Beautiful Edible Perennials To Use In Your MN Landscaping

What can I say about grocery store prices that hasn’t already been said? You know the drill. The prices. They keep getting higher. It makes sense that more people have been turning to gardening to circumvent their ever-climbing food budget. Here’s the thing: gardening isn’t easy. It requires research, planning, watering, and weeding. It’s not for everyone. Foodscaping, on the other hand, lets you think outside the raised bed. Rather than weeding your rows daily, planting edible perennials is about long-term planning. This guide lists edible landscaping options that will provide you and maybe even your community with more food security.

Like any form of landscaping, foodscaping is an art form. The thing is, the edible element adds another level of complexity to the matter. You have to consider what your family likes to eat. If you’re growing plums but no one in your family likes them, you won’t put much of a dent in your grocery budget. Edible perennials let you know that you have food for you and for your community secured for the future.

Tools to Help You Find the Right Edible Perennials for Your Landscape

Before you buy a perennial, you have to know what Plant Hardiness Zone you’re in. You can find the USDA’s zone map here. The zones change as the climate changes.

Anyone can also check for zone updates and growing guides with the University of Minnesota. Their resources can help choose the right plants for your landscaping and troubleshoot any issues that might come your way. Their plant elements of design tool searches for plants that will work with the specifics of your landscaping needs. The scroll-down menu chooses from elements such as: MN native, landscape use (including edible perennials), zones, the amount of light, and even the form, such as whether the plants are cone-shaped or cascading.

You should also talk to your local nursery about your plans; you may need to remain flexible. Recently, nurseries in my area have stopped offering peach and apricot trees, as those they haven’t been thriving locally. I was disappointed that my plans to grow an apricot tree were thwarted, sure. But I didn’t head to the internet to order one. If my local plant professionals deemed the trees unable to thrive, they certainly won’t thrive under my hands-off gardening practices. Instead, my two plum trees are in their second year in my backyard. I’m excited to announce that we’re expecting quite a great harvest on both.

Fruit and Nut Trees in Minnesota

Fruit trees are a great way to provide shade and spring interest to your home. Of course, the nutritious and delicious snacks don’t hurt either. Typically, you’ll need two of the same species, such as apple or pear, to encourage cross-pollination. You do not need to use the same variety. In our home, we have a Honeycrisp and a Braeburn. Apple trees typically bear fruit every other year. Our Braeburn fruited last year; the Honeycrisp is, apparently, taking another year off. We only got one bloom this May.

Before you decide on what apple trees you’d like to plant, take a walk around the block. You don’t need to live near an orchard to get cross-pollination benefits. Crabapple trees do a lot of cross-pollination work. Apple trees can be up to 100 yards away and still cross-pollinate. If your neighbor has a crab apple tree, a single apple tree 90 yards away can still bear fruit. Many fruit tree variations can self-pollinate but they’ll bear more fruit if more than one tree is in the area

. Apple trees are the most common fruit tree to use in landscaping, but many few grocery store favorites can thrive in our northern climate:

• Pear
• Plum
• Cherry

Many resources suggest that Minnesotans can grow apricots and peaches. While that is true, it’s difficult, unpredictable, and work-intensive to get these trees to thrive in Minnesota. Of course, fruit isn’t the only food that grows on trees in Minnesota. There are three main nuts that people can grow in the upper Midwest.

• Chestnut
• Hickory
• Hazelnut
• Walnut: Be warned, black walnuts are time-intensive to harvest and can stunt the growth of other plants within a 50 to 60 diameter around the base of their trunk.

Backyard Classics You Can Get For Free

I can’t stop talking about the trees we added to our yard last spring. However, the real consistent edible perennials that I’ve harvested from my yard have been from plants with a little less star power. I’m talking rhubarb and raspberries. These power houses have been standard in Grandma gardens everywhere for generations. Give them water and sun and they’re not only going to thrive but they’re going to spread. Keep an eye on plant swaps and Facebook giveaway groups. Eventually, you’ll find someone who’s offering free raspberry shoots. You might even discover someone offering a rhubarb they need to split to keep their giant bushes under control.

Rhubarb

We got our rhubarb from my husband’s grandma. Now that she’s gone, I think of her every time I gather it’s stalks. Asking your family and friends if they have rhubarb is a way of continuing a long held tradition. Offer help splitting an overgrown plant and in time, you’ll soon be able to split your plant with someone too.

If you plant rhubarb from seed, waiting to harvest it until the third year is the general word of advice. Transplanting is another story. You might want to wait a year but if your rhubarb is looking radiant, you can probably treat yourself. Heck, I’m a greedy rhubarb lover. I guarantee I didn’t wait a year after transplanting before harvesting. In the seven years since I planted my rhubarb, I’ve already had to split it into three different plants.

Raspberries

Now, let’s talk raspberries. There are quite a few different varieties of raspberries. You get might simply depend on whatever your neighbor has. However, if you want to be choosy, there are a few options to consider:

• When do you want to harvest? My neighbor has a delicious variety of berry that’s taking over both of our front yards. It’s so juicy that people from all over the neighborhood can’t help but come back for samples. However, these berries only available for about a month, in June. Once the summer heat hits, it’s all over for these guys. The berry bush in my backyard, however, is of the ever bearing variety. After the hottest part of the summer is through, we often expect a second harvest of berries into October.
• What flavor and texture are you looking for? Remember how I said my neighbor’s June crop is outstanding? Well, our backyard every bearing bushes are tasty but not nearly as flavorful and juicy. Our everbearing raspberries are hardy. They travel well in lunch boxes. And yes, they’re still pretty delicious. But their taste, honestly, doesn’t hold a candle to the berries on the front bush.
• To spread or not to spread? Certain varieties won’t take over your yard and will stay where you plant them. If you’re looking for something civilized and low-maintenance, black and some purple varieties will be your best option. Check with your local nursery to make sure they don’t produce canes via underground stems.

As edible perennials go, rhubarb and raspberries are so common that they’re often overlooked. However, if you take care of them, they can feed you for decades to come.

Low Lying Fruit; Using Strawberries as Ground Covers

At some point, we bought strawberries. Does the patch we once planted still exist? No. It was taken over by the raspberry plot mentioned above. Do we have an even larger plot working as a ground cover under our apple trees now? Of course we do. That question was way too specific to be answered with a “no”. Here’s something I didn’t know before growing strawberries: strawberry plants die of old age. As sad as that may be, they are very prolific. If they’re doing well, they’ll spread out runners once they’re done fruiting. Overcrowding can encourage disease. Thinning the new plants and spreading them creates new patches and protects your original patch.

Here’s another thing. Strawberry plants are gorgeous. They’d make a beautiful addition to a front yard foodscape. I was hesitant to grow them under our apple trees as the official word is, strawberries need full sun. However, our plants seem to do better where the sun is more dappled. So go ahead and plant them where you think they’ll look good. If they don’t thrive, you’ll probably still have plenty more chances to plant the young runners throughout your landscape.

The Edible Perennial List Goes On

When I’m looking back on this piece, I can see I’ve already covered too much ground. There are so many beautiful edible perennials that thrive in our somewhat temperamental climate. I had to do away with a section on native plants and diehard edible landscaping favorites like sunchokes and lovage. It’s a good thing, I suppose. You can expect more long-winded foodscaping material to come your way. In the mean time, reach out to me if you have any questions or if you want a few raspberry shoots. Seriously, these bushes don’t stop.