Re: [gardeners] In the Garden - January 4, 1999
Linda Baranowski-Smith (gardeners@globalgarden.com)
Tue, 12 Jan 1999 01:29:20 -0500
>The jicama plant is a very large vine with purple flowers (some would say
>blue flowers but they look purple to me) and big bean pods, it would make an
>attractive ornamental trained over a trellis IMHO.. The edible part is a root
>ball that is just under the surface of the ground. The hort people say that
>the longer the vine lives the bigger the root on it but guess we won't find
>that out. I intend to leave at least one root in the ground for next years
>crop to grow from.
>
>George
Hi George!
Thanks for the jicama info from last week. Need to try one from the store.
Obviously, we can't grow them.
It's a bit unusual here, weatherwise. A month ago, we were applauding the
60-70 F temps. Now, we have lots of snow, over ice, big drifts keeping any
daring visitors from the front door, and wind chills (down to -45F with
wind chill factor, one night last week) that make Brenda Pink's ceramic
socks sound like a sure thing to put on a gift list. Schools were closed
for a week and some in outlying areas are still closed this week. One
interesting thing about visitors is that they phone ahead in this weather,
mostly to determine how to get to an entrance to the house!
I read an interesting blurb in the Johnny's Selected Seeds newsletter the
other day about microfarming. Some folks in Delaware grow popcorn shoots
as an edible garnish. The seed is planted, intensively, in trays. After
germination, the trays are moved to complete darkness and harvested about a
week or so later, when the plants are 4" tall. Has anyone out there eaten
popcorn shoots, or any kind of corn shoots? Wonder whether they would be a
good addition to a stir-fry.
Hope your weather is kinder to you than ours has been recently...
Linda in NW Ohio near Toledo/Lake Erie, USDA Zone 5
llbs@mail.glasscity.net