|
|
|
|
|
The big experiment........
Can small home site in surburbia (100 ft X 181 ft (0.42 acre)) produce enough vegetables, herbs, and fruit to sustain a family of say three year round?? Year Round??? Probably not, however the family's diet can be supplemented with enough home grown edibles to save money on vegetables, culinary herbs, and fruits normally purchased at the grocery store. Especially if excess produce is canned, dried, preserved, or otherwise stored for future use. In addition, home grown vegetables, culinary herbs, and fruits taste better and are likely healthier than store bought produce; you know what is being applied to the produce you produce (e.g. fertilizers, pesticides, insecticides or organic "cides" and organic fertilizers); and you can typically grow species and varieties that may be hard to find or unavailable at grocery stores in your home town. I've tried the high priced "vine ripened" tomatoes available at Baton Rouge and other city grocery stores, and my question is why do these "vine ripened" tomatoes not tasted as good as MY "vine ripened" tomatoes? Actually the last grocery store "vine ripened" tomatoes tasted just like the cheaper "non-vine ripened" grocery store tomatoes! The only difference I could find was that the "vine ripend" tomatoes cost more money and are more red in color than the other store purchased tomatoes. I believe most homeowners fail to understand how easy it is to incorporate edible species into the landscape, perhaps thinking that the edible landscape will be to hard to maintain, most plants would die, think they don't have time to grow and maintain the plants, home grown edibles cost too much money versus non-edible plants, or perhaps prefer the foods available at most grocery stores over better tasting, home grown foods. Granted some homeowner's idea of a perfect lawn is lots of green monoculture grass, no or limited overstory trees, and standard shrubs and flowers that their neighbors have in their lawns. Some homes here in Baton Rouge, Louisiana that I have seen do have a limited number of edibles incorporated into the landscape (typically a few of the various available fig varieties, muscadines, or a pecan, apple, or pear tree. When driving in the country, I typically see many homes having some type of vegetable bed with tomatoes, collard greens, turnips, beans, onions, etc. and figs, pears, or other fruit trees. Perhaps people think that in you live in suburbia that it is against some written or unwritten law that you must landscape ONLY WITH non-edible shrubs, trees, and flowers. Granted, when you live in a subdivision, plowing the front and back yards and planting nearly 100 percent edible plants probably would result in negative comments, however numerous species and varieties of edible plants can be easily incorporated and maintained in to the landscape along with ornamental and native trees, shrubs, and flowers. In fact, some edible shrubs and trees can serve dual purposes for both aesthetics and human food production. Examples are endless. Here in south Louisiana some excellent choices include pineapple guavas, pawpaws, Japanese and native plums, flowering crabapples that produce fruit, mayhaws, figs, blueberries, flowering and Turkish quinces, etc., etc. Many culinary herbs (e.g. basil, dill, mints, thyme, oregano, parsley, etc.) can be neatly incorporated into flower and shrub gardens. Some plants such as mints and strawberries can be grown close together, eliminating most weeds and the need for expensive commercial mulches. Creeping mints such as pennyroyal or strawberries can be planted between stepping stones or used as a border along walkways.
Do to the limited size of my lawn and the limited portion of the lawn that
|
|
Edible plant inventory:
Japanese Plums:
In February 2006, I will be installing two hives in my backyard. I will purchase two nucleus (Nuc) hives with Buckfast F1 Hybrid honeybees. A nuc (5 frames of bees & queen) will be installed in each hive. In addition, I will be installing Orchard Mason bee boxes in the lawn. The combination of the European honebees and the Orchard Mason bees ((Osmia lignaria) should result in more than adequate pollination of not only all my fruit trees, but especially the plums.
Native plums:
All three of my flatwoods plums bit the dust in 2005. Two died sometime prior to April and the third survived till early August. The Guntherie and American plum are still doing great as of March 2006. Only problem with the Guntherie was our hurricanes. Katrina blew it over towards the south and Rita blew it over to the north. The plum is now securely staked so that it is verticle. Pawpaw:
Pawpaws are unusally hard to come by in south Louisiana. The species grows wild in many portions of the Louisiana such as Tunica Hills Wildlife Management Area as well as many portions of the United States. The only nurseries I have seen so far in south Louisiana that typically stocks pawpaw is Coyote Creek north of St. Francisville and Bantings Nursery and Laughing Buhhda Nursery in Metairie. The 2004 Piedmont Arboretum plant sale had quite a number of pawpaws for sale. However, I have been unable to find any pawpaw cultivars for sale in Louisiana. Cultivars are readily available at many edible plant nurseries in the US, but it seems like Louisiana nurseries can't find pawpaw cultivars or have never heard of the cultivars. The same is true for cultivar pineapple guavas and loquats. My current pawpaw inventory includes 14 plants ranging from seedling to approximately 5 years of age. Most are planted in partial shade, but two are planted in full sun. Those planted in full sun have outgrown the same age plants in part sun or full shade. Pawpaw can be grown either in full sun, part sun or full shade. The only exception to this rule is that seedlings MUST be grown in full shade. To date, I only have one cultivar seedling (Mango) obtained from Raintree Nursery and four seedlings of a variety called baseball from Green Plant Nursery in Senoia, Georgia. The remaining pawpaws are of wild stock (Asimina triloba). Links to the previousley mentioned nurseries supplying pawpaws may be found on the links page. I first tasted pawpaw fruits in 2000 while living in Charlotte, North Carolina. While conducting watershed studies along Coddle Creek Reservoir for HDR, Inc., I typically found numerous pawpaw groves as well as scattered trees along the many streams I worked in. I can best decribe the taste of a ripe pawpaw fruit of a cross between bananas and vanilla custard. The pulp is smooth and fuity smelling. The fruit contains a few large inedible (toxic) seeds and in my opinion the fruit is at the peak of ripeness once they have fallen to the ground. Trees may be gently shaken to dislodge ripe fruit which have yet to fallen. Fruits that are hard to the touch are not yet ripe and should be set in a sunny window to mature prior to consuming. The seedling pawpaws variety Mango and Baseball (except 1) were killed by Katrina and Rita. Actually indirectly by limbs from the overstory water oak being snapped off by the tropical storm & hurricane force winds. The numerous falling limbs made direct hits on all the seedlings, breaking them off at ground level. I removed all even though they may have resprouted in 2006. Apple:
Purchased an Ein Shemer Apple from Louisiana Nursery in April 2005 to replace a loquat which had contracted Fire Blight. The Ein Shemer apple was approximately 6 feet in height at time of planting. Ein Shemer is a self-pollinating, low-chilling hour apple developed in Israel with fruit ripining in early-June. Purchased and planted a second one for the backyard in February 2006. Crabapple:
Mayhaw:
Citrus:
Figs:
Chinese banana:
The Chinese flowering banana originates from the Yunan Providence in China, and is reported to be hardy to temperatures down to 14 degrees F in the United States. In its native China, the species is inhabits slopes in southern Guizhou and central and western Yunnan and is cultivated in gardens according to the Flora of China.
Muscadine:
Grape:
Pecan:
Pineapple Guava:
Kiwi:
Quince:
My Havran Turkish Quince arrived from Raintree Nursery in March 2005 as a bare-root sapling approximately 5 feet tall.
Persimmon:
Maypop:
Planted three plants obtained from Passion Flower Farms in Atlanta in 2004. In 2005, the three plants have spread rapidly. Shoots regulary sprout up in the lawn up to 15 feet from where the plants were planted. The flowers are a magnet for honeybees and other native bees. Numerous fruit have been produced as of mid-July. Magnolia vine:
Magnolia vine, obtained in the spring of 2005 from Raintree Nursery is also another experimental planting. The species is a relative of the North American plant, baystar vine (Schisandra glabra) (also called magnolia vine), a rare species throughout its range. Schisandra glabra is found in south Louisiana in West Feliciana Parish (e.g. Tunica Hills Wildlife Management Area, so it is my thinking that Schizandra chinensis will also survive and flourish in south Louisiana, particularly in Baton Rouge. Schizandra chinensis will grow either in full sun or dense shade. It is an agressive climber which produces small white flowers and edible, red fruits. Update: June 2005: The magnolia vine bit the dust. As I generally kept the soil moist and in filtered sunlight I assume south Louisiana's high humidity was more than the plant could take. In May 2005, I sampled the magnolia vine berries, but found them to be quite repulsive. Not worth replanting for edible use. Will try to grow Schisandra glabra this fall. Although not edible, it would make a nice addition to the shady, moist portions of the lawn. Blueberries:
Strawberry:
Approximately 80 strawberry plants are located primarily in the large garden in the front of the house. Plants were initially scattered throughout the garden, however as songbirds enjoy stawberries more than humans, in the fall of 2005, all plant will be centralized in one location in rows so the plants can be netted to prevent destruction by songbirds. |
|
Only the Santa Rosa and Bruce produced marginal flowers in 2004. In 2005 both varieties produced an intense display of flowers, however the Methley still failed to produce any flowers. This year I moved one hummingbird feeders near Bruce plum (along Rosedown Drive) and adjacent to the largest native plum along N. Leighton in hopes of attracting the honeybees to the trees. The feeders drew the bees in as planned, however the bees concentrated their efforts on the feeders rather than pollinating the plum flowers completely. As a result, 2005 plum production was lower than expected. In 2006 all hummingbird feeders will be removed from the lawn till after the fruit trees have flowered. Despite inadequate pollination for a bountiful crop, about 20 Bruce plums were produced, a half dozen Santa Rosa plums, and about a half dozen Gunthery plums. 2004 resulted in at least 20 Gunthery plums produced.
Planted five pineapple guava shrubs in late spring 2004. Four put on quite a flowering show in April 2005. Two have begun to reflower in late May 2005. I'm hoping they will produce at least some fruit. The flower petals are edible and quite tasty, but the more petals one eats, the less fruit will result. Flowers have a mild pineapple taste.
The quince was developed at Izmir Agricultural Research and Introduction Center in Turkey and was introduced into the U.S. by Dr. Elwood Fisher.