Planting/Growing Your Own...The Garden Thread

[2300]

My 1st year of gardening this year in a small Chicago community garden.  Some successes (tomatoes, peas, herbs, kale, lettuce), some Ok results (beats), and some failures (spinach...not a single plant in spring or fall).  Continuing lots of learning in person and online.

Following this thread to learn more.

[Nancy]

Welcome, 2300! I'm pretty sure I'll continue to learn for as long as I garden. No two seasons are exactly the same.

[1967mama]

Jon_Snow,

How was the purple cabbage? Enquiring minds want to know!

[Nancy]

I'm still harvesting tomatoes and cucumbers along with my fall bounty. I'm feeling a bit under pressure to preserve it all. That's a ridiculous thing to type. I'm incredibly lucky. I'm just nervous that I won't get all my food projects done and there will be waste (ugh!). A bit more than a pint of raspberries every two days is the most wonderful gift the Earth could give me. I"m freezing for my winter oatmeal. Yum!

[Jon_Snow]

Jon_Snow,

How was the purple cabbage? Enquiring minds want to know!

I'm on the ferry tonight, so I will see how things look in the morning!

I've got lots to do with the garden to "put it to bed" for the season. Need to see what I can do for covering my beds with some sort of mulch...hopefully there are enough leaves on the ground. There is also a chance that there is going to be a bit of a storm on Saturday, remnants of a hurricane that passed by Hawaii...a big blow like that usually deposits a ton of seaweed on the beach. I'm wondering if I can gather a bunch, rinse off the salt water, and put this directly on my garden beds to decompose over the winter. Will need to do some web research on this.

And need to plant some garlic!

[Thegoblinchief]

Seaweed is excellent. Not sure how much it needs to be rinsed but it is very valuable as compost material.

[Astatine]

The nectarine tree I planted last year is going great guns this spring. It's grown about 30cm taller in the last couple of weeks. It's also got a gazillion proto nectarines. Unfortunately most are on very spindly branches so on the recommendation of a colleague (advice from last year) I'm pulling off all the baby nectarines unless they are on a sturdy branch. At least I know the pollinators were busy this spring!

[Tris Prior]

Hey 2300, do you garden with PGP? That's where my garden bed is.

My spinach didn't do that well either. Started some from seed; immediately died. Got some cheap plants; immediately bolted as soon as it got hot. I tried for a fall crop and 2 plants did sprout from seed... but they've got like 2 true leaves on them apiece and have not increased in size over the past few weeks, so I guess that is another fail.

I've got rainbow chard leaves the size of my head, though....

[Thegoblinchief]

Anyone (ideally in short-season climes) have bush or short-vine winter squash varieties they want to recommend?

[Erica/NWEdible]

Anyone (ideally in short-season climes) have bush or short-vine winter squash varieties they want to recommend?

What kind of storage do you need? Bush delicata does great.

[Thegoblinchief]

Anyone (ideally in short-season climes) have bush or short-vine winter squash varieties they want to recommend?

What kind of storage do you need? Bush delicata does great.

Ideally something longer storage. Plus I have my eyes on a viney delicata variety already.

[Penny Lane]

GC, I don't know if the smaller butternuts are less viney, like "Ponca"?  I haven't tried any of these.  I know I am disappointed in the quality of some winter squash , but it's hard to know if I didn't let it improve in storage for a long enough time.

[birdie55]

I have grown Renee's garden Honey nut squash, which is a small butternut.  Days to harvest is 110 and we trellis the plants.  No need to support the squash either, they have strong vines.  We got about 10 squash per plants this summer, however they are individual sized squash.  We grow a lot of Renee's seeds as she is fairly local to me (CA) and donates a lot of seeds to the Master gardener program that I belong. 

I bought Bush buttercup seeds from Baker creek and will plant them next year.  I have not grown them before, hope they are as sweet as butternut.  I've always grown Waltham in the past, just trying different stuff. 

I grew Banana squash and Kuri squash also this summer, both were great...banana was much larger than the kuri. 

[horsepoor]

We're having a hot fall this year, but it's going to make for some great late-season BLT's.  I am all about the Brandywines this year:



This weekend I'm going to start doing some clean-up for fall.  I've been busy and things are a mess.  It will feel great to chill and spend a solid day in the back yard getting things back in order.

My sweet potato vines looked great this year, but I think my watering must have been too uneven because the one plant I dug up so far had really deformed, cracked tubers underneath.  Disappointing.

[Jon_Snow]

It was a very productive Thanksgiving weekend in the garden. I now proclaim it "put to bed" until next Spring. I grabbed the last tomatoes, potatoes, squash, carrots, purple cabbage and some beets. The kale and Swiss chard continue to grow merrily. And some heads of nice looking lettuce seem to have sprung up out of nowhere.

I mulched up a bunch of fallen leaves, though they were a bit hard to come by as the leaves haven't started changing colours and falling in earnest quite yet. But I scrounged up enough to cover many of my beds with them. Also walked the beach and found some beautiful bull kelp specimens (30 feet long) washed ashore and hauled them to the garden. A bit bummed that I didn't get any garlic planted due to some poor planning on my part.

I am thinking about building a greenhouse in the Spring. Will happily research the requirements of such a project while on my Baja sojourn.

My first-year food growing experience exceeded my (admittedly low) expectations by a wide margin. Cannot wait till I do it again in 2016.

[birdie55]

Jon Snow, it's wonder to see a new gardener get bitten with the bug and look forward to their next garden. 

I planted a second crop of spinach this week in my home garden. 

I have garlic and potatoes in my long term bed, and spinach, kale, bok choi and chard in another bed.  I just ordered tomato seeds for next years warm season garden.  I will start them mid February so they will be ready to plant in early to mid April.  The potatoes and garlic will be ready to harvest in May or June, and I'll replant with summer squash and Chinese long beans then. 

At the Horticulture center where I volunteer, we have snap peas, lettuces, seven varieties of beets, different colors of chard, multiple different varieties of kale and an entire bed of carrots.  We have a lot of half barrels where we have cool season herbs, baby ball beets and carrots, garlic, Egyptian walking onions, lemon grass, garlic chives and more snap peas. 

There will be plenty of food from either garden,so I will only need to buy potatoes, sweet potatoes and onions until next spring.  I love it when I can get my vegetables from one of my gardens.  Both are organically grown as well. 

[Thegoblinchief]

I am thinking about building a greenhouse in the Spring. Will happily research the requirements of such a project while on my Baja sojourn.

There may be other/better books out there, but Eliot Coleman's "Winter Harvest Handbook" has quite a bit to say about greenhouse design and growing info. I'd start there if you haven't read it already.

Probably doesn't translate about the border, but down here Johnny's probably has the best selection of supplies. Generally speaking, though, the only things you'd need to mail-order would be a tubing bender (if applicable to your design) and greenhouse plastic/clips. Nearly all designs are based off of set sizes of common EMT conduit or top-tubes for chain-link fence (varying thicknesses based on how tall you want the damn thing).

[Jon_Snow]

Jon Snow, it's wonder to see a new gardener get bitten with the bug and look forward to their next garden. 

I cannot remember being "bitten" so pleasurably...well, maybe apart from a few instances. *ahem*

[Jon_Snow]

I am thinking about building a greenhouse in the Spring. Will happily research the requirements of such a project while on my Baja sojourn.

There may be other/better books out there, but Eliot Coleman's "Winter Harvest Handbook" has quite a bit to say about greenhouse design and growing info. I'd start there if you haven't read it already.

Probably doesn't translate about the border, but down here Johnny's probably has the best selection of supplies. Generally speaking, though, the only things you'd need to mail-order would be a tubing bender (if applicable to your design) and greenhouse plastic/clips. Nearly all designs are based off of set sizes of common EMT conduit or top-tubes for chain-link fence (varying thicknesses based on how tall you want the damn thing).

Thanks for another great sounding recommendation Chief. I'm in the process of loading up my Kindle for my trip south, and this one sounds like a good candidate. I'm also going back in this thread and my Journal to check on some of your other suggestions.

[Astatine]

It's hot already so I'm going to gamble that we'll have no more frosts til winter next year. All going well, I will plant some cherry tomatoes and zucchini this weekend. We're going to take it easy with gardening this spring given my limits. DH is not really into gardening but is ok keeping tomatoes and zucchini alive, and harvesting when ready.

Meanwhile, the strawberry on the north side of the house (equivalent to south side in the northern hemisphere) is growing a gazillion baby strawberries. If the earwigs don't get them, we could be in for a bumper harvest! I have no idea what I planted - it was about 4 years ago when I planted it. I do nothing special - just deep watering when they look a bit wilted in the heat.

[happy]

I planted a lemon last year which promptly got pruned by the wallaby… has taken a long time to recover, but is starting to look good again….no blossom so far , but lots of new leaves at least.  My garden is overgrown with weed and I'm way behind this year.  Have cleared a bed, in which I will grow a dwarf mulberry tree. The comfry which i thought I'd lost is coming back.

[Jon_Snow]

Beautiful colours, ASL!!!

I'm headin' to my island garden one more time before I book it south...bound and determined to get the garlic planted this time! And nail down EXACTLY where the greenhouse is going in the Spring.

[Jon_Snow]

Very excited for my greenhouse too! Got some important decisions to make. If I locate it within my fenced garden area, I can definitely build it quite a bit cheaper by using plastic sheeting on the outside. But I'm not too thrilled by losing some future garden bed real estate by doing so. I'm leaning toward building it OUTSIDE my deer-proof area - and this will COST ME. Why, you may ask? Apparently, I just recently learned, the deer have learned how to use their antlers to poke through the plastic on some greenhouses and very happily proceeded to devour the delicious contents. I mean, REALLY?

So, anything I build outside of my fence will have to be a more costly glass or rigid plastic...I'm just looking into what kind of greenhouse kits of these types might be out there.

[pbkmaine]

 So let me get this straight - the greenhouse is more important than the house?

[horsepoor]

John, a couple years ago we built a greenhouse on a wood frame with rigid plastic.  Really happy with it and it was easy to build.

Mine is a lean-to style, but could easily be done free-standing.  Not sure what kind of kits you might be looking at, but at least the Harbor Freight type greenhouses are pretty flimsy.  I had one but it couldn't withstand windstorms and finally blew apart.  This one isn't going anywhere, and might deter the deer, too.

[Thegoblinchief]

Greenhouse:

-Most important thing is sun angle, particularly in the low sun months, so pay attention to trees that aren't shading the area now but might shade at a lower sun height.

Deer/fencing:

How high would the deer actively try "poking"? A roll of meter-high basic chicken wire fencing set just far enough outboard the structure to keep them from antlering, but close enough that they wouldn't want to jump it (say half a meter?) is probably considerably cheaper than a rigid plastic or glass house. Around here I can get ~45 meters of 1" hex galvanized chicken wire for under $100. Pound some T-posts in, and ziptie. Bam. Done.

[Threshkin]

Greenhouse:

-Most important thing is sun angle, particularly in the low sun months, so pay attention to trees that aren't shading the area now but might shade at a lower sun height.

Deer/fencing:

How high would the deer actively try "poking"? A roll of meter-high basic chicken wire fencing set just far enough outboard the structure to keep them from antlering, but close enough that they wouldn't want to jump it (say half a meter?) is probably considerably cheaper than a rigid plastic or glass house. Around here I can get ~45 meters of 1" hex galvanized chicken wire for under $100. Pound some T-posts in, and ziptie. Bam. Done.

Chief - Do you have any suggestions for keeping out (getting rid of) the mice & voles?  They are invading my garden space.  They like to eat a few bites of a tomato, then a few bites out of the next tomato........

[Jon_Snow]

Horsepoor, your greenhouse looks pretty skookum. I don't have a pre-existing structure to provide support, but a free standing version of what you have done there would serve me very well.

Chief, I'm not certain how "determined" the deer would be in trying to get past the chicken wire...though I've heard anecdotes over the years that suggest it might not be enough. I think I will at the very least go with a rigid plastic akin to what horsepoor has for hers. And great point about the sun...the trees that ring my property are tall - and a coast redwood is positively GINORMOUS - so moving the greenhouse away from the trees, and towards the center of the clearing is probably necessary. This would pretty much put it in deer-Grand-Central.

The deer stopped being "cute" a long time ago.

[Thegoblinchief]

Threshkin - Outdoor cat, bait boxes.

[Astatine]

Planted cherry toms in our new garden bed. Planted 4 zucchinis and 2 basil. That's it for this spring.

[Astatine]

Help! Earwigs are demolishing the zucchini plants I planted last week. As in, they are pretty much gone, no stem or leaves left. DH went outside just now (after dark) and found the culprits munching on the 2 zucchini plants left over sitting on the back step.

I have lots and lots of mulch (random leaves, twigs, pea straw, etc) on my garden beds. It's the only reason I can grow anything in the garden because of a) crappy clay soil and b) our summers are brutally hot and dry and very few plants survive without mulch. I mention this because last year I have vague recollections that removing hiding places for earwigs was the only suggestion I found.

I'm hoping the clever gardeners in this thread have solutions I can try. Otherwise, no zucchini for us this year :( and our strawberry bumper harvest will likely go the same way.

(Please note I'm in Australia so active ingredients rather than brand names would be most helpful. Or home-made stuff.)

Thank you :)

[Eric222]

Canning & Freezing (and not wasting)

This may be a bit of a naive/lazy question, but where do you find bell jars (or the equivalent) to can and store the food once you've gathered/processed it?

[Thegoblinchief]

Canning & Freezing (and not wasting)

This may be a bit of a naive/lazy question, but where do you find bell jars (or the equivalent) to can and store the food once you've gathered/processed it?

Ball jars are available in basically every grocery store, and many farm supply type stores. Around here, the grocers typically stock them in the baking section. $1/jar or less is an acceptable price to pay for a new jar with lid and ring.

Astatine - wish I could help. Never had that issue myself, so my only assistance would be Google. Hopefully others will have suggestions :)

Our main pest here is squash borer, which has yet to show up in my garden, but can be mitigated by rotation and a row cover when the moths are laying their eggs (date usually available on an ag extension web sites).

[4alpacas]

Canning & Freezing (and not wasting)

This may be a bit of a naive/lazy question, but where do you find bell jars (or the equivalent) to can and store the food once you've gathered/processed it?

Ball jars are available in basically every grocery store, and many farm supply type stores. Around here, the grocers typically stock them in the baking section. $1/jar or less is an acceptable price to pay for a new jar with lid and ring.

Astatine - wish I could help. Never had that issue myself, so my only assistance would be Google. Hopefully others will have suggestions :)

Our main pest here is squash borer, which has yet to show up in my garden, but can be mitigated by rotation and a row cover when the moths are laying their eggs (date usually available on an ag extension web sites).

I recently purchased some from Michael's (with the 40% off coupon).  I forget what I paid, but it was less than $1/jar.  I've tried to look at thrift shops for used ones, but I haven't had any luck.  Pinterest has made them too popular.

[Threshkin]

Canning & Freezing (and not wasting)

This may be a bit of a naive/lazy question, but where do you find bell jars (or the equivalent) to can and store the food once you've gathered/processed it?

Ball jars are available in basically every grocery store, and many farm supply type stores. Around here, the grocers typically stock them in the baking section. $1/jar or less is an acceptable price to pay for a new jar with lid and ring.

I recently purchased some from Michael's (with the 40% off coupon).  I forget what I paid, but it was less than $1/jar.  I've tried to look at thrift shops for used ones, but I haven't had any luck.  Pinterest has made them too popular.

Craigslist or your local equivalent is a good source for canning jars.  Around here they are popular for wedding decorations so are new and essentially unused.  Some people want ridiculous prices but that is typical Craigslist.

[RetiredAt63]

Warning - gross icky advice coming.  There is nothing a gardener will not do to protect his/her baby plants  ;-)

I always found brute force worked well - as in apply sole of shoe to earwig.

So: You need a solid smooth surface and shoes with a smooth sole.

Two houses ago we had masses of earwigs, they had just moved into our area and the predators had not discovered them.  They are attracted to light, so I would turn the porch light on, wait a bit, and then go step on them.  Wait a while, and stomp on the newcomers.  There were literally thousands, they had eaten my purple basil to skeletons.  I did get the numbers down.  You can also leave things out at night that they will like to hide under for the day, and then go and lift the whatever and again stomp.  Be sure the whatever is on a solid surface.  I found the trays for putting starter pots in worked well, they have that corrugated surface for draining water from the pots, and the earwigs liked them as hideouts.  Cardboard would be good too, where they can get in the corrugations, and then shake the cardboard out in the morning on a hard surface.

Some people use light traps.

I found squishing them between thumb and forefinger (wearing gardening gloves) was satisfying emotionally but made little difference to their numbers.  Every little bit helps though.  But for any kind of control you need to lure them and kill them.

You might want to take the mulch off the gardens temporarily, until you have killed a bunch.

Good luck.

Help! Earwigs are demolishing the zucchini plants I planted last week. As in, they are pretty much gone, no stem or leaves left. DH went outside just now (after dark) and found the culprits munching on the 2 zucchini plants left over sitting on the back step.

Thank you :)

[Astatine]

Thanks so much RetiredAt63! I'm going through cancer treatment at the moment so don't have much energy for earwig apocalypse. I will see if DH has the stomach for your stomping method. But... you mentioned light traps which finally helped me narrow my googling (had no luck with Google last year when earwigs were eating our strawberries before we could harvest them). And I finally found a page with a bunch of suggestions on trapping them. So thank you very much :)

[RetiredAt63]

@Astatine - good luck with the cancer treatment, and good luck to your husband with the earwigs!

I grew sweet potatoes for the first time this year; it felt very odd to be growing what I think of as a warm climate, long season crop.  I held off digging them as long as I could, to give them lots of grow time, and I got a good harvest - most of a half-bushel basket, I would say, from 14 plants in a 4x12' bed.  Digging them was a bit of work, I think I need a deeper soil (they were in a raised bed with good soil on a clay base).  I let them cure in the house for at least 2 weeks before I started eating them, and they are just as tasty as the store-bought ones, and I know what they were sprayed with - nothing  ;-) 
It was hard to do the "2 weeks curing at about 80^oF" because outside was highs of 10^oC and lows below freezing, and the house was 15-20^oC.
I saved some vines and am rooting them, I hope to be able to keep them going all winter and make lots of cuttings in the spring.

[1967mama]

First year cherry tomato grower here ;-) The vine has all but rotted out but there are still about 10 green tomatoes growing on the vine. With our PNW rains now settled in, I'm not sure what to do? Pick them? Leave them to ripen? We do have a bit of sun in the forecast each day for the next 5 days. Thanks for any help!

[Astatine]

I'm not sure, 1967mama. I once had a bunch of unripe green tomatoes from my garden. I used them in a green tomato recipe but had to throw it in the compost bin because it was unbearably sour (and I'm someone who loves to put lemon juice in lots of meals). But, some people must love green tomatoes given the number of recipes out there.

I'm posting a win and a loss.

Win! Probably about 1kg of strawberries harvested on the weekend from the one sprawling plant on the sunny northside garden (equivalent to northern hemisphere's south facing gardens).

Loss :( all my zucchinis and a couple of cherry tomato plants have been chomped into oblivion by earwigs. I have put out some earwig traps and cockroach baits (one site said they worked on earwigs?) but neither of us have any energy to stomp on earwigs yet. I will replant this week and try to remember to cover them with plastic containers every night to try to protect them from wee ravaging beasties.

[horsepoor]

Green tomatoes - you could try picking them and bringing them in to see if they will ripen.  Or you could make a salsa verde.

I spent the better part of the day today processing sweet potatoes.  I kept all the nice baker-sized ones out, but the oddly sized ones with weird cracks and crevices were broken down and I now have six quarts of cubes plus a bunch of fries and hashbrowns in the freezer.  The odd bits are dehydrating right now for dog treats.

Yesterday I picked all the tomatoes I thought still had a chance of ripening, as well as the rest of the peppers.  That pretty much filled up the wheelbarrow, so I drove that right into the basement to get sorted later.  We're expecting the first freeze in a few days so trying to get the garden cleanup mostly done but haven't taken the vines down yet.

[backyardfeast]

Jon_Snow, just a thought on your greenhouse (and good tip about the deer; I had not heard about that trick!!).  The rigid plastic looks really easy to work with, but the cheapest option, if you're up for something slightly more challenging (and possibly creative) is just to get free or cheap glass from Craigslist/used.com.  People regularly are taking down glass deck railings, throwing out old windows, and even taking down old greenhouses.  We know numerous people who have managed to cobble together attractive and functional greenhouses at a very low cost this way.  Google recycled greenhouses and you'll see lots of funky examples; lloyd kahn has a particularly nice one.

The older glass is way better, too; you don't want new, high efficiency windows for a greenhouse.  It's an awesome upcycling to re-use older, leaky, highly transparent glass this way.  Just a thought!

[happy]

This weekend gone I  planted a dwarf black mulberry tree, and some butternut pumpkin seed. I got the seed last year from a random shop bought butternut and 2 plants gave me 23 pumpkins.  Hoping for a repeat this year. My first lot of snow and snap peas were decimated by snails, so I resowed and used some snail bait in desperation (I 've never used any before but I've never managed to grow peas or beans either).  The first pea is just coming into flower, so thats progress. The late planted garlic is growing, but looking a bit tattered…not sure what will happen, usually its harvested in November, so I will start to pull up one or two. They can be eaten nicely like spring onions/shallots if the bulbs are not developed. I'm OK with that, but will have to buy garlic to plant next year.

[Nancy]

Picked raspberries, carrots, and a parsnip yesterday. I have a lot of rutabaga left in the garden, so I'm going to have to think up some recipes quickly. I've decided against a winter garden since I didn't have enough time to plan it properly, and the soil and I could use some rest.

[1967mama]

Thanks for the tips! I will pick the little green cherry tomatoes tomorrow!

[Tris Prior]

If you pick green tomatoes and then bring them inside and put them in a paper bag with the top folded over, at least some of them will ripen. I did this last year when my mother tore out her garden and "gifted" me with an entire suitcase-load of green tomatoes. I did have to pitch some that rotted but well over half of them did eventually turn red!

I'm having similar luck this year; our community garden closes for the season Sunday and it's been freakishly warm out so I've been taking advantage and pulling the almost-dead-but-still-making-tomatoes plants.

I'm going to plant some seed garlic in the bed before it closes, for the first time ever. Any tips?

[Rural]

 We are expecting our first freeze tonight, so I'm finally putting things to bed. I re-harvested the last of the outdoor basil – thought I had done the end of that month and a half ago, but it bushed back out again. Also picked the last of the tomatoes, Still green, and put them in the freezer for stew later.


 Brought in the Swiss chard in a pot and other potted plants, and brought in the two 5 gallon buckets of hot peppers – those will at least ripen The current green peppers, and likely will grow some more if I hand pollinate – had good luck with tomatoes doing that last winter,  and we have lots of blooms.


 I meant to, but did not, pick a great big bunch of marigolds for a vase in the house. If they survive the not I'll do it tomorrow. Packed up the hose and covered the outdoor Fossett, not that I twill need it for a mild freeze, but it's good practice.


 And, I'm worn-out – first day after a minor outpatient surgery. So all the basil leaves are in the refrigerator, and I'll make pesto tomorrow. Ditto chopping up the peppers that I harvested.


 I have Kale, spinach, and more Swiss chard growing in a wheelbarrow in the atrium, but I think that it'll survive just fine. The plan is for them to grow most of the winter. In the atrium, I think that will probably work out.

[Astatine]

We lost our first lot of zucchinis. Completely munched down to the ground. So we tried again. So far so good. Cleared the area of mulch around each hole for the plants (about 40cm diameter), wet the soil with a bit of diluted pyrethrum and then planted, without replacing the mulch. Some nibbles on the leaves but they are still recognisable as plants! So we will keep the mulch cleared around the base until the leaves are big enough to deter even the hungriest earwigs. Does mean watering more, but we've luckily had some rain this week. Also put down a bit of snail bait because we found a snail on a zucchini leaf. Little buggers.

And planted a random snow pea that we got for cheap at a local fundraiser. $2 for a plant. Planted it under the trellis where one tomato plant had died (damn earwigs! *shakes fist*) and cleared mulch around it again. Other two cherry tomatoes have grown and will hopefully survive any future predation.

[Tom Bri]

Brought in everything I want to save over the winter a few days ago. Got very lucky this year, and didn't lose anything to the hard frost like I did last year. I have onions and shallots, parsley, sage, a citrus tree and a pomegranate bush, and some petunias. One of the petunias is on its third year. I also have a small tobacco plant that was in a pot and somehow survived the frost.
The broccoli is still in the garden and should survive all but a very hard frost.

[happy]

I finally grew some snow peas and sugar snap peas, after multiple attempts. I had to compromise my organic principles and put out some snail bait to get the seedlings to survive.  ( gross that stuff works, a zillion dead snails)  For the first time I tasted the delight of snow peas and sugar snap peas straight off the plant. I did keep some to cook and they were so tender and delicious. My new favourite crop.

I'm way behind this year, partly because my netted enclosures fell down and are still not rebuilt and partly because I seemed to temporarily lose enthusiasm for gardening. Still I'm currently harvesting silver beet, immature garlic,  rocket, lettuce,  chives and other herbs.

Question for the experts, I have coriander (cilantro) which is producing seed. Currently getting lots of green pods. How long do I leave them on the plant? Do I harvest them for seed green, or wait til it browns off?