I have grown rhubarb for years and have shared through the years many recipes on this site for rhubarb cake, pie and have even made wine with rhubarb. It is an easy perennial to grow and can be paired with many of the fruits that I also grow. I have canned it and it also freezes wonderfully. On the new property here it is not quite as prolific as it was on the Missouri farm but it still grows well enough to keep me in rhubarb for all my many uses.
This last week started out great with nice warm days on Monday so we took the time to separate one of the rhubarb crowns in my garden. I try to separate the crowns every three years or so or they get too thick and the centers start dying out.
The large crown was just starting to come up from winter dormancy. The root system was very large and we ended up having to take the machete to it in the end but we managed to get it into 7 pieces.
We had so much help of the web footed variety just waiting for any bug or grub to be turned up.
In the end I ended up with 7 separate plants all planted in a row down the front of a blueberry bed. It should look nice there and be out of the way. We added lots of worm castings, compost and soybean meal to the hole to help with fertility when we planted each piece. These become massive plants and will need it. I love free plants and I could have also potted them up and probably sold them on the community bulletin board generating income for the garden expenses had I wanted to take the time. While this is a lot of plants I am sure I can come up with something to do with all that rhubarb.
I love perennial plants that I can propagate myself to plant in the garden without the added expense of buying new plants as they are expensive right now. Perennials like this are great to fill in the holes in a garden.
With rain, frost and snow in the forecast for the rest of the week I am glad to have got this done. For the remainder of the week I have some canning projects to tackle.
Blessings from The Holler
The Canned Quilter
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I did the very same thing this past year. They are looking good so far. Rhubarb pie is Hubby's favorite :-)
ReplyDeleteOnly one of my 3 rhubarb plants looks very good right now. I bought a new one at Lowe's and it was $8.98. So you saved a bundle by dividing yours!
ReplyDeleteDid you dig up the whole plant and then divide it? Or just cut pieces off down including some roots? I have cut off pieces of my hostas and thinned them so wanted to check how you did this rhubarb. I made my first rhubarb strawberry pie this year. Sooooo yummy! I definitely need to plant some!
ReplyDeleteDug the whole plant up, chopped it into pieces and then replanted the pieces. Lots of compost because they get really big so need lots of food.
DeleteMy mom always said not to pick off the new transplants. Do you do the same? I just divided mine into three this fall and I'm just starting to see growth. Thank you for the advice and great content, I really enjoy it.
ReplyDeleteSame here I don't pick any sprouts off but just divide every 3 years.
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