First harvest!

[rachelmanija]

Basil and parsley died. I now have new parsley. I was advised that basil is not a winter plant, so I will hold off on that.

The dill and the kale with it have some white marks - possibly powdery mildew? I will try spraying with a milk solution.





The herbs on the sunny deck continue to be healthy. I added sage and oregano.



I purchased two more little kale plants, and used my chalk paints to decorate their pots.



My downstairs garden! Haven't decided what to put in the empty pot yet.



And I had my first real harvest! Behold my teeny bowl of kale!



Teeny salad with my own kale, plus farmer's market nectarines and peach balsamic.



Farmer's market hanger steak rubbed with my own thyme; farmer's market sunchokes roasted with my own rosemary and sprinkled with my own parsley.



In addition to being delicious, it was immensely satisfying to eat food I grew myself.

One step closer to my dream of growing, fishing, and hunting my own food! I hear some places have 30-50 unwanted feral hogs...

Comments

[movingfinger]

Basil isn't a winter plant, but you're in SoCal. If you can't get seedlings to keep up, pick up one of the established greenhouse plants supermarkets often have and repot it (larger pot), keep warm/sunny/watered, it may hang in and produce enough leaves for modest culinary use (pesto takes SO MUCH though!)!

ETA: Should have started with---they look great! I cannot get a good look at the white marks. Do you have hard water, or hard-ish water? That can leave mineral deposits on leaves, from watering.

[rachelmanija]

I do have hard water. It might be that.

[telophase]

You killed basil? I am impressed! :D

(BTW, the most recent Reply All podcast is on 30-50 feral hogs: the host wanted to see what was up with the tweet, and then ended up with a dive into the U.S.'s feral hog problem.)

[rachelmanija]

Feral hogs are a legit problem! Mowing them down with an AK is not a solution.

[telophase]

Oh yes, that's definitely what the podcast says. It's a systemic problem that's going to require a systemic solution. And there's unexpected factors, such as idiots going "Hey hog hunting sounds like fun!" so now people are IMPORTING HOGS TO OTHER AREAS in order to make money off of people who want to hunt them.

[rachelmanija]

OMFG what is wrong with people.

[lilacsigil]

It's not just in the US! An area near where I live is called the Stony Rises (the terrain is exactly what it sounds like) and hunters managed to clear out all the feral pigs and deer from there, hooray! Then some idiot released more feral pigs in there so they'd have something to hunt - they could have gone 20km up the road and there would have been more right there!

[jesuswasbatman]

Yep, you need something with a much larger calibre to hunt hogs.

[jesuswasbatman]

In parts of England there are issues with wild boar that were imported to be farmed for meat and escaped, and there have been public warnings: do not try to hunt hogs with a .22 or a shotgun - at best it simply injures the animal and causes unnecessary pain to it, and at worst it might get pissed off and disembowel you.

[princessofgeeks]

\o/

[lydamorehouse]

The salad looked very yummy. I'm impressed with your plants. I will kill nearly anything in a pot, so I'm impressed you've done so well with yours.

Living in Minnesota and having a yard of my own, I can just throw seeds on the ground and they will sprout, so I've had decent luck with an in-the-ground garden. But I showed you pictures of my basil. It got WAY too cold, WAY too early here this year. I had death by black spots. :-(

[lilacsigil]

It's so great to have your own herbs!

[vass]

Congrats on your harvest! That looks great.

[indywind]

Congrats on first harvest! The salad looks lovely.
Seconding movinfinger about the basil.

[dolorosa_12]

That looks delicious! How satisfying to eat food you've grown yourself, and all your pots of herbs look so cheerful!

[dantesspirit]

Fun, isn't it, when you can not only grow, but harvest and enjoy your own foodstuffs.}:)

You can harvest, chop and freeze herbs in stock or plain water, in ice cube trays, to add to soups and such too.

Grocery stores often sell full grown herb plants, such as Basil, Dill, etc, in the produce section, you can pick up a Basil that way, so you'll have some fresh too.