Gifts for Gardeners (and Budding Foragers)

Plenty of garden-focused blogs post lists of gifts for gardeners for the holiday season.  I haven't put up such a list before, partly because I am not a big "shopper," but this year I am giving it a try.

This year's list has a theme, though, because people who know that, in addition to growing good food, I also do some foraging (an extension of gardening...) ask about mushrooms pretty often. If you or someone you know has an interest in, but zero knowledge of, hunting for wild mushrooms or growing mushrooms at home, this shopping guide is for you.

Having excellent teachers and guides is very important, because eating the wrong mushroom can be fatal. Knowing the potential danger does not deter all people, which explains why the very first items on the gift list are about education.

A year's membership in a local mushroom club is a great gift, along with the promise to go along on guided "mushroom walks" with the club. There are knowledgeable people in the clubs, and on the guided walks, to get anyone's education off to a good start. In the Atlanta area, that club will be the Mushroom Club of Georgia. This group offers monthly meetings, classes, workshops, and guided walks. The Morel walk in March is usually a members-only event, which is a definite perk. If you are not in the metro-Atlanta area, look online for your nearest mushroom club.

Books and tool for mushrooming. PHOTO/Amygwh

 For mushroom-ID help on your mushroom walks/hunts, a basic guide like the National Audubon Society Field Guide to North American Mushrooms is also useful. This is the book that many local foragers seem to always keep handy for reference. The pictures are very good, and descriptions include information about edibility for each kind of mushroom in the book.

Using a mushroom-growing kit at home to  become familiar with the growth habits of mushrooms is another great way to help get ready for foraging season. A kit to grow oyster mushrooms like this one (linked) is especially good because you are likely to see oyster mushrooms "in the wild". Careful observation as these grow at home could help flatten the mushroom-identification learning curve by a little bit.

Oyster mushrooms grown on straw. PHOTO/Amygwh

I have grown portobello mushrooms in a purchased kit and oyster mushrooms as part of a mushroom club workshop. Both brought good food into my kitchen, and both were easy. Anyone who already has tried a couple of kits and is looking for a different challenge might want a copy of the book Mycelium Running. It contains a long section about growing many kinds of mushrooms in many ways.

This book also includes information on the benefits of adding the old mushroom-growing substrate to gardens, which is a great "crossover" to my more major interest in growing good food.

Oyster mushrooms in the wild. PHOTO/Husband of Amygwh

A last item on the shopping list for a budding mushroomer is a folding mushroom foraging knife. I know that this may seem like an unnecessary thing, and it is, but the curved blade really does help in harvesting mushrooms, and the little brush at the end is great for cleaning dirt and leafy debris from wild-harvested mushrooms. Putting pre-cleaned mushrooms into your basket or bag makes the kitchen-prep work at home much easier.


Some of my garden-writer friends have their own Christmas shopping lists, too. Those lists will be linked here as soon as they are available:

See Marianne's list at The Small Town Gardener.
See Kathy's Gift Ideas for Garden Cats at her Cats in Gardens blog.
The Washington Gardener's Holiday Gift Guide
Top 10 Books for Gardeners, also from the Washington Gardener

Happy gardening!

Squash Downy Mildew

It has been hilariously rainy here, and the garden is having some of the expected disease problems that go along with all the wet soil and humid conditions. For example, a volunteer butternut squash plant growing among the tomatoes is showing signs of downy mildew on its oldest leaves.

The front of the leaf looks unwell, but not spectacularly bad: it is yellowing and is showing some small brown spots inside bright yellow halos. This alone would not be enough to really nail down a diagnosis. (Sorry for the quality of the photos - I was having trouble with the lighting.)

The backside of the leaf is the clincher: it shows the development of the purplish spores of the mildew.

A 2009 article about Downy Mildew, by Debbie Roos, out of NCSU's Growing Small Farms program, includes a useful set of suggestions for managing downy mildew in cucurbits (cucumbers, squash, melons) using organic-growing methods:

"Cultural strategies can help prevent downy mildew. Plant resistant varieties. Plant in locations with good air circulation. Use drip irrigation to minimize leaf wetness.

There are a number of OMRI-listed products purported to help control downy mildew in cucurbits: copper, neem, biofungicides (e.g., Serenade®), peroxides (e.g., OxiDate®), and bicarbonates (e.g., Kaligreen®). According to Dr. Louws, research has shown that copper is the best organic option, but only on the crops that show little to no symptoms. He said if the infection is far along not to bother spraying because it wouldn’t do much good. Spray early in the morning to avoid phytotoxicity problems caused by spraying in the heat of the day. If the disease is present on the farm, a prophylactic application of a copper product can be made to curcurbit crops that show mild or no symptoms. If the weather does not favor the disease (which likes it warm and wet and humid), then the copper is more likely to suppress the disease. In other words, the copper may help but it may not be enough. (See Pesticide Use Guidelines)."

Notice the mention of weather that is "warm and wet and humid"? That is exactly what we have going this month, so this one volunteer squash might not be the only plant in Cobb County to be experiencing the problem. It may be helpful (though disheartening) to know that Powdery Mildew isn't the same as Downy Mildew, so that treatments that work for Powdery Mildew, which many local gardens dealt with last summer, might not work on this different mildew/fungus. (The ATTRA article on Downy Mildew in cucurbits, by George Kuepper, offers similar suggestions to those in the above NCSU article, with caveats that don't appear in the Roos' version, in case anyone is interested in looking at an additional source.)

It is a little too late to plant resistant varieties this year, but if anyone has a garden that is particularly plagued by this fungus, selecting a resistant variety for next year might be a good idea. The bad news is that I have been unable to find a good list of resistant cultivars. Apparently, several cucumbers have decent resistance to Downy Mildew, but very few squash do.

However, it is still possible to improve air circulation around existing plants, by pruning or removing nearby other vegetation, even though we can't do much about the rain.

I would whine about how the weather this year is unusually bad for gardening, but it seems to be bad, in one way or another, pretty much every year. There will be a deluge, or a drought, crazy high winds, unusual high temperatures, or unusual cool temperatures, tornadoes, hurricanes or their remnants, hail, falling trees that come across the top of the house and smash parts of the garden.... you get the picture. No year will be The Perfect Gardening Year. Amazingly, we still get plenty of good food out of the garden, and I still love to be working in the yard on my little patches of crops.

Hope that all the other gardens and gardeners out there are growing well!

Garden Update

The usual abundance of the summer garden is finally kicking in:

Straight Nine cucumbers; yellow, red, and black tomatoes; assorted peppers.  PHOTO/Amy W.

Chanterelle mushrooms.      PHOTO/Amy W.

The harvests aren't wildly varied right now, but that will change as the summer rolls on. The cucumbers are doing especially well. I don't know how long that will last, though, because the first vine up already has some interesting angular lesions on its leaves. That is not a good sign. However, Joe started a crock of brined pickles today, and I loaded the dehydrator with tomatoes and peppers. Things are looking up!

The woods have been a source of abundance, too. We've eaten chanterelle mushrooms with a few meals in the past week or so, and a lot were dried (have I said lately how much we love our dehydrator?) for later use.

Out in the neighborhood, the Cobb County Water department has been working on the water lines. We have a new fire hydrant in the Northwest corner of our yard, which is definitely good, but we also have a bit of a mess up by the curb. When we found out about the plan to replace our pipes, I delayed planting some of the crops that had been slated for the beds nearest the road.

Cucumber on a still-healthy vine.     PHOTO/Amy W.

The workmen did a great job of avoiding my gardens, even though they technically encroach into the easement, and I decided last week that it was probably safe to plant those spaces.

It is too late for the peanuts, so those will have to wait until next year. It is probably too late for the sorghum, too, but I planted some anyway. There were a lot more seeds in that packet than in the peanut packet, so it seemed like a safer gamble.

I also planted some bush beans. There is still plenty of time for those!  There is a plan to put a couple of tomato plants where the first bush beans came out (those pesky Bean Beetles did a lot of damage!), but the weekend has been very busy, and that isn't done yet.

In a weird bit of good news, I have a bad habit of tossing tomatoes affected by things like chipmunk bites and blossom end rot into the shrubbery by the creek.

Poblano peppers.       PHOTO/Amy W.

A couple of tomato plants have come up over there, and they both already have a few flowers. I have no idea what kind they are, but I will be digging them up one evening this week to transplant into the garden.

Meanwhile, I am expecting the zucchini plants to expire soon (due to Squash Vine Borers), and when they do, I will be planting buckwheat as a short-term cover crop in that space. In mid-August, when it is time to start putting out the fall crops, I'll turn the buckwheat into the soil and plant carrots in that bed.

I hope that all the other gardens out there are enjoying our break from the rains and doing well!

Found Food: Black Trumpet Mushrooms

When I was out walking the dog the other day, I noticed some very tiny yellow chanterelle mushrooms beginning to form. In years past, a place I know that has tended to produce small numbers of black trumpet mushrooms has been "past its prime" by the time the chanterelles were large and well-formed, so I went (as soon as I could) straight to the black-trumpet-spot to check it out, hoping that I hadn't missed the magical black-trumpet time.

If I had been a day or two later, the mushrooms might have been larger, but waiting also meant risking a total loss if I couldn't get back to the spot in time.  This is what I was able to harvest:

Small Black Trumpet mushrooms.                                  PHOTO/Amy W.

I don't think I can complain! These mushrooms weigh very little, but they are packed with amazingly wonderful flavor.

Wild Harvest

It seems awfully early for cauliflower mushrooms to be up, but here they are:



They joined a small pile of yellow chanterelle mushrooms in the kitchen, and were just wonderful to eat.



I am pretty sure that cauliflower mushrooms are my favorite of the wild mushrooms that we eat. Chanterelles are pretty good too, which is a lucky thing because there are so many more of them. In the last few days, Joe and I have also found a few black trumpets and some teeny, tiny cinnabar red chanterelles.

The cauliflower mushrooms we just sauteed in butter and ate, but the chanterelles have been added to a wide assortment of other foods, including spaghetti sauce, sauteed yellow squash, eggplant & zuchini fritters, and scrambled eggs. There are more of those yellow mushrooms in a basket on the kitchen counter, so I am assuming that they will add to yet another meal this evening. Not sure yet what that will be, though.

Wild Food for Supper

We still have plenty of leftover Thanksgiving food, so we didn't actually need for anyone in the family to go out foraging, but Joe was feeling the need to be outside today. This morning, he loaded the canoe onto the jeep, grabbed a lunch (turkey sandwich included) and a fishing pole, and headed out.

He brought back one ten-and-a-half-inch yellow perch and a big bunch of oyster mushrooms.



I took a break from work (my schedule is weird, I know) to clean and cook the mushrooms while Joe took care of the fish. We had little fried fish fillets and fried mushrooms along with our (leftover, still) mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, and cranberry sauce. It was all good.

Shiitake

My shiitake-innoculated log is still just a log, even though it is almost two years old. However, the log of my friend Susan (whose log is from the source, on the same day) is making mushrooms!



She says the secret may be "benign neglect." We had been told to "plant" the logs; she planted hers in a container, then stuck it in the shade under a holly. She then pretty much forgot about it, until a couple of weeks ago, when she noticed that it looked different.

I am so happy to see those mushrooms. They give me hope that my log, too, will someday burst with fungal fruiting bodies.

Found Food: Cauliflower Mushroom

We found a really great fungus over the weekend, a cauliflower mushroom (Sparassis sp.). My copy of the book Mushrooms Demystified calls it both "edible and exceptional."

The mushroom, which doesn't look much like either a mushroom or a cauliflower, was growing at the base of a tree.



Up close, it was beautiful.



Of course, as members in good standing of the Mushroom Club of Georgia, we harvested the mushroom and brought it home to cook. My books all mention that

1. cleaning this particular fungus is not easy, and
2. cooking it so that it eventually becomes tender takes a while.


The books are right. I finally decided that a few little bark bits and dirt specks wouldn't hurt us, and that, even tough, this fungus was indeed exceptional. The texture was, as Joe pointed out, a little like "mushroom jerky," but the flavor was outstanding. I will definitely be looking for more of these!

Rust in the Garden

One of the great things about working at the Plant-a-Row-for-the-Hungry garden, besides getting to hang out with a cool bunch of gardeners, is that it adds a lot to my gardening experience. This week, it added "bean rust" to the list of plant diseases with which I am now familiar.

This is what bean rust looks like on the top of a leaf:



And this is what it looks like on the underside of a leaf:



This bean variety is State Half Runner. The poor plants were already beset with Mexican bean beetles, but this is, potentially, worse.

I had brought my copy of Ellis and Bradley's Organic Gardeners Handbook of Natural Insect and Disease Control with me on Wednesday morning (our usual work time) to look up what was wrong with our cucumbers (another post...). It definitely came in handy! Photos on page 34 made the problem easy to identify, and this is what the book says:

As this fungal disease progresses, leaves turn yellow and drop. Spots also appear on pods and stems. . . Rust usually develops in late summer. To control, spray sulfur as soon as you see indications of the disease. Plant cultivars that are rust-tolerant, such as 'Burpee Stringless,' 'Kentucky Wonder,' 'Roma,' 'Spurt,' and 'Sungold,' to prevent problems.

After reading this, we looked up sulfur in the index, to learn more:

Sulfur is probably the most commonly used organic fungicide, although plain sulfur is more a protective measure than a control. Sulfur doesn't kill fungal spores, but it does prevent them from germinating on the plant surface. Another useful control is lime-sulfur, which can kill recently germinated disease spores. (page 348)

And then we found this:

A severe limitation to the use of sulfur is the foliar damage it causes in hot weather. (page 369)

In essence, we have a problem. If the rust progresses - and in this hot weather it will - the plants could lose all their leaves, which would definitely impair production. If we use a sulfur spray, the leaves could become damaged in this hot weather, which would impair the plants' production. It's almost one of those "danged if you do and danged if you don't" situations. Our fearless leader, however, has decided to try the sulfur.

Stinkhorns!

Walking the dogs around the yard this morning I saw a clump of my favorite fungus, stinkhorns. I like these because they remind me of a line in that old TV show, Wings.

The line is spoken by the ditzy lady (Faye) behind the ticket counter. She is entertaining the waiting passengers with fun facts, and one is something like, “the pressure from a whale’s blowhole can shoot a baby 23 feet in the air” (I know the height number isn’t right, but the idea is). Then she says, “Isn’t mother nature a hoot?”

When I see stinkhorns, I think that line.

Sometimes the taxonomists do a good job of assigning helpful names, and the family name of the stinkhorns, Phallaceae, is an excellent example; they are all a bit phallic in appearance. Of course, the stinkhorn family contains many species, but I’m pretty sure the stinkhorns that pop up in my yard are Mutinus caninus (also called the dog stinkhorn; they aren't as tapered as M. elegans).

My 1979 copy of Ian Ross’s book Biology of the Fungi includes a little stinkhorn-related story from a 1959 text by Wasson and Wasson, about Charles Darwin’s aunt. The story is that she “used to seek out and destroy such horrible growths from the neighboring woods, so that when the maids of the household went out for walks, their morals would not be impaired.”

The commentary that follows the story is also interesting: “One assumes, of course, that Darwin’s aunt was, as are all censors, incapable of being affected by such gross objects.”

According to Kerry's Garden, the dog stinkhorn is edible. A comment under the post by Jim Krupnik adds that it is also considered a delicacy by the Chinese. It is possible that stinkhorns are the plant world's version of Limberger cheese. My in-laws used to say that the trick is getting it past your nose---then, it is pretty good. Needless to say, I never got that stinky cheese past my nose. I think the stinkhorns are going to stay out of my kitchen, but it is good to know that they aren't at all dangerous.