Gardening with leftover veggies? Garlic, what else?

[Anjou]

Any recommendations for small, experimental gardens straight from the veggie bin or fridge? Either for beauty or for actual food.

I figure garlic grows pretty well in the refrigerator (as do onions... hmm.. wonder about shallots since they're more expensive).

What have you successfully (figuratively) 'tossed out the window' and it grew well? (I suppose it would be best to avoid GM foods for this!!!)

I once saw a perfect strawberry hanging on a little strawberry plant just barely tucked into some run-of-the-mill ornamental bushes at a shopping mall... always wondered if maybe someone tossed out their strawberry smoothie and one of the seeds got lucky.

 

[ejagno]

As a matter of fact, now that you mentioned it......................I threw a cantaloupe outside a month ago and I've got the most beautiful and huge cantaloupe patch growing where the original landed.

Shallots do grow as well.

 

[Gateway]

I buy garlic at the grocery store, separate the cloves and plant them. They are very prolific. This fall will be the first time I plant the 'seeds' from the garlic flower heads. I am told these will also grow into garlic.

I have also bought and planted ginger. It grows into a 12" tall, plant. It did not do well come fall so this one may be for warmer climates.

Also planted oat seeds from a bag of horse feed and they grew.
And 'fingerling' potatoes from the store grew and spread into a nice crop.

 

[Pogonip]

Got 2 pineapple plants, a mango, and a couple of avocados growing in my compost heap right now...and a grape vine--have -no- idea how the grape got there!

Tucked a date pit in one of my flowerpots, and a year later, it's put up a one foot shoot.

Know someone who cuts the core out of cabbages and plants them, and gets baby cabbagelets, just right for one serving.

In theory, you can plant the root ends of leeks and green onions--I covered them with soil, think that's why they rotted...

Fun, isn't it?

 

[blue gecko]

I've got a monster watermelon vine growing just off my porch from a seed spit out earlier this summer. Also there is a pineapple growing in the garden and several ornamental gourds. I've grown garlic, specialty beans (from the health food store), potatoes, onions, shallots etc. I figure if its willing to sprout its worth giving a chance...you never can tell! Oh yeah I've got a 4 foot tangering tree that my dad started from a seed...this year its really taking off. BG

 

[Yammy]

I have some gorgeous peppers growing from seeds I had planted from grocery store peppers

 

[NC Susan]

we have wild scuppernung grapes on the back fence: thrown the seeds just to see if they would grow.

The squirrels carried and planted so much of our yard. Oaks, pycantha, blackberry, lantana, sweet pea bushwhc..........


My kids planted a plum seed 15 years ago, which became the most wonderful tree and we harvest a bushel or two a year when the grandkids arent climbing in it.

My grandmother (1894-1964) always planted baby trees with a hambone. Today you could buy a bag of bonemeal.

 

[chairborne commando]

blue gecko:

What state do you live in? It sounds like the soil there is outstanding!

 

[NC Susan]

blue gecko:

What state do you live in? It sounds like the soil there is outstanding!

My grandmother was Penna Dutch, of the Rarig family who Originally settled in Katawissa Penn, near NY state line before the Revolutionary War. Until agriculture colleges and pestisides, all farms were organic, and folks were generally healthy. I remember her city home was Shenandoah, in the Coal belt and it was a garden of peonies, and the blue spruce pines and heavenly smelling roses.

Now many years later, the Army brought us to Fort Bragg for a 2 year tour, but that was 22 years ago. We are still here. Cumberland County is home to bright leaf tobacco and soy beans. A hard humid and hot climate, but what grows here grows exceptionally well. More sunshine than clouds.

Tobacco crops are now being replaced with cotton and grapes. In the next 20 years we could soon be the world exporter on cancer wine: Reservitol http://www.duplinwinery.com/health_cancer_cd.htm

 

[blue gecko]

Chairborne and Susan, I live in Northwest Arkansas. The tender things I have growing (the tangerine tree and other citrus) go into the solarium for winter...I guess I'll have to dig up that pineapple! The soil here varies...we tend to grow a lot of rocks! Raised beds help alot. We are fortunate enough to live on the south side of a mountain that has large flat bluffs coming toward us (we live on one of them). Over the years top soil has gotten washed down from the top and accumulates in places. My original garden was in one of those 'soil goldmines' and has recently been converted to orchard, berries, grapes and perrenial vegies i.e. asparagus, elephant garlic, horshradish and such....its sort of an ongoing project! I've been moving my vegie to raised beds closer to the house for easier care. Been trying to plan for the future! This year has been very cool and rainy which is a change for us. Our usual summer expectation is hot, dry and humid for the month of August + and - a week or two.

 

[grommit]

jeruslem artichokes from small tubors or even the peels. Some people have reported large crops in the compost bin.