Seed St. Louis

🍎🍐 We've heard from lots of orchards that they are having issues with fire blight this year! What is fire blight? It is a disease that typically spreads while the trees are blooming and also in wet weather. A telltale sign is blackened branch tips. If these damaged areas are not removed, the fire blight can kill the tree. It can also be spread to other trees by pollinators, wind, and rain.

What to do if you have fire blight 🔥
✂️ Prune all limbs that have evidence of desiccated leaves and blackened wood, 12" above the infection. Sanitize pruners/saws with diluted isopropyl or other sanitizer AFTER EVERY CUT. Throw cut limbs in the trash; do not compost or leave them in the orchard. Pruning can happen when you first see symptoms; it doesn't have to be when trees are dormant. Avoid rainy and windy days to help prevent the spread.
🍏 Clean up all fallen fruit, leaves, branches, and other debris around the tree and throw it away.
🌳 If the infection has reached the main trunk of the tree, consider cutting it down. If fire blight is on the top of the trunk, you may be able to remove just the infected part, but monitor closely for further symptoms.
🍐 Do not plant apples, pears, or other potentially susceptible plants in the same spot.
🍎 If fire blight is a regular problem for you, consider using Monterey Complete Disease Control as a preventative spray. It is a specific beneficial bacteria that is helpful to reduce fireblight infections; it's like a probiotic for your tree. It's best as a preventative, so ideally, you would spray as the leaves are emerging, but you can use it anytime.

Example pictures of fire blight are below! The third photo is of a tree that was killed by it. 😭

Come see us this Saturday, 11 am-1 pm at EarthDance Organic Farm School for their Pollinator Party!!

🥬 Chun Mei was one of the winners of our bok choy variety trial due to its impressive resistance to bolting until July, which is unusual for bok choy grown in the St. Louis area. Even more unusual is the size of this particular Chun Mei, harvested on May 21st and weighing in at 4 pounds 4 ounces! 😲

We typically expect this variety to produce baby heads, but this is no baby. Never underestimate the magic of last season's free city compost and good spring weather at the Bell Community Garden!

✏️🌱 There is still time for schools to apply for one of Sprouts Foundation's Neighborhood Grants! Grants are up to $5,000 and support school gardens and community nutrition programs.

Learn more and apply here:

Sprouts Foundation Grants | Sprouts Farmers Market Our Neighborhood Grants support organizations working at the community level, providing nutrition education and healthy food access to kids.

🍎🍐🍑 While removing fruit from trees may seem counterproductive, it's actually beneficial to us and the tree! Apples often produce clusters of three or more fruits, which can weigh down branches and cause them to become crowded. In spring and early summer, use clean pruners to thin to one or two fruits per cluster. This is a good opportunity to identify apples that have been partially eaten, bruised, etc.

Removing excess fruits allows the tree to put more energy into the remaining fruits (in other words, get bigger fruit!), plus gives them more space to grow! Fruit thinning is also beneficial for pears and peaches.

See the difference in fruit size in the second picture from a branch that was thinned and one that was not!

If you know of someone 18 and older who may be interested in this part-time paid internship at the Missouri Botanical Garden, the application deadline is this Friday, May 22nd!

Here is the list for what we will have for sale tomorrow, Saturday, May 15th, 9-11 am! It will be at our Carriage House, 3815 Bell Ave., St. Louis, MO 63108.

🌱Sweet Potato Slips
🍅 Tomatoes: Jet Star, San Marzano, Mikado, Brad's Atomic Grape, Yellow Korean Apple
🌶️ Peppers: Lemon Drop, Jalapeno Early, Shish*to, Corbaci
🍆 Egg Plant: Ping Tung
🌿 Basils: Thai, Lemon, Prospero Red (matures to be very purple!), Treviso (very low quantities!)
🌱 Other random herbs (all in very low quantities): Thyme, Rosemary, Parsley
🌼Native Perennials: Hairy Beardtongue, Coral Bells, Bowman's Root, Ohio Horsemint, River Oats Grass, Purple Penstemon

There will also be some annual flowers and luffa!

This fun virtual class is next Wednesday at 4 pm!! Make sure to register at the link in the original post below!

🌿 Growing Native Food Crops in St. Louis
📅 Wednesday, May 20, 4:00 pm CT

𝐌𝐚𝐲 𝟐𝟎: 𝐆𝐫𝐨𝐰 𝐍𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐯𝐞! 𝐖𝐞𝐛𝐢𝐧𝐚𝐫: 𝐆𝐫𝐨𝐰𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐍𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐯𝐞 𝐅𝐨𝐨𝐝 𝐂𝐫𝐨𝐩𝐬 𝐢𝐧 𝐒𝐭. 𝐋𝐨𝐮𝐢𝐬
Before it was common to have foods imported from across the ocean, Missouri agriculture provided all the food we needed. Fruits, veggies, grains, and even desserts can be grown in our own backyards… but how?

Join Chani Sorkin of Seed St. Louis as they discuss the growing needs of edible Missouri native trees, shrubs, and herbaceous plants that are easy and accessible to St. Louisans, as well as how Seed St. Louis works with native plantings in gardens across the region.

This free webinar, to be held via Zoom, will include a presentation and a live question-and-answer session. The webinar will be recorded, and a link to the recording will be sent to all registrants and posted to the MPF YouTube channel.

Wednesday, May 20 at 4:00 p.m. 1 GNPCP CEU. Register here: https://ow.ly/vY4P50YVNVq

𝑃ℎ𝑜𝑡𝑜 𝑜𝑓 𝑠𝑒𝑟𝑣𝑖𝑐𝑒𝑏𝑒𝑟𝑟𝑦 (𝐴𝑚𝑒𝑙𝑎𝑛𝑐ℎ𝑖𝑒𝑟 𝑎𝑟𝑏𝑜𝑟𝑒𝑎) 𝑏𝑦 𝐶ℎ𝑎𝑛𝑖 𝑆𝑜𝑟𝑘𝑖𝑛

💚 We're back with another tip to reduce food waste! If you grow or buy fresh asparagus, then you know the ends of asparagus always get tough and woody if you let them grow too long or let them sit too long in the fridge. These too-tough-to-eat bits still have life in them by making asparagus soup! This is the perfect way to capture the delicious asparagus flavor from these seemingly compost-bound pieces.

🥣 This wonderful recipe from Alan Bergo, the ForagerChef, shows you how to use all those asparagus ends. For those growing asparagus, we particularly like this recipe as a way to extend the asparagus season. Throw all of the woody asparagus ends in the freezer as you harvest, then make soup to get the garden-grown taste of asparagus any time of year!

Asparagus End Soup (What to do with Asparagus Ends) Wondering, what to do with asparagus ends? Use them to make this creamy asparagus soup from James Beard Award-winning Chef Alan Bergo.