#ClimateChangeGardening #ClimateDiary #ClimateChange #FoodSecurity #Gardening #permaculture #NativePlants #food #cooking #foraging #organic #sustainability #hurricane #Tropicalstorm
This thread is about plants that I tried this year and won’t try again next year as well as ones that did really well.
East coast North America, zone 8/9, rainfall 120cm.
*Updated with pics
1/ Biggest loser: wasabi radish.
I planted the seeds outside in raised garden beds in full sun in late March and they immediately bolted. They produced wispy little bolts that only had one or two seed pods. They continued to grow and bolt and grow and bolt. I’m now on my fourth or fifth generation. I’m not going to try these again, but I’m sure they’ll continue to reseed themselves in my garden. I’d occasionally use a seed pod but they’re not worth the space they take up.
15/ Baobab, consistent perennial, does get bugs indoors.
My plants are still young, so they’re not heavy producers. The plants will get aphids when you bring them inside in winter. I manage these by unleashing hordes of ladybugs into the sunroom where they are overwintering.
The tree doesn’t produce fruit until it’s at least 15 years old, so I am only using the leaves for now.
14/ Bloody dock sorrel. Consistent short lived perennial.
This one also doesn’t get insect damaged (besides katuk and sissoo). I grow these in pots with tropical trees and it does fine. It’s small and not a heavy producer so I only harvest a few leaves a day. Plants are grown with beans and trees.
13/ Sissoo spinach, consistent short-lived perennial.
Can be grown indoors. Needs a bit of shade. It really thrives well in heat. Doesn’t sustain any damage in tropical storms or hurricanes. Does need nitrogen. I grew beans in a pot with them and the spinach did well with them. Not a water hog, just watch for them getting a little wilty.
Propagates by cloning. A few sprigs should be cloned once a year to replace old ones that eventually give out.
12/ Katuk. Consistent producing perennial.
I use this plant a lot. I cut a couple of sprigs with leaves on them for salad nearly every single day. Can also be cooked. It needs to be brought indoors in winter. Since it’s in a pot, it does need to be fertilized occasionally with nitrogen-rich fertilizer. Can use compost or grow beans as companions for this. Not a major water hog. Survived tropical storms ok. Gets eaten by rabbits so needs to be caged.
11/ Miracle berry. Consistently producing perennial.
The fruit on the seed is scant. But it produces a lot of berries spring-fall and doesn’t want a lot of fertilizer. It wants a lot of perlite and sand in its soil so it is well-draining. Full sun to part shade. Bring indoors in winter. I do water it since it’s in a pot but it isn’t a water hog.
10/ Titan sunflower. I will not grow these again.
They grew fine, but they didn’t produce many viable seeds for some reason, even though they were well-visited by pollinators. It might be because they weren’t grown in very good soil and got no fertilizer (the Tepary did fine with the same conditions). They took a major beating in the storms. I never watered them except to start the seedlings when there was no rain.
9/ Tepary beans. Will grow again.
I never watered these. The first generation I started in late March didn’t survive but the ones in May did and grew and produced well. I had them growing as companion plants to Titan sunflower and they grew up the stalks. These need to be protected from rabbits.
8/ I do not grow tomatoes bc of pests, diseases, nutritional demands, water hogs, animals stealing the fruit, not doing well in tropical storms and hurricanes. They’re just too demanding.
I grow the native ground cherry instead. Physalis grisea, they have a tomato flavor after heating. They do not need extra water or fertilizer and produce well. Survives storms. May look battered but keeps producing. I cultivate these for personal use and give the seeds away for food security programs.
7/ winged bean vs winged pea
Winged bean (Psophocarpus tetragonolobus) did great, winged pea (Lotus tetrogonolobus) did not.
The bean is an autumn fruiting bean. I planted in late spring and it grew well in heat and held on to its fruit in tropical storms. Leaves are edible. It must be well-protected from rabbits.
The peas did not survive the heat. And where they were sheltered in part sun, they got really stippled by insects.
6/ eggplant. I will not grow these again.
I started these indoors in early and planted out of doors in late spring. This year I grew the Kami eggplants. The plant themselves grew fine, but the raccoons destroyed the fencing that was protecting them, and I’d find half-eaten eggplants all over the yard. It’s not worth the space and effort if you’re only going to harvest one or two fruits off of multiple plants.
5/ Dwarf bok choi
I grew these in pots with tropical trees in late March and planted multiple generations. They never grew as they were supposed to. They bolted almost immediately. On the upside, it produced a lot of flowers and seed pods that I could use in salads. I would not buy these again because they are reseeding themselves in the pots with tropical trees.
4/ Rat tail radish and watermelon radish. I would grow these again.
I planted these in raised garden beds in late March and in pots with tropical trees. The ones grown with the trees grew the best.
Rat tail needs shelter from midday sun. Many of the watermelon radish bolted but I still got small tubers. I planted these this fall too.
3/ Beit aleph cucumber
Downy mildew issues, struggled with heat. I planted these and raised garden beds in the spring in full sun. Produced but always looked pathetic.
Taste is ok.
2/ pink soba and achocha.
These grew really well, but nothing really pollinated them. I got no fruit from the achocha even though they grew to be monstrous vines. Both the soba and achocha were growing adjacent to monarda and globe amaranth which are very popular with pollinators.
There are just a few viable seeds on the pink soba and they reseed themselves but not enough to harvest as food.
@jblue I have had meh success with these in the past. Not something I'd ever buy the seeds again.
@jblue awfully high in oxalates, though. 
@deepmud I only put a 2-3 small leaves into a salad. I’m not worried.
@malterod Sauropus androgynus. I pinned a thread on it on my profile. 
@jblue have you ever grown watercress? It's super easy, unless your dog eats it like mine used to. Very good nutritionally as well
@deepmud yeah I did once but it got buggy in the sunroom with my other plants. It’s too hot to grow it outside or in the sunroom most of the year. I pull hundreds of plants into my sunroom and garage during winter and they bring bugs with them. So whatever I grow needs to be really pest resistant or the plants will be overwhelmed by spring. I do buy ladybugs for the sunroom.
@jblue I also have the plants in and out but definitely not so many plants as you. I rely on my trusty pressure washer. I set the pressure way down to where it just stings. And then I proceed to massacre all the soft bodied critters I can get to. My personal vendetta is for spider mites. I hates them.
I admire your vast number of varieties! I garden on what is essentially a gravel pile. It's thin and low nutrient. At the moment I'm growing mostly for bees and birds.
@jblue what does it taste like?
@deepmud it has a peanut-y flavor with a touch of green
@malterod it really grows the best in mostly sun/part sun and warm temps. Indoors in winter, it doesn’t grow very much. When you trim it back for winter, you can dry the leaves to add to sauces,soups or powder to add to flour.
@malterod Synsepalum dulcificum
@malterod it’s an easy plant but is sensitive to over-fertilizing (it can die). It needs a lot of perlite in its potting mix (~25-30%). If it seems like too much, it’s probably enough. It can’t sit in water. Indoors, you need to hand-pollinate the flowers and it doesn’t set much fruit (maybe one or two berries in winter. In summer outside, it produces a lot. Give it as much light as you can to set fruit. Keep it above 10C.
@jblue “May look battered but keeps producing” describes my whole garden. 
@jblue I just recently saw Dried ground cherries being sold as a gourmet food by a specialty shop. Could be the next big thing!
@docdieterlen yeah, they’re physalis peruviana species. They’re 2.5 times bigger than grisea and are much more tart. The native ones do dry but they’re really very small, not much bigger than currants when dried. Both species are very seedy so when you eat the dried berries it’s like crunching down on mostly tiny hard seeds. You don’t notice it when they’re fresh.
@jblue the gourmet shop pitched the seeds as part of the appeal, believe it or not. No idea whether they are selling many. They weren't cheap.
@docdieterlen Whole Foods sells them under their house brand, 365 under the name goldenberries. I’ve seen them regularly discounted, full price online is $8.69 for 227g. Honestly, they’re not super glorious and it’s easy enough to grow them yourself. They require almost no care.
@jblue exactly- I've grown them in the past and you are right- super easy. If the Dried ones take off as a fad, we gardeners could all have a nearly effortless side business :)
@jblue I grow tomatillos (Physalis ixocarpa) for many of the same reasons. I'm not a fan of eating them fresh, but I enjoy them cooked & I love them fermented.
@jblue this one looks very interesting to me. I might like to try it.
@deepmud are you on my list for free seeds?
@jblue I'm not sure. I garden in the pnw. It's kind of cool here.
Oooooh! I’m zone 8. What’s your list for free seeds? (Ground Cherry) Haven’t figured out how to DM. ha-ha
@GrancyGreybeard
The first link is to the food security+climate change project.
And the second link is to the ones that I sell.
@jblue who knew the darned raccoons ate eggplants.
@Rasta I understand raccoons eating peaches. They're sweet. Eggplant doesn't have much flavor, and not a great source of calories, either. My husband won't touch the stuff.
@deepmud they usually eat fish in these parts
@Rasta waaaay more food value
@jblue re: beit alpha cukes: Diva does well for me, although I am a long way from you. It is quite susceptible to cuke beetles, and some virus or blight gets it by the end of the season. The cukes are the best I have had! I also grow Excelsior, a pickling cuke that is very robust and productive.
@jblue I tend to have better luck with soba in seasons other than summer.