Advice needed!
May. 13th, 2011 04:11 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
melannen posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
common_natureComm, I have a problem.
You see, I want to grow vegetables. But my yard is basically a forest understory - there's no place that gets more than 3-4 hours of sun on a good day. I went to an ag fair a few weeks ago and asked everybody there what to do for vegetable gardening in the shade, and I got great advice like "cut down some trees" or "plant lettuce in a wheelbarrow and wheel it around to follow the sun" or "go ask those people over there."
Now, as tempted I am to make little robotic light-seeking raised beds, I'd rather just find some advice on vegetable gardening in the shade, but all the resources I can find for shade gardening in zone 7 (where I am) assumes you're growing nothing but ornamentals. Isn't there somebody who has already figured out how to grow nice edible vegetables under trees in a temperate climate?
It's not like my yard has any shortage of edible plants already growing in it. We have
raspberry (Rubus strigosis)
pokeweed (Phytotacca americana)
oak (Quercus phellos in the picture, but we have white, red, and pin oak, too)
mulberry (Moris rubra, probably hybridized with invasives)
wild grape (Vitis sp.)
dandelion (Taraxacum officinale)
chokecherry (prunus sp.)
black walnut (Juglans nigra)
common violets (Viola sororia) (with yellow woodsorrel, Oxalis stricta)
maple (Acer saccharum in the picture, but we have red and silver maple too)
Indian strawberry (Potentilla indica), growing with English ivy Hedera helix, which is not edible
and plantain (Plantago major) (with Carolina cranesbill Geranium carolinianum, not edible)
already growing in abundance, plus a pecan tree and wild mint and wild onions and some sort of volunteer rosebushes and usually some edible mushrooms at some point, and that's just the ones I can ID offhand in a quick turn around the yard in May--
But I'd kind of like to grow something that has a slightly higher calories-to-prep-time ratio than most of the wild edibles do. Anyone have any recommendations for growing vegetables under a forest?
You see, I want to grow vegetables. But my yard is basically a forest understory - there's no place that gets more than 3-4 hours of sun on a good day. I went to an ag fair a few weeks ago and asked everybody there what to do for vegetable gardening in the shade, and I got great advice like "cut down some trees" or "plant lettuce in a wheelbarrow and wheel it around to follow the sun" or "go ask those people over there."
Now, as tempted I am to make little robotic light-seeking raised beds, I'd rather just find some advice on vegetable gardening in the shade, but all the resources I can find for shade gardening in zone 7 (where I am) assumes you're growing nothing but ornamentals. Isn't there somebody who has already figured out how to grow nice edible vegetables under trees in a temperate climate?
It's not like my yard has any shortage of edible plants already growing in it. We have
raspberry (Rubus strigosis)
pokeweed (Phytotacca americana)
oak (Quercus phellos in the picture, but we have white, red, and pin oak, too)
mulberry (Moris rubra, probably hybridized with invasives)
wild grape (Vitis sp.)
dandelion (Taraxacum officinale)
chokecherry (prunus sp.)
black walnut (Juglans nigra)
common violets (Viola sororia) (with yellow woodsorrel, Oxalis stricta)
maple (Acer saccharum in the picture, but we have red and silver maple too)
Indian strawberry (Potentilla indica), growing with English ivy Hedera helix, which is not edible
and plantain (Plantago major) (with Carolina cranesbill Geranium carolinianum, not edible)
already growing in abundance, plus a pecan tree and wild mint and wild onions and some sort of volunteer rosebushes and usually some edible mushrooms at some point, and that's just the ones I can ID offhand in a quick turn around the yard in May--
But I'd kind of like to grow something that has a slightly higher calories-to-prep-time ratio than most of the wild edibles do. Anyone have any recommendations for growing vegetables under a forest?
no subject
Date: 2011-05-15 01:02 am (UTC)Also, I have succesfully grown zuchinni under fruit trees, in a big pile of old compost and grass clippings off to the side. It didn't get much sun, and didn't fruit spectacularly, but it was enough for me to eat. Oh, and things like spinach that bolt when its too hot. They might appreciate the shade.
no subject
Date: 2011-05-16 07:03 pm (UTC)I tried to do zucchinni once and got nothin' (which no-one I talked to could believe) but it's possible that was a combination of old seed and August drought as well as shade. I would love to grow a moderate amount of squash, though. (We've had watermelon and pumpkin come up spontaneously from compost, but it's never fruited; that might be because of being seeds from commercial fruit though.)