How to Collect Chive Seeds

Chives are one of my favorite plants in the herb garden. They have the most gorgeous flowers and they’re so easy to grow. It just takes a quick snip to get a handful of an aromatic, tasty add-in for anything tangy- sour cream, Greek yogurt, butter, etc... They also re-seed themselves quite easily so I keep the blossoms clipped off as soon as they're ready to harvest. I just don't want them to spread all over the plot. Once established, they will usually thrive for years but neglect and/or disease can end them. In case I want to start them in a different spot or gift some (they ARE pretty) I save some seeds from year to year. They're very easy to collect! 

Start by clipping off the older blossoms. Leave about an inch or so of the stem on them for a "handle." Drop them loosely into a paper bag. Set them aside. Make sure the top of the bag is securely closed and give it a gentle shake every day to make sure the blossoms are getting airflow all around them. Do this for about a week.

Open the bag and see if any seeds are laying in the bottom. If you can see several seeds, it's time to take out the blossoms. Carefully tip them into a container with an edge so the seeds don't roll away.

Pick up each blossom by the stem and give it a little tickle with your other hand to dislodge any remaining seeds. The loose seeds will have a static-like property so be careful not to lose them! 

After you've finished tickling the blossoms, carefully scoop up the seeds and put them into an envelope or bag. Store them in a dry place until you’re ready to plant.

Getting Stuff Done

DH got an unexpected weekend off so we crammed it full! We didn't have time for planning, we were in "shoot first, ask questions later" mode! Here's a rundown:

  Friday evening I went to the Amish auction and got 8 baby Dutch rabbits to grow out before winter. We still had 2 of the last batch of rabbits and they couldn't be kept in the same cage so the new ones got to have a big slumber party until DH had time to free up some space.

  Saturday DH finished working on his truck brakes. Then we harvested the sunflowers. It was the first time I had grown them and I was very pleased with the results! I would have liked to finish them out on the stalks but they were in the middle of the garden so we decided to cut them down.

Then I took a picture of the disaster our summer garden had become. Yikes! I am almost too embarrassed to share it but I've heard other horror stories and I don't want those people to think they were alone. Besides, I want to have a "before" and "after" show. 

"Before"

         and 6 hours of hard work later

"After"

 Of course the birds came out to help us finish up. I think they were checking to see if any pesky worms had been tilled up!  We left the green bean, pepper, and tomato plants because they are still blooming. And that evening I made a turnip seed tape to plant along with some leftover onion sets and a new pack of sweet peas. All that stuff will go in the ground today!

 Sunday we went to a great morning worship service at our church, hit a local Chinese buffet with a couple of DSs for lunch, mowed MIL's yard, butchered the last of the New Zealand rabbits, and still had time to take in a movie in town! Whew!

This morning I shipped DH off to St. Louis and, as promised, I am going to share about Peach Butter. This was the first time I've made it and I didn't follow one specific recipe. I just searched for lots of recipes and then played it by ear.
 I peeled and pitted, then pureed the peaches in my food processor. I didn't count or weigh them, just kept the process going until my crockpot was almost full. Then I added the sweetener and spices (4 cups of sugar, 3 Tablespoons of Cinnamon, 1 Tablespoon of Ground Cloves, and 2 teaspoons of All Spice.) I stirred all that real well and then set the crockpot on low with the lid propped open to vent steam. My goal was to just let it cook on low until it reached the thickness I like but 16 hours later I just got tired of waiting (patience isn't one of my virtues) so I turned it up to high for the next 2 hours. I also took the lid completely off. Then I processed it in half pint jars in a hot water bath for 15 minutes. It turned out sooo yummy!

Matthew 11:28  Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. 

Parsley, Sage, Rosemary, and Rabbits

 A girl can get a lot done when her DH  is home! For instance, we found the part of the garden that had disappeared under the tomatoes and weeds. The parsley was nothing much to look at and the rosemary was on it's last leg. I cut off all the rosemary that was still green and trimmed the plants back to almost bare. We'll wait and see what some cooler fall temps will do for them. As for the sage, well it had exploded. I guess it liked being under the tomato canopy! I cut off as much as I could use and decided to just let it go.


 Saturday DH butchered the first set of rabbits we have managed to save from predators. They had been in lockdown in  an old dog kennel from day 1! It was the first time I had witnessed rabbit butchering so I watched from a distance until the chickens decided to get in on the action. So I stepped up for guard duty until all 4 rabbits were finished-Hoosier Girl to the rescue! We put them in our garage fridge to age and will grill one this evening. The rest will go in the freezer!
 I made a marinade of rosemary, sea salt, pepper, and oil for the one that will be grilled.

Then I got to work preserving the rest of the sage I had picked today. I am not a fan of dried herbs unless I don't have a choice so I chopped it up and placed it in some more of those "handy" KFC reusable containers. I topped it off with some chicken broth and put it in the freezer for when cooler weather comes (hopefully soon!)









I still had a little bit left so I chopped it up and scattered it over some bread crumbs that are drying for homemade dressing. That should make a nice little side dish with the grilled rabbit this evening!

The Secret Garden

Not the book. Although I loved reading that one, this secret garden is in my backyard. It's in the same general vicinity as the garden I planted in the spring. There are rumors going around that this is the very same garden but I am here to tell you that what you find there now is nowhere close to what I envisioned in that spot! Aside from the corn that was eaten by the thunderstorm (look back, it's in an earlier post) there are other strange goings on.
   For instance the green beans. Now green beans aren't easy things for me to grow. It is not uncommon to plant the darn seeds 3 or 4 times before they actually sprout and thrive here. So I'm very careful with the little boogers. I planted bush type, stringless seeds. And I got a couple of plants that were-bush type, stringless beans. I also got 8 plants that are vining pole beans with very tough strings. HUH? They all came out of the same seed packet. so HUH???
  Another mystery is the basil. I know I planted basil. I have picked the yummy leaves twice and even have some in the freezer right now. So where is it? I thought the whole plant had moved on to a bigger and better garden until this morning when I realized it was under a tomato plant. HUH? That tomato was nowhere near the basil last week. I think it must be one of those killer tomato plants that plans on taking over the whole garden. Maybe it is holding the basil for ransom? If you don't hear from me again, suspect that tomato!
    And then there are the weeds. They weren't in the plan for the original garden. In fact, when I planned the whole thing out on paper, I purposely didn't leave room for weeds. But they snuck their sneaky little selves in. They infiltrated slow and quiet and then they just laid back and waited for the perfect opportunity to strike-like this week while the temps are over 100 and nobody has the strength to pull one wimpy weed let alone billions of tough ones. That sun is a killer and I'm seriously considering putting my next garden in the shade!
   But in spite of all the mysterious happenings, I still harvested 6 bell peppers, a handful of green onions, and a bottom-of-my-shirt-full of big boy tomatoes today. And last night I got these:

First blackberries!

And these:

First roma tomatoes

The first batch of blackberries and tomatoes are a signal to me. They herald the beginning of serious preserving time. So... Let the games begin!

Seed Tape continued

 After a few hours on the kitchen table, the seed tape looked like this:

All dry!

 I have to admit, I didn't think the seeds would stick. But I turned it upside down and gave a gentle shake and all the seeds stayed in place. So after the temperature outside started going down, I went out to the garden and picked the spot! There was a nice place where 2 sheets of plastic met up so I just pulled them apart and started digging.

 I covered it over with our nice sandy dirt and now all I have to do is wait. It is probably too warm to grow nice carrots which is why I didn't plant very many. But I want to see if the seeds will sprout and how the seed tape will work here. 

 And while I'm waiting I will have time to figure out what happened here:

feathers!

Maybe I don't want to know?

Seed Tape

Thanks to an overabundance of rainy days and some (a very little, mind you) slacking on my part, the carrots did not get thinned this year. Add to that that they were planted too close to a hyper-growing tomato on one side and some carrot happy weeds on the other side and it came down to get the carrots out of the ground now or lose them in the undergrowth. So I dug a huge bunch of baby carrots yesterday.

 The rabbits and goats all had a feast of carrot tops last night and they were very happy critters. (We-elll, the last mating of the buck and doe rabbits didn't take so we were letting them try again. Maybe that had a little to do with the smiles on their faces?)

 But as far as the carrots situation, I decided to try my hand at making seed tapes today to prevent the necessity of thinning next time. So I mixed up a Tablespoon of corn starch and a cup of cold water until smooth.

Then I added a blop (an exact blop, not more or less) of green food coloring, for the purpose of being able to see it on the white background.

I brought that to a boil, stirring constantly. Then I let it cool for a minute while I got the rest of the supplies together.

yardstick and toilet paper

I stuck an old heavy ad under the toilet paper to keep the "glue" from leaking through and then used an old syringe to make glue dots an inch apart and dropped a seed into each dot.

Voila! Seed tape. I just made a small one for practice and am going to stick it in an empty spot in the garden as soon as it is dry. Away from the tomatoes. and the weeds. 

Garden Goodies

 I placed an order for some fall planting seeds from a company that was new to me, My Patriot Supply. I found them on a homesteading forum I visit frequently.
 I have never paid much attention to the seed I bought until I watched the documentary "Food, Inc" (which is a definite must watch if you haven't seen it.) Although the part of the movie that focused on seeds was geared toward bigger farms, it sure opened my eyes to a subject that I had never thought about.
 But the reason I am sharing this is because of the excellent customer service I got from the company. I placed my order early one morning (when my internet connection seems to be the best!) and chose the cheapest form of shipping available since I wasn't in a hurry to get the seeds. I received an email that the order had been filled and shipped that same day. AND withing 2 days I had the seeds. Well, I sent them an email thanking them for such prompt delivery AND received a reply that day! All correspondence was a human reply-not a computer generated form. I am impressed.

new seeds!

The selection of seeds wasn't huge, just right for someone like me who doesn't have a lot of acreage. I can't say these are the best seeds ever, I haven't even opened them yet. But I love knowing I got something from an American company who is interested in their customer. I thought the prices were very reasonable also.
If you are interested in heirloom seeds, check them out:  http://www.mypatriotsupply.com/ 

And I got my first cabbages from the garden today! They are huge-even after I took off what the bugs had munched on (happy rabbits later!)

I put the store bought cauliflower in the pic to show the difference in size home grown can make. The only "help" these cabbages got was a little rabbit fertilizer. There are 6 more that will be ready to pick soon. Ooh, I can smell the cabbage rolls now. Yummmm.

What I learned today: Don't text and mow. 'nuf said!

Bounty

 I knew the lettuce needed picked so I headed out to the garden first thing this morning (well after I gave a goat a bottle.) It turned out that half the garden needed picked.

I guess the rain had worked it's magic because most plants needed cut back. Besides lettuce, I got a gallon bag of basil. one of sage, several green onions, and a big bunch of spinach. Oh and (drum roll please) the first tomato!! There's nothing like the emotion from bringing in the first pickings from the garden! It's that special time when you can enjoy what you've grown and not worry about having to preserve a boatload of it (until next week lol!)
There is a mystery with the zucchini though. All of the big green leaves have turned brown and died. There are small shoots coming out from the center of the plant so I haven't pulled them but I do not know what happened! Usually zucchini is one of the things I wish would die after I picked a zillion of them. Hopefully they will pull through but if I have to loose something, I'm glad it's something that can be easily replaced at the Farmer's Market.
 I was really pleased with the progress my blackberries are showing.

The bushes are loaded!

 Tomorrow I will be blueberry picking and I hope to get the first handful of green beans!