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Plant Parenting: Easy Ways to Make More Houseplants, Vegetables, and Flowers by Leslie F. Halleck (Timber Press, 256 pp., 2019, $24.95) How are your plant propagation skills? If you’re like me, you’re probably pretty decent at starting plants from seed but maybe not so great at taking cuttings to propagate plants. I first heard about Leslie Halleck’s new book, Plant […]
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For today’s garden column, I wrote about growing artichokes. And specifically some things you can you to have productive artichokes if you live in a colder, shorter growing season like I do. Here is a link to my column in today’s edition of The Spokesman-Review: Chill artichoke seedlings to fool them into producing. Artichokes can be grown as perennials in […]
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For this week’s column, I wrote about seed-starting: the supplies you need and the steps to go through in order to be successful. Here’s a link to it in today’s edition of The Spokesman-Review: Give seeds a good start with the right containers, soil and light. I’ve been starting my own vegetable and flower plants from seed for years. There […]
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I’ve been growing microgreens during the winter months for several years now. Up until recently, I have planted the seeds in a seed-starting mix (also known as a germination mix). But I recently heard about using jute mats in place of the sterile potting soil. Intrigued, I ordered some from True Leaf Market and tried them out. Spoiler alert: It […]
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What would you say if I told you it’s possible to plant specially-prepared containers with seeds and put them outside, where it’s snowy and/or rainy for the rest of the winter? That sounds crazy, doesn’t it? But winter sowing is a viable, no-fuss way to start seeds and it just happens to be the topic of this week’s video and […]
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Whether you’re growing vegetables or flowers (or both), this is the perfect time to order your seeds and focus on the right timing for your seed-starting activities. And I’ve got some helpful tools and information right here on this website to help you out. First of all, you might want to check out which veggies I’ll be growing in my […]
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It’s time for my next monthly garden column! This one is about seed viability (the shelf life of seeds) and some of my favorite seed catalogs. You can read it in today’s edition of The Spokesman-Review: ‘Tis the season to prepare. The seed catalogs have been rolling in steadily, which sure makes it hard for me to make my choices. […]
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Now that the holiday decorations are out of the way, I finally had room to set up a grow light so I could start growing microgreens for the winter. If you haven’t heard of microgreens or vaguely recall my mentioning this last winter, I think a “growing microgreens refresher” is in order! Put simply, this involves thickly sowing vegetable or […]
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Perhaps I caught your attention with today’s topic, eh? After all, we gardeners love saving money in the garden, right? You can learn more about this in my column in today’s edition of The Spokesman-Review: Saving money in the garden. On July 12, I posted a question on my Facebook page, asking folks to weigh in on what they do […]
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Take a look at this tomato seedling. I just planted it in the garden yesterday and am very pleased with the shape it’s in. Now, I’m not posting this to brag but, in my humble opinion, this is absolutely the perfect size tomato seedling for transplanting. You might recall I mentioned a few weeks ago that I don’t start my […]
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