thirteen day check-up

here's what we had thirteen days ago when i planted the mystery guest turned spud...

and this is where we were five days ago when i replanted and identified it...

light and water have been provided as needed and the plant has utilized both as it gains both verdantcy and verticality and it looks as though it will expand into a larger( and deeper ) container in the coming weeks...

a mashua vine has irrupted through the yacon...

the forty cent tomato cage is proving to be a fair trellis as the mashua latches on to it using its leaf stems rather than any specialized tendrils...

there is some snow cover on the winter wheat and rye and there is another five to eight inches forecast over the next week...from a travel standpoint that may nor be especially good news, however i am hopeful there will be a few inches since temperatures around the south end of the inland sea are foretold to be in the single digits ( faherenheit ) by weekend after next and if the plants are well insulated my winter crop season may be over before it starts...i am not up for a second failure in three years...it's also not my decision...we will wait and see

mystery no more

one look at the better developed leaves of the mystery guest and there was no doubt...a potato...spud..solanum tuberosum...take your pick...it is an indeterminate variety of spud...

it was dark in the plant room when i found it..i did not have the overhead light on and i just caught sight of the green stem in the light from the grow lights and i just stuck it in a pot...it did have a node at the end of the stem but i didn't really stop to look...i had other things to do...so today , after i knew what it was i took a closer look...

any doubts definitively removed...

so i replanted the tuber and nascent root system deep in a peat pot and covered the stems almost up tot he leaves to stimulate tuber growth...i will be planting the peat pot deeper still in a larger container soon enough to keep the season going and , hopefully, tubers setting...i wouldn't expect anything sizable form a basement season...some drops to plant outside is what my expectation would be...we will see...so the season i had wanted to keep to a minimum has expanded without asking...the hazards of having tubers, indirect light, loose soil and a humid basement...once started we will try to finish...neglect isn't an option.

minimalism and abundance

the minimal season i have going on in the basement is doing well if you take the constraints artificial light places on plants that are nothing if not adaptable...the forty cent tomato cage is working out well as an improvised trellis for this mashua and the vine continues to grow and produce new leaves...

this plant has begun copious new growth at the base ot replace the vines that have died back on the trellis...a habit in indoor mashua at least...and one that leaves me wondering how much impact all that energy expenditure will have on tuber production...bound to be some...

while i was moving stuff around to make room ( we will get tot he reason for that in a bit ) i discovered that the mashua cohabiting with the yacon had produced a vine about three feet long that was trailing along the floor...i curled it around the container and moved the leaves up onto the trellis, closer tot he light...

the mystery guest has signed in with some leaves finally...however i am still not ready to make any sort of identification...we could probably eliminate a few things...it isn't maize or teocintli for instance...but what it is...unknown still...

puddles' kids are looking a lot like mom did and their onion pals aren't much less leggy...this will hopefully change in the spring..they also find themselves rather hemmed in by bags of compost and potting mix...

in fact the incipient demise of a local big box store has led to a veritable orgy of acquisition of gardening supplies...compost, potting soil, seed starter mix, grow lights, peat pots...we have laid in a supply that will hod us for a few seasons to come at remarkably little cost...the "invisible hand" that guides "market forces" continues to lower the working population...an unfortunate fact of an avaricious system...however this is a garden blog and we verge on a political rant...we will save that for another blog...you can switch over and have a look if you are inclined to...whether anyone reads them or not i will still rant away...this is the interweb after all.

downstairs

the season in the basement is quiet and moving along...and i will not argue with either of those characteristics...

puddles kids and their onion cohabitants are green and robust, if leggy...they should do well in the april transfer to true sunlight...

the yacon is another cohabitant...this time with mashua...the doesn't seem to be any sort of conflict in the pots and the mashua is using the yacon as a trellis for some of its vines...

one of the vines on the trellises in this container has died back...it has been replaced by a mas of new growth around the base...new vines soon eenough...

this one has gotten big enough to begin trying to cascade over the pot and i am fresh out of small wrought iron trellises...so i invested forty cents in a small tomato cage that fits the container and allows the plant to continue to move toward the light rather than away...

finally...a mystery guest popped up in a pile of compost so i put it in its very own container and gave it a good soaking...i cannot see any identifiable traits just yet so we will be keeping this one separate for the nonce...we are not trying to dirupt the quiet.

pieces of last year