Thread: Getting back to living off the land.....

I have an NZ made electric dehydrator. I just cut the figs into relatively thin portions and spread them out on the trays. I can't remember how long they took to dry last time. I have read that if you dry things above a certain temperature they will lose some nutritional value. But lately I've cranked up the heat to get the job done. I figure that I could eat supermarket confectionery after dinner.... or I could eat hastily dried fruit. No matter how quick I dry it, it still tastes pretty good and it is natural.

I will possibly dry some apples this year as well. One of my favourite dried fruits is pear. The flavour gets concentrated nicely. Unfortunately I don't have a pear tree.

I dry tomatoes. These are excellent to put on the pizzas we make during the year. And we might toss a few small bits into salads. Canned tomatoes are cheap, so it is a waste to use the dried ones in casseroles etc. I also make tomato sauce.

My tomato crop wasn't wonderful this year.... and once again the peppers didn't produce. I have a friend who got some decent peppers, but his were grown in a glasshouse .... even though, in my mind, they should flourish well outdoors in 'sunny Nelson'. But I've never grown a decent crop of peppers outdoors.

I am on a quest to find the open pollinated variety of tomato that does the best in my area. The first quality I seek is reliability... closely followed by flavour. I've grown many heirloom varieties. This year the best and earliest producer was Bloody Butcher. I've found psyllids on my tomatoes every season for about the last four years. And later in the season the stink beetles/vegetable bugs climb all over the fruit and I suspect they are often the reason that the quality of the fruit deteriorates around this time. So my current philosophy is to grow early varieties that will give me a crop before the psyllid and vege bugs arrive in big numbers.

I think the best variety of tomato I've grown is Stupice. They are a potato leafed type which aren't overly vigorous. They produce early with comparatively good crops. They can be a bit bland when eaten raw, but they are fantastic cooked or dried. I think I will go back to growing them next season. I save my own seeds and I keep the seed in the fridge where it seems to stay viable for several years. I look forward to planting my seeds in the first week of September. I place the seeds in a multi-folded wet paper towel which I keep in a plastic bag on top of my fridge. The seeds generally start to sprout in about three to five days. Before the sprouts get too long I plant them into pots which I keep under a plastic cloche. Starting the seeds in the paper lets me know ASAP whether I have good seeds or not. I also think I save a little growing time.

I'm always happy to share seeds if I have a surplus.

Originally Posted by gonetropo

i planted 10 tomato plants for the mrs, got bugga all off them this year (well enough to keep her happy). chili plants failed miserably too. interestingly the neighbours plants plants across his back fence had similar issues.
at least i got a sack of spuds out of the patch this year so that keeps me happy.

The soil is very hungry where you live.You might be best putting in some raised beds and growing in fresh topsoil rather than trying to improve what you have.

Originally Posted by norsk

The soil is very hungry where you live.You might be best putting in some raised beds and growing in fresh topsoil rather than trying to improve what you have.

they are in raised beds and the soil came from a garden center, had good result last year but this year was abysmal
now the wife wants me to extend the vege patch and she's the only one that eats the stuff !!!

A very relevant thread right now...does anybody have a toilet paper tree I can take a cutting from, ?also a paracetamol tree would be good as well. thanx.

Originally Posted by Max Headroom

A very relevant thread right now...does anybody have a toilet paper tree I can take a cutting from, ?also a paracetamol tree would be good as well. thanx.

dont be silly, there are no painkillers in the jungle cos the parrots eat em all

Originally Posted by gonetropo

dont be silly, there are no painkillers in the jungle cos the parrots eat em all

I wondered why they got so pop eyed and screeched a lot. Junkies.

I suppose I should try and put some netting over my fig tree like you did Phil. I'd have to buy more though, and it is a fairly big tree. Currently all my netting is in use on my grapes. I used to hang old CD discs in the fruit trees and vines, and I think it helped in the early stages. Now, it seems, when the birds see the discs it is like a visual dinner gong for them. 'Whoo-hoo .... Stephen is telling us the fruit is ready. Bring a friend'.

Got the figs sliced and in the dryer.

There is a organic insecticide called Entrust that is very good on caterpillars and Syllids if you want to go that way.

figs are so simple to clone my solution to not getting enough because of birds or nabours is to plant a dozen of their cuttings in places where you want them to grow

Thanks for telling me about Entrust. Never heard of it till now. I was using neem oil and diatomaceous earth powder but I'm unsure how effective these were.

Figs certainly do seem to grow well from cuttings... and sometimes shoots that come from the base of the tree form their own roots. There is a trend down here to plant 'edibles' in parks, and the guy in charge of planting in our local park is really keen on figs. He propagates a lot of them, and the variety he seems to favour is 'Brown Turkey'.

The trays on the dryer are around 38 cm in diameter. I have seven stackable trays, but I could buy more and stack them higher. In the past I've tried drying in a home made 'solar' dryer. I also dried a fair bit of stuff over a home-made wood-fired cookstove back when such things were possible. An electric dryer costs a bit to purchase and to operate, but it is very convenient and not dependent on the weather. We don't have a woodstove in our current home, so that isn't an option at present. I haven't kept records of drying times, but if I run it fairly warm I think a batch of tomato slices will dry overnight. I like to dry apples at a cooler temperature in the hope more nutritional value will be retained... so these might take 24 to 36 hours I suppose depending on how thick I've cut them. But I'm just guessing really. I should pay more attention.

I've occasionally dried strips of venison offcuts for dog tucker just by hanging them from a rope. It is good stuff to have on hand and the dog enjoyed it. I also made a few batches of biltong and I dried these by hanging the meat indoors. I didn't really like the finished product though. It was edible, but damn it got hard unless I was prepared to put it in the fridge or freezer once it got to the right consistency. I prefer fried steak.

Originally Posted by Max Headroom

A very relevant thread right now...does anybody have a toilet paper tree I can take a cutting from, ?also a paracetamol tree would be good as well. thanx.

Not a tree, but you could plant a row of 'Flannel Leaf' plenty in wet high country areas

Greetings All,
I believe that Rangiora leaves, which have a soft downy underside, were known as bushman's toilet paper in earlier times. Probably best picked as required though with a short use by date if hoarded.
Grandpamac.

Waterblaster.

Greetings All,
I believe that Rangiora leaves, which have a soft downy underside, were known as bushman's toilet paper in earlier times. Probably best picked as required though with a short use by date if hoarded.
Grandpamac.

For headaches and fever Hildreth's book How to Survive suggests a decoction of Mingi mingi leaves and the inner bark of Totara respectively. You will have to Google what a decoction is exactly. I think it is boiling in water and leaving to cool but probably best not to try this at home anyway.
All sorted Max Headroom?
Grandpamac.