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Post by greenfinger on Mar 30, 2015 14:18:37 GMT -5
We've added wild blackberries, redbud trees, elderberries, wild fox grapes, a couple dwarf fruit trees. Concord grapes contributed by the other neighbor-in exchange for a bottle of wine every harvest... Oh, would concord grapes climbing a maple tree harm anything? I am thinking of muscadines rambling through the forest canopy. We had been planting our sunchokes in planters until last spring when we made a screen of them hiding our neighbor's front door from our swing. It was beautiful... and prolific. 10 plants with an estimated gallon of tubers PER PLANT. I'm glad we don't suffer from flatulence. The row will be longer this year Last year we were short on mulch, it was unpleasantly weedy. "Understory" self-seedings of garden huckleberries and purple basil were choked by grasses. I thought we might plant sweet potatoes for a living mulch instead... But would this overtax the nutrients in this area? Reduction of sunchoke harvest is alright, but I hope for a good sweet potato harvest. Perhaps just over plant?
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Post by mskrieger on Mar 30, 2015 19:16:36 GMT -5
I like this concept, was thinking of doing it on the bed between my driveway and my neighbor's property. What's your climate like? I was thinking of doing a Prunus species hedge (plums and hardy Ukrainian almonds) underplanted with something thorny and edible (black raspberries?) and bulbs for spring flowers (daffodils and such). There's already a Japanese maple and some lilacs established that I'd keep.
How often does it rain where you are (and/or how often do you water?) How dense is the planting?
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Post by greenfinger on Mar 31, 2015 6:54:52 GMT -5
My original plan was for sunchokes, and holyhocks for the screen with shorter poppies... The other seeds just rotted. But the sunchokes let loose from a pot are quite a bit wider in habit. Distance was about 3 feet. It works well. The blackberries were started several years ago from transplanting from a friends' field. 3 spaced 6 feet apart. Wild blackberries. I expected runners and such, but WOW. They are now about 4 feet wide and span 50 feet. and expanding. The redbuds were volunteers, roughly 4 ft apart, staggered. The blosoms make mild tea. If you get the seed pods still green, before the pod develops a string they can be used like snow peas in stirfrys. Dehydrated and ground, can be used as flour extender. We have spring and fall thunderstorms, threatening tornadoes, though they rarely touch down here. 3 in the last 20 years within 50 miles. I only water the vegies and new shrubs. May needs a watering a week, June 2, July and Aug 3 or 4. In a normal year. Last year I watered 3 times. Weird.
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Post by reed on Mar 31, 2015 8:12:06 GMT -5
I just planted a bunch of grapes several of which will be allowed to free range in the trees. Well maybe not total free range, I don't want lots of grapes up where I can't get to them, I figure when I prune each year I'll remove any stems trying to to go straight up. The trees are mostly black locust that often lose a lot of leaves and start going dormant in late summer. I'm thinking that will allow sun to help ripen any that are in a lot of shade.
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Post by mskrieger on Mar 31, 2015 9:33:42 GMT -5
OK. So sounds like you are in the middle of the country, greenfinger. Don't think it gets quite as hot here, but sounds like you don't water your hedgerow and it does just fine? And is fruitful? Good to know. Post pictures sometime, it sounds beautiful. As for those wild blackberries, bramble fruits are called brambles for a reason -- they all need serious pruning if you want them to stay in line! Though sounds like you don't care so much about that so it's all good.
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Post by greenfinger on Mar 31, 2015 17:39:34 GMT -5
"bramble fruits are called brambles for a reason -- they all need serious pruning if you want them to stay in line" Well, it was country when we moved here. Those housing complexes are moving closer and closer. Our immediate neighborhood has 1 to 4 acres per owner. Shall I call it bramble, or free fencing? No, no watering after it has been established. Though, if sunchokes wilt too much, they would be watered. They do get eaten. Though I was wondering if we do get a fence, we'd have to mow it all down. Would it fruit on new canes, or would they miss a year of producing?
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Post by mskrieger on Apr 1, 2015 9:13:01 GMT -5
"in the middle of the country" haha, sorry! --- I meant in the middle of the US (somewhere like Oklahoma? Or maybe the heat and tornadoes you mentioned have me confused ) I suspect if they are wild blackberries and you mowed all the canes down, you'd miss a season of production, either that summer if you did it in spring or the next year if you did it in autumn. Only a few cultivars that fruit on first-year growth.
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Post by greenfinger on Apr 1, 2015 11:32:44 GMT -5
Oh, southwest Tennessee
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coppice
gardener
gardening curmudgeon
Posts: 149
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Post by coppice on Apr 7, 2015 15:19:22 GMT -5
Grape in trees might be natural, but it will pull trees down in time, and it only feeds birds.
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Post by reed on Apr 7, 2015 19:24:12 GMT -5
Wild grapes here can completely smother big trees. I know a place where you can see how as each tree died the vines grew up the next one, the trunks of some of the vines are as big as small trees and lay along the ground where the first trees fell and rotted away and the vine found the next one to go up, really cool place.
I go through my woods once in a while and rescue trees by cutting the vines that have found them. I like the vines though so I don't cut them all, just ones that threaten nice trees. I'v been doing it long enough that my woods is getting pretty resistant to the vines in a lot of places with the canopy of trees closing off the light underneath.
I love seeing them hang in the locust and cedar trees. I'll keep them trimmed from going to far up so I can reach the grapes. As I learn to start them from cuttings I'm going to take them with me on hikes and plant them anywhere I think they might grow. Maybe they will reproduce and cross and go wild and feed the critters and years from now someone can find them.
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Post by Joseph Lofthouse on Apr 8, 2015 10:57:16 GMT -5
I use trees as trellises for my grapes. I prune the vines most every year to keep them at a great height for harvesting. So basically, I only allow one year or two year old vines in the trees. The stump of the vines grow on a wire trellis.
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Post by reed on Apr 9, 2015 6:39:04 GMT -5
Those sure are some pretty grapes. Bet you are cheating again with your dry air, none of that grey powder stuff on the leaves, no rotten looking fruits in the clusters. I'm jealous.
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Post by Joseph Lofthouse on Apr 9, 2015 11:24:36 GMT -5
I love my dry growing conditions. It sure helps minimize pests and diseases. My biggest pest/disease problem with grapes is that a tiny spider climbs inside the clusters and makes an egg nest. Perhaps only one cluster in 10, and it's compact, so easy enough to remove. Some years about harvest time one variety has a tremendous whitefly infestation. So putting on a dust mask helps while harvesting.
One of the varieties I grow is called Himrod... The vegetation thrives here, but it only produces fruit about 1 year in 5. I really should graft something else onto the stump.
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