There are some vegetables in our gardens which come back yearly, and those plants must be nurtured in a way very different from the other vegetables and edible flower varieties. Others need to be harvested daily and not allowed to go to seed or they will cease to produce. With the upsurge in survival gardening these past twenty years, people need to ask, can you pick asparagus the first year.
The answer to that question simply, is yes, but also no. These spears are a plant which will winter over nicely and come back stronger and better each year. Experienced gardeners will tell you that first-year spears can be harvested for about two weeks, then allow the rest to mature in order to have an even better harvest for the next season.
Broccoli is a plant which should be handled in precisely the opposite manner because it will die over the late summer and winter months. It begins to produce florets in late May and June, and one can still get a harvest until mid to late July depending on how hot the region is. However, eventually the plant becomes spindly and can allowed to go to seed.
In the South, sometimes broccoli will come back from seed the next Spring, but not always. Apparently the harsh summer months followed by at least one hard freeze in winter kills the seeds which might have come up the next year. One can harvest seeds, but only if your vegetables are an heirloom variety and not a GMO hybridized plant.
Chickens and vegetable gardens go hand-in-hand, as the chickens can be allowed to roam outside the area of the vegetables and they will eat the pests that eat the crop. It is a great way to allow the chickens to road, so long as the run is fully enclosed in chicken wire to keep the chickens out of the vegetables, and also to protect them. The chicken waste can be collected and saved for fertilizer the next year.
It may sound like they are not free-roaming, but guinea hens in the wild have a small territory. Chickens do not need to have acres of space to roam in, but the average back yard will do. Should one live in an area where such farm animals are forbidden may want to stick with hens and have no crowing roosters, and a privacy fence is also a good idea.
Many people start gardens because it is important to them that their children have that experience. Others are gardening because they love the way it makes them feel. However, the primary reason people are growing their own food these days is to combat the presence of unmarked GMO foods all over our grocery stores.
Growing fruits and vegetables in the yard allows one to make sure everything is sun-ripened on the vine. Many fruits and vegetables one might find at the local supermarket are picked green and allowed to ripen in transit. Most fruits and vegetables done this way are hard and lack the flavor that foods had when most of us were children.
The answer to that question simply, is yes, but also no. These spears are a plant which will winter over nicely and come back stronger and better each year. Experienced gardeners will tell you that first-year spears can be harvested for about two weeks, then allow the rest to mature in order to have an even better harvest for the next season.
Broccoli is a plant which should be handled in precisely the opposite manner because it will die over the late summer and winter months. It begins to produce florets in late May and June, and one can still get a harvest until mid to late July depending on how hot the region is. However, eventually the plant becomes spindly and can allowed to go to seed.
In the South, sometimes broccoli will come back from seed the next Spring, but not always. Apparently the harsh summer months followed by at least one hard freeze in winter kills the seeds which might have come up the next year. One can harvest seeds, but only if your vegetables are an heirloom variety and not a GMO hybridized plant.
Chickens and vegetable gardens go hand-in-hand, as the chickens can be allowed to roam outside the area of the vegetables and they will eat the pests that eat the crop. It is a great way to allow the chickens to road, so long as the run is fully enclosed in chicken wire to keep the chickens out of the vegetables, and also to protect them. The chicken waste can be collected and saved for fertilizer the next year.
It may sound like they are not free-roaming, but guinea hens in the wild have a small territory. Chickens do not need to have acres of space to roam in, but the average back yard will do. Should one live in an area where such farm animals are forbidden may want to stick with hens and have no crowing roosters, and a privacy fence is also a good idea.
Many people start gardens because it is important to them that their children have that experience. Others are gardening because they love the way it makes them feel. However, the primary reason people are growing their own food these days is to combat the presence of unmarked GMO foods all over our grocery stores.
Growing fruits and vegetables in the yard allows one to make sure everything is sun-ripened on the vine. Many fruits and vegetables one might find at the local supermarket are picked green and allowed to ripen in transit. Most fruits and vegetables done this way are hard and lack the flavor that foods had when most of us were children.
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