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Post by caledonian on Jan 4, 2013 22:22:56 GMT -5
Has anyone mentioned roses? The hips are delicious (like a delightfully tangy apricot) and in some varieties big enough to be useful for eating. Plus, they're one of the relatively few cold-weather winter vitamin C sources.
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Post by steev on Jan 4, 2013 23:20:10 GMT -5
I'm making an effort to harvest seed from promising Pyracantha, with an eye to planting it out around my farm area. My intent is to have it as a trap crop for the voracious migrating birds; deer don't seem to bother it much, if at all. Worse comes to worst, I can harvest the fruit for syrup or jelly.
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Post by steev on Jan 4, 2013 23:21:43 GMT -5
Roses love the farm, so potentially a food source, but the deer think so, too.
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Post by MikeH on Jan 5, 2013 4:28:15 GMT -5
Has anyone mentioned roses? The hips are delicious (like a delightfully tangy apricot) and in some varieties big enough to be useful for eating. Plus, they're one of the relatively few cold-weather winter vitamin C sources. We "wild" forage Rosa rugosa wherever we can find them which is usually at Taco Bell or some such, for us, off-the-beaten-path place. Nothing beats rose hip jelly except maybe fresh honey from a single comb. Because these wild places often get re-landscaped on a neatness theme, Rosa rugosa often gets replaced with hosta and orange-coloured bark mulch. For that reason and the fact that who knows what toxic treats have been visited on the bounty, two years ago, I wintered sowed some of the seeds from the hips we gathered. Now we have 30 bushes lining the driveway. Last year was a heavy drought and the year before only a bit less so but they have survived albeit with watering help but not yet produced much. But this year ............... Another very good cold climate source of Vitamin C is sea buckthorn. |
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Post by richardw on Jan 6, 2013 12:47:53 GMT -5
We have large areas of Rosa rugosa growing on the hills near here,really we should be using the hips more though i have been asked by another gardener up north to get some seed for here. Rosa rugosa do handle heavy droughts because the areas they grow in here are very dry hill country yet they do so well.
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Post by circumspice on Jan 6, 2013 16:32:46 GMT -5
I remember seeing rose bushes loaded with large hips along the autobahn in parts of Germany. We stopped at a rest area that had a particularly large thicket & sampled some of them. They were very, very tart or sour. I wish I had gathered some for seed. Would the seeds have produced rose bushes?
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Post by MikeH on Jan 6, 2013 18:54:33 GMT -5
Yes, if they were Rosa Rugosa. I've never trying propagating other roses from seed or cutting although we do have a couple of Apothecary's roses on their own roots that I'm going to try propagating this winter from cuttings in a hot frame..
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Post by steev on Jan 7, 2013 0:07:29 GMT -5
I often high-grade the prunings from interesting roses for cuttings when I'm dormant-pruning clients' roses (this is the season). I'll stick 7 to 12, 10"-12" cuttings, 3/4 deep in a 5-gallon pot, generally to good result.
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Post by circumspice on Jan 7, 2013 15:12:38 GMT -5
Ah, the possibilities!!! How does one save seed from rose hips? Also, how does one plant rose seed? This is totally unfamiliar territory for me.  |
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Post by caledonian on Jan 7, 2013 19:06:56 GMT -5
I wish the rugosa roses on the local university campus produced hips. But they seem to get some kind of disease that renders the hips into dead, dry things.
The multiflora roses produce plentifully; they don't produce a lot of flesh between the skin and inedible fiber core, but there's a lot of them. Too bad they're a nasty invasive.
I've ordered a native - Rosa virginica, the Virginia rose - that's supposed to have relative large fruit. I'll let you know how it goes.
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Post by MikeH on Jan 7, 2013 19:14:43 GMT -5
We harvest only the ripest hips - dark orange to red. Open them up and scoop out the sticky seeds. Put on a plate to let them dry but not so long that they dry out. When they're no longer sticky, we consider them dry. We winter sow them and keep them in a baggie in the refrigerator until ready to winter sow. Germination isn't great but with a large seed supply from a half-dozen good size hips, it doesn't matter much unless one is commercial. Winter sowing provides the cold stratification that they need.
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Post by MikeH on Jan 7, 2013 19:18:10 GMT -5
We harvest only the ripest hips - dark orange to red. Open them up and scoop out the sticky seeds. Put on a plate to let them dry but not so long that they dry out. When they're no longer sticky, we consider them dry. We winter sow them and keep them in a baggie in the refrigerator until ready to winter sow. Germination isn't great but with a large seed supply from a half-dozen good size hips, it doesn't matter much unless one is commercial. Winter sowing provides the cold stratification that they seem to need.
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Post by MikeH on Jan 7, 2013 19:39:09 GMT -5
Haskap/honeyberries are fantastic sources of Vitamin C and are extremely cold hardy. Blossoms survive -7C with no impact. And they look like any other nondescript bush even in flower. The flower is pale yellow and not very impressive.  |
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Post by steev on Jan 7, 2013 21:21:20 GMT -5
Roses are so easy to root from cuttings, I don't bother with seeds. I potted cuttings of a very nice caning, single, scarlet rose today. I'm very partial to the single, five-petalled roses. Also potted a bunch of Wonderful pomegranate cuttings, about the only variety grown commercially in California. By and large, I prefer to plant less commonly available varieties, but WTH, I have the cuttings and the space. The water? So far.
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Post by circumspice on Jan 7, 2013 23:16:39 GMT -5
Roses are so easy to root from cuttings, I don't bother with seeds. I potted cuttings of a very nice caning, single, scarlet rose today. I'm very partial to the single, five-petalled roses. Also potted a bunch of Wonderful pomegranate cuttings, about the only variety grown commercially in California. By and large, I prefer to plant less commonly available varieties, but WTH, I have the cuttings and the space. The water? So far. For my purposes, propagating rosa rugosa from seeds is more pratical for me. I want to plant a dense hedge of the rugosa roses. I have absolutely no access to canes. If I am able to locate a good quantity of ripe hips from which to get seed, I might be able to plant the hedge that I'd like to grow. It's probably just wishful thinking on my part though. But! I have adopted coppice's concept of harvesting seeds & cutting for future use. I recently raided some relatives plants for cuttings. I got an even dozen each of cuttings from rosemary & figs, also some raintree seedlings & seed pods, along with some liveoak acorns. I figure if I use the shotgun approach, I might achieve some small measure of success. |
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