New Trader looking for edibles

Ok, I have multiple reasons for my wish here:

1. I have a challenge to try to feed my _entire_ family (all six of us) from my garden - no buying veggies, no purchased ketchup, nothing vegetable or fruit related comes out of a store - for a year. I may not be able to do it next year (I intend to do fruit as well, and that means waiting 2-3 years for viability). However, in the meantime, I need to get myself together and plant things, get to know the garden, the plants, and the space I need. And we're going to do as much as possible until I can do it all.

2. I want my kids to see the garden as a place for food as well as pretties - and get a sense that their food actually comes from somewhere (they've been living in Brooklyn for a few years. As far as they're concerned, all food grows in styrofoam, and flavor comes from the spices (which grow in jars).

3. I just adore oddly-colored and unique vegetables and fruits. I love the idea of serving pink-and-purple potatoes. I giggle when I produce carrots that look like legs (last year I had a pair of carrots that wound up looking like two people... *ahem* - it was so funny we took pictures of it). Weird and surprising veggies are so much fun!

4. I hate cardboard-flavoured food. I grew up on a small farm (subsistence level), and our eggs didn't taste like paper, our chicken tasted like _bird_, and our tomatoes melted in our mouths. I miss that!

5. I don't want to see heirloom veggies and fruits go extinct. I'd love to think I had had a hand in preserving the variety of our world's foodstuffs.

I have joined SSE and Dave's. So now I'm looking for some assistance.

I've already spent a good chunk of money on seeds, but they're going to be grown this coming year - and many of them are hybridized things which won't grow true from their own seeds (I didn't realize that happened, much to my dismay). We don't have much money to start with - my husband's income is below the poverty level for a family of three (let alone six), so we're struggling (another reason for my challenge - that's serious money!).

If anyone has extra edible-plant, veg or fruit or flower, that they are willing to send or trade to someone who _will_ grow them, I'm willing to buy a book or two of stamps for envelopes (and trade anything I have, though at the moment it's mostly standard stuff).


I have pumpkin seeds from a pumpkin I bought at Pathmark (no idea what type - possibly Big Max?). They do grow, as I have four vines growing in a large pot as we speak (yay for apartment/container plantings - we'll have pumpkin in the early spring haha).

I have an aloe plant which has a few babies I could send, provided we do it quickly (or in the spring), as frost is coming soon, and I don't want it to die in transit.

A friend gave me a funny, orangey-red and green tomato (ribbed, shaped like a little bowl, but sizeable), which I took the seeds out of and planted - they grow. I can send you some of those (although I'm not sure if I 'prepared' them correctly, as I've never 'fermented' tomato seeds before).

My eggplant and spaghetti squash (also store bought) didn't grow, so they're useless. I have yet to see sprouts from the empire and cortland apples, either - I don't know how long they should take, but they might be dead too.

I have some butternut squash (also store bought, possibly Waltham?) which does grow - I have plants in a pot.

I have seeds from a Jalapeno pepper. It was grown on an organic CSA that a friend of mine is a member of, so the seeds should sprout - I just don't know if they're a hybrid that will grow true or not.

If you're willing to trade for those or for SASE / SAE, I would like to hear from you. I'm interested in anything that will grow and feed people, and VERY interested in anything that is nifty for kids, or that will produce a lot in a small space (vines which can be staked/poled/trellised do count).

-Sevidra

i have a family of 7 and i have 5 kid's i have been there too. i believe i can help ya out with quit a bit of stuff. i'll try to check my stash tonight and get back to ya what i have after the kid's go to bed. i'd just want postage for what i'd send.
silkie

That would be wonderful. I'm poking in a few seeds as we speak for containers - if they grow and give seed, you're welcome to them. I'm not sure they will, though - like I said, many are hybrids (and not all seem to be marked as hybrids). I've got a Caspar pumpkin (Ferry Morse) and a few berry types from Trade Wind Fruit. Of course, I won't have berries for years :/

But I do have an alpine strawberry (reugen), which should be up in a few months in the living room, and had better fruit or I'll be very disappointed in it.

-Sevidra

Sevidra,

Good luck in your quest. I hope you are successful. I have a couple of suggestions for you.
1) I still have a few lingonberry fruit/seed that I could send for postage. Please reseach them first before requesting, and you can also check earlier in this trade forum for how to start them. They'l take a few years to produce fruit, but don't take much space. Growing from seed is the most cost effective way of getting a lot of plants. I don't know anybody that has tried them that doesn't like them. They do require acid soil.
2) Bronze fennel is easy, attractive and useful in many ways. The seed keeps well and imparts a licorice flavor to food that I think your kids will like. MIne self seed everey year.
3) I would strongly recommend Bolivian sunroot, also called yacon. In a square 2'x2', you can grow 1 plant that will produce up to 20 lbs of sweet, crunchy tubers. They store well and get sweeter as they age.
The plant produces two kinds of tubers, ones for storage and eating and a second kind for porpagation and starting the plant again. The plant will NOT survive outside in NJ for winter (to the best of my knowledge), so you would need to keep the starts indoors for the next year. I have successfully kept a crown through the winter in a tightly closed plastic bag in the fridge produce area, as well as keeping a couple of small plants in pots overwinter. Available in the spring from Nichols. This is a fall harvest that will keep well into the winter. You can usually get multple plants from each crown, so you can triple or quadruple your numbers each year.
4) Also consider Jerusulem artichoke, which is a relative of the sunflower. These produce pounds of tubers and survive the winter. It will come back year after year and is very productive. It does take some work to harvest, but can be dug well into winter if plants are mulched.

I would also suggest putting in some raised beds. They just make a lot of things easier.

Further, you should give some thought to using garden clips, available from a number of places (Nichols, Territorial come to mind), with 1/2 PVC pipe on rebar pounded into the ground to make hoop-house green houses that can significantly extend your growing season and productivity.

Good luck.

You might try joining this seed swap over in Round Robin Trading, too. It looks like they might still be open to people joining. They say newbies without seeds are welcome to particpate for SASE.

http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/780897/

Hi, Sevidra,
I can help you out with a bunch of vegetable seeds for SASBE. I,m originally from Washington and Oxford, NJ and still have family in those areas. I've been to Lake Hopatcong...not sure if it's in your area.
I'm in the address exchange, but if you need my address just dmail.

JoAnn

Krowten, I've never had lingonberries. I'd be interested. I love berries of almost any type - fruit is a big weakness for me. Cherries are my absolute favorite food, but I don't have any pits for that - and trees, unless I container-grow them, are going to be tough. Do cherries fruit in containers?

Anyway, I'd love to try your lingonberries, if you send me an address in d-mail. I'll send you an SASE and anything you want (if you do) that I have.

Susybell, I posted there just now, thank you for the link!

Frausnow, check your d-mail. I actually live right near Lake Hopatcong, on the River Styx. Er, right across the bridge on the River Styx. My family got a real kick out of that, when we moved in here - we seriously considered dressing my husband up as Charon for Halloween and selling ferry trips across it. :)

-Sevidra

My pumpkins - these grew from the pumpkin I bought at Pathmark! They're inside now, due to frost tonight, but hopefully I'll get a pumpkin or two out of them.

Hi Sevidra, glad to help (I'm just starting with seeds so I don't have any to share yet, myself)

LOL on Charon and the River Styx-that would've been great!

i am sending what seeds i have left

I'm trying to work out seed packets. My pumpkin made seeds, and the few others I have - but I saw a list, of guidelines for how many seeds to add to each packet. I can't find it now. Anyone have a link or directions I could use?

Thanks,
Sev

Sev,
I'd like to help out. I don't have too many edibles but here's what I can send you in spring, now is not the best time for me to dig. Just let me know begining of May. Here's what I can share:
- chives
- garlic chvies
- 2-3 fraise des plants (they are ever bearing alpine strawberries that won't take much space and will give you fruit till snow)
- thyme
- raspberries (red sweet, not many thorns I hardly use gloves, but the labels are all lost)

Ooh, berries! I love berries. I have yet to meet a berry I didn't like.

It sounds funny, but it's true. Straw-, rasp-, goose-, you name it, if I've tried it, I've liked it.

I'd definitely appreciate what you have, enya. Thank you.

-Sev

I have thornless semi-erect blackberry plants to spare. The berries are good and sometimes an inch long! Dmail me your address if you are interested.

No problem. My son loves to watch the alpine strawberries grow and will pick them and raspberries himself :)

I'll also have regular strawberry plants.


This message was edited Oct 29, 2007 4:25 PM

Sev, There are small cherries, such as the sour pie cherries and nanking that are productive in small spaces. I keep my Nankings in pots at the moment. A small sour cherry tree is a great addition, but would need to be in ground for best production. A couple of quality gooseberries are alos worthwhile, such as Hinnomaki yellow and black velvet produce a lot of fruit in a small space.

Nankin cherries are nice in that you can use them as a hedge too, so it could be a double duty plant.

Hi Sevidra,

I have sent you a D-Mail with what I have, just shoot me one back if you are interested.

I've been eyeing dwarf Stella or black tartarian (geh, spelling - first thing in the morning and I'm too lazy to look it up at the moment) cherries - has anyone had success with those in pots? They seem ideal for it, and self-pollinating so they'd fruit. I'd have to pay for the plants, of course, but... it's worth it for cherries!

My husband thinks I'm funny, for how gaga I go over cherries. Then again, he had to learn the hard way how offensive I find maraschino's (what a waste of a cherry!). *laugh*

Hmmm I should get my mother's cherry-pie recipe. Wonder if I can 'translate' it to be gluten-free...