Spring Gardens are Waking Up
A friend up north in Canada, Niki Jabbour, posted on Twitter this morning that she's expecting 2 feet of snow tonight. Here in Southern California our spring gardens are waking up and we're planting warm season crops already. Take heart, northern gardeners, this is what you can expect in your own gardens soon: A container lemon tree props up nicotiana with a background of trumpet vine. Flowers are blooming and bees are buzzing at Gardenerd HQ. Some fruit trees are…
Recipe: Lentil Soup with Collard Greens
We cook from the garden around here. Whatever is coming in from "out there" determines the meal of the day. Since collard greens are finishing up, we needed to find a recipe to showcase them. Enter Sandy's Great Lentil Soup with Collard Greens. The recipe comes from a cookbook that's been in my collection for many years: Simply Natural: All-time Favorite Recipes from Kitchens of North America's Best Natural Foods Restaurants, by Les Sussman and Sally Bordwell. (BTW - it's…
Recipe: Garlicky Fresh Christmas Lima Beans with Thyme
I've grown Christmas Lima Beans for several years and have come to love this prolific plant. The first time, we planted in spring and it grew and produced for a year and a half (and it would have kept going if we didn't have to pull it out). This time, after a year of constant production, we had to make way for new crops. Sad but true. After harvesting all the dried pods, the plant was still full of green…
Mini Orchard & Garden for Mom and Dog
Spring is just around the corner, but in the Valley it's already here. Southern California continues to have unseasonably high temperatures and one new gardener wanted to take advantage of it with a new mini orchard and garden for her Sherman Oaks home. The homeowner wanted to grow what she eats: mostly fruit and veggies. So we set her up with a mini orchard of 6 fruit trees and two raised beds, plus a few planters for herbs and berries.…
Brussels Sprouts and Aphids
How to keep aphids off your brussels sprouts
Let’s Go to Seed School – Part 3
In this, our last installment about Seed School we explore the economic and political makeup of seeds in our world. For me, this is the real reason we need to save seed and preserve species. On our final day, we were asked to brainstorm about how to solve problems on a local level, as well as a global one. As gardeners we know that local action is sometimes the only thing that makes a difference. Community gardens, for example, have…
I am Planting a Garden, by Heidi Rose
I ran across this poem a friend wrote several years ago. I read it through again and felt it went right to the heart of what every gardener must be feeling in anticipation of spring. The excitement of new journeys, the fear of failure (yet again), and the burning desire to get out there in the garden right now; all of these feelings are swirling about. This poem reminds us that patience, trial and error, and suspense are all part of…
Recipes for Winter Harvests
How to make good use out of your Winter harvest