A Gardener's Notebook

Archive for the ‘Education’ Category

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Images from a short walk in Millard Canyon, Angeles National Forest, just north of Los Angeles.

While these shots are out in the “wild” mountains north of Los Angeles, there is a gardening link. If and when you design a water feature in your garden, it pays to go out and take a look at the way nature does it. In this video, I especially noted how twigs and limbs that have fallen from the surrounding trees have created dams which collect smaller stones and directly effect how the water flows down the creek. It also is very important to the sound of your water features. You will most likely have to change the position of the elements in your water feature until it sounds like you want.

Sound is also very important for attracting wildlife, if you wish. Birds and other animals are quickly attracted to the sound of running water, especially if other sources are limited. This is one reason I am working hard to get a water feature  installed in my garden. I love having the birds here, so anything that helps attract them would be great.

The RHS Chelsea Flower Show is happening this week near London and I am so jealous. I will be there in just over 2 weeks, but all of this will be gone. (Pout!)

Still, I can live vicariously through this Flickr slide show from those that DID make it.

There is also a lot of video on YouTube.

This was originally written for release in February 2010 for another publication, but it never appeared. Much of the information is still valid, though, even as as move through April. — Douglas

While much of the US is still buried under quite a bit of snow, out here in California we are already planting veggies in our gardens. I don’t point this out to be mean. I am from Ohio, after all, so I understand what Winter means. That said, those of you cooped up in your houses can live vicariously through those of us in warmer climes and maybe even get a few good ideas for your garden once the ground thaws.

While our warmer weather allows us to plant earlier in the season there is also a bit of necessity. Our summers are so much warmer here that traditional garden staples like lettuce, cabbage, broccoli and cauliflower simply can’t cope. Try to plant them in May and they will be bolted almost before you get them in the ground. Sure, we can get tomatoes earlier, but in the middle of summer they can suck up a small fortune in water to keep them going. So, now is the time for us to get all our cold weather vegetables into the ground so we can get our harvest before the 100+ temperatures shrivels them in the ground.

This can make your garden planning for your summer much easier, though. Seek out garden bloggers in warmer areas to get an early idea what the neatest, coolest, best producing varieties are new this year. You can even get some real-world feedback on how well they do before you need to start your own seedlings. It is true,though, that good news about certain plants could have you looking for space to hang grow lights and set up irrigation systems trying to get jump on your own garden.

Here are a couple of hints on how you can use warm climate gardeners as your get your started in your own garden (and kitchen) planning for the coming season.

* Check out online forums and see what others are planning and what they might already be planting.

Share your experience with others. What worked (or didn’t work) for you last year? What are you going to trying this year? You’ll find people from all over the country and the globe.

* Start collecting recipes that can make use of your garden bounty.

Gardening planning is always easier when you have some obvious goal in mine. Online recipe files have thousands of possibilities for all sorts of vegetables.

* Seek out garden bloggers. We all love sharing what is happening in our gardens.

You can use Google or other search engines to locate gardeners both in your area and around the world.

* Use restaurants as your guide

Many higher-end restaurants specialize in using new and interesting ingredients in the dishes. Consider the ingredients in an interesting dish, especially one’s new to you and how they might fit into your garden. Then, seek out these plants in seed catalogs and your local nurseries.

*Be adventurous!

Try something new this year.

Related articles by Zemanta

• Get That First Herb Garden Started (hbb2obm.com)
• Your Urban Garden (welchwrite.com)
• Top 10 Posts from A Gardener’s Notebook for 2009 (welchwrite.com)
• Why we garden (welchwrite.com)

Seen on the Backwards Beekeepers site…

Urban Beekeeping 101
Hosted by sustainablesilverlake.org
at the Silver Lake Library
Saturday June 5, 2010 @ 11AM

Talk with Q&A by Kirk Anderson and Leonardo Chalupowicz

Kirk Anderson, a local master beekeeper, and Leonardo Chalupowicz, a local green architect and amateur beekeeper, will outline a brief history of bees and beekeeping and the fundamentals of beekeeping in an urban setting. They will explore the basic equipment and techniques, how to do it the bee’s way versus the commercial way, and colony collapse disorder.

Related articles by Zemanta

• Video: Urban Beekeeping: Ins and Outs – Dos and Don’ts – Webinar (welchwrite.com)