(easy guitar music) (bright orchestral music) - Welcome to "Oklahoma Gardening."

Today, we finish our garden leaf casting project.

I'll share with you a way you can keep growing this winter.

We introduce you to a different kind of Poinsettia.

Andrine Shufran talks about ballooning spiders, and then, Jessica Riggin is back with her final recipe.

Underwriting assistance for our program is provided by the Oklahoma Department of Agriculture, Food and Forestry, helping to keep Oklahoma green and growing.

So if you're looking for an easy, low-maintenance perennial.

(bright orchestral music resumes) We have two different types of flowers on one plant.

Capsaicins that gives the pepper its heat.

- Okay, so here I have one that I did the other day, so we're gonna go ahead and reveal it.

- Okay.

- There we go.

And it's a nice big one.

- It grew.

- It grew.

(Casey laughs) There we go.

So I'm gonna go ahead and set this down here underneath outta the way.

- Okay.

- So now, these are very tricky.

So to lift it up, usually you have to leave a spot open here you can get your hand under.

- [Casey] Okay.

- I didn't do that, so I gotta find a way to do it.

But luckily my sides are pretty thick, so I'm just going to pick up like this.

- Am I holding the plastic down or?

- Flip it over.

- Wow.

It's already painted.

- It's already painted, there you go.

So now, I just set it right down.

So now, I pull it out.

Now, this one is to replace my fountain in the back.

- Oh, okay.

- So, it's already here.

This is gonna be removed, so that the water drains through there.

- [Casey] So you put in a spillway, and then this is where you.

- [Ken] That's where my hose is gonna be.

- [Casey] You went ahead and put the faucet sort of plug there.

- Yep, and I'll have that silicone 'cause it's a little loose, but.

- Okay.

- So now, to peel it out.

- Okay, this is the leaf we're lookin' at.

- This is the leaf.

- So we're gotta take this leaf off.

- Yep, we're just gonna start pullin' away at it, and we'll get that later (laughs).

And this one came out rather nice.

So now.

- So on some of the crevices it might get stuck in there?

- We have picks.

- Oh, okay.

- [Ken] So now I get to.

- [Casey] Just like your dentist.

- [Ken] Yep, use my little picks to get in there, and get any of these little pieces left in there.

Break that off.

I'll use my grinder to make sure I get it out and reveal my spillway.

- [Casey] Okay.

So that's the lip, the water will flow over the top of that and under the leaf.

- And then, of course, I'm gonna do something a little different with this one.

I'm actually going to seal it with enamel or acrylic, I mean.

- Uh huh.

- Gonna have the whole thing sealed with acrylic, so that it'll never lose its color once I paint it.

- Oh, okay, okay.

- If I paint it at all.

- So you had talked about the edges, if the concrete goes over the edges a little bit, what to do in that situation.

- [Ken] Yes, so the next stage is to start cleaning up your edges.

Now, what I like to do is I like to use a grinder.

Grinder is very loud and messy, so make sure that you're wearing your mask and your glasses so that you don't get anything, safety first.

But you wanna just slightly trim around the edges just enough to where you get to the edge of your leaf and make it nice and clean and smooth.

Once you do that, I like to take a little sanding block and just kinda hit the edge of it a little bit just to kinda clean it up and finish it off.

Now, if you don't have a grinder, you can use a dremel, but my recommendation is, is don't go past the edge of the leaf when you're setting your concrete.

Just go right up to it, but not quite to the edge.

That way, you don't have any grinding to do.

- So it's startin' to look more like a leaf now?

- Absolutely, just a little smaller.

- Okay.

- But this is actually one that we already had finished.

- Right.

- Now what I've done is I've gone ahead and sprayed it with crystal clear enamel.

- Okay.

- That gives me a nice solid base, and it basically seals the concrete for me as well.

- All right, so the color we have in there is from the tint.

- That's from the tint.

This is that buff coloring.

- Okay.

- Okay so, now what I would do is I would start selecting colors that I wanna paint it and decide what I wanna do with it.

Now I could go through and paint each little seam here and add a little color to it, like I have some of those over there, or I could just leave the seams the color they are and go for a fall motif.

- Okay.

- So.

- This is where you let your artist take over, right.

- Exactly, and really, what I like to do is I like to just dry brush in layers.

- Okay.

- So, I will just take a little bit of yellow and start with and go around my edges, and just start kinda lightly going through it, hitting it here and there, and letting the paint just kinda hit, especially on the edge, 'cause I want the edge to kinda glow a little bit.

But I just found that if you just start playing, you can create something.

- Really interesting.

- Okay.

- And that's really just how I kinda got into it.

I just started playing and seeing what happens if I do this, and what happens if I do that.

And I do watch a lotta YouTube videos.

(host laughing) So that helps.

Now that that's done, I'll just go ahead and hit it.

Now usually, you wanna wear a mask and everything, but we're outside.

- Right.

So I'll just step back- - Or I can come around the other way.

- A little bit.

- And I'll just give it a quick spray.

(bottle hissing) Just enough to seal in the color that I've put on there.

- And then you'll be able to go on with your next layer.

- And then I'll go on with another layer and another layer and another layer, until it finally gets over here to these.

- I mean, these are amazing.

(laughing) They're so beautiful.

- Now, it's strictly up to you what you do on, for instance, this here was a hydrangea leaf.

- Okay.

- Okay?

And I just had extra concrete, so I decided to use it up.

So I brought out a little hydrangea leaf, gave it a little lift, and after I got it done, I painted it in fall colors.

- [Host] Now, how did you get the tooth and the serration on the margins?

Was that with the grinder and the Dremel?

- That's with the grinder and the Dremel.

- Okay, so that gives you a little more detail.

- Right.

So this one here, obviously, is much thinner, so I was able to use a little more of a Dremel tool to it.

- Okay.

- And I actually was able to cut in to the leaf a tad bit more.

- Okay.

- And give it a little more of that character.

- All right.

- That leaf shape.

- [Host] And this bowl is beautiful here.

What is this leaf?

- [Ken] Now, these are eggplant leaves.

- [Host] Oh.

- So just something different I decided to try.

I had a bowl.

I then built up sand all the way around it and laid my leaves out, glued 'em together to where they were on there and they wouldn't move, and then I started filling in the concrete.

Of course, you build everything upside down.

- Okay.

- So when you don't know what you have until you flip it over.

That's why one's missing.

- That's a surprise.

(laughing) Well, I wouldn't have known.

- It slipped.

- I thought it was supposed to be a triangle like that.

- But actually, my wife likes it because a little Champagne glass with a little sauce.

- Yeah.

- You know?

Or some cheddar, set it right there, and put some chips in, and you got yourself a nice little chip bowl.

- Perfect.

Well, Ken, thank you so much for sharing this idea and a way of preserving our garden.

- Oh, it was my pleasure.

Thank you for having me.

- Thank you.

(light country music) If you're interested in trying it at home, there are a lotta home kits that you can purchase in order to kind of run that experiment in your own house or in your own backyard.

Now, there's several different types of kits you can get.

Some are as simple as something in a box.

A lotta times you can find these at your local garden centers.

Or there are some larger kind of bigger home production kits that you can get that actually are inoculated logs.

So probably something that you would maybe have in a shady area or in your backyard, not something in your home.

We bought a few of these kits to try to experiment with at our place here and just see how well they do.

And I have to say, these kits are kind of nice because they are contained.

They're easy to manage, and they're very clean.

So it's something that you can easily do in your own home kitchen or in your dining room and allow them to kinda grow.

Now, like I said, they are very easy.

So I'll kinda walk you through.

We've grown some out and you can see the impressive mushroom display that you will get.

This one actually, I've already harvested, but we're gonna get some more on it.

So it's really as simple as opening up the package.

And there are some good instructions that come with it.

A lot of these different kits that are smaller come with the inoculation in kind of a bag here.

So you can see what ours looks like, not that pretty, I will admit.

But this is all the good stuff that makes those mushrooms grow so well.

And so they have a nice shelf life to 'em.

What you're gonna do is actually grow these inside this box.

So you can see there's a perforation here that we are just going to kind of cut this out.

(box thumping) So once you get that perforation cut out, what you're then going to do is slide this, you can see how this is folded over, but we're gonna slide this with that back in there.

So we can see where our window is.

And simple cut an X in that window.

(box thumping) Now, it's okay if you cut that substrate a little bit.

This is all inoculated with the mushroom, whichever one you choose to buy.

This one actually was a Pink Oyster, and we also have a Pearl Oyster.

We're gonna pull these flaps back a little bit.

And then, you can see it has a little bit of a coating on it.

What we're gonna do is just sort of scratch that up a little bit.

- [Instructor] And get that ready to be soaked really well.

It's okay if you lose a little bit of that substance there, it's not a big deal.

So at this point, we're simply just going to float this in the water.

So you simply place them in a tub of water, and allow 'em to float for about six to 10 hours.

So it's really good to do, just leave that overnight.

And the next morning what you're gonna do is get your box, don't throw this away, because this is kind of how you contain it.

So you're just gonna allow it to kind of run off that water, and you're simply gonna slip it back into your box here.

And this is where it's gonna continue to grow.

So you can close it back up like this, and just put your handle back on it here.

And so you've got a nice container.

And at this point, every morning and evening, what you're gonna do with this little water bottle that they provide you with is just kind of open up these flaps a little bit and spritz it a little bit more.

And you'll do that about eight to 10 spritzes, just enough to keep it moist.

Now, a lot of times when we think about plants, we're thinking, okay, well, we need to go put it in a sunny window.

But think about, these are mushrooms that we're growing, so we do not wanna put those in a sunny window.

If you do have a window or something, I actually placed these in a north facing kitchen window, but I turned the back of it towards the window.

So I just had 'em on my kitchen counter, not up in the windowsill.

And so they're getting even less light.

So if you think you've never been able to grow plants because you don't have enough light, you might try mushrooms, this might be the ideal plant.

And I have to say, they were super easy to grow.

So if, again, you think you maybe don't have a green thumb, you might try these as well.

It's a fun little project.

And so you can see, after about three days I started seeing this budding, which is basically the spores are starting to kind of expose that fruiting body a little bit.

And so, there are tiny mushrooms that are starting.

And they will continue to grow and double in what seems like from morning to night, and night to the next morning.

They just really take off.

And, again, it sort of depends on how much light you might put them in.

You do wanna make sure you're keeping that humidity on 'em though by spraying 'em.

So this one here, we've had this growing.

I started this process one week ago, and you can see how many mushrooms we have.

Again, this is the pink oyster mushroom, and they're just really taking off.

And so at this point what we'll do is harvest 'em, and you simply take your knife and go in and cut down towards the substrate and then pull those off.

And so you can harvest however many you want, and continue to let them grow if you would like.

There's still plenty of that spore in this substrate.

And so this one that we harvested the other day, the pearl mushroom, you can actually see that there are starting to be more growing on it.

So just because you've harvested it, doesn't mean to throw it away.

Continue to try to get a few more crops out of your box that you buy.

Now, I will say these can be a little bit pricey.

They're ranging anywhere from like 15 up to $30, especially a little bit more pricey if you get the log version.

However, it's really the experience that you're paying for, not so much just to have fresh mushrooms, but that's a nice bonus after all.

But it really is the experience, and it's a fun activity, especially if you have kids, to kind of monitor and watch this.

You could journal it if you want to, you can measure it and see how much they grow during the day.

Put a time lapse video on it even if you wanted to.

There's a lot of fun things that you could do with this kit at home.

And the other thing I would say is if you are a person, like me, who is still in awe of germinating seeds, watching something go from like what seems like a dormant thing on the shelf all of a sudden come to life is really an incredible experience.

So you might check out growing your own mushrooms at home.

(pleasant music) (pleasant music continues) - This is one of my favorite plants.

Some people consider it a weed, but a weed is just a plant outta place.

And no matter where these guys pop up, even in sidewalk cracks, to me, I like it, so it's not a weed.

This is called a native poinsettia, they are native to all the states.

They're also invasive, you don't have to be introduced to be invasive.

So these guys scatter like crazy 'cause they're self-sowers.

They actually are an annual, but they seed so easily that they spread.

I bought one of these and it started way over there, and now I have seeds all over and it was just bought last year.

So this is related to the snow on the mountain plant that you'll find in pastures, that has white showy foliage this time of year.

But this is the fire on the mountain version.

The native poinsettia is also related to the spurges.

Like you'll see the prostate spurge or the spotted spurge in your flowerbeds, and you consider that a weed.

I consider that a weed also, but it's related to it, they both have milky sap.

And so if you're allergic to latex, you don't wanna touch any of the spurges if they're gonna open up and make you have an allergic reaction.

But this one of my favorite native wild plants.

(cheerful music) - So this is the one of the original areas that I started my first wild poinsettia in.

And it's native but prefers moist soil.

And if you give it moist soil and you really take care of it, it'll bush out and bloom probably looks better than the ones in the pasture that just have, you know, random drought and heat to deal with.

So these are kind of pampered and they like sun.

And this is on the east side of the house, so they do get morning sun, but as you can see, they spread pretty easily.

If you find this in your yard or garden and you think it's a weeded, feel free to pull it.

But if you don't think it's a weeded, feel free to leave it alone and enjoy its natural beauty.

(cheerful music) - Welcome to another segment on the Bug of the Month.

This month we're looking at not just one particular insect, but an action that arachnids do every winter, and that's called ballooning.

Tiny newborn spiders don't wanna stick around in the place where their family and more predators are, and so they let off a single strand of silk until that silk weighs more than their body and it catches the wind and it allows them to disperse and move sometimes very long distances.

And the best way to see this is to go out in the morning while the dew is still on the grass, and you'll see long strands of silk covering all the plants as the spiders are moving away from where they were born.

(gentle music) - Hi, everybody.

Today, I am gonna be showing you how to make a beep stir fry.

This is definitely not an authentic Asian stir fry, so don't worry about it if you don't have a wok.

We're just gonna make it in a skillet today.

This is a really fun recipe to get your kids involved.

It's got a lot of different components and pre-teens or young teens could take turns, doing the different cuts on the vegetables and the meat, or you could throw it together all by yourself either way, but it's a simple recipe that your family is really gonna like.

So I have got my skillet heating here on the stove unto it.

I'm gonna add some olive oil, some avocado oil would also be really good and I'm just gonna let that heat up.

And then I'm gonna add my steak.

It's just a round steak that's been tenderized and then sliced really thin.

So if you've got some meat in the freezer that you were gonna make chicken fried steak out of, then that would work really great.

Your tougher cuts of meat work really well in this.

So we'll slice some really thin and so, and it's a quick recipe so you don't have to cook 'em for a long time to get them tender.

(loud sound coming from the meat) Okay, once your meat is starting to brown, we're gonna remove it and just put it in a clean bowl or on a clean plate.

You don't wanna remove it back to the same plate it was on when it was raw 'cause we don't wanna cross contaminate.

And don't worry if it's not all the way cooked through yet, because we are gonna cook it a little bit more in just a minute.

But we're gonna start remove it, remove it to a bowl, and then to the same pan, we're gonna add our sliced onions and sliced bell peppers.

So I've just cut the onion in half and then sliced it into little half moons.

And then I just slice my bell peppers into strips.

We're gonna put this into the hot skillet and cook that down until it starts to get a little bit of color on it and it's really soft.

Alright, so my vegetables are starting to get soft and I'm starting to see some brown color on the onions and the bell peppers.

So, I'm going to add to this some zucchini.

I've got two zucchini here that I sliced lengthwise, and then cut into little half moon shapes.

I'm gonna throw those in there and I'm gonna season this with some ginger and garlic powder and a little bit of soy sauce.

(oil sizzling) - Now I'm gonna add back in my beef that I took out already.

And we'll let this cook just a little longer until the zucchini is soft.

(food sizzling) All right, I'm starting to see some color on my zucchini now, and it's getting softer.

And here comes the tricky part where to this, we're gonna add some bok choy.

If you have never had bok choy before, it's a very mild green, it's kind of, it'll be over by the cabbage in the grocery store.

It has a green leafy part at the top, and then kind of a white stalk.

And people think that you can't eat the white stalk and they'll just cut off the green part and throw away the stalk.

But you can eat it.

And so I've saved some of the stalk.

I've just sliced it in straight across.

We're gonna have to add this in batches, because it's not all gonna fit in my pan, but it will cook down like a green.

(food sizzling) Okay, so once your bok choy has wilted down and the stalk part is starting to get really soft, it's just about done.

At this point, we have not seasoned the bok choy or the meat, and so at this point, if you want to hit it with a little bit more ginger, a little bit more soy sauce, then that would be a good time to do it.

And remember, our soy sauce is acting like a salt, so we don't need any salt in this dish.

The soy sauce is the salt.

If your family is really heat tolerant, then some red pepper flakes might be really great in it.

I don't usually add that, because my children don't like spicy stuff, but that would be really, really good.

This stir fry is full of vegetables that I think your kids are gonna like, and there's lots of fiber, lots of vitamins and minerals in here.

And then you've got the protein from the meat, from the beef.

You could make it vegetarian by using tofu or just leaving the protein out altogether.

And you could add any vegetables in here that you like.

It would be great with shredded carrots or broccoli or snow peas.

Just whatever you like.

So we're basically done here.

I'm gonna serve this over some brown rice.

You could use whatever kind of grain you like.

It would be really good with quinoa.

A more traditional choice would be white rice, but the brown rice is gonna give me more protein and more fiber.

I think this is gonna be a family favorite and I hope that you'll give it a try.

(cheerful music) - [Announcer] "Oklahoma Gardening" wants to thank Jessica Riggin for sharing her expertise and passion with us over the past couple of years.

We wish her all the best as her career takes her to new places.

(cheerful music) - [Presenter] There are a lot of great horticulture activities this time of year.

Be sure and consider some of these events in the weeks ahead.

(bright classical music) Join us next week on "Oklahoma Gardening" as we wander from Tulsa to Guthrie, looking at some unique aspects of horticulture.

(bright classical music) - Make sure you have gloves.

- Alright, 'cause it's kind of a, what's the word?

- It can dry out you hair.

- There we go.

- Really bad.

(bright classical music) - [Presenter] To find out more information about show topics as well as recipes, videos, articles, fact sheets, and other resources, including a directory of local extension offices, be sure to visit our website at oklahomagardening.okstate.edu.

(bright classical music) Join in on Facebook and Instagram.

You can find this entire show and other recent shows, as well as individual segments on our "Oklahoma Gardening" YouTube channel.

Tune in to our OKGardeningClassics YouTube channel to watch segments from previous hosts.

"Oklahoma Gardening" is produced by the Oklahoma Cooperative Extension Service as part of the division of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources at Oklahoma State University.

The Botanic Garden at OSU is home to our studio gardens, and we encourage you to come visit this beautiful Stillwater gem.

We would like to thank our generous underwriter, the Oklahoma Department of Agriculture, Food and Forestry.

Additional support is also provided by Greenleaf Nursery and the Garden Debut Plants, the Oklahoma Horticulture Society, the Tulsa Garden Club, and the Tulsa Garden Center.

(bright classical music)