Pete Podurgiel

Welcome to permies, Melissa!
I'd like to chat some if you're up for it (PM sent).

This might be the guy Larry had in mind, total inspiration!

Hi Jen,

I'm not an expert on ginger by any means, but I did have moderate success growing it last year. I purchased my ginger stock from Fedco and followed their germination guide with excellent results. One thing that jumped out at me in your post is that you soaked the rhizomes. Fedco recommends only watering them sparingly at this stage, at least until they sprout:

Germinating
Keep the soil in your bedded-down crate of ginger or turmeric rhizomes at 80 degrees with a heat mat or in a heated greenhouse. Direct sunlight is helpful, and the heat is crucial. Go light on the watering; especially before sprouts appear, the rhizomes won't take much water. Only when the soil is dry to the touch should you sprinkle it lightly. Ginger and turmeric are sensitive to overwatering at this stage, but most sprouting failures are due to low or fluctuating temperatures.

(source: https://www.fedcoseeds.com/resources/growing-guides/ginger-and-turmeric.htm)

I've seen videos where folks have transplanted them into pots and brought them inside for the winter. Not sure how to advise on that, but if they survived this long might be best to leave them be. Perhaps you can create a 'microclimate' with some buckets of hot water and cover them on cold nights, or use an infrared lamp ...?

Hope things works out for you this year - cheers!

If you have the space, perhaps adding some house plants in clay pots will help.
An added benefit, it appears some house plants will work double-duty as air purifiers:

https://www.goodhousekeeping.com/home/gardening/a32552/houseplants-that-purify-air/

Hey fellas,

I'm not sure how it will work for you being a just a wee bit colder than here in southern New England (zone 5a) , but I was able to get some fairly decent yields out of my attempt.

Here's a link to my thread on the topic. https://permies.com/t/266153/Tips-growing-ginger-turmeric-cold#2846988

For what it's worth, I source my rhizomes from Fedco, https://www.fedcoseeds.com/moose/ginger-and-turmeric]

The order comes with instuctions, but they also list the how-to's online here: https://www.fedcoseeds.com/resources/growing-guides/ginger-and-turmeric.htm

I had to laugh when I saw the pic on the Fedco instruction page showing the full-grown rhizome ball. I'm here to tell you, it took quite of bit of pruning to clean them up for that pic (see my thread for what they look like coming out of the ground).

Hope this helps - cheers!

Just writing a follow-up post on my harvest. I was able to keep them in the hoop house until late October before we had some hard freezes. Things went pretty well and I ended up with around 4 pounds each of ginger and turmeric. I started with 1/2lb each, so I ended up with something like an 8:1 yield.

I used them to make some fire cider and froze the rest. I also found recipe for a delicious ginger chicken stir-fry, which is one of my favorites now:

     https://www.marthastewart.com/339666/chicken-with-ginger
 
Here's some pics showing the turmeric roots from just one of the plants (the ginger roots looked similar). The darker rhizome was the 'mother' of the cluster. I ended up with maybe 4-5 plants out of the 1/2 lb starter.  

Although growing them wasn't terribly difficult, cleaning and trimming the roots turned out to be much more labor-intensive than I anticipated. I ended up having to break them up into tiny pieces and go over them with a toothbrush to get all the dirt out from the nooks and crannies. Not sure if I will bother doing the turmeric again, but all in all it was a fun learning experience.  

cheers!

Curious to know, are you picking them up when you are outside hiking, gardening, etc...  or are you perhaps getting them from indoor/outdoor pet activity (ie: taking Fido for a walk or letting the cat out to hunt mice)?

Thread bump.

Saw this on the utube, very inspiring....

This is pretty awe-inspiring...

Hi John,

Good news -  I ended up harvesting those cabbages and they did just fine after I let them thaw out in the fridge.  

And thanks for the reminder ...I've been pre-occupied with work and it slipped my mind that I still needed to process them, LOL.
I took half of the cabbages (about 2 lbs) and made a batch of slaw using my favorite Classic Coleslaw Recipe.

I forget exactly which variety I grew, but they should've been around a 65 day variety. However, these had been growing for nearly 90 days and I had mixed results. I think I'm largely to blame though, as I really didn't do much in the way of adding any compost or other amendments when planting, resulting in somewhat stunted growth. In comparison, the Spring planting yielded 4lb heads!

in any case, I'll chalk this up as a victory. It's my first successful Fall planting of cabbage and hope to do it again next year.

Cheers!

Nice setup!

It seems you already have a diverse array of sprouts, but one item you might consider adding to your list is sunflower seeds. I've had mixed results with them though, mostly to do with the seed husks clinging to the sprouts  (along with some soil) and made for a difficult harvest. If I recall correctly, there are tricks to avoid this issue, but they escape me at this moment (it might have had something to do with lack of moisture/humidity).

On a side note: I'm currently debating whether or not to try and overwinter my celery, I grew some in pots as an experiment over the summer (they never grow like store-bought celery) and I brought them indoors for the winter. However, they don't seem to be getting enough light. Not sure if they are worth the trouble, but you have me thinking about setting up my own indoor winter garden to see if I can keep them going as a perennial.

One other herb you might try is parsley (if not already on your iist).

Cheers!