Backyard gardening on Ann Arbor's west side: harvesting veggies and saving seeds

Sunflowers
Photo by Atcha Dorn
Yes! It is time to start planning for next year. Think about what worked and what didn’t work this year. What would you do differently? What varieties do you love and want to save the seeds from? Personally, I’m saving seeds from my heirloom pear paste and yellow rainbow tomatoes, provider green beans, cilantro, mizuna and possibly more.

Picking kale
Photo by Atcha Dorn
Since August is the harvest month, here are some harvesting tips. Many plants will give you a continual harvest. These include: kale, collards, chard, basil and parsley. The new leaves of these plants grow from the inner crown. Pick off the outermost leaves by gently peeling them away from the stem, leaving 3-4 healthy leaves on the plant. It is always best to pick “greens” in the morning before the sun hits the plants. This is the least stressful for the plants and also yields the tastiest greens. Harvesting these greens in this way can provide you with months of fresh garden veggies. However, some people do plant a fall crop of kale and collards. These hearty greens can survive a frost and actually sweeten in flavor.

Basil nodes
Photo by Atcha Dorn
Cilantro and dill can be cut down to about an inch and will resprout. Don’t fret about flowers and seeds. Both of these plants are easy to store seeds from. Also cilantro seeds are coriander - a common cooking spice and dill seeds are commonly used in making pickles.

Garlic harvest
Photo by Atcha Dorn
Let me remind you about the Ball Blue Book; this is the food preservation guide that I use with safe success. You can find it virtually anywhere, but I recommend Downtown Home and Garden. The staff there is knowledgeable and friendly.
The gold finches have been enjoying the sunflowers. The ruby throated hummingbirds have been enjoying the jewelweed. The bees are enjoying the bee balm and echinacea. I hope your gardening is going well. If you haven’t smelled primrose yet this summer, I highly recommend it.

Bee balm
Photo by Atcha Dorn

Echinacea
Photo by Atcha Dorn
This is the fifth entry to the garden blog. Lately I’ve been gardening more than writing, but future entries will follow. Happy summer! Kevin Dorn.