Tag: Organic Gardening

  • Beautiful Broccoli

    Catherine Seidenberg, our now-year-two vegetable garden guru, has once again aced the Broccoli Bonanza. That’s right, my bride and I have been devouring 100% organic, pest-free broccoli fresh out of the garden for a couple of weeks now. Quickly steamed, it’s packed with flavor, and oh-too-sexy to resist!

  • How to Use Tanglefoot (And Why Fruit Trees Need It)

    How to Use Tanglefoot (And Why Fruit Trees Need It)

    It’s time for a follow-up to my Organic Orcharding post, specifically a detailed look at how to use Tanglefoot for non-toxic pest control in a holistic fruit tree orchard. For readers wondering about zone compatibility and looking for a regional reference to help you evaluate the relevance of this post to your individual growing conditions,…

  • Radishes and Radish Greens

    Radishes and Radish Greens

    On this technicolor Tuesday I present to you one of our flashiest May garden treats, French Breakfast Radishes. Field and forrest foraged veggies — like stinging nettles, wild ramps, and fiddleheads — are nature’s charitable reminder that winter has once again yielded to spring. Then our vegetable gardens begin to awaken with asparagus and spinach that spoil…

  • Organic Orcharding

    For the last few years I’ve made brazen claims about holistic, organic gardening and orcharding. No pesticides. No way; no how. Period. No exceptions. I’ve refused to spray our fruit trees to inoculate them against all of the baddies that lurk in an orchard’s tender places. I’ve refuted the discouraging oracles who assure me that I will fail; that a…

  • Spinach, Still Spinach

    Spinach is one of the first garden fresh veggies we enjoy each spring. And it’s one of the last in the fall. A “shoulder” vegetable… And we usually manage to grow it most of the summer as well. Too hot, and it bolts. But a fresh batch is quick to germinate, so we replant often…

  • Why Are My Cucumbers Orange?

    Why are my cucumbers orange? They’re turning yellow-orange, to be precise… This summer we have enjoyed more productive cucumber plants than ever before, but recently the enormous fruit are discoloring from green to yellow to orange before we can eat them. Here’s the reason why. Cucumbers turn orange when they grow excessively ripe before harvesting,…

  • Snakes, Swiss Chard & Automobiles

    A week ago today was a day for snakes. Though – sadly, I must add – it was not a day for living snakes… Rattlesnakes and White Tail Deer Let’s start with the good news. Or at least the benign-if-slightly-amusing news. To set the stage, imagine yourself walking across the still dewy lawn south of…

  • Broccoli Bonanza

    For the first time in my gardening life I am enjoying homegrown broccoli from our vegetable garden. Better yet? It’s totally organic and totally pest free! That’s a broccoli bonanza! Our friend, neighbor and gardening guru Catherine Seidenberg asked me back in May why we weren’t planting broccoli. She had just agreed to join “Team…

  • Plum Premature Fruit Drop

    For weeks I’ve been anticipating our first crop of plums. A small crop, but proof that the last few years nurturing our plum trees to health despite hail storms and severe Adirondack winters, Japanese beetles and a zero pesticide regimen was worth it. And then this! Plum premature fruit drop… Today is July 15, 2015…

  • Protecting Strawberries from Squirrels

    Of all the ways that gardeners try protecting strawberries from birds, bird netting offers the best solution. Learn how to safely protect your strawberries. (Source: Bonnie Plants) I mentioned to Catherine Seidenberg recently that strawberry bandits persistently steal/damage our ripe strawberries. The first couple of years after we established our strawberry patch, we produced an excess of strawberries.…

  • Mid-May Grafting Update

    Some discouraging grafting news this morning: all three apple trees that I grafted with my father a little less than a month ago appear to be rejecting the grafts. No, that’s a bit presumptuous. The trees probably aren’t responsible for the failed grafts, I am. I found no indication that any of our grafts have taken. Most of…

  • From Artichoke to Sea Anemone

    When you don’t harvest your artichokes in time they bloom. And then they look like sea anemones! On the one hand, it’s a pity. One fewer chokes to steam and dab in mayonnaise or butter or… hollandaise sauce. Yum. On the other hand, these giant thistle blossoms are stunning! The size of softball, and violet…