Category: Outdoors

Pick berries, make pie

Have you ever wondered what would happen after a story ends? I have. The children’s book Blueberries for Sal came out in 1948 and has been a hit for 75 years. If Sal was 4 years old in the book, she must be pushing 80. I imagine she went to the University of Maine and got a degree in teaching. She probably married her college sweetie at age 24, and taught for six years before deciding to start a family. I bet she makes a mean blueberry pie.

The key to a great blueberry pie, in my opinion, is to let the blueberries dominate the flavors, not sugar. Pick a recipe, and mix the ingredients using less sugar than recommended. Maybe half, if it seems like a lot. Or if your recipe uses just a half a cup for six cups of berries, it’s probably fine. Add cinnamon, but more is not better. Sometimes I like a little cardamom.

The best berries for a pie are those you picked yourself. Even better are those you grew yourself. I’m picking blueberries now, and have some tips on how to get a good crop.

Paul Franklin and his wife, Nancy, own Riverbend Farm, a self-pick orchard with apples, pears, pumpkins and 1,600 blueberry plants in Plainfield, N.H. Paul once told me that there are just three things to get right if you want lots of blueberries: proper soil pH, proper soil pH and proper soil pH. That’s right: If you don’t have very acidic soil for your berries, you can still have nice bushes, but without proper soil pH, you will only get a few.

For most of us, a simple soil test done with a kit you buy at the garden center or hardware store will show that our soil is around 6.0 or 6.5 if not adjusted. But blueberries want a pH of 4.5 to 5.5 which is much, much more acidic than that. The scale is logarithmic, meaning each change in a number multiplies the acidity 10-fold. So a pH of 5.5 is 10 times more acidic than a pH of 6.5 and 4.5 is 100 times more acidic.

How do you adjust pH? Buy soil acidifier or agricultural sulfur and sprinkle it on the surface of the soil. If you have a thick layer of mulch to keep down the weeds, pull it back, then add your acidifier. Follow the directions on the bag as to how much to add once you know your soil pH. It may take two to three years to drop the soil pH to the proper level. And doing it now won’t affect this year’s crop.

What else should you do? Give your bushes room to grow. I did a single row and spaced the bushes 6 to 7 feet apart. But they are a little crowded now, 20-some years later. If I were doing it again, I’d space them farther apart. It’s best to run your row east-west rather than north-south to avoid one plant shading another. Full sun is best, but six hours of sun is adequate.

Blueberries like moisture, but don’t plant them in soggy soil. Also avoid the top of a sunny, sandy hillside. I have mine not far from my brook, and they have done very well. When planting, mix in some duff from under evergreen trees because it will help acidify the soil and will also add fungi that encourage good growth. Pine needles make a great mulch if you have some.

Blueberries do not like weeds, so do a good job of pulling out the grasses and weeds in the place you plant your berries — before you plant. And then add a good thick layer of wood chips around the plants to discourage weeds in the future.

Blueberries are pollinated by bees. And although some varieties are labeled “self-pollinating” it’s always best to plant several bushes and at least two different varieties.

There is a terrible pest that has arrived in most parts of New England, the spotted-winged drosophila. This is an Asian fruit fly that lays eggs in good fruit, as opposed to other fruit flies that only attack overripe fruit. In a matter of days, blueberries can go from healthy to mushy and full of larvae. If you cut open a berry that has been infected, you will see the small larvae. At present there is no organic method for controlling them other than covering your bushes with a fine mesh that the fruit flies can’t reach through.

If you are planting blueberries now, choose bushes that produce their fruit early in the season and avoid plants that mature later in the summer. Why? Some growers are finding that the fruit flies don’t show up early in the summer, so they are getting crops of early blueberries before the pest shows up. And buy the biggest bushes you can find — or afford. Blueberries are relatively slow-growing in our climate.

Birds can be a problem, too. I no longer cover my bushes with netting — I found too many birds got caught in the mesh, so now we just share. And unless you get a flock of cedar waxwings (which are voracious berry eaters), most birds don’t seem to be greedy. Last summer I enjoyed watching bluebirds feeding their second set of chicks with my berries.

I bet Sal (who had a close encounter with a mother bear in that wonderful book) had three kids, two girls and a boy. By now those kids would range in age 43 to 48, so her grandkids are either teenagers or in college. But I bet they all visit her in blueberry season for her wonderful pie. Her mother’s recipe, no doubt. Pie is always a good lure for grandkids, especially blueberry pie.

Henry is the author of four gardening books and is a lifelong organic gardener. Reach him by e-mail at henry.homeyer@comcast.net.

Featured photo: Not all berries ripen at once, even in a cluster. Photo by Henry Homeyer.

Your plants can be your partners

The recent rains have kept many gardeners from getting outdoors to weed, and weeds have loved the rain and are growing like Boy Scouts on “Free Ice Cream Day” at the Ben & Jerry’s factory. But don’t give up. Weeds also pull well now, with the soft, moist or soggy soil, so get to work!

Recently I spent an hour or so pulling dock (Rumex spp.), a coarse, tall weed that can get to be 5 feet tall or more. There are several species of dock, but all are about the same. And all have deep, fleshy roots that often fork and divide deep in the ground.

I took a garden fork and plunged it into the soil a few inches from each clump of weeds and tipped back the handle to loosen the soil. For the biggest clumps I used the fork in up to four places, once on each side. Then I grasped the clump of strong stems down low and leaned back, allowing all my weight to slowly pull out the weed. And out they came, roots and all. Very satisfying. If I had tried that when the soil was dry, it would have been much more difficult and resulted in broken roots, which would re-sprout the pesky weeds.

I worked on those dock plants now as they had already flowered and had formed seeds, which I don’t want in the soil. If pressed for time, I could have just cut the plants at ground level so the seeds would not be dispersed, but I favored pulling the weeds and getting rid of them once and for all.

Herbalists use dock for various concoctions, not the least of which, I have read, is to prevent “elf sickness.” Not much of that around here, but if you have a problem with it, consult Just Weeds: History, Myths and Uses by Pamela Jones (Chapters Publishing, 1994). It’s an interesting and amusing read.

I’ve been working on most of my flower gardens for at least 40 years and have lots of mature plants. This allows me to brag that in some beds I need not weed at all, or only very occasionally. How is that? The plants are growing so close together that most weeds cannot compete. The weeds are shaded out, or starved for nutrients and moisture by plants with deep roots and thick leaves.

One of those plants good for outcompeting weeds is the ever-present shade-lover, hosta. Although I sometimes plant daffodils between hostas, the daffies bloom and the foliage dies back by the time hostas are fully leafed out. Most common weeds will not compete well with hostas.

Bigroot geranium (Geranium macrorrhizum) is another plant that outcompetes weeds. I use it as a groundcover — the leaves stand 12 inches tall or more, and it blooms with pink, magenta or white flowers in early summer. It works well in dry shade, but will grow in sun or shade. It spreads by root, so plant three plants a foot apart in a triangle and let them fill in the space. Once well-established, it outcompetes most anything.

What else? Sweet woodruff (Galium odoratum) is good for sun or shade and, once established, spreads well. It stands about 8 inches tall and has fragrant white flowers in the spring. It may be a bit too aggressive, though. It can run roughshod over more delicate plants, growing right up to them and stealing moisture and nutrients. This year I plan to weed some out of a dry shade bed where it is diminishing the effectiveness of some primroses.

Dead nettles (Lamium spp.) is another shade to part-shade ground cover and, like the plants above, is non-native here in the United States. It is low-growing with green and silver or white leaves and attractive small flowers that can be pink, white or even yellow, depending on the species. Rarely do I see grasses or weeds coming through plantings of it.

As to full-sun plants there are many that, once established, outcompete weeds. Among those are amsonia, astilbe, black-eyed susans, daylilies, daisies, European wild ginger, Siberian iris, Helenium, phlox, iris and goldenrod. But even these take time to establish themselves. Not only that; you need three or more of each in a planting, and patience.

A perennial plant that will form a clump 2 or 3 feet wide when mature will come in an 8-inch pot. For most plants, it will take three years or more to get to full size. If you plant them 18 inches apart, they will fill in and their leaves touch sooner than if you plant them farther apart. Think of dice with three or five dots. Those are good patterns for planting if you want overlap, much better than planting them in a row.

Weeds will grow almost anywhere, even in your gravel driveway. Cultivated plants need some help to get established. So when you plant, dig a wide hole, say 2 feet wide for an 8-inch potted plant. Put in two or more shovels of compost and stir it up, mixing the native soil with the compost. I always add some organic slow-release fertilizers to the hole, too. That first year water when dry.

Mulch helps young plantings to get established. It helps keep weed seeds from germinating and holds in moisture. You will still have to weed for a few years while getting your flower bed to maturity.

There is no such thing as a weed-free garden. But with time and effort, you can reduce the work considerably once established.

Henry is a lifetime organic gardener living in Cornish, New Hampshire. Reach him at henry.homeyer@comcast.net. His website is www.Gardening-Guy.com.

Featured photo: Seeds and roots of dock, a big weed. Photo by Henry Homeyer.

Cut them fresh in the morning if you can

I’ve been keeping track this year of what blooms for me, and when. So far I’ve recorded over 100 species of flowers (plus many more named varieties of the same genus) and 40 species of flowering trees and shrubs. Blooming starts with snowdrops in March and will continue on until well after frost in November with witch hazel trees blooming even after leaf drop.

I grow so many flowers because they give me pleasure to look at them. And even though I spend a lot of time in the garden, I spend more time indoors than out, so I cut stems of annuals, perennials and flowering woodies and arrange them in vases. I want flowers on the kitchen counter, the dining room table, the desk I write at, in the bedroom, in the bathroom — in fact, on every flat surface in the house.

Let’s look at some basics of preparing and arranging flowers. When is the best time to pick flowers? Pick in the cool of the morning, especially if the day will be hot. The stems are full of water and carbohydrates and should feel full, not limp. Bring along a clean container so that as you wander around picking flowers their stems are well-submerged. Instead of picking flowers just before dinner with company, try to pick them before going to work in the morning.

Flowers with multiple blossoms on a stem (delphinium, foxglove, for example) should have some blossoms in full bloom, others showing color and some in tight bud. This will prolong the show. Flowers that grow on individual stems should be in full bloom, or just starting to open. Peonies, for example, will often have tight buds on the same stem as an open blossom, but it is rare for them to bloom in the vase. Daylilies only bloom for a day, but a single scape can have up to 10 buds that will bloom in sequence for a week or more.

It’s best to let your freshly cut flowers stay in the bucket of water for an hour before you arrange them. Cut the stems on a 45-degree angle using floral shears, or your bypass pruners if they are sharp. Scissors made for cutting paper are not good for flowers, so you may want to buy a dedicated pair of floral shears.

Because of capillary action, water in hollow stems will be sucked up the stem a little as soon as you cut them. So you need to recut about ¾ of an inch of each stem and place it in a vase right away. Otherwise an air bubble may inhibit water take-up.

Be sure to remove all leaves or flowers that would be submersed in the vase you are using. Why? The leaves will rot and ferment; the bacteria will inhibit water uptake.

Florists selling fancy roses or other expensive flowers generally provide a packet of “flower preservative.” But you can buy that stuff or make your own for your homegrown flowers. In a quart of water add a teaspoon of sugar, a teaspoon of household bleach and 2 teaspoons of lemon or lime juice. I learned long ago to drop a couple of copper pennies in a vase with a bunch of tulips to help keep the buds closed longer and have seen it work. Failing that, just change the water every two or three days, and trim off a little of each stem.

The height of the vase is important. I’ve read “expert” advice recommending different ratios for the height of the vase to the length of the flowers ranging from flowers being 1.5 times the vase height, up to three times the vase height.

To my eye, a 6-inch vase will look good with 9-to-12-inch flowers in it, but even 18-inch stems may look fine, especially if you place shorter flowers around the outside perimeter of the arrangement. I made an arrangement recently with six stems of beebalm in an 8-inch vase. I angled the stems to create support for a 24-inch stem of delphinium in the middle, standing straight up. That looked great to me.

There are devices called frogs that can be placed in a bowl or big vase to hold flowers in place. They consist of a piece of heavy metal with sharp, upward-pointing pins that allow you to stab the flower stems and hold them in place. Glass frogs also exist that have divots in a chunk of glass where a stem can be lodged.

What is blooming now that will look good in a vase? I love delphinium, astilbe, daylilies, roses, bee balm, phlox and Shasta daisies. All will last well in a vase, and provide plenty of height for a tall vase.

We just finished the peony season with the Itoh peonies lasting well past normal herbaceous peonies. They are the result of crossing tree peonies with regular peonies. Mine, called Garden Treasure, produced 30 or more 5-inch-diameter blossoms that last very well in a vase.

Arranging flowers is an art form we can all enjoy. You don’t need training or expertise. Just pick what you like, and arrange them in a vase, or even in a tall water glass. Give flowers to an aging uncle or a friend with a sprained knee. Everyone loves the gift of flowers. And be sure to put some on your dinner table tonight.

Henry is the author of four gardening books and is a gardening consultant. Reach him at henry.homeyer@comcast.net.

Featured photo: Flower arrangements are easy to make and pleasing to the eye. Photo by Henry Homeyer.

Have you thinned your root crops yet?

For me, July has started off wet: rains, heavy at times, three days a week and going on for weeks. Although I like not having to water my new plantings in the vegetable garden and flower beds, some plants are having a tough time — they need sunshine!

It’s fortunate that I make raised beds in my vegetable garden, which is near our stream. Hoeing up the earth from the pathways and adding compost has helped me considerably. Even though the beds are only 6 inches above the walkways, it helps to drain soggy soil. Of course it’s too late to do that if you have already planted on the flat of the garden — but remember for next year, as we may see these conditions again.

If you haven’t thinned your carrots, beets and other root crops yet, now is the time to do so. I try to get that done by July 4, but later is OK. You can thin to 1 inch if you want to thin them again to 2 inches in a few weeks, or you can just thin to 2-inch spacing now. The advantage to thinning twice is that your carrots will be big enough to eat when you thin them the second time.

Carrots are heavy feeders, so you may want to side-dress the rows with a little slow-release organic fertilizer like Pro-Gro or Espoma Garden Tone. Just sprinkle a thin line of fertilizer alongside the carrots, and then use a hand tool to work it in a little.

I recently finished mulching my pathways and around bigger plants like tomatoes. I put down a layer of newspaper, four sheets or more, and cover it with straw. This does a good job of keeping down the weeds. Hay is cheaper, of course, but has seeds, which can grow.

For onions, carrots and other things planted close together in straight rows I tear strips of newspapers and cover them with grass clippings or, better still, chopped leaves from last fall. FYI: Newspapers rip well from top to bottom, but not across the page.

I did lots of staking of peonies in June, as many of them have such heavy blossoms that they bend over and land on the ground, particularly after a rain. Tall fall asters and goldenrod and even phlox will fall over later on as they get too tall to stand up to rains and wind.

I have lots of 4-foot and 5-foot quarter-inch-diameter iron rods I had custom-made for me for holding up these fall beauties. The iron rods go deep into the soil more easily than thin bamboo stakes, and are stronger. To avoid getting poked in the eye when bending over, I put a wine cork on the top of each one. I drill a quarter-inch hole into the cork and slide it on. They are a good excuse to buy a nice bottle or French red from time to time with a real cork!

It’s getting late in the season to cut back tall flowers to keep them shorter, but you might try cutting back some phlox or asters now if they haven’t started making flower buds yet. Traditionally this is called the “Chelsea Chop” and is named after the Chelsea Flower Show in London, which occurs in late May each year. After the Chelsea show English gardeners prune back big tall plants. They bloom later, are shorter, and often have many more blossoms. Good candidates for hard pruning include asters, Boltonia, purple coneflower, Joe Pye weed, sneezeweed (Helenium), bee balm, Russian sage, phlox, obedient plant, rudbeckias of all sorts and Culver’s root.

Not all flowers respond well to the Chelsea Chop. Do not do this with lady’s mantle, columbine, goat’s beard, astilbe, delphinium, gas plant (dictamus), foxglove, geraniums, daylilies, hostas, iris, lupines or oriental poppies, among others. You can find lists of which to cut and which to leave alone in Tracy DiSabato-Aust’s fine book The Well-Tended Perennial Garden. Everyone should have a copy of it.

Weeding flower beds is loved by a few gardeners but avoided by many. I am so lucky that both my wife Cindy and I like to weed. Cindy is a formidable weeder, even better than me, and she has much more endurance than I do. If you don’t enjoy weeding, set a goal: Work for half an hour. Work until this small bed is weed-free. Weed every morning or evening for 15 minutes. Small efforts done every day really make a huge difference.

My advice? Get a good weeding tool that you like, one that will get under the roots so that you can lift from below and pull from above. For us, that is the CobraHead weeder (www.CobraHead.com). It’s made like a curved finger with just a single tine. I can tease out roots that, if broken, would re-sprout. It’s important to get the entire root system out so you don’t have to pull the same weed over and over.

We use ground fall leaves in the flower beds, or, lacking enough, we buy double-ground bark mulch. But be careful: If you use too much, you can starve your plants of water from light rains. An inch and a half is what I strive for. Anything less than an inch looks good but won’t do much to deter weeds. And if there are roots from things like goutweed or Japanese knotweed, no amount of mulch will deter those culprits.

Henry is a lifelong organic gardener and a 20-year veteran of the UNH Master Gardener program. He is the author of four gardening books and a gardening consultant. Reach him at henry.homeyer@comcast.net.

Featured photo: Wine corks placed ontips of iron rods protect me against a poke in the eye when bending over to sniff the peonies Photo by Henry Homeyer.