Tips from the Potting Bench

It has finally rained enough to wake the old creek that is our property’s northern border. With more rain to come, our gardening activities are limited to inside work. That means one of two things, sitting down with seed catalogs or browsing them online, dreaming and scheming about this year’s garden, or starting seeds. I’ll leave the dreaming and scheming to you, so let’s talk about seed starting. Read More →

Another year, another opportunity to perfect your gardening! It’s garden-planning time once again. The seed catalogs have been arriving in the mail with all their tantalizing choices. Read More →

With two rainstorms under our belts I’m so ready to settle into winter, how about you? I was able to get some winter grain crops sowed before the first storm and with the warm weather that followed they are already germinating. I am really excited to get this new grain growing experiment going. It’s something we have wanted to do for quite awhile. It’s another step in the road towards self-sufficiency. Read More →

Ah, harvest season. It starts in dribs and drabs and builds until you hardly know what to do with all the abundance. There are zucchini the size of baseball bats, crookneck squash turned into warty old clubs, cucumbers bloating and turning yellow and melons so juicy over ripe they burst their seems right in the garden. We gave up on the French filet beans because the seven varieties of edamame I planted all came on at the same time. Read More →

Flowers and Fruit By Rita Jacinto, TRT Contributing Writer "Flowers and Fruit are only the beginning. In the seed lies the life of the future." Marion Zimmer Bradley I’m starting to feel it, are you? It hit me a few weeks ago like a lightning bolt. I was going about my everyday maintenance chores, you [...] Read More →

Happy Lammas everyone! We are at another turning point in the seasonal cycle of life, half way from the Summer Solstice and half way to the Autumn Equinox. It’s a time for rejoicing and giving thanks for the first harvests of the season as well as a time for farewells and regrets. The surging energy of spring as the day light grew leading up to the summer solstice is giving way to softer energies and the diminishing light of harvesting and preserving for the winter dark to come. Read More →

Is it just me or has anyone else noticed the increase in bird population lately? It is a veritable symphony around here starting at about 4am and lasting well into the evening. I can’t help but think of that Happy Days episode where Fonzi and the gang go camping and Fonzi can’t get to sleep because of all the forest critter chatter. And in a classic Fonzi move he gets up and yells Ayyyyy! And they all quiet down. Ok, so you had to be there! In any event I sure am liking all the bird song. I wonder if the weather has kept them around longer than usual? Read More →

When we first moved here a friend of ours who had farmed in Orleans on land similar to ours suggested we not waste our time trying to improve our soil. His suggestion was that we buy topsoil and add an eight to 12 inch layer where we wanted to have our garden beds. Read More →