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Homegrown Celery and Lessons Learned

March 8, 2022

Bishop Gardening, Optimism, Vegetables , 2 Comments

I have seen many suggestions that celery can be grown from the base of a store bought celery stalks. Being of curious mind for most things, I decided to give it a try. Beginning last Fall/202,1 I began to plug the cut off stalk bases into the soil. Nothing fancy, just shove the base down until the top cut is flush with the soil and keep it moist.

Two recent additions to the garden waiting to sprout.
After about a week or two or three, the cut off stalk will begin to sprout.
This is one after about 45+ days of optimal growing weather. Adjacent is a Golden Beet competing for space.

I was surprised at the growth habit in my garden and being a novice to celery growing I was expecting a tightly bunched stalk. Here is where some of my lessons to be learned began to be realized 1. increase spacing especially if sharing space with other veggies. 2. As you will see in a photo later, commercially grown celery is blanched either by trench planting or by wrapping in paper and cardboard and mounding the soil up around the stalk.

Here is a method incorporating wrapping in newspaper and mounding up the base of the stalks. Source; https://gardenerspath.com/plants/vegetables/blanch-celery/

Another lesson learned…..celery takes 120-130 days to mature. Record keeping is not one of my strengths whether it be for, gardening, beekeeping, beer brewing( a little better here for repeatability) or vehicle maintenance. So for the next go around of stalks to harvest I will just be guessing based on size and shape. My usual process…..LOL

Unmounded, unblanched and poorly harvested. I had to do a taste test and just cut a handful of stalks.
Obviously unblanched yet surprisingly tasty. Also nice and crunchy so I will give it a thumbs up

Based on my dead reckoning I have 4 or 5 stalks needing attention for blanching. I am not confident that the most recently planted cut offs will not degrade into something to bitterness due to the Houston, Texas heat. I will update all y’all my progress as the heat finally sets in.

So, those articles you have seen or read about planting the cut off bases of celery stalk do have merit. In the Fall of 2022 I will begin again. As for record keeping, technology may help……so as I put a cut off base in the ground I could use use my smart phone to establish a harvest date 130 days out minus the 3 week window for blanching! Ok…….I’m sure it could work but…….

TTFN

Bishop

Backyard Farm Resurrection

November 15, 2021

Bishop Beekeeping, Composting, Fall, Gardening, Healthy Lifestyle, mulching, Vegetables , , , , , , , 4 Comments

June of 2021 was my last update, don’t get the wrong idea…….I haven’t given up on the garden……but nearly given up on my blogging. Oh, I have good intentions, taken photos, jotted down notes in my brain……an unwise and not secure place to store thoughts…LOL. A friend began shaming be about the hiatus and I agreed to be more diligent!

One of the aspects of gardening that bothers me, but I also realize that thinning when planting by seed is a necessary evil…..the taking of a life….pulling out a crowded seedling and seeing it suffer, wilt but yet, create the circle of life becoming organic material for the soil. oh well, necessary for those that grow to harvesting size.

Thinning activities are happening with the carrots and the beets. Need to be sure to wear my reading glasses because, too often, the emerging seedlings are almost twins!

Some emerging beets previously thinned.
Carrots poking up through the leaf mulch. So delicate at this stage so I really need the reading glasses for my 70 year old eyes.
Some beets with a head start. My first plantings were from a packet dated for 2017 so germination wasn’t too good! latest beet seeds are 2021 season packets, both red and golden.

Sugar snap peas aren’t cooperating at all so I may have to try again in the spring. I have added some bases off of celery stalks and, lo and behold…..they are taking hold. Hopefully they take off and enjoy the cool Houston fall and winter.

It should be pretty obvious which one went in first and which one was last. I may continue and eventually make an edible border in the garden! They also share space with some beets….they seem to get along pretty well.

Bees seem happy and I will do my best to help them through the winter….I will share more about them soon…..really I will!

TTFN

Bishop

Facebook Memes…..Do They Work? Or – Doing it “My Way”

March 11, 2020

Bishop Composting, Gardening, Healthy Lifestyle, Philosophical, Vegetables , , , , Leave a comment

If you follow Facebook there are multiple memes showing how to grow vegetables from your kitchen scraps. I don’t know about you, but they seem a bit too good to be true. Ok, raise your hand if you have tried…….hmmm, how many hands are up?

Well, I am going to raise my hand now. If you have followed me for a long time you have seen some of my experiments. At the top of that list are my strawberry towers, with reasonably good results, but only for the initial growing season. I do have an update coming, but will hold off for a few more weeks.

Let me start with celery. I didn’t follow the instructions in the meme, surprise, surprise! I did it my way as Frank would have sung. As a side note, I heard that Frank hated singing that song.

From a Wall Street Journal article, June 2nd, 2009.”Frank Sinatra may not have always been the easiest guy in the world to get along with, but he was nothing if not consistent. One attitude that rarely varied was his opinion of “My Way,” a song whose 40th anniversary is being heralded with the reissue of the 1969 album. “My Way” was quite possibly the single most popular number from the final act of Sinatra’s career. And in concert after concert over a 25-year period, he never hesitated to tell audiences exactly what he thought of it:

— “I hate this song — you sing it for eight years, you would hate it too!” (Caesars Palace, 1978)

— “And of course, the time comes now for the torturous moment — not for you, but for me.” (L.A. Amphitheater, 1979)

– “I hate this song. I HATE THIS SONG! I got it up to here [with] this God damned song!” (Atlantic City, 1979)”……………..

Ok, back to the celery, did it my way and just poked the stub into the ground in the garden and walked away. A week later it was showing life. Now, at three weeks, it looks like a young celery plant. See photo below.

I hope it survives the coming warm weather so I can finish the experiment by eating some!

Well that worked pretty well. I next took a couple of cut off ends from some Romaine lettuce, and yes, I did it my way. They too were just poked into the dirt and allowed to fend for themselves.

One of the twin plantings
I poked this one in the ground a couple of days ago and the center is sprouting!

One more little tidbit, I have been a no till gardener for about three years now and it seems to be working. I use layers of leaves, grass clippings and buckets full of compost out of my bins. This has made a very dark and rich looking soil.

Stay tuned for more gardening done “My Way” ……. sorry Frank I just had to do it!

TTFN

Bishop

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