Share my passion for all things gardening!
I just posted a video about curing winter squash and pumpkins before storing them on my Facebook page and YouTube channel. One thing you might be wondering about is the ideal conditions for storing them after the curing process.
Read moreDiane and Bruce Moriarty in their productive straw bale garden. I think you are going to love today’s column from The Spokesman-Review! Remember how I wrote a feature story in May about a Spokane Valley couple who were trying straw-bale gardening? Well, that was Bruce and Diane Moriarty. They had 40 straw bales and grew all sorts of veggies in […]
Read moreNow that you’ve watched the video about my pole bean trellis, I wanted to better show you how it’s set up in my garden. As you can see by the above photo, I have 4 arbors that span a 3-foot-wide path between two of my raised beds. Each arbor has spikes that you push down into the soil for stability. […]
Read moreAmaranth ‘Joseph’s Coat’ Here’s a link to my column in today’s edition of The Spokesman-Review: Blend of gardening, quilting. This one is all about an upcoming event that I think you’ll enjoy. It’s called “Art in Bloom: Flowers, Fabric and Friends” and it’s a fundraiser for the beautiful Moore-Turner Heritage Gardens on Spokane’s lower South Hill. The event, held on […]
Read moreJoe uses cattle panels to support his tomato plants in his salsa garden. In my column in today’s Spokesman-Review, I’ve written a profile of another local gardener. His name is Joe Hutchinson and he is crazy about tomato salsa. Each year, he grows a lot of tomatoes, onions, peppers and herbs so he and his wife, Donna, can bottle up […]
Read moreLook at these gorgeous Victoria lily pads at Longwood Gardens! Wow. It’s two-fer Sunday! In addition to my garden column in today’s edition of The Spokesman-Review (see post), I also wrote a travel article about our trip to see the amazing Pennsylvania gardens. Here’s a link to it: A gardener’s vacation. Hope you’ll enjoy the photos that accompany it as […]
Read moreThese blackberries have been frozen individually. Are you growing berries in your garden? We grow strawberries, blueberries, raspberries and blackberries. While I enjoy making jams and jellies, it’s nice to freeze some of the berries for those winter fruit cobblers and crisps, too. Freezing blueberries is a piece of cake: you just pick them, wash them lightly, pop them into […]
Read moreViola ‘Heartthrob’ (foreground) and painted fern (background). Wow, how can it be the last day of August already?! But it’s just in time for my last column of the month in today’s edition of The Spokesman-Review: Time to focus on perennials, trees, shrubs. This one is all about the fall plant sale put on by the Friends of Manito. It […]
Read moreI recently planted cover crops in some of my vegetable garden beds that are done producing for the year. So, what are cover crops anyway? They are usually members of the legume or grass families that are planted in idle soil to suppress weeds, maybe to protect soil from erosion, or to add nutrients into the soil. That last reason […]
Read moreEvery year I grow a lot of green beans. I usually only grow pole beans (‘Italian Snap’) but am also growing bush beans (‘French filet’ style beans) which have been really productive. I have to admit that I’m a bit of a chicken when it comes to canning low-acid vegetables, which beans are. That’s because of the risk of botulism […]
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