Food Worth Growing: Mountain Mint

Back in 2010, when I was travelling to promote the release of my second book, Grow Great Grub, I made a stop at a small bookstore in Montreal. Before the event, I went plant shopping with the store manager, who wanted to get a little herb garden planted in front of the shop. In the

Food Worth Growing: Nodding Onion

I grow several allium species and cultivars in my garden and I find that many of them serve as a hub for a surprising range of pollinators. This is nodding onion (Allium cernuum), an easy to grow, multi-use plant that is native to Carolinian habitats (parts of Canada and the US, including right here in

Aliens in My Garden: Ligated Sweat Bee

I have not been very diligent about posting here, but I have continued to follow the directive I set for myself in 2016 to photograph and identify the bees and other insects that inhabit my garden. Aliens in My Garden is a series capturing the fascinating insects that inhabit my small, urban garden. While many

Bombus Be(e)ing

I spent about an hour yesterday afternoon perched on a stool in front of a patch of borage (Borago officinalis) with my camera poised to take photos of pollinators as they went about their business collecting pollen. I observed at least 6 different types of bees on this particular plant, many of which were small

Aliens in My Garden: Sphecodes Bee

The attendance of pollinators and other insect allies in my garden has blossomed in the five years since I first put spade to the earth and dug up the turf grass that dominated this yard. Over the years, I’ve had many gardens in a range of urban settings, but none have been as alive as

Remembering Summer: A Bee’s Butt

I found this photo today while searching through folders of summer images on my computer and felt compelled to post it. This was a common sight in my garden last summer, especially over the weeks that liatris was in bloom. It’s a pollinator magnet and I’ll never have another garden in this climate without at

TO Bees

We are excited about hosting a wild bee nesting box in our new garden as a part of a study on wild bee populations in urban habitats that is being conducted by Scott McIvor through the Packer Collection (PCYU) at York University. You can see how the nestboxes are constructed here. We can’t wait to