width=”425″ height=”282″ /> Sorry, Punxsutawney Phil did see his shadow so six more weeks of winter. Though for those of you with a blanket of snow on the ground and more coming this is probably not hard to believe. Just for the record Punxsutawney Phil is only right 39 percent of the time so probably best to not put too much of your seed planning on his prediction. Keeping fingers…
width=”549″ height=”412″ /> I have used egg cartons to plant seedlings before but here is a slight twist, instead of taking the whole lid off I cut the top off the lid. This not only gives you a neat place to label your seeds but more importantly, it provides an extra inch of depth for your seedlings to get a running start before being transplanted to your garden.
width=”549″ height=”412″ /> Last summer I setup some cheap rain barrels which I describe in this post which worked great though had one major flaw. If you wanted to do some maintenance or add any new barrels you would have to literally have to saw them apart. This time around I came up with a design that is not only simple but can be done with almost no tools…
width=”549″ height=”412″ /> The last few years have bought a bag or two of potting soil for my spring planting though each year I am disappointed when I open the bag containing a bunch of bark , twigs, gravel, and even several pretty large rocks. This year I have decided to make my own potting soil with very little effort and much less cost. Given I just recently harvested…
width=”549″ height=”412″ /> When it comes to making compost I am pretty lazy approach to this process, no turning, no tumblers, just stack up material in the compost bin and let natural decomposition process and worms do their job. Given I use a portable SoilSaver Classic Composter with just a bit muscle I can lift this off my pile of compost. As you can see with the composter removed…
width=”549″ height=”412″ /> Here is a quick and easy way to add additional aeration and also provide a convenient way to deeply water your compost during dry months. Simply cut to length of corrugated irrigation pipe with a utility knife and run them through your compost bin. Fill with uncomposted material being careful to not add material in the exposed tube(s). This should allow better airflow to your compost…
width=”549″ height=”412″ /> Though it is still pretty cold inside right now is the time for me to begin start planting seeds for this spring. These include bok choy which are very cold tolerant, onions which do pretty good in the cold but could use a head start on these to get some good sized bulbs by the end of the season. I also started some daisies which I…
width=”550″ height=”367″ /> Hope you have a happy holiday and for those looking to get started with your garden don’t fret there are seeds you can start indoors soon. If you wondering what you can start planting in Dec/Jan in your area check out our seed starting calculator.
width=”550″ height=”366″ /> There appears to be a tomato flying 4.791 miles per second, 230 miles above our heads which is probably a first. If you are wondering how it go there… Astronaut Koichi Wakata has the answer: "One fresh tomato for dinner makes us happy in space. It came up with us on Soyuz TMA-11M two weeks ago." I wish I could have tomato salads in space too….
width=”549″ height=”412″ /> The end of this summer I planted a bunch of carrots one afternoon and I unfortunately pretty much forgot about them. Without proper thinning I ended up with quite a few short and/or twisted carrots which I decided would be perfect to make some fermented ginger carrots. Step 1: Clean and peel carrots. Peeled and cut the ends off of the carrots and set them aside….
width=”549″ height=”412″ border=”0″ /> My seed collection from my Winter Luxury Pie pumpkin I purchased a few years back finally paid off and I was able to produce a couple of decent sized pumpkins which should provide me enough pumpkin goo (canned pumpkin) to make plenty of baked goods this fall. For those who have not made their own pumpkin goo the process is very easy…even easier this…
width=”488″ height=”366″ border=”0″ /> This weekend we decided to head to our favorite pumpkin patch to get some obvious pumpkins, kettle corn, cider donuts, and about a dozen pounds of u-pick apples. Now that I have amassed a plethora of apples we decided to make some homemade applesauce. For just a few apples I would just cut the apples by hand but with this many I break out my…