Kitchen Garden Forum

I've called them worse names than that!

I found out by accident that if you pull them out (not the sporing heads)and put them in a plastic bag and leave them for a year (was supposed to go in the bin), you get a really nice fine crunbly brown material that makes excellent soil conditioner.
Jennifer

Hi Jenny
That sounds like a good idea. But at the risk of sounding totally thick - what is a sporing head? They come up out of the ground like a pinkish spike and eventually open up to bright green bottle brush - is that the sporing head?
Polly.

Yo!

Could turn it into a pond and grow spring fed trout!

Loz

When I first stocked up with rhubarb here I nearly lost all 17 crowns, the last few I put in the polytunnel and I now have a rhubarb forest in there, I think a lot depends on the type of soil that you have, here it is clay-like, liquid in winter, dries hard in summer until humus increased, previous garden was very sandy, light soil.
Allan

Hi Pol,
Most horsetails come up as you describe and make what my neighbours describe as Christmas trees. But at this time of year many of them come up with a creamy coloured coloured tip which produces lots of very fine spores which is another way that they can multiply themselves.These spikes tend to die back once they have done their job. Putting these in with the green ones would probably just introduce more spores into the ground when eventually dug in.
Hope the description helps you recognise them,
Jenny

Thanks Jenny. Do you mean that the green 'trees' are ok to compost? I must admit I tend to put all of any weeds I dig up (and boy are there a lot here!) straight into the council green waste bin to be collected, as I am not sure what is ok to compost and what not, so it is safer to just get rid of the lot. When we moved in last September the whole veggie plot was under 6feet high weeds of all types. We are still struggling to keep them down as much as possible.
So, now as well as trying to keep digging the b*****s out from all over the place I now also have to keep an eye out for these cream coloured tips to get rid of as well - oh the joy of gardening!

Pol wrote:Yes arthur - you're right. I am struggling with mares tail in a damp area next to my polytunnel. Does anyone have a tasty recipe for mares tales???

My old man was telling me this very evening that he'd heard you can eat mare's tail like asparagus. I think he's dreaming.

Just had a look in Hugh FW's 'A cook on the wild side' and he makes no mention of mares tails so eating it like asparagus probably isn't an option.Goodness knows if it was remotely edible he'd have tried it!
Bob Flowerdew reccomends chucking perennial weeds in a tub of water for a few weeks to make them compostable.

http://www.pfaf.org/database/plants.php?Hippuris+vulgaris

The above link suggests boiling marestail or as a soup.......Good luck...I would not like to try it!