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Category Archives: Blog
Growing Tomatoes in Florida
A Florida gardenerd wrote in recently:
“I live in Orlando, Florida and I know that every place has its season to grow vegetables. I am interested in growing tomatoes and green peppers to start. Don’t know anything about it, and want
to know how to grow them organically. Thank you for your help.”
You’re smack in the middle of the ever changing Zone 9 over there in Orlando. According to several sources, that area has been shifting between zone 10, 9a, and 9b for the last 50
years. Sandy soil, tropical heat and sudden frosts, right?
I did some research and …
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Pruning, Tools and Tool Care Class Review
On Saturday, we rounded out the Gardenerd Organic Gardening Series with the final class on Pruning, Tools and Tool Care. We talked tools.
A lot of tools. We talked about hand tools, larger tools, watering tools, and pruning tools, all with their special purposes. Seven fellow gardenerds discussed everything from
pruning a geranium to sanding rust off an old set of hand pruners.
Tool Talk for Spring Gardening
The newest Gardenerd Tip of the Week Podcast is available online. We probably won’t be posting these on this blog for much longer, now that
iTunes is podcasting them. For help with subscribing, visit the home page of Gardenerd.com. Or you can search for Gardenerd
under Podcasts on iTunes.
Tool Talk for Spring Gardening
…
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A Nursery Full of Babies
Shhhhhh… there’s sleeping. Actually, they’re not sleeping, they’re growing big and strong. I’m talking about my little baby seedlings
that were started indoors about a month and a half ago. It almost brings tears to my eyes to see how big they’re getting in such a short time. Really though, this is the most
fun I’ve had in ages.
My husband must think I’m crazy because I keep barging into his office, kneeling down on the floor and looking eagerly over the trays of seedlings at least 3 times a day when I get home from
work. If I could …
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Upside-Down Tomatoes
Recently some students in the Gardenerd Organic Gardening Series asked about growing tomatoes upside-down. I can happily say that I’ve done that without any special equipment –
and it works!
One year, on the patio of our apartment, my husband and I decided to take a regular hanging planter and plant a tomato in it. Instead of staking it up, we let the vines hang
down. It flowered, it set fruit, the fruit ripened and we ate well. There are a couple of caveats, however, to be aware of when using a regular hanging planter:
1) The branches do bend or crease at the …
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Organic Gardening 101 Article Featured on LowImpactLiving.com
A new article I recently wrote for Low Impact Living has been featured on this week’s How-To-Tuesday. Low Impact Living is a great website with
tons of ideas on how to go green in your home and lifestyle. Check out the site and this blog posting:
Organic Gardening 101 –
How-To-Tuesday
Happy Gardening, everyone!
Posted in What's Growin' On
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Seed-Starting, Transplants and Heirlooms Class Review
Today we completed the third installment in the Gardenerd Organic Gardening Series on Seed-starting, Transplants and Heirlooms, and I think this was
my favorite class so far. There’s something about nursing little babies (I mean the seedlings, not the beginning gardeners) to life. We started the class with an overview of seeds –
how to store them properly, how to interpret the seed packet information, and how to test for seed viability.
Then we moved on to discuss the difference between heirlooms, open-pollinated seeds, and hybrids. It was good to review those differences, since I constantly have to look …
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Posted in What's Growin' On
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Gardenerd Tip of the Week Podcast
This week’s Tip of the week is our first that is broadcasting on iTunes. You can subscribe by going to iTunes (which is downloadable for free)
or you can visit our home page and click on
the Podcast icon under the Latest Gardenerd News. For those with less inclination in the ways of the computer. Just click below and listen.
Enjoy!
Bougainvillea Woes & Shade Plants
A relatively new gardener writes in:
“I have two questions. First, I have bougainvillea bushes that grow in my back yard. Something is eating them ragged and I can’t actually find any evidence of the
pest except for the pitifully chomped leaves. Can you give me some clue about what the problem might be and how I can keep it from happening in the future?
Second, I have a lot of shady areas where I’d like to plant, or areas that get lots of sun part of the summer and lots of shade toward the end. Can you recommend some …
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Posted in Sage Advice
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Small Space and Container Gardening Class Review
The second class in the Gardenerd Organic Gardening Series went over even better than the first. We had 12 fellow gardenerd there, all with
plenty of questions. We talked about bio-intensive gardening, and growing plants in containers and raised beds.
Posted in What's Growin' On
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