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gardening, organic garden, seeds
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Featured Review: Arugula Rocket - 1 Pkt. (500 seeds) |
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Arugula Rocket - 1 Pkt. (500 seeds)
Average Customer Rating  5 out of 5
"Tender smooth leaves with robust, peppery flavor. Cook mature leaves with other greens. Ready to harvest in 35 days. Zesty accent in salad.<p>GARDEN HINTS: Grows best in cool weather. Can also be grown as a fall crop. Sow early in spring. Protect from heat with shade cloth. Likes fertile soil, ample water. Best when picked minutes before your meal. Thin plants 8"" apart. 500 seeds per packet, will plant about 30' of row. Grows best in full sun, will tolerate light shade."
Read all reviews at Burpee
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Featured Review
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5 of 5
Great stuff
December 11, 2009
By dolly from Houston
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"We like arugula so much, I have it in pots by the back door so we can easily pick it to add to sandwiches. Also excellent mixed in a lettuce salad. It does get quite peppery and rank when the weather is hot. Germinates very easily."
Read all reviews at Burpee
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Gardening calendar: March 2010, week 2 |
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This week, prepare your roses and onions, and consider mowing the lawn. Make
your own obelisk, and make sure you photograph the location of your
daffodils!
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Gardening calendar: March 2010, week 3 |
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Wildflower meadows resplendant with bees, layered shrubs and a top tip in our
march gardening calendar this week.
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Gardening calender: March 2010, week 4 |
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Week four of our March gardening calender brings tips on growing potatoes,
asparagus, potted lillies, together with a seasonal recipe for parslay
pesto.
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Gardening calendar: March 2010 |
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Our March 2010 gardening calendar is filled to the brim with ideas to prepare,
prune, plant and purchase the kind of garden you want.
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Garden Makeovers |
| Making over a garden can become necessary when the garden becomes overgrown or when site conditions, like lighting, change. Sometimes gardeners simply want to try creating a new garden. Here is some advice for taking a look at where you are with your garden plans and reassessing what you can do to capitalize on what you have.
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Take the Pruners Apart to Clean |
| Disassemble Pruners - How to Sharpen Hand Pruners |
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Keep Track of the Pieces |
| Cleaning Garden Pruners |
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Interested in a gardening/nature/outdoors unconference? |
| My past experiences with unconferences like BarCampLA, PodCampAZ and my own CareerCampLA started me thinking about some sort of gardening/nature/outdoors unconfererence here in the Los Angeles area (or elsewhere). I am totally sold on the concept of unconferences and their ability to facilitate sharing the knowledge we all have with each other and the world.
For [...] Interested in a gardening/nature/outdoors unconference? is a post from: A Gardener's Notebook
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 My past experiences with unconferences like BarCampLA, PodCampAZ and my own CareerCampLA started me thinking about some sort of gardening/nature/outdoors unconfererence here in the Los Angeles area (or elsewhere). I am totally sold on the concept of unconferences and their ability to facilitate sharing the knowledge we all have with each other and the world.
For a gardening unconference, I could see presentations by attendees on their own special and specific interests like roses, vegetables, sub-irrigated planters, and a host of other topics. For a nature or outdoor conference, I would be interested in bringing in interested individuals as well as groups dedicated to endangered species, habitat preservation, hiking and more.
Any interest in an unconference like this here in the Los Angeles area? Leave your questions and comments on this blog post using the Comments like above or below this post.
Interested in a gardening/nature/outdoors unconference? is a post from: A Gardener's Notebook
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I Like This – February 25, 2010 |
| Modern Birdhouses – February 24, 2010
More Citizen Science Opportunities – February 24, 2010
TomatoMania – February 23, 2010 – The World’s Largest Tomato Seedling Sale is coming again! It will be here in Encino March 26-28.
Deconstruction: David van Alphen’s Modern Shed – February 23, 2010
Bee Rescue Hotline! – February 20, 2010
Palladio’s Escape [...] I Like This – February 25, 2010 is a post from: A Gardener's Notebook
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I Like This – February 25, 2010 is a post from: A Gardener's Notebook
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Event: Tomatomania 2010 |
| Tomatomania is coming again to Encino, California and other locations both east and west. Check out the web site for complete information.
From the Tomatomania web site…
One of Los Angeles’ oldest garden traditions meets one of its newest sensations as Tapia Brothers Farm Stand hosts the largest of the TOMATOMANIA! seedling sales.
To get there drive [...] Event: Tomatomania 2010 is a post from: A Gardener's Notebook
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 Tomatomania is coming again to Encino, California and other locations both east and west. Check out the web site for complete information.
From the Tomatomania web site…
One of Los Angeles’ oldest garden traditions meets one of its newest sensations as Tapia Brothers Farm Stand hosts the largest of the TOMATOMANIA! seedling sales.
To get there drive north on the Ventura Freeway (101N), pass the 405 fwy and exit at HAYVENHURST. Turn right at the stop, then make a quick left into the very busy parking lot.
If you’re driving south on the 101 exit at BALBOA, turn left at the stoplight, go under the freeway and then turn right on BURBANK BLVD. Turn right on HAYVENHURST and right again into the parking lot.
We’ll be open from open 9-5 all three days and there’s plenty of parking available. How many seedlings do you need? We’ll have almost 300 tomato varieties and everything you’ll need to have the most successful tomato season ever!
Wear your TOMATOMANIA! t-shirt and get 10% off your purchase!
March 26 – 28
Tapia Brothers’ Farm Stand
5251 Hayvenhurst Ave.
Encino, CA 91436
818.905.6155
Here is a video from an earlier Tomatomania event.
Event: Tomatomania 2010 is a post from: A Gardener's Notebook
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Third seed shipment sent to Norway seed vault by USDA |
| A shipment of seed sent by the Agricultural Research Service earlier this month to the Svalbard Global Seed Vault in Norway included a wild Russian strawberry that an expeditionary team braved bears and volcanoes to collect. |
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Discovery in legumes could reduce fertilizer use, aid environment |
| Escalating use of nitrogen fertilizer is increasing algal blooms and global warming, but a recent discovery by researchers could begin to reverse that. They have revealed a key step in how symbiotic bacteria living in legumes turn nitrogen into plant food, which could be used to improve the process in some plants, reducing the need for chemical fertilizers. |
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Plant hormone increases cotton yields in drought conditions |
| A naturally occurring class of plant hormones called cytokinins has been found to help increase cotton yields during drought conditions. |
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6 new books for gardeners |
| A gardener's library should be enriched with practical and inspiring volumes as well as those that are just plain fun. Here are six recent releases for the aspiring or advanced green thumb. |
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Weeds Genetically Engineer Themselves to Resist Roundup |
Monsanto deserves its critics. They genetically engineered plants to resist Roundup, and now the weeds are doing the same to keep up. Way to go Monsanto... in reference to: "Scientists said on Friday they have confirmed expanding weed resistance to a key ingredient in Monsanto's (MON.N)widely used Roundup herbicide, a troubling development for farmers and fresh fodder for Monsanto critics."
- UPDATE 1-More US weeds found resisting Monsanto Roundup | Reuters (view on Google Sidewiki) |
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From the Grass-fed Duh Files |
OK, I shouldn't be so harsh when people discover that grass-fed beef is better for you and the planet, especially when they're playing up the angle that rotating fields of grass-fed beef actually improves degraded soil. But it is a sort of duh. Just look at the fertile plains of North America that the settlers found under roaming buffalo that had built the prairie over eons of rotation through those fields. And look at those fields now... barren big agri wastelands polluted with petroleum-based farming known as synthetic chemical subsidized agri-business. And then look at the feed lots where thousands of animals are concentrated into environmental grass lands.
Then look at this:
Case rested. |
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Natural Pest Control Product |
 The question I get most often is how to get rid of bugs. The answer, for the garden at least, is to make sure your soil is healthy, which will make sure your plants are healthy (other factors do apply, like sun, temperature, water...), which will make the plants more able to resist bugs. Stressed out plants are bug magnets, since bugs are just doing their job by helping weed out the weaklings.
Occasionally, though, the bugs go crazy and attack everything. In that case, you need an organic and natural pest killer. Our friend Jackie (who makes great Hawaiian perfumes and body butters) recently started Natural Pest Free, which sells cedar-oil-based natural pest control products.
CEDAR OIL for more than a 1000 years is and has been a proven method of pest control that emphasizes simple, inexpensive, 100% organic practices that cause no harm to people or the environment. CEDAR OIL focuses on building a barrier of entry on the perimeter of your property, so bugs stay out of your yard, which means they stay out of your home. At Natural Pest Free we are dedicated to reducing the health risk and environmental impacts of pesticides and promoting organic alternatives to homeowners across America, one home at a time.
I'm a big fan of the natural barrier plan. I surround my garden with rows of clover , which rabbits and deer love. They'll stop and eat the clover and be happy with it, never making it deep into the garden where the expensive goodies are. Occasionally there's a deer (like our regular visitor, Scarface, shown here), who gets deep into the garden where he's learned to love pea shoots (who doesn't). In that case I use hot pepper waxes , another barrier--one that sends scarface running for the nearest water.
So, a cedar oil barrier makes sense for keeping the bugs out. I suggest using it sparingly, mostly when there's a serious infestation of something you really need to stop. Remember, when you're gardening, most bugs are beneficial, so you don't want to just keep all bugs out.
But in your home is another matter. This is a great product for use as an in-home pesticide.
...control of Head lice, Mosquitoes, Flies, Fleas, No-See-Um, Chiggers, Ticks, Chinch Bugs, Grub Worms, Mites, Mole Crickets, Earwigs, Slugs, Snails, Caterpillars, Beetles, June Bugs, May Bugs, Root Maggots, Army Worms, Weevils, Wire Worms, Ants and Termites.
Way to go Jackie! I'm proud to be affiliated with such a fine product! |
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Cold Climate Composting |
As my friend Mort Mather says, the soil is your bank. You can't make withdrawals unless you make deposits. I get composting straw and manure from Nectar Hills Farm (where we also get the beef for our grass-fed gourmet beef jerky), which I mix with my kitchen waste to create compost that I then deposit into the soil bank so I can make fresh veggie withdrawals. Mort and I are both lazy gardeners, meaning we like to let nature do as much of the work as possible, and we just help her along.
Last winter, though, my compost pile (which, by the way, lowers my carbon footprint considerably, since that food waste won't decompose anaerobically in the landfill) froze solid, like a big block of ice. It was my first real winter after years of living in substantially warmer climates. This year, I was ready for these sub-zero temperatures. With a couple of bags of hay, some very dry, aged horse manure, and a lot of snow for insulation, I have built a very insulated compost pile.
Since I'm lazy, the pile is up against the foundation of the house, right at the bottom of the back stairs. I don't want to have to put on the snow shoes to compost all winter. This way, the compost is only exposed on three sides. On two of those sides, I've stacked flakes from the hay bales, creating a kind of straw bale shelter for the pile. The front is open, but held up about 18 inches with some chicken wire fencing, which I have now piled snow up against for insulation. The top of the pile is covered with snow, which I poured hot water down to create a cylindrical hole down to the top of the pile.
Now, when I want to compost , I just pour some fresh hot water down the hole to melt any new snow that accumulated, then I dump my compost bucket down the hole, layer some manure on top of that, and then a couple of handfulls of hay (or the cedar shreds I take out of our turtle cage when I clean it, which has turtle manure) down the hole. Come spring (or another thaw like we had a week ago) there will be a bunch of cylinders of frozen compost sticking up on the top of the pile. I'll be sure to take a picture of that scene.
But underneath all that lies the compost pile proper, where my probes have proven that composting is taking place, worms are thriving (future turtle food), and aerobic decomposition is reducing our carbon output. But the best part, of course, is that come spring, when I build some new raised beds , I'll have plenty of currency saved up for the soil bank!
Of course, if you have a little money to spend, I imagine a black plastic composter  would use insulating and solar power to keep your pile going year around, unless you're above the arctic circle. |
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