Perennial Vegetables (Part II)

This is Part II of a two-part review of the book. (Read Part I of the review of Eric Toensmeier's Perennial Vegetables.)

Toensmeier, Eric. Perennial Vegetables: From Artichoke to 'Zuiki' Taro, a Gardener's Guide to Over 100 Delicious, Easy-to-Grow Edibles. Chelsea Green Publishing: White River Junction, Vermont, 2007.

Part II of the book begins with a caution about sampling too much of too many new food plants for the first time. This is an important caution, given the prevalence of food allergies. Sample slowly! I was also a little taken aback to see how frequently some of these perennials have poisonous cousins and look alikes. Exercise caution and know what you are eating before you taste!

After that brief caution, Part II plunges into the meat (OK, the vegetables) of the subject in earnest. What follows is a list of edible perennials, accompanied by a map of the U.S. climate range for the particular plant (similar to the maps in bird-watching books); shaded pink where the crop is perennial and yellow where it might be grown as an annual. Along with the Latin name of the plant and known common names, Toensmeier provides the following for each entry (as applicable): Overview, Crop Description, Climate, Tolerances and Preferences, Naturalization, Pests-Diseases-Weeds, Propagation-Planting-Cultivation, Harvest and Storage, Uses, and Related Species and Breeding Potential. Wow! These "notes" on various plants are alone worth the price of admission. (However, I should note that Toensmeier breaks his pattern sometimes and treats some plant in a cursory manner, e.g., Lovage, pp. 86-87.) I cannot wait to try a few new plantings and report on the results this year. But, of course, I live in what Toensmeier calls the "Cold Temperate" section of the country in Zone 5b Indianapolis. I'll not be able to plant anything now until the ground thaws. We woke today to a temperature of 16F in an area that regularly experiences temperatures as as low as -16F. It will be March 2010 before I am able to plant, and many of the perennials will likely take a full year or more to become fully established. So, my sampling of new vegetables will be slow. As indicated in the previous review, though Toensmeier discusses growing tropical perennials in some locations as annuals, I plan, because of my particular climate, to ignore the tropical plants and those for the warmer Southeast and review the book with an eye toward its greatest usefulness to me here in the Cold Temperate Midwest.

So, what can I and will I plant? Herewith, my personal list of potential perennials, with an asterisk beside those I plan to try in 2010:

Onion Family, Alliaceae

Arrowhead, tubers cooked like potatoes.

Multiplier Onions

*Ramps (wild leek)

Perennial Onions

The Celery Family, Apiaceae

*Lovage

Water Celery

*Skirret

The Aroid Family, Araceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Spikenard Family, Araliaceae

Udo

The Aster Family, Asteraceae

Chicory and Dandelion

Sunchoke (Jerusalem Artichoke)

Fuki

Scorzonera

The Malabar Spinach Family, Basellaceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Cabbage Family, Brassicaceae

Turkish Rocket

Sea Kale

Watercress

The Cactus Family, Cactaceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Canna Family, Cannaceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Papaya Family, Caricaceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Goosefoot Family, Chenopodiaceae

*Good King Henry

The Morning Glory Family, Convolvulaceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Squash Family, Cucurbitaceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Sedge Family, Cyperaceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Yam Family, Dioscoreaceae

*Yams (D. japonica and Chinese yam)

The Wood-Fern Family, Dryopteridaceae

Ostrich Fern

The Spurge Family, Euphorbiaceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Pea Family, Fabaceae

*Groundnut

The Mint Family, Lamiaceae

Chinese Artichoke

The Lily Family, Liliaceae

Asparagus

Camass

Daylily

Giant Solomon's Seal

The Mallow Family, Malvaceae

Musk Mallow

The Neem Family, Meliaceae

Fragrant Spring Tree

The Mulberry Family, Moraceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Moringa Family, Moringaceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Banana Family, Musaceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Lotus Family, Nelumbonaceae

Water Lotus

The Wood-Sorrel Family, Oxalidaceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Pokeweed Family, Phytolaccaceae

Pokeweed

The Grass Family, Poaceae

Running Bamboos

the Smartweed Family, Polygonaceae

Rhubarb

*Sorrel

The Nightshade Family, Solanaceae

Wolfberry

The New Zealand Spinach Family, Tetragoniaceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Linden Family, Tiliaceae

Linden

The Nasturtium Family, Tropaeolaceae

NONE AVAILABLE

The Nettle Family, Urticaceae

Stinging Nettle and Wood Nettle

Remember, I have listed above ONLY what Toensmeier has claimed is hardy as a perennial to Zone 5b. Part III of the book is entitled "Resources" and includes lists of perennial vegetables for each climate type (similar to what I have done above, but for all of the plant hardiness zones and with greater detail, including variety names and Latin names). He also includes a list of recommended books in the following categories: useful plants, permaculture and edible landscaping, history-ecology-native/non-native species, garden climates, and gardening techniques, water gardening, pests-diseases, and propagation. There is a short, but excellent list of organizations and web sites, and lists of plant and seed sources and garden suppliers. Finally, Toensmeier includes a bibliography and helpful index.

I heartily recommend the book. It is well worth the $35 list price. The only downside is that the cultivation of perennials as garden vegetables is so new that the details are sometimes sketchy at best, because sketchy details are all that is available. Toensmeier has done us a great service in drawing so much information together under one roof. It is now our turn to do the hard work of collecting, propagating, and breeding these plants--and introducing them to our friends and neighbors--until they become successful, mainstream garden varieties. I for one wish winter would hurry up and end so that I can get started.

[Note: The above title was provided for review by the publisher. No remuneration was received for the review.]

Perennial Vegetables

This is Part I of a two-part review of the book.
(Read Part II of the review of Eric Toensmeier's Perennial Vegetables.)

Toensmeier, Eric. Perennial Vegetables: From Artichoke to 'Zuiki' Taro, a Gardener's Guide to Over 100 Delicious, Easy-to-Grow Edibles. Chelsea Green Publishing: White River Junction, Vermont, 2007.

If you are a gardener interested in sustainability, the "holy grail" must be a more-or-less stable perennial polyculture. (See Wes Jackson's work with perennial grains at The Land Institute, for a related example.) In other words, you want a garden that mimics nature. The problem is that most of our food gardens are the opposite: we grow lots of annuals, mostly of a very few varieties. That is why, if you are anything like me, you already know what artichokes are--and even the difference between artichokes and Jerusalem artichokes--but you may never have heard of 'Zuiki' Taro or any of the "Over 100 Delicious, Easy-to-Grow Edibles" heralded by Eric Toensmeier's subtitle. His goal is to introduce people who garden for food to 100+ new food crops, all perennials. He wants to ring the changes on perennial vegetables from A to Z! Does he succeed? Yes, in my opinion he does. My only caveat to the readers of this review is that my experience with these plants is very limited. For that reason, and because I have gardened for food avidly now for a decade, I think I am directly in the bulls eye of Mr. Toensmeier's target audience. For far too many of the plants that Toensmeier names I cannot provide an independent evaluation of his recommendations. Most of these plants I have never grown or tasted, or even seen with any recognition! And that is what is so exciting. I cannot wait to devote sections of my garden to this new (to me) kind of vegetable next year. Already I grow lots of perennial fruit, so the addition of perennial vegetables is only natural. The key questions, it appears, will be where to find good varieties of the vegetables Toensmeier names ("Only a small number of nurseries and seed companies offer even the best perennial vegetables!") and whether I agree that they are palatable. (This latter appears to be a point of much debate.)

Part I: Gardening with Perennial Vegetables

Before we take a look at a few examples of the many new varieties that will be on our Zone 5b purchasing list for next spring, let's review part one of the book. I'll call this the "How to Garden" section. It is devoted to general information about gardening, with an eye toward the gardening of perennial vegetables. If you already have experience with perennial ornamental plants, fruits, and nuts, there will not be much new in this section. You already know much that is required to plan the garden, choose the plants, prepare the soil, and plant and care for your new "babies." You know how agonizingly long it can take for your plants to "grow up" (especially if more mature specimens are not readily available for planting), how to watch for and mitigate problems with species that are "aggressive," and all about plant pests and diseases.

Given the relation of perennial vegetable growing to the concept of permaculture, it isn't surprising that a whole chapter of the book is devoted to "Design Ideas" (chapter 2). I must admit to a bit of bias here. I have never quite been able to swallow the whole permaculture ideal, especially as presented by Introduction to Permaculture. It has always seemed a little bit Rube Goldberg to me. Permaculture as a system and movement just seems a bit too complicated and totalizing. The idea that humans can so totally plan and design every aspect of their environment without something going wildly a muck seems to me to smack of the same sort of hubris that afflicts rampant development. Too much talk of "conscious design" and the "harmonious integration" of the elements of a garden make me want to say, "you haven't seen my garden!" And, when I look at such fully detailed plans, "you don't have my limited budget." My garden is a constant flux between chaos and order, with chaos always on the verge of gaining the upper hand. All that having been said, the great thing about this chapter (and the whole book) is that Toensmeier doesn't present a "system" so much as real, good, reliable information. With regard to permaculture, for example, he merely provides a few drawings of exemplary garden layouts and recommends several resources for further study, including Edible Forest Gardens (2 volume set), which he co-authored. He also recommends The Complete Book of Edible Landscaping: Home Landscaping with Food-Bearing Plants and Resource-Saving Techniques, Designing And Maintaining Your Edible Landscape Naturally, and Food Not Lawns: How to Turn Your Yard into a Garden And Your Neighborhood into a Community.

For the purposes of "Selecting Species" (chapter 3), Toensmeier divides the country into "eight basic climate types." The climates are

• Extreme Cold: High Mountains and Frozen Northlands
  
• Cold Temperate: East, Midwest, and Mountain West
  
• Cool Maritime: The Pacific Northwest
  
• Hot and Humid: The Southeast
  
• Arid and Hot: The Southwest
  
• Mediterranean and Mild Subtropical: Southern and Coastal California
  
• Tropical Lowlands: Hawaii and South Florida
  
• The Hawaiian Upland Tropics
  

Indianapolis at Zone 5b is in the Cold Temperate section of the country. Though Toensmeier discusses growing tropical perennials in some locations as annuals, I plan, because of my particular climate, to ignore the tropical plants and those for the warmer Southeast and review the book with an eye toward its greatest usefulness to me here in the Cold Temperate Midwest. A subsection of this chapter is entitled, "You Might Be Surprised by What You Can Grow." While I trust that Toensmeier knows whereof he speaks, I'll want to verify that before sinking a lot of money into plants that may not be hardy in my zone. For example, Toensmeier lists the groundnut (Apios americana, aka Potato bean) as "extremely cold-hardy..., being hardy to Zone 3." However, the only source I've found for them as of now (12/01/2009) is in the Edible Landscaping catalog. Edible Landscaping lists the plant as recommended for Zones 6-8. At $15 for the quart or $25 for the gallon, I'll think twice before going all out. Maybe a quart first just to see whether I can get them established? My hunch is that the catalog is playing it safe with the USDA Hardiness Zone info and that Toensmeier may be stretching. At any rate, Zone 5b is close enough to Zone 6 for this gardener to gamble, what with global warming and all that jazz.

One potentially controversial aspect of the book should be mentioned. Toensmeier advocates a rethinking of the whole issue of nonnative plants. Following David Theodoropoulos (Invasion Biology: Critique of a Pseudoscience), he suggests that the whole "native" vs. "nonnative" plant issue has been overblown, or that the native plant movement has become too rigid. More to the point, he advocates the use of some non-native perennial vegetables.

Toensmeier offers an extensive section on plant propagation and breeding in chapter 4, "Techniques." Throughout the book he advocates that we backyard gardeners must once again regain this significant part of our gardening heritage to become effective plant breeders and propagators once again. We seem to have lost that art, especially the art of breeding, and with it some of the variety that used to characterize food gardening. More to the point, many of these perennial vegetables are still very hard to come by. Propagating them ourselves, and improving the available varieties, will for a while be our best and sometimes only choice.

[Note: The above title was provided for review by the publisher. No remuneration was received for the review.]