everybody is buying us out?

[Amishway Homesteaders]

OK most of you know we work at a Amish Greenhouse and we also have our own Herb Bussiness. But this year we are close to (or have already) being sold out of most peppers ,tomatoes, Herbs and most vegetables 2 to 3 weeks before we did in the past? same amount or more plants as years past and people keep coming and coming.

We have had a lot of new gardeners show up with " we want to put in a garden what should we get?" I know here in New York we are all feeling the pinch but I was wondering if it is the same all over? Lots of talk about gas prices and the higher price of food in the stores so paople are staying home and putting gardens this year.

So have you seen this were you go to get your plants, seeds or order from?

 

Good thing we got ours all in.

 

[Carolyn]

DD's went to look for some seeds that we didn't save and supplies are low. She looked at the plants also--just to see what was available and the plants are pretty much sold out also. Carolyn

[quiltys41]

No, it's not just yall up there. It's here in NW TN also. We ran out of sweet potato slips and onion sets here before you had a chance to get them. All of us regular gardeners got caught with our britches down on that. Thank the good Lord for a kind soul who sent us some of both this year!! Even our friend Danny who pre-orders his with the local co-op for his truck garden got shorted on his orders.

 

You can bet though, that I will not count on local stuff next year, but try my hand at starting my own plants and slips instead. Because the food prices are only getting worse, not better and by next spring there will be even more people out there starting gardens for the first time.

 

And with that said, yall need to think about being ahead of the curve on canners, canning supplies, food saver and bags, dehydrator, etc...for preservation of the garden before the wake up and realize they will need it too and short those things just like they did plants and seeds this past spring.

 

Q

[Mother]

Very good point Quiltys, We might want to add jelly making supplies (pectin), canning salt, sugar, spices, and etc to that list.

 

Thanks for the heads up!

 

[Darlene]

Quiltys, how do you keep slips from sweet potatoes to plant next year?

 

I need to place an order for Pomona pectin.

[quiltys41]

Gee they make that awefully hard. Just take a couple of sweet potatoes out and set in a sunny window a few days in the winter. Now take those and put in a dark well ventilated spot (I stick them in a closet lol) for a couple of weeks until they have a few good runners. Cut those eyes with the runner and a little bit of the meat of the potato out and stick into small pots. Line them up in a sunny winidow and water every couple of days. They will start to take up roots in about a week. You can make as many or as few as you want. I usually get two good sized runners of each end of the potato and a couple of smaller ones out of the middle part giving you on average 6 slips per sweet potato.

 

Now this year, we ended up eating all the taters and DH didn't realize it was down to one jar in the pantry lol! Store bought taters do okay, but the beau regaurd and centennials seem to make the best slips from your own stock. I think someone once told me that they put a growth retardant on them in the store so they wont sprout.

 

Q

[Mother]

If you buy organic sweet potatoes you will have no trouble with sprouting them. They aren't coated with anything supposedly.

 

I start mine by taking sweet potatoes out of storage when they've just started to sprout as they usually are by spring but you can do it directly from non-sprouted ones also. I cut them in half lengthways and put each half, cut side down in shallow trays of water until they start to root well. They get kind of mushy as they sprout. Then I cut them apart or sometimes I can just pull rooted plants off the sweet potatoe and put them into separate pots in a sunny window until I can put them out in the garden. (These make a beautiful vine-like house plant too but eventually die back as they are restricted by the pots.)

 

By the way, sweet potatoes take up a LOT Of room in the garden but home grown ones are well worth it. We usually plant ours near the edge and let them sprawl. I've tried them in the corn patch but they don't seem to get enough sun there and don't produce as well. We grow squash and pole beans there instead.

 

Your way is a lot easier I believe, Quiltys. I'll try it next year.

Thanks

[quiltys41]

Mother, lol, I was going to try your way next year! Never saw an "organic" sweet potato around here? Maybe that's why the three that I got from the store never sent out shoots, they aren't organic.

 

We plant ours on the edges of the garden too since the vines want to spread out all over the garden...hard to get any tilling done that way. I let DH trim them back with the lawn mower that way too lol. We do that because we had read a couple of places that some commercial farmers do it to get the plants to put more energy into potato growth that way than vine production. Not so sure how well it does as the potatoes seemed about the same size either way.

 

Q

[MommaDogs]

Originally Posted By: quiltys41

Mother, lol, I was going to try your way next year! Never saw an "organic" sweet potato around here? Maybe that's why the three that I got from the store never sent out shoots, they aren't orgasmic.

Q

Not laughing AT you quiltys, but LOL... orgasmic sweet potatoes. Boy, those must be good.

[Amishway Homesteaders]

Thanks for all the feedback - Glad to know it ain't just us.

But good to know we are doing it right as we have saved seed and can make our own plants.

as for sweet potatoes all you need do it take one and put it into a glass jar point down so some of it is in the water. within a week you will start to get slips growing. When they are about 5 - 6 inches long we cut (or break) them off and put them into another jar (with water). when they get lots of roots we then plant them in pots until it is time to put them outside after the soil is at least 65 degress and the night are warm.

If you can get them from a farm stand or local farmers market that is great - store bought you are taking chances.

[quiltys41]

Originally Posted By: MommaDogs

Originally Posted By: quiltys41

Mother, lol, I was going to try your way next year! Never saw an "organic" sweet potato around here? Maybe that's why the three that I got from the store never sent out shoots, they aren't orgasmic.

Q

Not laughing AT you quiltys, but LOL... orgasmic sweet potatoes. Boy, those must be good.

I fixed it...i am sooo sorry about that lol. I need to drink some coffe first next time.

Q

[DoubleD]

I liked your original version better quilty! LOL!

 

"I'll have what she's having!"

[JCK88]

You can take hunks of sweet potatoe and stick toothpicks in them and suspend them over water. They will send out shoots then--and when I lived in Virginia almost every lady in the office had tons of these little vines growing on their windowsills and then suddenly they all disappeared. It was explained to me that planting time had come and they took them home and put these things in their gardens! I just remembered this now...gosh, it's been 20 years almost since I lived there. perhaps sweet potatoes need a little prompting to send out shoots?

[Jewlzm]

rofl! Quilty

 

Out here in the middle of nowhere people are buying up everything they can. The business are trying hard to keep up with demand. The lady at the D&B said she had to restock everything 4 times and there is a backorder on some stuff like tomatoes and pepper plants. I cant find acorn squash anywhere not even in seed form and squash seeds are just about non existent around here. **sigh** Its a sign of the times. But the D&B lady says that there are alot of new gardeners out there now because of the high prices so I hope this means people are starting to open their eyes at the ways of the world now.

[Dee62]

Even here in the rainy UK the same things happening.One local nursery is on its 3rd EXTRA veg plant order.The sales of fruit and veg plants and seeds have gone through the roof this year.Not sure wether its to do with the 'eat local/fresh' campaigns we've had running recently on TV or to do with household economies.

 

Its quite nice to have people nearer my own age in the queue at the veg racks,I'm normally surrounded by dear old pensioners.Not that I mind as I'm always gleaning more tips from them