If you head over to Campbell’s Help Grow Your Soup site you can get some free tomato seeds and while you are at it vote for a barn which Campbell’s will give $250,000 to restore. So free seeds for you and one dollar for a barn restoration.
I doubt there is anyone who enjoys pulling weeds, though now at the end of the season is a great time to do some preventive measures to prevent new growth next season. Kill your weeds early: The sooner you pull your weeds the easier it is to keep up with them. In addition, if you pick the weeds before the mature and flower and drop seeds you will save…
The kids and I carved several pumpkins this year but we waited carve the three pumpkins we grew in our backyard until Halloween since these were the seeds I wanted to save for planting next year. First, I know exactly how these pumpkins were grow, organically and free of any pesticides. Second, I was able to let these pumpkins grow undisturbed until the day I picked the seeds, so…
Corn is one of those crops I really don’t have space to grow but still like to try every year. This past year I only had one ear that made it to maturity, in the plants defense we have a very hot summer and I didn’t have the most consistent watering schedule so I am to blame for most of their demise. Given I used the last of my…
We have seen MIT students making robots to tend on their plants. Now Fuji Heavy Industries has created a robot that can completely take care of your fruits and vegetables in your fields (or greenhouse) for a modest fee of only $100,000. You can pick up your own by the next fiscal year. It uses lasers with reflective panels to orient itself and is 6.5 feet long, unfortunately there…
Well this is pretty much clichéd nerdiness but given it only required a couple of lines of C# I couldn’t resist. I have updated my grow box software to “tweet” some sort of semi-humorous and not really witty comment appropriate to its current state and share its current temperature and moisture content every 2.5 hours. For those who want to do something similar, this is how I did it. …
If it were up to me every part of my landscaping would be edible. Though my homeowners association may disagree with me but blueberry bushes looks just as nice as any ornamental plant/bush when you visit the nursery with the obvious bonus of free food. When selecting a blueberry bush, unless you are very patient spend about $10 a plant and get some more established ones (about 1/2 inch…
My jalapeno peppers did great this year. So good I didn’t really know what to do with all of them. After making some salsa and having several mature red ones as snacks in the garden, I still have about two pounds that I didn’t want to go to waste. After a little thought I decided to make some pickled jalapeno peppers. CVG Picked jalapeno pepper recipe 1 cup vinegar…
Though I have made some significant changes to the grow box controller, the actual grow box has undergone some minor but important changes over the past few months. Automated watering Now I must say this one is pretty darn simple. Though I will be planning on a slightly more complicated hydroponic setup later I decided to start with a very easy bottom watering technique. Just take a regular old…
Last February my 7-year-old daughter and I attended the Northwest Flower and Garden show for the first time, which is back on next year if you haven’t yet heard the good news. During our visit my daughter purchased a single dahlia tuber from Swan Island Dahlias. We carefully followed the detailed planting instructions and it grew to about 5 feet by the end of the summer, though there were…
Whether you are trying to determine if those seeds you have been stored for 3-4 years are still good or questioning your ability to harvest seeds on your own testing germination is a great way to take away from of the guesswork and avoid disappointment next spring. The process is very simple, I believe I did the same thing in second grade during our plant section. Though that was…
Well slightly more exciting than watching grass grow but for something that takes several weeks to complete is definitely worth a watch. If you watch carefully you can even see the automatic watering in action. Joining the sprouts is a mature pepper plant which has been flowering and daisy seedling my 7 year old planted hoping it will flower as well.