What does the loving landscape look like?

April 16, 2015

...u can see the garden in all seasons. As a start, check out these images at Gardening Gone Wild. *** Okay, so that’s all very well for the professionals and for big parks, but how does this work in smaller spaces? I think it can work very well. We just have to cast our imaginations back in time before the invention cheap artificial fertilizers and weed killers–not to me the lawn mower–made a carpet of turf the universal default setting in home gard...

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Saturday Tweets: Dubious Tips, Growing Furniture and So Much More

Mr. Homegrown

April 18, 2015

Saturday Linkages

Gardening in the Age of Pinterest: Dubious Online Garden Tips http://t.co/Fm48N2bfiP via @WVgardenguru — Root Simple (@rootsimple) April 17, 2015 Skyglow: Timelapse film dedicated to the need for light-pollution-free skies for stargazing via @BoingBoing http://t.co/SBBVj0q9Tx — Root Simple (@rootsimple) April 17, 2015 If homeless people can’t sleep outside, Apple customers shouldn’t either http://t.co/Mh3sDHRZYk via @dailydot — Root Simple (@root...

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In Defense of the Paper Wasp

Mr. Homegrown

March 18, 2014

Animals, Insects

12 Comments

Paper wasp building a nest. Image: Wikimedia. I really don’t like gardening advice that divides the natural world into lists of good and bad bugs. From nature’s perspective all creatures have a role, even the much despised paper wasp. Paper Wasp Biology 101 Wasps perform important duties: some wasps eat other insects, other wasps are scavengers, acting as nature’s garbage disposers. That’s not to say that wasps don’t earn some of their bad reputa...

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How to Deal With Cabbage Worms

Mr. Homegrown

January 17, 2014

Gardening, Pests

27 Comments

It happens every year. I forget the gardening lessons of the year before. Take my many failed attempts to grow cabbage, for instance. It always gets decimated by the imported cabbage worm (Pieris rapae), a creature as abundant in Los Angeles as aspiring actors. There are several strategies I could use to deal with this pest (cabbage worms, that is–I have no problem with actors). I could spray Bacillus thuringiensis but I don’t like the idea of ki...

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Day to day, our decisions count

Mrs. Homegrown

April 30, 2015

Back to the Garden

6 Comments

...nd they are delicious! Eating this way is also a good primer for vegetable gardening. It teaches you what grows well in your area, and how the seasons run, and gives you some inspiration as to good local varieties you can seek out. By the by, I thought I’d mention Azure Standard here, too. This is a U.S. based company–it does not operate in every state, unfortunately, but it delivers bulk whole and natural foods to community drop-off points. You c...

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