A Narrative of the University of Oregon Urban Farm

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Edible Flowers

Did you know there are some flowers you can eat? And they are delicious! As summer approaches at the Urban Farm, there are a variety of tasty flowers in bloom. Keep your eye out for these unassuming treats as you meander through the farm.

Borage: This is a flower you might be familiar with by now if you have spent much time in the garden. It grows and spreads profusely after being introduced to a garden. The little indigo blooms are edible and have a mildly sweet taste. Make sure to only eat the petals and avoid the stem, which is rough and fuzzy.

Daylily: These are some of the best edible flowers, in my humble opinion. The petals are large and fleshy, and they taste super sweet! Tear off one petal for a taste, or eat the whole flower for a great snack.

Nasturtium: This annual flower is not sweet, as you might expect it to be. It is instead deliciously peppery. The soft crunch is oh so satisfying.

Comfrey: A Compost Companion

It’s mid-May and comfrey is blooming in the garden, bringing our attention to this wonderful plant. The flowers are unexpected–sweet, bell shaped purple blooms drooping in umbles. Comfrey is a gem of the garden, providing many uses and benefits. At the Urban Farm, we like to add them to nearly every batch of compost because their leaves contain lots of nitrogen, phosphorus, AND potassium–the agricultural nutrient trifecta, NPK. 

NPK are the primary elements of every fertilizer. They are the basis of what you need to grow plants. You can make your own fertilizer out of just comfrey leaves and water. All you have to do is fill a bucket with about a quart of comfrey leaves and 4-5 gallons of water. Let it sit for a month or so, and you’ll have a stinky brown liquid to fertilize your crops. You can add comfrey with any method of adding nutrients to the soil/plants, like mulching, leaf mould heaps, or simply the bottom of a pot or hole you’re growing vegetables in. 

Comfrey is a wonderful plant to have growing in every garden. The nutrient-dense, prolific perennial not only acts as fertilizer but also attracts pollinators with their sweet purple blooms and has medicinal properties. Comfrey has soothing, anti-inflammatory properties and can be made into an herbal salve for skin conditions like dryness, rashes, and abrasions. It grows back rapidly after each harvest, making it a great plant to use throughout the season. Grow comfrey to serve a multitude of needs and add vibrant health to your garden!

 

Garden Hoops

To maximize space on the Urban Farm, we are always trying to think  of news ways to grow our food vertically. A few years ago, we installed these garden hoops to act as a trellis system throughout the farm. We use them to grow beans, peas and sometimes even squash!

The construction process was pretty simple and the cost was relatively low. We used cattle fencing that we bought from a nearby feed store to act as the trellis. I think it was about $25 bucks a pop for each length of fencing. We hammered some rebar deep into the ground, then fastened the cattle fencing to the rebar every couple feet on either side. They made these great, wide hoops that are about six or seven feet in height.

The trick to growing squash on the trellis is to keep careful watch on the vines. You need to train them to climb it in the right spots. As they develop little squash fruits, you need to support them with old nylon. That makes little hammocks that will stretch as the squash grows, otherwise the fruit gets too heavy.

We have a few other versions of trellis systems at the farm, but this is definitely one of our favorites. You can grow a ton of things on them and you get a nice micro-climate underneath to grow cooler veggies.

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