Where to find these plants

Hello,

Where can I find comfrey or Jerusalem Artichockes (sunchokes) for my garden/beginning food forest?

I looked where I have been buying seeds, and they don't have it. I love any and all advice.

Thanks!
Julia

For comfrey, I like Coe's Comfrey.

www.coescomfrey.com

Excellent customer service.

I don't have experience with sunchokes yet.

Howdy Julia, Do you get any seed catalogs yet?
Here is one with both.

http://www.groworganic.com/

There are many others.
There are also folks here at permies who sell or give cuttings, seeds , bulbs etc.

Kroger's.

I had some good luck with Jerusalem artichokes that I got at Kroger's and stuck in the ground. First year they did pretty good and gave me a yield in compacted hardpan clay. Next year though, I moved them to another spot and it wasn't quite sunny enough and they didn't do well.

With things like ginger and taro and sunchokes, you can plant what you buy at the grocery store, just make sure that when you are buying it that you get ones that are firm and have a nub that is about ready to put forth a shoot.

I got mine from friends. If there are permie type gardeners in your area, they may have plenty of sunchokes. I've got loads of them. Don't plant them unless you're sure you want them there forever. Where are you located?

Comfrey grows easily when it's divided.

You know what's really fun? This spring we had a seed swap party. people brought seeds and tubers and just shared the heck out of them. It was great, and I look forward to doing it again. If you don't have a friend who gardens near you, buy the plants and make lots of gardeny friends. then next year or the year after have a party and share your sunchokes and comfrey.

we bought jerusalem artichockes at the grocery store and planted them.

we planted about 8 last year, and we harvested about 50-60 new tubers to plant elsewhere at the end of the year.

we are using them as a wind break / screen.

Thanks. I will probably end up buying them off of a website. I love the idea of a root/seed swap gathering in spring. Right now, I am so new to this I have no friends or community who do the same thing. I've tried meet-up for my area, but with no success.

@Matu- how did you establish and make your network of friends with similar interests?

You guys are great!

That's a good question. It's taken me a bit to think of the answer.

I grew up in the city/suburbs and moved to this town for college and never wanted to leave. More beaches, woods and farms. So I've been here for nearly two decades. Meeting people is cumulative, sometimes you meet one person and get invited to a party and then there are all these great people at the party!

I belong to our local food co-op where I've met farmers, herbalists, activists, all sorts of folks. I volunteered then worked there for a while too, and met a ton of customers.

I met a farmer there who was using the co-op as a drop off place for his CSA, joined the CSA, volunteered for the CSA, then worked for him on his farm. I met his best friend on that farm and married him!

About nine years ago I joined the local Unitarian Universalist congregation and met so many great people. One of my favorite gardeners of all time went there, and she has since passed away. Lots of nice people, mostly atheists who love music and plants and animals.

Plus going to the farmers markets. When I moved here there was one measley scrawny one, for six months of the year. Now there are more than I can count, on different days of the week, and two year round ones. You can chat farmers up at the markets, while they're not waiting on other folks. I have learned a lot asking questions and listening to answers. Ironically, my favorite farmers out of all of them were there at that scrawny market back before local was a thing.

It's taken me a while but I really feel a connection to my community here. I do have a friend who is a more recent transplant but a real go getter. She knew everyone by the time she'd been here three years. She has a potluck party just for farmers twice a year. It's wonderful! I felt lucky to be in her inner circle, that was a smart move on her part.

The sharing economy is where it's at. Good hard working people sharing things, help, food and company. I give what I can and I get back much more than I put in.