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Organic Gardening - Flowers, Fruits, Vegetables
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| (no subject) |
[Apr. 25th, 2012|12:51 pm] |
So, these two types of mushrooms suddenly popped up in my celery seedlings, which are about a month old. Any ideas as to what they might be? TIA. Pics under cut.
( Pics! )
x-posted |
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| Squash |
[Apr. 22nd, 2012|10:58 am] |
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I know that they can produce in the shade of corn and beans in the three sisters method, but does anyone have any experiece growing squash in 2-3 hours of sun? I have a shady side yard that just sitting there with ivy growing on the ground. |
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| (no subject) |
[Mar. 18th, 2012|02:51 pm] |
Hello everyone!
A rather naive question, I am afraid.
I am about to start a herb garden in my flat, and am aware that I will probably need extra lighting. Is it at all possible to use a standard table lamp with a particular bulb to achieve this? I don't really have the space for a bigger set up! If this is feasable, can anyone explain to me which bulb will be best?
Tried to have a look online but it all got rather complicated rather quickly.
Thanks! |
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| What seeds are you starting indoors? |
[Feb. 19th, 2012|11:30 am] |
I admit that I am very much a hap-hazard gardener. Winter and spring are always busy times for me, and I've never gotten organized enough to start my own seeds indoors before. I know I am running a little late for some seeds, but in some cases I figure I am ahead if I start them now instead of outside next month. (I'm in the USDA Hardiness Zones 5 to 6 region.)
So, this year I finally have all my supplies together and am re-checking my seed inventory on what I should be starting now. I have my basic list, but thought I'd ask what others like to start early, besides the basics of tomatoes, peppers, cabbages, squash, and melon. Maybe I've overlooked something really beneficial?
Any experiential advice which you care to add is also appreciated.
Thanks, all! |
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| Leaf Mold |
[Feb. 4th, 2012|01:17 pm] |
I must admit, that one area where I'm tempted to use chemical fertilizer is with regard to adding nitrogen to my so called compost pile. I call it compost, but the realit is that it is probably 90% leaves. I'm on a quiet street, with little traffic or on street parkings, so I feel pretty safe in collecting leaves on my block and do so obsessively. Starting in September, I built the pile up to exceed 20 cubic yards, and with yard waste, kitchen waste, pee and some purchase blood meal, it heated up quickly and started to rot as I continued to add more leaves until it was at 30 yards by the end of Octover.
We've had a warm wet winter, but by now, the pile is starving for nitrogen, and I'm tryijng to locate a cheap source of organic nitrogen. I'll probably buy a back of Ringer's lawn fetilizer, but that's nowhere near enough. Any ideas on cheap nitrogen? |
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| Courseware for Basics in Gardening |
[Jan. 17th, 2012|06:28 pm] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| |  confused | ] |
Hi, I am Computer Science student and and total noob in gardening. In one of subjects, our group decided to make a courseware with gardening as the topic. Basically, we want to create a flash software for beginners in gardening or something like a how-to's in gardening. I just want to ask what sort of things or topics should we put in our project. Can someone suggest what things should we include in our courseware? Any suggestion would be really helpful.
I hope I didn't break any rules :D
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| uses for CDs? |
[Dec. 30th, 2011|12:59 pm] |
I've heard of (and seen) people hanging strings of old CDs around fruit trees to protect the fruit from birds - the reflections are supposed to scare them off. Does it work? How thickly do they need to be strung? How high/low would they need to be to protect the tree top-to-bottom?
Also, has anyone tried placing an old CD (shiny side up) as protection around a veg seedling? For example, a squash or melon? I ask because silver reflective mulch is supposed to reflect light onto the undersides of leaves and deter some pests - would a CD be sufficiently reflective? Could it also work as a sort of cutworm collar?
The CD-around-seedling idea is just one that came to mind this morning; I'm not sure if it would be at all useful. I don't see references to such an idea online, so figured I'd ask if anyone had tried such a thing.
Possible drawbacks that come to mind: not water-permeable, so would create a dry zone; contains silver...although hopefully that can't leach out and is only a problem if it melts; could get splashed with mud and then wouldn't be reflective anymore; slugs might hide on the underside. Thoughts? |
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| growing garlic |
[Nov. 25th, 2011|02:26 pm] |
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I'm about a 90% organic gardener. I use neither chemical fertilizers or pesticides on anything I grow, and buy organic plants when I can, including certified disease free organic seed potatoes. Two big exceptions are blueberries, I've never been able to grow them without adding iron sulphate to acidify the soil, and garlic. Organic seed garlic is so expensive, that it would be cheaper to just buy organic garlic all year round rather than grow my own. So each year I pick up a healthy batch of garlic at the supermarket, seperate the cloves and plant the largest ones, using the rest in cooking over the next week or so. |
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| Fall planting on onions plants? |
[Aug. 25th, 2011|06:02 pm] |
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I've been reading a bit about the idea of planting onion transplants in the fall. I've never done this before. Has anyone had any luck with this in zone 6\7. I'm in Maryland. |
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| the secret to awesome leeks |
[Aug. 21st, 2011|07:39 pm] |
I read this tip in Eliot Coleman's Winter Harvest Handbook last winter, and decided to try it out this year.
Instead of planting leeks a couple inches deep, and then hilling up around the plants as they get taller over the growing season, he basically pushes a 1-inch-diameter dowel about 9 inches into the ground, drops a plant (with its roots trimmed to 1") into the hole, and moves on. He wrote that this technique eliminated the time-consuming, messy hilling, and produced leeks that were beautifully and uniformly blanched for market.
The photo below shows the result of my test. I used an old broom handle as my dowel, marked at 9" from the end with a sharpie marker, to make my holes. Super easy!! My plants probably should have been a bit larger--I lost a few more than I normally would have when soil fell into the holes and covered the whole plant. Those plants that survived did not seem to mind being planted so deeply:
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