities end there. Most are better steamed or cooked in some way than raw. And calling them a spinach substitute does them a disservice. It makes us expect a spinach taste, which interferes with our enjoying them for their own unique flavors. These cut-and-come-again vegetables are among the easiest to grow. But there are a few tricks to keep the work light and the plants vigorous. A common mistake is to plant too much They are good eating when they are young and tender. But if you have overplanted and are frugal, the tendency is to pick large outer leaves, which are really past their prime. 'That leads to disappointment, and some people abandon the crop when they simply haven't learned how to pick it. You must pick fairly heavily to keep the greens good, but let enough leaves remain to support regeneration. The plants must have plenty of water and rich soil for the rapid and succulent growth that produces tender leaves. Each one of these vegetables is a little different, so I'll give special cultural details for each - Swiss chard is a beet that never' forms a sweet root, but' its leaves are much better than any beet greens you can raise, Chard is raised just like beets. You can easily plant too much. The best-tasting leaves are six to ten inches long. Ideally, you pick only a few outer leaves from each plant When too many leaves get large and coarse, waving around at knee height, I whack off all of them about three inches above-ground on half the row, and then pick only the Inner leaves on the remaining plants. The cut plants will send up tender new tasty leaves within a month. Another good thing about chard is that--with its deep, strong root-- it often lives over winter, especially if mulched, and - starts producing leaves in early spring while many other vegetables are still just seeds in the packet Going strong all season long as it does, chard often needs a side-dressing of manure tea or other fertilizer in midsummer. But even without it, chard doesn't slow down much, probably because its deep root system ranges far for nourish mend ' Vegetable amaranth has teem developed in the Orient strictly as a cut and-come-again crop, not as a grain producer. There are several main types and numerous cultivars grown in China and Taiwan, but only three are available here. Only a small area is needed to produce a nice supply of summer greens, according to Skip Kaufman, who is in charge of experimental amaranth plantings at the Organic Gardening and Farming Research Center. A bed of only 24 plants planted six inches apart in all directions will produce one cutting of greens a week The cuttings produced from one to 23; pounds each." Much more at above URL. -- Bill S. Jersey USA zone 5 shade garden http://www.informationisbeautiful.ne...l-supplements/ |
#2
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cut and-come-again crops
Bill who putters wrote:
A common mistake is to plant too much Anything worth doing is worth overdoing. Let me put in a plug for seed saving, with benefits. A couple of years ago, I grew an heirloom rutabaga (Macomber) for seed. Easy enough; put a dozen roots in the cold cellar over winter; planted out early the next spring. Stripped the dry seed pods into a paper shopping bag the next summer, and as they finished drying they split open, so all I had to do was occasionally shake the bag to get lots of clean seed at the bottom. The bonus: The next spring I had a dense carpet of greens from the seeds that fell before I harvested the pods. We ate greens all summer, plus a bunch of sweet rutabagas as the excess plants were thinned out. Right now, I've got a mass of "Schnittmangelb Gold" baby chard plants from some that were grown from seed in the summer, then rototilled in after the seeds were stripped. And a nice second-growth row of kale also self-seeded. Time to plant the garlic... Gary Woods AKA K2AHC- PGP key on request, or at home.earthlink.net/~garygarlic Zone 5/4 in upstate New York, 1420' elevation. NY WO G |
#3
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cut and-come-again crops
"Gary Woods" wrote in message ... Bill who putters wrote: A common mistake is to plant too much Anything worth doing is worth overdoing. Well, I over did the mustard greens this year. The wife & I have frozen over 4 bushels and I've given over 10 bushels away. Geez, you pick it & 3 days later you can't teel you've picked. Anybody want some mustard, there's like a pick up load ready now. Dam, this is harder to get rid of than zuchinni. Time to plant the garlic... Planted mine a week age. The German White is already coming up. Gary Woods AKA K2AHC- PGP key on request, or at home.earthlink.net/~garygarlic Zone 5/4 in upstate New York, 1420' elevation. NY WO G Seriously if anyone wants greens & is close enough, come get them! |
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