Plant Entry Format and Request For An Entry

David Trammel's picture

Here is the finalized format for the Main Plant Entries.

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BASIC IDENTIFICATION:

- Common name, followed by Scientific Name, then (any) Alternative Names: (text) .

- Header Photo

- General Description of the Plant: (text) .

- Why We Grow This? (common uses): (text) .

- Historical Facts and Quotes: (text) .

- Can Be Confused With: (text) .

- Cautions and Hazards: (text) .

 

CULTIVATION:

- Popular Variations and Cultivars (text) .

- Starting: from seed; from cutting; by root stock, rhizome, bulb, grafting; other (text) .

- Bedding Out: plant spacing, soil temperature, soil amendments, best rotation cycle. (text) .

- Best soil type: Loamy, moist; Sandy, well-drained; Mineral-dense, clay (text) .

- Sowing Season & Habits: Annual, Perennial, Biennial, self seeding, self pollinating, dioecious (text) .

- Plant Health maintenance: diseases, pests, treatments, cold shelters, interventions (text) .

- Companion Planting (text) .

 

HARVEST

- Signs of ripeness, over- and under-ripe (text) .

- Gathering tips. Gloves, techniques (text) .

- Preserving and Storage (text) .

- Post-harvest soil care and compostable wastes (text) .

 

COOKING AND EATING:

- Nutritional Information: (text) .

- How to prepare before eating: (text) .

- Useful recipes and cooking hints: (text) .

- Historical dishes and meals: (text) .

- Non-Food Usages: (text) .

 

SEEDS

- How This Plant Propagates: (text) .

- Harvesting Seeds: (text) .

- Seed Storage: (text) .

 

OTHER INFO

- Green Wizard forum links

- Outside Links

- Helpful Books

- Contributors

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If you have a plant that you grow on a regular basis and can take a few minutes to filling out the information, please post a reply to this thread with the name of the plant. I will make a new post, with you as author, with the template of this format. This will allow you to post the information.

Blueberry's picture

My plants are grown from seed happy with the outcome. Will have to work on getting all the info. Main use is eating or making of jam if I can control myself. Each fruit contains 2-3 seeds so be careful when eating. The plants are cold hardy in North Florida but the fruit can be damaged by a very cold winter. Last winter just a few fruit made it we had a Ice storm Jan 03 2018 Bloom time is late fall harvest time is now ( March).

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alice's picture

I have a few photos. A local charity had been cutting their willow, they use it for basketry so it needs to be chopped every year to keep it growing nice withies. They invited people to take spare stems away in return for a donation. I cut the stems into approx foot lengths and filled a carrier. In the first photo I have been using a vegetable peeler to remove strips of bark from the lengths. Ideally choose smooth lengths without many buds and knots just because those are easier to harvest.

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alice's picture

So in this photo I have been working right to left, unpeeled lengths on the right, peelings in the middle (and the peeler), stripped lengths on the left. Those have gone out to the yard to season and will be kindling next year.

I have been told it's best to harvest willow when the buds are not quite broken. Here's another photo of a few stems in the state these have been cut to show buds not quite burst. If you are peeling the bark of the withies like I have been, you can apparently dry the whole thing and use it for teas and decoctions. If you have to harvest white willow other times of year I think you might have to strip out the cambium which is the active part from below the bark proper.

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alice's picture

Some notes on how people have been using willow Richard Whelan, Deb of Peterman Brook Herb Farm.

I have made a decoction before and kept it in the fridge a few days. I can't remember the strength though and don't seem to have recorded it my notebook.

I have dried the bark in my electric dehydrator on 'low' -- 35 C / 95? F, until it is about half the width it was fresh and it's 'snap dry'. I am sure it would dry well in a rack above a wood burner or whatever.

Thanks for this, Alice. It was good to see which bark was used - I was imagining mature tree bark, but of course the bark on the new shooting tips would be where lots of the nutrients would be. Thanks for showing how to process them. One of my daughters has just moved into a share house with a giant willow tree, so I will wait until spring here in the Southern Hemisphere and harvest some and give the tea a go.