Somebody asked me to show how I force veggies indoors in winter, so here you have a link to a short video showing what is available at the moment! At this time of year, most of our leafy greens used in salads and cooking are either harvested from the forcing pots shown in the video or directly from the cold cellar under the house. Here is a mixture of perennials, biennials and annuals. Still looking for a good perennial chicory for forcing. See the list of plants shown below. Follow the link to the video. Witloof Festive Chicory (sikori / julesalat) Witloof Væres Venner mix (my own selection from the community garden based on several varieties from various gene banks) Hristo’s onion (Allium flavescens x nutans?) Kandahar cress (karse) from the Experimental Farm Network (seed harvested in the community garden) Wild buckwheat / vill bokhvete (seed harvested in The Edible Garden) Garlic bulbil sprouts / spirte hvitløk bulbiller Nodding onion / prærieløk (Allium cernuum) Dandelion / løvetann
The 5th Permaveggies / Forest Gardening course I’ve held in Malvik took place on Sunday 21st and Monday 22nd May with guest Jen McConachie who gave her forest gardening course at Presthus Farm on the Monday evening. On the Sunday we met at my garden (The Edible Garden) for a garden tour and lunch from the garden with focus this year on growing food while maintaining a high biodiversity. On Monday we visited The Væres Venner Community garden to see the World Garden and also the large collection of edible trees and bushes that have been planted there, followed by a visit to the Onion Garden at the Ringve Botanical Garden in Trondheim. Previous Permaveggies weekends were held in 2012, 2013, 2016 and 2019 whilst the 2020-weekend had to be cancelled because of Covid. More information on previous courses can be found here: Previous Permaveggies Courses. I didn’t take many pictures this year, so thanks to Meg Anderson, Jen McConachie and Mark Tacker who took the pictures below. Malvik:
With Jen McConachie
Talkijg about Hosta
Talking Hablitzia
The Hablitzia / Heracleum community that has evolved over the years – the Heracleum sowed itself here and the Hablitzia now uses it as a support
Talking about udo (Aralia cordata)
Lunch with many perennial vegetables
Meg tells us about lunch
In the Onion Garden Chicago at the Ringve Botanical Garden:
After Jen’s forest garden course, the participants split into groups to design a forest garden in a field next to the farm which it is planned to be developed as a forest garden (get in touch if you are interested!). Here is one of the groups presenting their plans:
The 3 autumn olive / Japansk sølvbusk (Elaeagnus umbellata) bushes at the Væres Venner Community Garden are now producing well. This is about 2/3 of the berries and I hope to harvest the remainder tomorrow. Apart from a few Aronia and Worcesterberries and apples we are near the end of the fresh fruit / berry harvest. See also my blog post “Late Fresh Berries” here: https://www.edimentals.com/blog/?p=29619 …and two pictures of the final fruit leather. Like sour cherries, they become sweeter on drying. Delicious!
Last week was National Organic Week (Økouka), a busy week for me as I had two garden tours in my Edible Garden in Malvik (the rain stopped both days just before we started), a walk and talk in the community garden at Væres Venner and a talk at Stammen Cafe & Bar in Trondheim on “Perennial Climate-friendly Food Plants for Urban Areas” talking about 15 advantages of growing perennials! Below you can see pictures from each of the events which were all well attended. I’ve credited the various photographers below. Thanks to all that came along!
1. Garden tour on Wednesday 27th September
Making the Ø letter for Økouka (picture: Margaret Anderson)
2. Talk at Stammen
Picture by Margaret Anderson
2. Garden tour on Sunday 1st October
Picture by Margaret Anderson
Pictures by Markus Tacker (click on the album pictures for more information):
Talking about Aster yomena and other oriental Asters
Talking Hosta
My largest vegetable, udo (Aralia cordata); the steepest slope is the most productive part of the garden!
Broad bean (bondebønner) re-flowering. Let’s demand large scale growing of vegan food in Trøndelag. The tastiest and original felafel and hummus is made with this hady bean!
Pictures by Marit By (click on the album pictures for more information)::
Japanese grape (Vitis coignetiae) clambering over a yew (barlind) laden with berries ready for the birds
Talking about one of my favourite perennial vegetables, Hosta
Talking about why there should be fields of broad beans (favabønner / bondebønner) than just grain fields!
My largest vegetable, udo (Aralia cordata) starting to collapse under its own weight
Talking about how to germinated udo seeds
4. Walk and talk in the Væres Venner Community Garden Pictures by Marit By (the World Garden looking good in its autumn colours with the backdrop of the old ash trees):
First and second harvest of broad beans for drying to eat and next year’s seed. This is my “Væres Venner Mix” land race selected for maximum bean diversity each year – a joy to work with and candy for the eyes! The first sowing (first picture) were sown on 18th May and harvested on 19th September; the second sowing was on 2nd June and were harvested on 24th September (both were 5 different colour selections from last year’s crop; sown in 5 adjacent rows!)
Seed processing season is upon us once again and all available space on window sills is full 🙂 Grow your own spice! These are seeds of black mustard /svartsennep (Brassica nigra / Rhamphospermum nigrum) grown in the Væres Venner Community Garden this year. I use them most in Indian food.
I remember years ago ordering seed of a special heirloom heritage radish “rat’s tail” (Raphanus sativus var caudatus) through the Heritage Seed Library in the UK. I remember that it was the gardener at naturalist Gilbert White’s House and Gardens at Selbourne in Hampshire that offered the seed and I remember that we ended up trading seed as they were looking for plants that Gilbert White mentioned; see https://gilbertwhiteshouse.org.uk/gilberts-gardens The resultant plants had long green pods. However, I lost them eventually. Subsequently I’ve tried seed of rat’s tails several times and the pods have never been as long as those original plants. Radishes are difficult to grow here in spring as our long days result in them quickly bolting (still looking for a good day neutral variety). I remember reading that when wild radish Raphanus sativus was originally domesticated in China that it was for the young seed pods rather than the swollen tap roots. I therefore decided this winter to source various rat’s tail radishes from commercial sources and also obtained seed of 4 (of 8 available) accessions from the German genebank IPK Gatersleben. There was no available descriptons, so this was a random selection. They were sown in May in the World Garden (Verdenshagen) at the Væres Venner Community Garden (NB! I do grow a few annuals on the world garden if they have an interesting geographical story associated). Yesterday I harvested a few of each and was blown away by the diversity with long red, thin green and two more stumpy varieties like I had been getting in recent years when ordering rat’s tails. Below is what Cornucopia II says on this interesting vegetable. Assuming like me that you will want to grow your radishes to seed for the following year, the land is occupied all season in any case, so rat’s tails produce more than root radishes. The flowers are also also rather pretty bicoloured pink and white and area also attractive to pollinators! I think I will save seed and deveop a mixed grex of these and more varieties from the gene bank next year! And this gave the opportunity for a unique rat’s tail salad for lunch with radish flowering tops too, also delicious (see the pictures at the bottom) :)
We’ve had a lovely 3 day visit this last weekend from artist Elin Eriksen from Nesodden starting a project based on my perennial vegetables. She sketched and photographed candidate plants in all 3 of my gardens, The Edible Garden, Ringve Botanical Gardens Onion Garden and the World Garden at Væres Venner! We look forward to seeing the results!
Elin has earlier created a poster of birds for Birdlife Norway (also for kids) and recently lead a course in botanical drawing for Sopp og Nyttevekstforbund at Valdres.
Photographing in the Onion Garden Chicago Fotografering i Løkhagen Chicago
Sketching in the Onion Garden Chicago Skissering i Løkhagen Chicago
Wietse’s onion in the Onion Garden Chicago Wietsesløk i Løkhagen Chicago ved Ringve Allium pskemense x fistulosum
Documenting perennial vegetables in the World Garden in the Væres Venner community garden at Ranheim! Dokumentering av flerårige grønnsaker i Verdenshagen hos Væres Venners Felleshagen på Ranheim
Relaxing with a multispecies perennial vegetable quiche in The Edible Garden!
It’s always a pleasure to spend time with students from the Fosen Folk High School from the other side of the fjord. Despite the dreadful weather, we visited all 3 of my sites – the onion garden Chicago at the Ringve Botanical Gardens followed by the Væres Venners Community Garden and, finally, my own garden The Edible Garden (this is the first time I’ve taken a group to all 3 sites!). Those that took part were two of the “lines”: The Self-sufficiency line and the The Organic Farming line (small scale). The Organic Farming line were only on the first two visits, so the picture only shows the Self-sufficiency folk!
(Norwegian under) This year was the 20th season of growing Sarpo potatoes here in Malvik/Trondheim and yields are as good as ever with 100% blight resistance! These were harvested from the community garden at Væres Venner in Trondheim this week. My favourite variety is Sarpo Tominia which seems to be a little earlier and therefore better for areas with early frost (they remain vigorous right through to the time when the first hard frosts kill the foliage). I’ve also grown Sarpo Mira since 2009 and have also tried Sarpo Axona and “Sarpo Surprise” (from true seed). Norwegian: I år var det den 20. sesongen med dyrking av Sarpo-poteter her i Malvik/Trondheim og avlingene er like gode som alltid med 100 % tørråte-resistens! Disse ble høstet fra felleshagen på Væres Venner i Trondheim denne uken. Min favorittsort er Sarpo Tominia som ser ut til å være litt tidligere og derfor bedre for områder med tidlig frost (den vokser helt frem til de hardfrostene). Jeg har også dyrket Sarpo Mira siden 2009 og har også prøvd Sarpo Axona og “Sarpo Surprise” fra ekte frø.
Perennial vegetables, Edimentals (plants that are edible and ornamental) and other goings on in The Edible Garden
…and two pictures of the final fruit leather. Like sour cherries, they become sweeter on drying. Delicious!
Making the Ø letter for Økouka (picture: Margaret Anderson)
