Share my passion for all things gardening!
It’s time for my next garden column! In it, discuss important considerations for garden site selection for growing vegetables. Here is a link to it, in today’s edition of The Spokesman-Review: First step, selecting the right site. (or you can read my column lower in this post) As you know, I’ll be filming a series of videos throughout this season […]
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Well, today’s a momentous day! It’s the start of my column-writing season with today’s being about my go-to vegetable varieties. And, what’s particularly exciting is that I’m pairing each of my columns with a video this year. The videos are part of my new series called “Everyone Can Grow A Garden!” They will allow me to expand on what I’ve […]
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I’ve been growing microgreens for the first time this winter. It’s so much fun and a great way to eat healthy greens that I’ve grown myself indoors. I wanted to give you an update to hear what I’ve learned since the last time I wrote about this. But first, in case you’re sitting there saying, “microgreens? What in the world […]
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Have you been overwintering geraniums and/or canna lilies from last year’s garden? Now that it’s early February, it’s time to pot them up. It’s so snowy and stormy outside here. This is a nice way to play in dirt inside my toasty home! Last February, I shot a video on potting up geraniums. Have a look, then I’ll discuss how […]
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The last thing you want to see when looking out the window at your pond, is that it’s nearly empty! But that’s exactly what I discovered recently. Talk about your adrenaline rush. How could this happen, you ask? Well, first we got a whole bunch of snow. Then we had several visits by the “polar vortex.” It was soon impossible […]
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I just learned something intriguing about planting onions and wanted to share it with you. As you know, you can grow onions from seeds, sets (little bulbs) and from plant starts. For years, I used onion sets but had mediocre results with them. The bulb size was small and their overall plant vigor was lacking. Several years ago, I was […]
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This topic might seem either a little late or very early, but it’s very relevant right now. During the growing season, I’m a big fan of freezing vegetables to preserve them. It works really great for green beans, celery, diced onions, Swiss chard, and sliced leeks. The veggies I seem to freeze the most are pole and bush beans. That’s […]
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I know I’ve talked about this before but crop rotation is a big deal! It’s the best tool vegetable gardeners have to cut down on insect and disease problems. And it’s free, too. Crop rotation involves keeping records of where you grew each crop in the previous 3 to 4 years. That way, you can grow them in different locations […]
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Do you recall how I rescued part of my rosemary plant a couple of months ago? They aren’t hardy enough to grow outdoors year-round here. I ordinarily will dig them up, pot them and move them indoors. Well, I got busy and completely forgot about it. I didn’t help that the plant was huge so not easily dug up. Fortunately, […]
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Beaks, Bones & Bird Songs: How the Struggle for Survival Has Shaped Birds and Their Behavior by Roger J. Lederer (2016, Timber Press, 280 pp., $24.95) As most folks know, I am an avid birdwatcher. I love watching them, photographing them and landscaping to attract them. I’ve also discovered that a large percentage of the gardeners I connect with are […]
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