The Manzanita Miracle, or, why you should love native plants if you live in a dry climate

December 17, 2015

...nking that is what “low water use plant” means. The math shows us how wrong that is–and why manzanitas often die in home landscapes. Imagine a yard which doesn’t need water at all, even in a drought year. Imagine yourself, free from the chore of watering, free to just not worry about it, because the plants are taking care of themselves. Wouldn’t that make it worth the trouble to learn how to host native plants? 225 days....

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There Will Be Kraut Part II–Full Day Hands-On Fermentation Workshop at the Greystone Mansion

Mr. Homegrown

April 11, 2013

Events

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...orkshop for only $200 ! Erik Knutzen: Co-author of The Urban Homestead and Making It: Radical Home Ec for a Post-Consumer World, co-founder of the Los Angeles Bead Bakers collective. Hae Jung Cho: After recovering from a career in nonprofit management, Hae Jung has been working in the food industry since 2003 in high-end restaurants, catering and retail environments. Driven by a passion for foods that require time and patience, she became a Master...

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Bike Lane Blocking, An Angry Rant and Something You Can Do

Mr. Homegrown

November 13, 2018

Bikes, Transportation

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...xy and often politically unpalatable work of installing bus only lanes and making the city more pedestrian and bike friendly, seems to think that the future lies in a techno-optimist future of flying cars and private tubes as peddled by Elon Musk. Instead of improvements we could have right now (all a bus lane takes is a line of paint) we’re waiting for a future that will never come. I’ve held off writing this post for years but I can’t stay silen...

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Grow the Soil

Mr. Homegrown

June 20, 2008

Gardening

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...On the left a vigorous eggplant growing in high-end potting soil in a self-watering container. On the right a spindly, nitrogen starved specimen of the same variety of eggplant, planted at the same time, in our parkway garden. The container eggplant on the left is larger, has greener leaves and is obviously more healthy. The stunted eggplant on the right is the victim of depleted soil. There’s some irony here. With our book release and press folks...

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Our new front yard, part 3: design

Mrs. Homegrown

November 17, 2015

Back to the Garden, front yard series, Garden Design, Gardening

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...showiest plants, and also the ones that persist no matter what the season, making them the bones of the garden. This includes trees and bushes, as well as large perennials. In a grassland landscape where there are no trees or bushes, this category would include tall grasses as well as plants with dramatic seed heads which persist long after the bloom. Filler plants: These are the transitory, often self-seeding plants which pop up opportunistically...

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