A Gift From the Squirrels

Last spring while I was planting my garden I discovered a good looking little plant growing in the grass near the garage. I had no idea what it was but decided to keep my eye on it for a while. When I was watering one of my flower pots a week or so later, I saw another of these interesting plants  It didn't belong in my flower pot, so I dug it out. That's when I discovered a peanut at it's base, so I decided to move it to the edge of the vegetable garden.  One of my neighbours must have been feeding the squirrels peanuts, and the squirrels had apparently planted a couple of peanuts for me. I immediately moved the one from the grass into the garden with the other one.  One of these plants ended up under the canopy of leaves created by the zucchini and tomatoes, but it survived, even if it didn't grow as well as it's neighbour.

It was a long hot, dry summer, but I watered the plants everyday when I watered the rest of the garden, though apparently peanuts don't require a lot of water compared to other nuts.

Peanut plants produce small yellow flowers close to the ground. The flowers send spikes into the ground and the peanuts grow on those. I don't know of anything else that grows in this manner, but if you do, I'd be happy to hear about it.

I looked up when to harvest the peanuts, and it said to wait until the leaves on the plants turned yellow. Well, we had snow before that happened so once that melted away I decided to dig up the plants and see if there were actually any new peanuts in the ground.

Each plant had several new peanuts, though definitely not the 40 my research says they might produce. I shook the dirt off the roots and put the plants in the basement to dry.  After a couple of weeks I removed the peanuts from the roots and put them in a single layer to dry some more. 

I may eat them raw or roast them. I might even replant them next spring. I am thankful to the squirrels for supplying me with these little treats.  I never would have learned so much about peanuts without their help.