Marieke De Jong

Hi everyone,

Interesting question Nancy, and I never seem to manage enough or fully functional pea sticks no matter how I vow to do it!
Anyway, I just happened to come across a Dutch website on rare seeds and they listed a pea that's been saved by one if their farmer - seed growers and they described their technique of growing the peas together with wheat (or some grain, but I think they said wheat). I'll try this one of these years once I get grain going in my garden. I can see it work even if you wanted some fresh peas, as long as you leave space you can just walk along the rows and pick some.

YES! Brilliant initiative!

Fresh seeds are so much stronger, it's incredible. Even direct sown tomatoes and chillies came up this spring. Accidental discovery by using old potting soil as a bit of mulch on a new bed 😂 but definitely worth trying intentionally.

This year has been very dry where we are, and I'm hopeful the leek mix has successfully set seed. Roots don't really like our garden much, but results seem to be improving.

Hope to have some good things to send you 🌾

Hello,

On the hunt  for Dutch red cabbage:

There's a mid 1800 heirloom that's still for sale that's Red drumhead. Which from the description is a larger keeping type, so that might work for you.
This seems to be the one that is currently available for sale in Ireland as well, so it may be developed from what you refer to as large Dutch.

The other possibility for you is Langedijker Bewaar, translates roughly to Keeper from Langedijk. Still available in the Netherlands.

If you've seen them in Australia/NZ, it might be worthwhile to find out if they are the same or related to any of the above. And if the NZ/Australia ones are the exact ones you want, you might be better off trying to get some seeds from there.

Let me know of you'd like one of the two named ones above and I'll see about getting some.

Marieke

Hello Blake,

Can you tell me more about the Dutch cabbages you are looking for?
We've got quite few red cabbages in the Netherlands. They are often named after the area they are grown and so there are several. Would any of those do?

The giant flat Dutch doesn't ring an immediate bell as to it's equivalent in the Netherlands, so it's probably lost its name along the road and been renamed "Dutch" in either UK or America. Any details you can give me and I'll keep a lookout for you.

Nice idea, a settlers veg garden

Edit: looks like marysheirloomseeds is the US has a flat dutch cabbage.

https://www.marysheirloomseeds.com/collections/heirloom-cabbage/products/late-flat-dutch-cabbage

Marieke

https://www.growildnursery.co.uk/. Just emailed a newsletter to say their seedlist is mostly full again with fresh seeds.
Not sure if they are already on Steve's list, but it seemed worth a mention since they have special seeds and limited stocks.

M.

What a list Steve, thank you!

These are maybe not technically companies, but you can get some interesting seed from them (and send some back when you save seeds!)

https://seedsaving.network/

A work in progress, at least the website. When they're open in the spring it works fine. I've saved some seed for them this year.

https://www.incredibleseedlibrary.com/

I've not used this one myself, I only discovered them when the season was in full swing and they were sold out of most of the things that would interest me.

That's disappointing! Sorry Nancy, I thought I was bringing good news 😏

We have a clump of those in the garden, I didn't know they were edible! Thanks Steve

I'm happy to send you some of the dahlia seeds if you like? So far I've harvested from the three earliest plants.

Send your address in a Moosage if you want some and I'll pop them in the post.

When we moved to the highlands (57°55 north) I brough quite a few plants. (The movers were polite enough to just smile) One of them was my partner C's dahlia. His mother grows them in The Netherlands and he loves them. On arrival I plonked in the ground, and it lingered for two years or so and then vanished.

Now my mother-in-law is a dear lady who insists on giving me birthday and Sinterklaas (Dutch st. Nick) gifts. But only 'good' gifts, so not always what I would want 😂 Since I also already have everything, this is a problem of sorts. So every year I rack my brain to find something that will be useful, and that will be approved by the queeny of gifts.
After reading in one of James Wong's books (homegrown revolution?🤔) that dahlia bulbs are edible .. well you can probably guess.

A few weeks before my birthday I received a parcel containing 40 dahlia bulbs 🤣 about thirty more than I was expectinging. She doesn't do half jobs, my mother in law. So there was some frantic finding of crates and dry compost. Somehow I managed to get all of them in pots/the ground in spring.

They were a lot later than the ones in NL, but some were quite early and bloomed for months.

There are 2 Lilac time. Huge, huge flowers. Late and the insects can't get at the pollen/nectar because of the flower's structure. Pretty, but why would I grow something the pollinators can't eat?? C pointed out that they would be good for textile dye, since they've huge and I won't feel bad about picking them 🐝 so, maybe I'll find them a corner. Maybe.

2 bishop of Llandaff. Late. Very striking. The first flower broke off, so I doubt it will produce seed this year, but hey, they might.

30 bee friendly mix. This is where the magic lives. They're awesome. They are open, some with a double origami-looking ruff of petals. Lovely shades, short and tall. And popular with pollinators. Bumblebees overnight on them, even hiding between the leaves of the doubles, then continue eating as the sun hits.(it's hilarious)
I'm leaving the tubers in the ground (lazy badger is me) and saving seed from the earliest flowers to see if I can't landrace them into being Scottish.

Anyone done this to dahlias by any chance? Advice, stories and tips are very welcome!

Thanks for the reminder, their email is sliding into the to-do archive as I read.. (lethal place, things get lost in there for years! 😱)
I'll find some pennies to invest. Won't be much, but I'd really like for them to succeed.

Nancy Reading wrote:I put in just a little - I can't get ethical dairy here - lucky to get organic really. It would be super if they had a nationwide reach!

We get cheese delivered from The Ethical Dairy sometimes (can I post links to external shops?), they're in Dumfries.
They've really upped their prices since the crises, but they do deliver to us last time I checked, so they might also deliver to Skye?
The new highland courier seems to be having trouble, we just had a pet food order cancelled because of it. So maybe wait until that mess is sorted out.