lorax

Jeez, Michael. They're really good sources of protein! It's no stranger than eating peanuts.

Eric

Yeah, but peanuts don't squirm when ya try to stick them in your mouth. BTW, a friend caught me one, yesterday, and I Almost did it... but chickened out. What do they taste like?

lorax

Neither do locusts, after you pop them in the popper. They're kind of nutty.

Eric

Okay ... In the popper might not be so bad & we get Lots of locusts around here. BTW, it was a grasshopper I tried to eat.
Oh, and Thanx for the pic of the Andean Spectacled Bear !! Can't imagine a little bear, that cute, being on the endangered list. Why?

lorax

Habitat endangerment, mostly - they require fairly specific forest conditions (cloud forests above 1200m of altitude, where both Cecropia palmata and Neurolepis nana grow in abundance.) This is also prime land for vacation properties and cool-crop farming (maize, wheat, barley) so people are invading something fierce. Some farmers think they eat lambs, but that's pretty spurious given both their size and vegetarian habits. Notwithstanding, they still get hunted a bit. Also, Spectacled Bears used to be very popular in circuses down here, largely because they're quite calm and docile.

I have a friend (Rodrigo in Alto Choco) who runs a Spectacled Bear Rehab center, where he goes out into the cloudforest with former circus bears and teaches them how to be bears again, right up to how to climb certain trees for the big edible beans, and how to find termites. He also does catch and release with wild bears that are in people's farmland - he tranqs them and returns them to his 50,000 hectare cloudforest reserve, where they won't be bothered by people.

Eric

Good to hear about the help they're getting . Good to hear about the 50,000 hectare cloudforest reserve, too. A little critter that inoffensive & cute should Never face extinction. Don't think I care to go to any circuses... Back on-topic :

Bigdog, I notice you live in Tennessee. Can you grow sugarcane there, especially, the purple-leafed S. Officinarum?

browndrake

I was talking to an old-timer last night. He told me that the "old-timers" used to grow sugarcane here for molasses. They probably haven't done it though in 70+ years. He has no idea what cultivar or any other info about it. Just that they did it and that parts from the old crusher or grinder or whatever it is are still out there. He says that they hooked horses up to it and they would go around in circles processing the cane.

Any suggestions on specific cultivars? I know that there are several that have been bred for Florida and other places stateside..but many of them do no produce seed. I think that I would like to get one that will seed and be true to form from seed.

Beth, do you think that Flor del Azucar would survive here? A mixed type like that sounds wonderful. If not that do you or anybody have suggestions of another similar type that might do well here?

Open to any ideas.

I would like to be able to produce 50-100 kilos of sugar/molasses a year.

Thanks

aaron

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conejov

Looks like Mitch is going to sneak it in!


Browndrake & micheal keep us updated on your progress... oh and dont for get PICTURES.

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lorax

I have no idea, but it might be worth a shot...

browndrake

I am not sure why, but I previously had the impression those were just ornamentals

aaron

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Eric

Appearances can be deceiving. There's often a Twilight Zone in the world of plants. Peppers often have Euglenas for this; some peppers I grow are labelled ornamental & yet no hotter than a Jalapena. We use them in salsas every summer .

browndrake

a little update:

I learned that there somebody has some seed from the original sugarcane grown here. The seed is OLD. One of the local nurseries is going to try and germinate it. I am going to try to get some of it, if even one plant...I think that it would be nice, for historic reasons. I am still looking at other cultivars for my principal sugarcane

aaron

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Eric

Would sure appreciate it if you could let me know how that turns out . I'm a bit of a history buff, myself.

Moodene

I grow 2 kinds of sugacane variety here. I posted pictures in my gallery ..The variegated kind and the purple color kind..

browndrake

nice pics.

thanks

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momoese

Very nice!

browndrake

Beth,

You say that there, they grow the sugarcane right in on the floodplain. How would it work actually in water or slightly boggy ground. I could plant in the creek bottoms here. They are full of tamarisks and other such plants. Sometimes there is no surface water, sometimes there is, (often 4-6 inches of slow moving water). When there is no surface water, there is still much subsurface.

Does that sound like something that would work for sugarcane? Or is it subject to root rot or other such with so much water? If so, would it be okay, if on the dryer land near the flowing water, with close subsurface? or ???

thanks

aaron

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lorax

The floodplain is only boggy for about a month each year, during the flood - however, cane will grow in marginal and swamped land with little difficulty, provided that you're starting with ratoons or seedlings rather than unsprouted seed. It's a water hog to begin with, and there is really very little you can do to kill it.

jjjankovsky

hey beth...good to see your posts

in my area of mexico, the cane producers are up a bit in altitude, but in a rain shadow...

looks like processing is an issue without a good grinder...maybe one of those 8hp units found up north to grind yard waste...

bottom line, it's sugar, if you use it...my grandfolk lived out on the plains in colorado where the lowly sugar beet was the plant of choice, and i've never heard anyone interested in growing that plant instead of buying a bag of sugar at the store,,,

but, if one considers the archetectural qualities of a 12 foot grass in the garden (think background), sugar cane is a great grass...a nice background to augment those 6' fences that cities limit the gardens to...

all ornamental grases require yearly work...and sometimes very sharp ground tools and maybe a big maul to cut the old plant pad...but what the heck, grasses are some way cool gardening...

on the other side beth...everything settled down down there?