General growing and maintenance guidelines. Your plants and how to care for them…
It was bought impulsively; one of those corner market jobs that catches your fancy from out of the corner of your eye. And it did, and I did, while walking home slightly inebriated from a decadent restaurant meal. (Worse things have happened under the influence of alcohol, I am sure.) It shouldn’t have been outside …
I recently had an assortment of old film developed (recently being tonight) and one of those rolls contained photos that I took last January at Rancho la Puerta in Tecate, Mexico.
‘Doone Valley,’ a variegated creeping thyme with a lemon scent/flavour is seen here growing in my Dry Bed in and around red semperivum and a Silver Brocade Artemisia (Artemisia stelleriana). I’ve been growing thyme (Thymus spp.) for about as long as I’ve been gardening and I over that time I have tried every variety you …
Last weekend we dug up a boatload of Jerusalem artichokes aka sunchokes from the garden, right on schedule. Believe it or not, many of the tubers are even bigger this year than last. And there are more of them! God help us. When we began digging, I told Davin that we would only be excavating …
Recently, the addition of an island/counter that has suddenly provided me with more counter space than I have ever had before, as well as the well-timed arrival of an indulgent purchase of newly published cookbooks has us spending whole days in the kitchen. I am always drawn to the kitchen in other people’s homes. It’s …
Hey guys, I did it! I unlocked the Prepare the Garden For Winter achievement! The weather this week has been beautiful, sunny, and mild so I resolved to take advantage of what are surely our final nice days to complete all of the garden chores that have been nagging me. I don’t know about you …
Yep, I’m behind. As always. No new story here. It is November 15 and I am yet to plant my garlic. I have been here before. In fact, there was that year that I didn’t get garlic in at all. As I write this, there is a total of six cloves in the ground. That’s …
Last spring we made a big change to the structure of our garden which resulted in a new perennial bed. Since the perennials were still quite small and lacklustre, I made use of the gaps and filled them in with an assortment of seeds including annual flowers, herbs, and greens. All of the plants I …
We shuffled all of the remaining houseplants inside last Friday just before the hard frost returned. And so began the arduous process of stuffing potted plants into windows and underneath lights in preparation for a long winter indoors. This year I decided to go for an all succulent mix in my office window, which wasn’t …
Here we are again folks. It’s too many green tomatoes time! Friends, I was smart and totally on top of my shit this year. I picked away at the harvest in manageable chunks rather than frantically hauling them all inside at once. But today, with the high winds and heavy rains of hurricane Sandy looming, …
They arrive early in the spring along with the hellebore, and the crocus, and the few other earliest of the early flowers. They are a gift. They greet us silently and yet there is an audible gasp when their bobbing heads are spotted above the debris. Oh thank god we’re gonna make it after all …
The quest to preserve what remains of the fall garden bounty continues at a fevered pitch. I used to complain that I didn’t have enough green tomatoes at the end of the season, and now… let’s just say, Be careful what you wish for. One nice way to use up the last of the herbs …