Rhubarb should do well in our hardiness zone. My mom had a large patch of it along the side of one of our outbuildings that she would pick from whenever she needed rhubarb, and it was about as maintenance free as you could get for twenty years or more. It's probably still producing rhubarb for all I know. I planted three rhubarb shoots last year. Two of them never did come up. A third one grew a few good leaves, but it's too early to tell if it made it through the winter. I late spring, I planted three more. All three developed a little bit of green, but only one expanded into a leaf and then the leaf died away about as quickly as it came. This morning, I planted three more in the same area but, as I said, it's too early in the year to know whether any of the ones from last year made it through the winter. Perhaps even some of the ones that didn't do anything last year might still be alive, and willing to begin looking like an actual plant this year. I'm not even wanting to have eatable rhubarb from them this year, so long as I have plants that look like they're alive.
We had a nice clump of rhubarb. My husband stuck it in a poor, rocky little place far from the main yard. I never bothered with it but it grew. Go figure.
@Ken Anderson ..I have a small clump of red rhubarb growing ,I'd take a photo but I updated my iPad recently and since then my photo resize is acting very strange ..When I click to bring up my photos,( In the resize program) all I get is blank squares, with no visible photos Anyway if you ruhbarb starts going to seed ,remove the seed/ flower asap.We love stewed apple and rhubarb I had a green one ,growing once it grew about 60 cm tall, and had really thick stems ,but was tasteless
I really don't expect to be eating any of it. Now, if someone made a rhubarb pie and offered me a piece it would be rude not to accept it.
I looked up the facts about rhubarb leaves, not long ago and according to the site I was on the rhubarb we eat also contains the same poison however it's only a very small amount and not enough to make us sick @Ruby Begonia
A lot of people around here eat poke salad which is also toxic. My family ate it but I've never liked it.
It's a weed that is common in this area. People eat it because it's plentiful and I guess they like the taste. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phytolacca_americana
We used to grow rhubarb in idaho, and it never needed any kind of care there either, and we could pick all the rhubarb we wanted for most of the summer. I remember chewing on a stalk of rhubard as a snack when I was growing up. The sour taste is something that people either enjoy , or dislike, I think. I have tried growing it here, but with no luck. I think that it must be the hot summers that kills it; but it might be the hard-packed clay, or a combination. I finally tried growing some on a shady side of the house where it would get morning sun and be sheltered from the afternoon heat. It did better there; but still just barely survived, and this year, it didn't come back up. Actually, the one that survived the besst was one that I had in a rich potting soil and in a good sized container, and kept where it only got morning sun. I might try that again this year and see if it can survive. I think that if I could get a plant to ever actually develop, then maybe it would continue to come back each spring. Most rhubarb seems to like rich soil and you often see it growing along side of barns or similar outbuildings.
Rhubarb strudel sounds absolutely delicious, @Chrissy Page ! I have had apple and cherry strudel (just the kind sold in stores, not homemade), and i liked that. I used to make rhubarb cobbler when we lived in idaho, and that was delicious also. I had hopes of doing that again if we could get the rhubarb to grow here.
Yeah, I know that rhubarb should require no maintenance once it's established, and the one we had when I was a kid grew alongside an outbuilding too. I am planting it along a fence, which should give it roughly the same conditions. Getting it started seems to be the problem.