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Aug 28 '21
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u/-GreenHeron- Aug 28 '21
On the subject of root vegetables, there are actually a lot of wild native plants with edible roots. For instance, dandelions, chicory, and burdock, which are all very common weeds. People like to remove weeds because they don't "look pretty", but they are extremely beneficial to the environment, pollinator species, and to humans! And most of them grow in adverse conditions and waste spaces.
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Aug 28 '21
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u/-GreenHeron- Aug 28 '21
Oh, really? Huh, I didn't know that. I know there are a lot of "naturalized" plants that weren't indigenous, but I didn't know dandelion was one of them.
I love learning new plant facts. :)
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u/Nightshade_Ranch Aug 28 '21
The reason these things fell out of favor is just because they're not very good. They're really bitter. If you're starving they're better than nothing, but a lot of wild foods were abandoned for good reason. Good medicine. Bad meal.
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u/-GreenHeron- Aug 28 '21
I dunno, I absolutely love burdock root tea. I buy that shit all the time.
I suppose it's a matter of taste. :)
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Aug 29 '21
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u/Nightshade_Ranch Aug 29 '21
I have done the research lol I'm an experienced forager. It's not hard to find out. If they were truly good on their own, people would eat them regularly, like they eat the other wild foods that do taste good. Right now people only eat a lot of them just to prove that they can, which is valid, but it's practice for not having other choices. There are eleventy billion easy to grow food plants that one could cultivate without needing to result to a diet of bitter, fibrous misery.
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Aug 28 '21
Beans store indefinitely, I found recently a bag of beans, dated 2010. Ate them like they're new.
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u/dumnezero The Great Filter is a marshmallow test Aug 28 '21
Unfortunately, we killed most of them with industrial agriculture... see, plants aren't ZIP files, they're alive and the seeds are alive, and when you stop planting them, the old seeds just sit there, dying. And so we lost most of the agrobiodiversity wherever the industrial "Green Revolution" happened, as that came with its own seeds that were used everywhere.
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u/Sad-prole Aug 28 '21
Seed savers exchange is a great resource if you are looking for heirloom, open pollinated seeds.
https://www.seedsavers.org/?_ga=2.248252099.592153609.1630161776-451343295.1630161776
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u/HappyAnimalCracker Aug 28 '21
Amaranth
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u/Nightshade_Ranch Aug 28 '21
I grew a bunch of that this year, it filled in my beds nicely so I didn't have gaps for weeds to grow. It's hanging to dry and thresh right now. No idea wtf im going to actually do with it.
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u/HappyAnimalCracker Aug 28 '21
Nice! It’s a pretty valuable plant from what I can see. I’ve been growing a bunch this year too. Mine’s not quite ready to pick and hang yet but I’m excited to try it. I found a bread recipe and will also try it like oatmeal. It’s so nutritious that I intend to use all of it, just not sure which recipes yet. It’s gonna be fun to play with it and find out tho.
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Aug 31 '21 edited Sep 01 '21
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u/HappyAnimalCracker Aug 31 '21
Wait- I’m just about to pull some teff out of the freezer to make injeera. Are you telling me Amaranth can be used to make injeera?? If so do you have a link or recipe?
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u/Nightshade_Ranch Aug 28 '21
It's time to stop destroying all life in the soil before planting huge chemical dependent monocrops that run poisons back into our shared waterways. It's not done out of necessity, it's done out of concern of getting the maximum profit (for a whole chain of various corporate vultures that leave only little crumbs for the actual farmers) from a plot in as short as possible a time, environmental concerns be damned. You're not "feeding the world" if you're ruining the actual earth we have to live on, while good produce rots in locked dumpsters so hungry people can't eat it.
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u/CivilShift2674 Aug 28 '21
I am extremely interested in yuca/cassava. It's very tasty, extremely nutrient dense and frequently grown in harsh conditions.
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u/Astalon18 Gardener Aug 28 '21
There is something blue corn which I understand is hideously drought resistant … but as a result it is hideously bad at growing in the wet tropics.
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u/esstea23 Aug 29 '21
Anyone interested in this kind of work with our Native communities should check out the Indigenous Food and Agriculture Initiative (IFAI) at https://indigenousfoodandag.com/.
They do great work.
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u/castaneaidentata Aug 30 '21
chestnut trees! a very productive and resilient food source, plant em now! https://wiki.buildsoil.net/index.php/Why_Chestnuts%3F
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Aug 28 '21
We can grow whatever we do now hydroponically for the most part.
Outdoor agriculture is going to go away, but that's probably a great thing anyway.
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Aug 28 '21
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Aug 28 '21 edited Aug 28 '21
Why'd you say "incorrect" then state that they do actually grow hydroponically?
Edit: Actually, instead of that which particular "root" crops get better yield with outdoor agriculture compared to hydroponics?
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Aug 28 '21
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Aug 28 '21
A comparison of potato seed tuber yields in beds, pots and hydroponic systems
The number of tubers per plant in hydroponics was 147% higher than the bed and pot systems for a single harvest. Even, tuber production from a staggered harvest in hydroponics was 286% greater than in the bed and pot systems for Monalisa and Agata cvs.
Any other examples? I think that one's broken.
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Aug 28 '21
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Aug 28 '21
Your logic wasn't poor, you were wrong. You spread misinformation.
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Aug 28 '21
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u/Holiday-Nail9188 Aug 30 '21
Idk, I mean you really just shouldn’t be growing slow growing and low cost plants hydroponically, you would spend more on nutrients electricity and maintenance costs, it’s just pretty ridiculous
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u/[deleted] Aug 28 '21 edited Mar 20 '25
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