tuffy monteverdi

Inge Leonora-den Ouden wrote:

Ellen Lewis wrote:...
Several people mentioned aloe. How do you use aloe as a vegetable?

Yes, I saw my own comment of some years ago: Aloe vera is easy to grow as a houseplant. But I don't eat it as a vegetable!
The most common use is on the skin, for burns, cuts and scratches.
It can also be used as a remedy for 'cold' and 'flu': mix half a jar of honey with one large Aloe leaf in a blender (it becomes a green foamy 'slime', but the foam will go down later). Use 1 tablespoon full twice a day (morning and evening). The honey makes it sweet, but still you taste the very bitter Aloe. Probably it helps because it's bitter (there's an old Dutch saying 'bitter in de mond maakt het hart gezond', 'bitter in the mouth makes the heart healthy').

I just want to throw some caution and info here about the use of aloe internally:

The gel inside the green parts has been shown to be healing for wounds, cosmetics, GI tract, and beyond.

HOWEVER, the green outer parts of the aloe leaf, the “bitter” parts mentioned above, are a GI irritant (certain compounds in it are somewhat toxic) and thus are basically a very effective laxative.
Concerningly, there are studies that show the green parts can cause GI cancers with prolonged exposure - (probably due to its irritating qualities long term). These studies have been done on rats, not humans, however the results are not ambiguous, they were clear.

This study uses whole leaf and doesn’t differentiate inner and outer leaf, which sadly was an oversight, but nevertheless:
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3537128/

And this paper from the Williams Cancer institute goes into the mechanisms and the compounds responsible, with clarity and a little more depth:

https://williamscancerinstitute.com/aloe-vera-what-science-is-discovering-about-its-possible-cancer-links/

Anyway, one can effectively use the clear gel externally or internally, medicinally, it has very few of these irritant compounds, but the green parts might be best for constipation issues only, sporadically.
And there may be better plants or compounds for that purpose anyway, that aren’t associated with carcinogenesis.

A few of the asparagus crowns we planted died. The others seem great.

Steve Thorn wrote:What would you recommend to a brand new gardener as the easiest vegetable to grow?

For me and my area, I would recommend cucumbers!

Can you think of anything I've missed about cucumbers being easy to grow?

Wow! You are lucky!
What climate are you in?
cucumbers and Okra are the plants I’ve had the *hardest* time with in our Mediterranean climate. They seem incredibly fussy!

Easiest: potatoes and parsley (in shade), artichokes, celery (more shaded), nettles, chives, chard -pretty much perennial here and reseeds easily.

Thank you

I also found a really beautiful one: Ficus lyrata
It’s a tree though. But tropical. Not sure re ease of growth…

Photos from internet

Oh very cool! It’s a corm, related to arum plants!

Too bad it’s poisonous…could be neat to grow an edible corm inside..

Ah ok thank you
I’ll check those out.
Maybe a houseplant will thrive for me for once!

Thanks
Do you know the Latin name for zz?

Blake Lenoir wrote: Good evening folks! How are you? I'm looking for ways to combat higher fertilizer prices in an organic fashion without the chemical types and help others cope with the uncertainty in the world right now.
How can we create fertilizer for commercial use without chemicals and help grow crops quickly into autumn? I wanna help my community and others as much as possible. Please reach me on this forum if you need me. Good night!

I say take the manure from all the millions of CAFO operations in USA, and with bulldozers make 4 week hot style compost from it and distribute it to all the farmers truckload by truckload.
If browns are needed, grab all the paper recycling collections and mix in!

I’ve always had a really hard time keeping indoor plants healthy.
I think it’s too dark in my current place (tho my previous places were not), but also I feel bad for them, not having real sun and outside air?

Are there plants that grow well indoors in north facing / tree covered windows?

Butter, though seemingly too valuable and yummy to burn, seems a super easy way to get oil - for whatever purpose. And it’s constantly stored on the hoof..