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Rhubarb

 
Ken W Wilson
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I’ve planted rhubarb several times. It tends to die in our hot summers or wet springs.

I finally have one plant that’s 2-3 years old. It was wilted all summer but looks good now. I also have three that were planted last Spring.

I know I can harvest some of the older plant but not how much. One site says leave 2/3 of mature plants and all of younger plants. Another site says they freeze down in the winter anyway, so harvest everything in the fall.  I’m not sure how late in the fall. I think they meant to pick even the little ones.  I know they do freeze down so maybe that’s right?

We could have a light frost tomorrow. Can they stand some frost? They are growing good now,  so I’d rather wait a few weeks.
 
Mike Barkley
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They can handle frost but not long hard freezes. I don't harvest the smallest stalks but they will die off when it's time.

Argue for your limitations and they are yours forever.

 
James babs
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I have had some hit and misses, pursavere and try different times of the year. Once established Rhubarb is the gift that keeps on giving in my opinion. A lot of sites say full sunlight but my most successful Rhubard is by a wall that gets sunlight most of the day but not all of the day. I found early spring good so it is well enough established for winter and I have covered my younger plants  with pots over the coldest months
 
Hugo Morvan
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I've got three plants for years. Two are in full sun, i don't have to water them in summer, because they are in pond overflow area. One is in the shade against a north facing wall, that's the biggest one funnily enough. They love compost and manure.
Taking two third is a lot, i take half, but that's in spring when cooking a big batch.  I just pick leaves when i want some or if they start shading out surrounding plants i want to see growing.
Feel and look at the stems of the leaves, if they are rock hard, they're not as nice, they tend to get full of oxalate during the growing season, making them taste sour. Adding powdered chalk, just a pinch, balances out the sourness, as well as raisins or apple or whatever. Leave the young growth as well. They need the leaves to store energy for the winter.
In winter the leaves die, the new leaves hide close to the ground like a crop of salad, i cover them in straw or some other leave matter laying around. But our winters are not very hard.

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Michael Cox
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Hugo Morvan wrote:
Adding powdered chalk, just a pinch, balances out the sourness, as well as raisins or apple or whatever.



I'm going to HAVE to try this. Thanks

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Chris Kott
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I have some doubts about the full sunlight advice. While I have no doubt that in some cases it might be ideal, in my experience, I have found that the rhubarb that I don't tend at all but regularly comes up and produces all I could need happen on my fence line, and prolifically in areas where they are shaded out during the hottest part of the day.

I suspect that in some situations, rhubarb could adapt to full-sun, if there's enough water constantly available, but I think that keeping it in sun/shade transitional areas, where there's plenty of indirect and partial direct sunlight, it would be more tolerant of neglect.

Insofar as harvest and wintering goes, I would, as suggested above, monitor the turgidity of the stems, especially after the first mild frost. Also, mulch like crazy. I would make sure there's no less than three inches of good organic mulch around the crowns, and I would mound that up overtop of the cut ends of the harvested stalks in preparation for the snows.

I wouldn't worry about overmulching. I have had rhubarb push its way through two layers of plastic bag surrounding a forgotten bag of organic triple mix, after a cold winter where the ground froze solidly.

I love the stuff, particularly as an addition to pies and jams featuring the sweeter berries that I grow alongside them. Does anyone have experience using them in a savoury dish, like perhaps with butternut squash or tomato?

Great stuff here. Please keep it coming.

-CK

A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.
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Jarret Hynd
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Chris Kott wrote:I have some doubts about the full sunlight advice. While I have no doubt that in some cases it might be ideal, in my experience, I have found that the rhubarb that I don't tend at all but regularly comes up and produces all I could need happen on my fence line, and prolifically in areas where they are shaded out during the hottest part of the day.



In the way they propagate by seed, I've never seen a rhubarb takeover a plot of garden space in full-sun even when given the chance to. Propagation by roots/crowns though, and they have a much better chance to establish in a full-sun area. I've got one big one in the middle of my garden in full-sun, which I assume was grown from a crown long ago. Then once I took over the plot and stopped the rototilling, the birds must have scattered some of the seeds because now there are about 10 or so newly developing plants on the north side under a hedge row. There is even one that is 2 or 3 years old which has managed to grow 200ft away on the north side of a quonset in some tall grass.

From my experience with them, they definitely prefer partial-shade when given the opportunity.  

---

Ken W Wilson wrote:Can they stand some frost?



As for the freezing, just imagine rhubarb like beet tops or any other cold-hardy greens. In Central Canada, they can handle the early fall frosts without issue - even something like a surprise night of -4'C in early September. But once the temperature starts to drop consistently below freezing each night, they are done for the year.

Ken W Wilson wrote:Another site says they freeze down in the winter anyway, so harvest everything in the fall.



If your rhubarb was wilted all summer, and only one has managed to get to the 3 year mark so far, I'd only take small amounts as it likely needs to get it's taproot a little deeper into the ground. I wouldn't bother picking any of the smaller ones at all. Last year when we had an 85 day heat wave of 30'C+(90'F) weather, they were pretty much the only perennial that wasn't in distress, but these were also 10+ year old plants. If you can let them get well-established early on, in the future they will be able to handle all kinds of surprise weather without any issue, which is worth the wait.  

I don't really have a guideline for how much I pick, as I prefer pick a few stalks weekly in the early spring/summer to use with oatmeal or for a pound cake. By fall I have way too many other things to harvest and put away to even think about the rhubarb.

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Mike Barkley
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My first experience with rhubard was in northern Minnesota. It had been planted at least 5 years earlier & not touched since. Most likely in well prepared beds of well composted mix of hay & cow manure. It was an abandoned dairy farm & there was a small mountain of that available. Everything I tried to grow in that was amazing!!! Grew broccoli larger than a basketball. There was about a dozen rhubarb plants & they were roughly 4 or 5 feet tall with huge leaves & stalks. It was a mostly sunny location. It gets very cold there all winter but not too hot for long periods of time in summer. Will try to dig up the pix soon.

Have had fairly good success with them in TN. Full sun. Not severe winter or summer. It gets cold & hot but not brutal. Basically moderate temps with good rains all year long. I moved them to a different location this spring & did several divisions in the process. All have survived. They suffered some more this year because Seminole pumpkins & beans overgrew them & stole their sun. Last month I removed the beans & moved the pumpkins out of their light. They will get better treatment next year.

Rhubard is excellent with blueberries. Especially in cakes & pies. It saves for a long time in the freezer but it does lose it's crunchiness.


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Mike Barkley
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Add a big handful of blueberries too. Trust me on this:)


Ingredients
1/2 cup unsalted butter, room temperature, plus more for baking dish
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup buttermilk
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 1/4 cups sugar
1 large egg
2 cups chopped rhubarb
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
Directions
1. Step 1
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Butter a 9-by-13-inch baking dish; set aside. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, and salt; set aside. In a liquid measuring cup, combine buttermilk and vanilla; set aside.
1. Step 2
In the bowl of an electric mixer or using a handheld mixer, beat butter with 1 cup sugar until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Add egg, and beat to combine. Add the flour mixture, alternating with the buttermilk mixture, and starting and ending with the flour mixture. Stir in rhubarb.
1. Step 3
Spread batter evenly into prepared baking dish. In a small bowl, stir together remaining 1/4 cup sugar and cinnamon. Sprinkle cinnamon sugar evenly over batter. Bake until a cake tester inserted in center of cake comes out clean, about 35 minutes.
1. Step 4
Let cool on a wire rack in pan for 30 minutes before serving.

Argue for your limitations and they are yours forever.

 
Ken W Wilson
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Thanks, everybody!

I used to have a great recipe for rhubarb raisin pie, but I’ve lost it. Does anyone have one? I’ve made it without a recipe. It was OK, but not the same.
 
Dc Brown
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Hot tip:

When stewing rhubarb, if you have it, use honey instead of sugar. There is some kind of synergy goes on between the two ingredients that I cannot reproduce with sugar be it raw, fresh pressed juice, or processed. The rhubarb should still be tart so it offsets other sweet things like custard, ice cream, sweet pastry, crumble etc.

My favorite is simply custard and rhubarb. It's so quick and easy. But here in NZ we have pastured milk for the custard, manuka for the honey... I have international guests at times they lose their cool over the food I prepare them from local sources. Homegrown is a large part of it. However, if your condiments are rubbish you are downgrading the entire meal. Rhubarb is a hipster ingredient round here, making its way into yoghurts, ice creams etc now.

I always wondered if it was shade tolerant with those large leaves. Now I know, thanks for all the info folks.



 
Cristo Balete
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Be careful about eating the leaves, they aren't safe.  This is from Wikipedia

Rhubarb leaves contain poisonous substances, including oxalic acid, which is a nephrotoxic and corrosive acid that is present in many plants. Humans have been poisoned after ingesting the leaves, a particular problem during World War I when the leaves were mistakenly recommended as a food source in Britain.[36][37][38] The toxic rhubarb leaves have been used in flavouring extracts, after the oxalic acid is removed by treatment with precipitated chalk (i.e., calcium carbonate). Oxalic acid can also be found in the stalks of rhubarb, but the levels are too low to cause any bodily harm.

Rhubarb damaged by severe cold should not be eaten, as it may be high in oxalic acid, which migrates from the leaves and can cause illness.[9]

The advocate of organic gardening Lawrence D. Hills listed his favourite rhubarb varieties for flavour as ‘Hawke's Champagne’, ‘Victoria’, ‘Timperley Early’, and ‘Early Albert’, also recommending ‘Gaskin's Perpetual’ for having the lowest level of oxalic acid, allowing it to be harvested over a much longer period of the growing season without developing excessive sourness.[19]

The following cultivars have gained the Royal Horticultural Society’s Award of Garden Merit:-[20]

   ’Grandad’s Favourite’[21]
   ’Reed’s Early Superb’[22]
   ’Stein’s Champagne’[23]
   ’Timperley Early’[24]

An important distinction: Permaculture is not the same kind of gardening as organic gardening.
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Mike Barkley
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Well, since Cristo brought it up ... I have started growing plants (there are many) that contain oxalic acid around bee hives. Oxalic acid is an ingredient used to make some bee pest treatments. I use more natural techniques. I always grow those veggies somewhere, might as well be around the bees. Not sure if it actually works but I'm in the process of finding out.

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Hester Winterbourne
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Rhubarb originates in Siberia.  Not sure what it would think of Nevada.
 
Ken W Wilson
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I’m actually in Nevada, Missouri. It’s about 90 miles south of KC. Our summers do get hot though.

 
Mandy Launchbury-Rainey
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If you live in a hot area, take half the crown to replant and cover the existing crown in loose straw and a large black bin during the winter. You will get beautiful juicy stalks in spring but this forcing will exhaust the crown. Replace with your saved crowns. Forced rhubarb is a delicacy.  It is grown in dark sheds in the rhubarb triangle in the north of England, over old coal seams. You can actually hear it growing!

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Jonathan Ward
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So growing up we had Rhubarb in full sun and it always did well.  Grandpa always said you never pick it after the 4th of july.  He always said after the 4th it needs time to finish it's growth cycle and get ready for winter.  As for how much to pick, i think Grandpa usually did about half the plant but i could be wrong.  I have planted some Rhubarb this year in a shady/partial sun type location and it's doing pretty good.  I have also read you shouldn't harvest new plants.  My understanding (both reading and what Grandpa went by):
Year 1:  Trim the flowering parts so it can focus on root growth.  Don't pick.
Year 2:  See above but you can pick a few stems if it's doing well.
Year 3:  You judge.  If it's growing good you can lightly harvest and let it seed toward the end of the season, otherwise...year 1 or 2 treatment.
Year 4:  You should be good to harvest it in a normal fashion.

This being said, my experience is as a 10-15yr old boy growing up in southern illinois with a grandpa who spent pretty much his whole life farming in one fashion or another.

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Ed Belote
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Reminds me of an interesting article I recently read.

http://www.bbc.com/travel/story/20190424-the-english-vegetable-picked-by-candlelight?utm_source=pocket-newtab
 
Jonathan Ward
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These are my Rhubarb plants that i planted this year.
60915363_2318228045114973_8141963266734686208_n.jpg
[Thumbnail for 60915363_2318228045114973_8141963266734686208_n.jpg]
This one started out slowest but is looking good now.
60648587_448831669264687_2859092229241176064_n.jpg
[Thumbnail for 60648587_448831669264687_2859092229241176064_n.jpg]
This one was doing good but then got stepped on. Looks like a new leaf coming out so it'll be fine.

“Once a wise man told me, ‘Family don’t end in blood,’ but it doesn’t start there either. Family cares about you. Not what you can do for them. Family is there, for the good, bad, all of it. They got your back. Even when it hurts. That’s family.”

 
Mandy Launchbury-Rainey
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Here is a short clip About the rhubarb triangle I mentioned earlier

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Nicole Alderman
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I had no idea there were health benifits to rhubarb, thank you Mandy!

I went looking for more info on rhubarb's health benifits, and saw this quote (from https://greenblender.com/smoothies/8896/health-benefits-of-rhubarb)

Rhubarb usually pops up in grocery stores and farmer’s markets in late spring. Because its season is so short, cutting it up and freezing it for later use is a great idea!



Rhubarb has a season??? Mine looks and tastes the same all spring and summer and all the way until late fall when it freezes. What happens to other people's rhubarb? Am I missing something here?

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Michael Cox
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Most shop bought rhubarb is FORCED - dormant crowns are moved into dark climate controlled warehouses. As the crowns sprout they are harvested for the delicate pink stems, without the sourness that comes with chlorophyll. There is a only a limited window for forcing rhubarb as the crowns need to be on the point of breaking dormancy.

IN my garden, where we don't force it, the best stems are the first flush breaking from the dormant plant - they grow quickly etc... later in the summer they are a bit on the limp side, but still fine to eat.

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Donald MacLeod
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Michael Cox wrote:Most shop bought rhubarb is FORCED - dormant crowns are moved into dark climate controlled warehouses. As the crowns sprout they are harvested for the delicate pink stems, without the sourness that comes with chlorophyll. There is a only a limited window for forcing rhubarb as the crowns need to be on the point of breaking dormancy.

IN my garden, where we don't force it, the best stems are the first flush breaking from the dormant plant - they grow quickly etc... later in the summer they are a bit on the limp side, but still fine to eat.




Rhubarb here in New Zealand - as we now head into our Winter months - we are going to pull it all out tomorrow ( Friday 24th May ) -  chop off outer parts of the plant and discard the central core as this is the oldest part. We will re plant the new platelets into the garden once raised up and add rotted animal manure; this is a must for rhubarb. I guess your Northern Hemisphere Rhubarb like ours - does not like to fry in full sun and does much better in a sheltered moist animal rich manured soil, that way we keep the plant cooler and as such get fatter and tastier stems. Photo is of our Rhubarb a couple of months ago..
IMG_6507-(Copy).JPG
[Thumbnail for IMG_6507-(Copy).JPG]
 
Mandy Launchbury-Rainey
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Nicole Alderman wrote:I had no idea there were health benifits to rhubarb, thank you Mandy!



When my mother was in the nursing home to have me, one of the nurses, on having many and frequent nasty nappies to changed, asked the mums - what did you ladies have to eat yesterday?

Rhubarb crumble, came the reply.

The matron spoke to the kitchens and rhubarb was taken off the menu for nursing mothers.....

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Jonathan Ward
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Does anyone have experience just dropping the leaves around the plant after harvesting the stems?  Maybe cutting some of the larger leaves into smaller pieces.  Like a chop/drop scenario?  Was curious about doing that next year when i harvest a few.

“Once a wise man told me, ‘Family don’t end in blood,’ but it doesn’t start there either. Family cares about you. Not what you can do for them. Family is there, for the good, bad, all of it. They got your back. Even when it hurts. That’s family.”

 
Mandy Launchbury-Rainey
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Jonathan Ward wrote:Does anyone have experience just dropping the leaves around the plant after harvesting the stems?  Maybe cutting some of the larger leaves into smaller pieces.  Like a chop/drop scenario?  Was curious about doing that next year when i harvest a few.



Yes, Jonathan. Rhubarb,  like comfrey, is a mineral accumulator and can be used as chop and drop in the same way. My Gran always put the old leaves around the crowns.

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Jonathan Ward
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Awesome.  I assumed with its deeper roots it would perform that function but was curious before i just started doing it.

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Michael Cox
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Jonathan Ward wrote:Does anyone have experience just dropping the leaves around the plant after harvesting the stems?  Maybe cutting some of the larger leaves into smaller pieces.  Like a chop/drop scenario?  Was curious about doing that next year when i harvest a few.



I do that. Less to carry back to the house with me!

Also, I like to throw a bunch of leaves down in a layer on top of weeds. Not sure it does much but they take a week or so to break down and seem to slow the weeds.

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Donald MacLeod
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Michael Cox wrote:

Jonathan Ward wrote:Does anyone have experience just dropping the leaves around the plant after harvesting the stems?  Maybe cutting some of the larger leaves into smaller pieces.  Like a chop/drop scenario?  Was curious about doing that next year when i harvest a few.



I do that. Less to carry back to the house with me!

Also, I like to throw a bunch of leaves down in a layer on top of weeds. Not sure it does much but they take a week or so to break down and seem to slow the weeds.



RE: RHUBARB.. ""W A R N I N G ""  YOU MUST NOT EAT THE LEAVES - THEY ARE DEADLY POISONOUS.. ONLY THE STEM CAN BE COOKED AND USED.

Now back to my entry here: The other day I prepared a small area on the cooler side of the house to plant some rhubarb plants. While digging the ground I found an old glass INK bottle and wrote and added a photo about the old ink bottle find in the "WRITING WITH A FOUNTAIN PEN" topic.
I added the fact that during WW2 the area our house is now built was a USA military camp.   I suspect the glass ink bottle was discarded because it was empty. Today I began planting some rhubarb plants in the garden area I had prepared and took a couple of photos.  Will keep you posted over the next few months as to how they progess in this position.
Regards
Don
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Jonathan Ward
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Update on my Rhubarb.  One plant has now been stepped on three times by the girls but the other one is a little closer to a big lilac and so it hasn't been stepped on lol.  Easy to tell which is which.
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James Black
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Haven’t planted rhubarb yet, but wanted to point out that it has a rep for being a good crop in our area in Upstate NY in our silty/sandy loam that is very well drained (obviously). So thinking we’ll drained soil is one factor to success w/ rhubarb.
 
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I planted my crowns in pots. They were first in the dirt for 2 yrs but barely surviving despite frequent watering. They became happier immediately in the pots and are now about 10 yrs old. They produced short, small stalks and leaves until I covered them with shade cloth one summer - then pow!  That is the secret at least here in super dry 7b northern calif. Just provide shade in summer. I never pick all the stalks in the fall, leave the skinny ones that are pencil size and only twist the stalks slightly around the outer edge of their growth on each corm.  If they don't twist off easily on their own I leave them.  That assures the stalks are mature, sweet and that I don't pick too many.  Picking only the ripe ones that way encourages the growth of new stalks from the middle and helps the skinny ones get thicker/longer.  Also they all die back in the frost but come back once the weather warms during the spring rains. I remove any  dried or yellowed leaves/stalks all during the summer and into fall adding them to the compost pile. Also clean up any wilted/soft ones that have frozen leaving only 2- 4 inches of clean leaf mulch over them for the winter. They like a feeding of alfalfa pellets/hay worked into the soil or other nitrogen rich fertilizer (diluted urea) one or two times/year.
 
Denise Cares
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One more tip. I only planted one corm per large 24 -30 inch wide pot or at most 3 small ones evenly spaced. The single ones seem to do better when they are not too crowded together in the pot.  They should not be planted too close together in any case because they can get huge when they are happy!  Even my pots are separated from each other by a few inches. It's easy to water them with a hose wand on "rain shower" setting going from one pot to the next and giving them a good soak daily or every other day. I try to keep the leaves from looking wilted as it stresses them a bit but they usually bounce back if they are under the shade cloth. When not covered they tend to not rebound but will die when they wilt. Maybe it's the variety I have but they definitely like shade.
 
Timothy Norton
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Well I did it...

I ordered two Victoria Rhubarb plants for this fall to put in the ground and see how they fair with our New York winters but upon further inspection I have found that I had not ordered two plants... I ordered twelve!

While my wife might not appreciate the opportunity, I'm thinking of planting them at the base of a gentle slope to create a 'hedge' of sorts. Will it work? Who knows, but I'm willing to give it a shot!

Anyone fall plant rhubarb? I've only ever done spring planting.

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