meansoybean

This spearmint plant was a $2 liquidation find at Loblaws that I couldn’t resist. But it was getting wilty due to the heat. The plants in the front get a lot of sun during the day and they dry out very quickly, especially since they’re in containers. I’m pretty frugal with the water in general but you can’t adopt a tough love policy with plants that are kept above ground.

Having many empty blue wine bottles in the house (it’s for a project, I swear), I decided to fill one up with water and push the neck firmly into soil. I wasn’t sure if it would work or if all the water would just pour out, not giving the plant roots time to soak it up. I was surprised when I got home from work that the bottle was only partially empty and the spearmint was perky. Success!

So now I’m using a wine bottle for the larger planter in the front and everyone is happy.

I’m sure other types of bottles could work and it’s easy to test. The best part is that I’m reusing something that’s normally thrown in the recycling bin, and not having to purchase a fancy attachment marketed to “magically” transform a bottle into a self-waterer.

Four days after sowing the beet seeds I received from Tree and Twig — success!

I had some free space in the herb bed and put in about 36 seeds. Funny thing, though, is that many more sprouts will appear since, apparently, they’re seed clusters. Pretty neat! See everyone else’s progress.

I have six SJW plants, grown from seed, in the back yard. I was disappointed to find out that they don’t flower in the first year, but this little guy surprised me.

You know it’s a SJW by the black specks — the oil glands of the plant. This is what I’m ultimately after since I plan on making tinctures and oil from this precious plant.

For more about healing with SJW, there’s a great conversation over at Susun Weed’s forum.

Did you hear? I’m taking part of the Tree and Twig late beet planting challenge!

Linda, over at the Tree and Twig Farm blog, generously gave a bunch of peeps some beet seeds to plant in their own gardens. The challenge is to see how they turn out in our various locales and environments. We were supposed to all start on July 15th, but mine arrived a few days later. Regardless, I’ll be harvesting in 65 days, or September 21st.

Today I sowed about 36 seeds in the empty part of the herb bed. Can’t wait to see how they fare!