Straw Bale Garden Update: Success!

July 15, 2013

...g is a great solution for beginning gardeners or for those cursed with bad soil. And the skunks that have decimated my previous vegetable gardens are unable to get up on the bales. I’m considering trying another straw bale garden during our winter season. And I’m also pondering building boxes to put the bales in to make the garden look a bit neater. Compare the straw bale garden to the depleted raised beds in our front yard: I’ve talked to a lot o...

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Hens in the Orchard for Pest Control

Mr. Homegrown

July 25, 2013

Animals, Chickens, Fruit Trees, Gardening, Pests

3 Comments

...m.com, sent along a great pest control tip in response to our thrip post–chickens, of course! Chickens and orchards go together like gin and tonic. The hens take care of pests, clean up rotten fruit, add nitrogen to the soil and the canopy of the orchard protects the hens from hawks and heat. Plus you get eggs and meat. Permaculture in action. The 1920s era photo you see above comes from one of Terry’s posts, Chickens in Orchards....

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Peat Moss is Gardening Crack

Mr. Homegrown

August 13, 2015

Gardening

14 Comments

...tted plants and raised beds we’ve used our share of peat moss. Many bagged soil providers like to say that their peat is “sustainably” harvested. The image above as well as an extensive list of citations and peat alternatives in the Facebook group In Defense of Plants proves that peat moss is as sustainable as tobacco is safe. Here’s those citations: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/09/090904165253.htm http://hortsci.ashspublications.org/...

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Our new front yard, part 4: a digression on the new paradigm

Mrs. Homegrown

November 19, 2015

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

5 Comments

...I cast blame around, against myself for being a poor gardener, against the soil, against the drought, against the nursery which sold the plant, against the plant itself. In all cases, though, I’m considering the plant as an isolated individual, and I’m evaluating its success or failure in myopic terms. Now, I’m not a botanist or any other kind of “ist” and I sometimes I suspect all I know about plants would fit in a thimble. Yet I don’t think that...

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O79 Growing and Breeding Tomatoes with Fred Hempel

Mr. Homegrown

March 23, 2016

Gardening, Podcasts, Tomatoes

...to an eight year old. We also talk about how to water tomatoes and prepare soil. During the podcast Fred mentions: Dumont #4 tweezers And two tomatoes bred by Fred that you can get seeds for: Blush Tomato Orange Jazz tomato I’ve had the pleasure of tasting these tomatoes at a lecture Fred does at the Heirloom Expo in Santa Rosa and they are really amazing. Fred’s website are: Artisan Seeds and Artisan Seeds in Facebook and Baia Nicchia Farm. If yo...

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