Some of our Ginger, Galangal and Turmeric plants were growing so well in one of our steel wicking beds that they were bowing out the sides! These cuttings (more like ‘hackings’) relieves the pressure a little! I shifted another of our Turmeric patches too, to a place where they will get a little more light – they’ve done well over the last couple of years but could do better. They should love the increase in sunlight along with the increased humidity (they’re tropical afterall). In our crowded garden, we had to make some space to put the Turmeric so I shortened a path that we rarely use, added some good soil and planted it there.
Who says Ginger is hard to grow in SA? I even wrote an article for it in Grass Roots a long while back exploring my technique and the info in that is here on this website in a post titled Guaranteeing Ginger. I did a talk one Winter at the Precinct, titled (tongue in cheek, of course) ‘Theoretical Ginger Growing’ on the topic. The title came about because it was totally the wrong time of year so it was all theoretical!
Here’s a bit of trivia too. Did you know that there are 2 kinds of Galangal that you can get down this way. They have many names but we call them Thai and Filipino from the nationalities of the people we originally got rhizome cuttings from.
The one we call Thai flowers at the end of the stems, looking almost like the flowers are growing out of the leaves themselves. The Filipino variety flowers in the same way as Ginger does, with a strongly and beautifully scented flower coming up from the rhizomes.
It’s not the best time to harvest these but needs must, as they say… The best time is when the leaves die back for the cold weather. That’s when the plant is pumping a lot of nutrients into the rhizome for storage over winter and a head start late next spring. The last couple of years though, the weather has been warmer so the plants have stayed green throughout.
Some of you may have seen that I've been writing a series of posts about herbs and making herbal remedies at home. I want to share what I know of this topic so that, as the world gets crazier, folks will have other avenues of medical care, namely those of themselves and their community. If you look back over this blog, you can see heaps of info on the topic, plus loads and loads of posts on herbs and using Australian bushfoods from a white perspective. If you haven't been around on in the @hivegarden and @naturalmedicine communities for long, you may be interested in looking back. There's w-a-a-a-a-y too much there for me to repost and the Hive system doesn't let you vote on old posts so, if you're happy with what you find, I believe that there is now a tip option...
