Playing In Dirt

[Ariaecheflame]

Oh... This is cool... This thread is popular I see.

I love raspberries and blackberrys and all those cold climate fruits.

I'm in the sub tropics so it's all bananas, citrus, mango's and avocados... stuff like that.

We just bought a house (which I had almost given up on the idea of home ownership... It has a small yard so I won't be growing a mango tree haha.

It already has a banana plant though... And also a category 3 weed which has grown all into the canopy of a large tree... Which will keep me busy eradicating it for the next decade or so haha...

The weed is maderia vine or potato vine some people call it... I've heard that the leaves are edible and taste like spinach - I wonder if anyone here knows anything about this weed vine and it's possible culinary uses?

I'm going to have to poison the mother plant but I'll be manually removing seedlings for years.

[linen53]

Originally Posted by Gracey

That is about how tall ours are too. We planted them from seeds and kept them by a window in our garage. We did that in may. Do your plants get big? Ours will get as tall as me usually.

No, Sweet and Neats will stay tiny. That's the whole point why I chose them.

[linen53]

I remember when I first moved to my house that I've been in for 20 years we had pear trees that were completely taken over with wood vine. It grew from the ground, up the tree and took over the tree tops smothering them. It took me about 2 years to cut the vines which were well established and measured 1 1/2 to 2 inches thick. Then pull on the vines which reached all the way to the tops of the trees. Sometimes 50 feet long entwining the trees. Many vines took over about 4 trees. Now the trees are all free and clear of this vine but it was lots of work back then.

Bindweed is a weed related to the popular morning glory flowers. But the roots are impossible to kill. And if you pull them up and don't pick them up they will reroot. I found out that the hard way one year.

I hate like crazy to use poisons but there is one weed killer that will kill all the way to the root. And that is Roundup Pro Max. I have a jug of it but can't use it on my bindweed because of my ducks which forage on our property during the day.

[Chrysalis]

I too have bindweed. I pull them out and leave them out to dry before throwing them in the garbage.

I read somewhere that you can cut them off at the soil line and the roots die because you cut off the leafy part.

Shame on them for looking like morning glories!

[Ariaecheflame]

I am not a fan of poison but it does has its place in times of absolute need... Madeira vine, unfortunately is one of those times.

I know what you mean though about the roots of plants like morning glory... Morning glory is an environmental weed here too lol... It's too warm, everything grows like an insane plant on steroids... Not sure if it is just me but I find they seem to have quite resistant to a lot of different herbicides as well, roundup being one of them.

I was reading in the paper yesterday about crops which have been engineered to emit certain scents which invasive pests don't like... So it stops the pests from breeding and laying eggs on the crops, instead they go elsewhere and leave the crops alone... It is hoped that it will greatly reduce the need for chemical pesticide use...
Anyway... I like science so I just found it interesting.

Madeira vine is a fleshy vine with numerous Aeriel potato like growths on the stems -
It continues to grow in the canopy even if the stems get chopped off at The ground so I will have to scrape the stems at intervals and poison them as far up as I can reach, that way hopefully the entire established plants will die off.
This plant is really quite amazing... any growth, leaves, Aeriel tubers, sections of vine which drop to the ground will sprout a new plant. It also has hundreds of these individual Potato like growths stored under the soil which also sprout until every last trace is removed.


I am actually quite impressed by its survivabilty - it pulls out all the stops - it really is quite amazing...

Fortunately here in my country it definitely does not reproduce by seed as well as the seeds are sterile thank goodness!

Originally Posted by linen53

No, Sweet and Neats will stay tiny. That's the whole point why I chose them.

sweet and neats,, ,such a cute name. I never heard of them before.

[linen53]

I do hate to poison Mother Earth but sometimes it is absolutely necessary with weeds that take over and just won't take 'no' for an answer.

Chrysalis our bindweed is everywhere. I can't plant a garden because of it. It's thick in that area. I would, and have in the past, spent time each day pulling, bucketing what I pull and throw them away, but I ended up with West Nile from the mosquitoes because of the many hours I devoted to weeding. Now I just let it be.

emeraldheart, your Madeira vine sounds worse than bindweed! And, until now, I couldn't imagine anything worse than bindweed. Yikes! Can you eat the tubers?

Gracey, you can't buy Sweet and Neats in a nursery or store. You have to order the seeds online. There is also a Tiny Tom that is even smaller than the Sweet and Neats. The Tiny Tom mature tomatoes are about as big as a green pea.

[Ariaecheflame]

Well I did a little more reading and the leaves are used in Japanese cooking they call it 'land seaweed'.

Seems it tastes like spinach I'm going to collect some leaves and seedlings before I get to poisoning the mother plants and try them in a stir -fry.

Apparently the underground tubers can be roasted like potatoes and eaten though I have not heard very good reviews about that one lol.... If I am feeling adventurous I will give it a try.

Does anyone else here forage for any other edible weeds in your garden or elsewhere? I used to forage a bit for local edible natives but I don't tend to forage for weeds as I always wonder about chemical spray... Although by the looks of my local parks in my current location... There isn't much spraying going on haha....

To be fair, it is along a watercourse though so it is left alone a bit more.

[linen53]

emeraldheart, I've read some pretty negative reviews on cooking certain foods. Deer ribs come to mind. I had to think outside the box to make them delicious and edible.

Maybe boil the tubers first/instead. Might cut them up before cooking to help remove any bitter or odd taste.

Chrysalis, the part about cutting the bindweed off at soil level and the roots will die does not work with the kind of bindweed we have. I repeatedly pulled up the leaves and stems and it just throws out twice as many shoots, over and over and over again. Roots don't die because the mother roots go down many feet. This article says about 10 feet (3 meters).

Furthermore a two or three year food supply is stored in an under ground root system of the plant.

http://mtwow.org/field-bindweed-ID.html

[linen53]

My Sweet and Neat tomato plants are covered in blossoms and are actually making a few tiny tomatoes.

Raspberries are doing well though it will be awhile before we get any ripe berries. I need to use up what raspberries I have in the freezer from last year.

Pear trees are covered in pears. Right now they are about the same size as a small fig.

I love summer harvests.