Eating the Weeds, Ground Cherries

About four or five years ago, I tried starting Ground Cherries from seeds I got from Baker Creek.  Not a one sprouted.  Not that I'm blaming Baker Creek, they are awesome.  More likely than not it was my black thumb that killed any chance of them even sprouting.  Anywho.....

A year after my failed attempt at planting a raised bed with them, I noticed some wild plants that looked exactly like the wonderful picture on the seed packet.  So I left them in the ditch where they had grown, and eventually, they produced bunches of those paper Chinese lantern thingies.  And I ate them.  And I didn't die..

So now that I know what the little plants look like, I just let them grow wherever they get a foothold.  Which seems to be, like, everywhere.  Apparently the deer enjoy munching on the younger plants and that's why I never seemed to notice the mature plants and their delicious fruits.  But now that Charlie is patrolling sleeping the area, the deer haven't been coming up so close to the house and the Ground Cherries have been taking off.

Paul had made me a small raised bed out of a tractor tire this spring.  Before I got around to planting anything in it, I noticed that there were tons of Ground Cherry seedlings popping up.  Whoo hoo!  Not only did I not have to plant anything in there (because I'm lazy), but it was something that I actually liked to eat.  I just had to weed around them, and it really wasn't that difficult because they took over very quickly. The fruits have been ripening the past few days so I've been munching on them whenever I'm outside.

That bowl contained only empty husks before I was finished
typing out this blog post.

Paul doesn't care for them, but that's perfectly fine with me.  I mean, well yeah, I'd rather have wild blueberry bushes or wild okra plants popping up, but I'll take whatever I can get, especially if it doesn't involve much labor on my part.  Slothwoman Gardening rocks.