DIY

Plant A Tabletop Succulent Bowl

Fri, 24 May 2013 14:32:00 -0700

Three Echeveria species, interplanted with a fine-textured succulent (front). In back, left, a hens-and-chicks (Sempervivum) with fine, white "cob-webbing".

Spring is the perfect time to plant a subtly textural succulent bowl for your summer dining table. Succulents are ideal for tabletops, not only because they're low-growing and therefore unlikely to block your view across the table, but also because they thrive on neglect: just hose them down every few days or once a week during the summer to keep them perky. Best of all, they are interesting to admire up close while sipping a gin and tonic on a summer afternoon, after a long afternoon of work.

The pot:

Best is to start with a container you already have and pick succulents that will compliment it. Wondering what to do with that beloved old cracked china casserole dish? Have a big, beautiful shell you can’t bear to throw out? Justify its existence by planting something in it. (Just make sure it has – or you can drill – a hole in the bottom, for drainage.) You also might poke around your garage for a nice little pot. If you need to purchase something, trawl thrift shops for something rustic, or just buy a wide, shallow bowl of terra cotta or stoneware. The taller the plants, the deeper the bowl should be. And of course, the larger your table, the larger a pot it can accommodate. Really low-growoing plants like hens-and-chicks (Sempervivum) can go in very flat pots or shells.

The potting mix:

Use a commercial cactus and succulent mix - or add about ½ the volume of horticultural pumice and a handful of sand to the same amount of commercial potting soil. Resist the tempation to use soil from the garden, as it is usually too heavy for succulents and won’t drain properly.

Tips:

Cut a little square of frost cloth or newspaper to put over the drainage hole of the pot. This minimizes the amount of dirt that flows through the pot onto your table when you water.

No need to add pebbles or rocks to the bottom of the pot – it doesn’t improve drainage and can lodge in drain holes and block them.

Finally, the best part – the plants!

Echeveria are always a favorite for summer planters. The colors are thrilling and the plump rosettes of foliage can be downright fascinating. Foliar colors include olive and fresh green, gold, powder blue, and all variety of pink, bronze and burgundy tints. Leaves can be hairy or smooth, with ruffled or wavy edges, often two-toned, and the plants produce copious, and adorably chubby little offsets during the season.

Try three Echeveria in a shallow, eight to 12-inch diameter terra cotta bowl. The Echeveria will fill in quickly and look like they’ve been like that for years. Mix and match for an appealing variety of colors and textures. Place smooth pebbles or river rock between them or interplant with a more finely-textured succulents (as in the photo). Echeveria rarely survive our cold, wet winters outdoors so bring the pot indoors in September or October, or just replant in spring.

Another nice tabletop plant is hens-and-chicks (Sempervivum) and their close relative, Jovibarba. These tough, cold-hardy plants make dense, intricately-patterned mats and come in a range of colors and textures. One small plant can fill in a four or six-inch pot in a season. Sempervivum make wonderful tabletop plants because they are low, flat and intensely textural - great for close-up viewing. Add a few handsome stones to the pot and watch the Semps slowly grow around and over them.

Creeping sedums make superb container plants, too. There are even sedums that thrive in shade or part shade. There are hundreds of varieties - visit the Sedum Chicks' website for a list of Sedum, Sempervivum and planting ideas for containers.

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Sow Seeds Now For Summer Flowers

Mon, 20 May 2013 13:20:00 -0700

Image: cjorgens

Zinnias - especially the charming green 'Envy' variety - make glorious and long-lasting bouquets

By far the best—and cheapest—way to fill your garden with flowers this summer is to grow them yourself from seed.

Your average packet of seeds is three bucks. Pick three varieties you love and you can end up with tremendous drifts of flamboyant flowers for bouquets and to feed hummingbirds and pollinators— and your own color-starved soul—for less than ten dollars.

Plant them now, as the danger of frost has passed. (In Portland, for all intents and purposes, we list our last frost date as April 15).

You can still plant in early June but you'll have to wait a bit longer for those glorious flowers.

Choose a sunny location with moist, well-drained soil. Provide consistent moisture during the first month after planting, while seeds are sprouting and baby plants are getting established.

These flowers grow quickly and usually show the first flowers by mid-summer. Deadhead spent flowers and they’ll keep coming until the frost arrives some time in the middle of October.

Here's my list of easy-to-grow, colorful flowers for summer blooms:

Image: O lympus

Cosmos keep flowering all summer and right into the first frosts of autumn

Cosmos
Zinnia
Nasturtium - edible flowers for salad, drought-tolerant
Batchelors buttons
Marigolds – edible flowers for salads,
Pot marigold (Calendula)
Sweet alyssum
Amaranth
Mexican sunflower (Tithonia)
Sunflower

A great way to fit even more flowers into your garden is to add flowering vines. These vines are annuals, so they only last through the first autumn frost - perfect for covering a chain link fence or trellis this summer.

These fast-growing vines can run between 6 and 12 feet in a season and will bloom their hearts out all season long:

Morning glory (Convolvulus)
Firecracker vine (Mina lobata)
Black-Eyed Susan vine (Thunbergia)
Scarlet runner beans
Lab-lab bean (Dolichos lablab)

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Incredible Edibles and Handmade Gardens

Fri, 03 May 2013 10:59:00 -0700

Image: Lyudmila Suvorova

Hate to rain on anyone's parade, but there's no use planting your tomatoes and eggplants outside this weekend - warm, sunny days notwithstanding, the nights have been chilly and the soil hasn't warmed up enough to support these heat-loving plants. (Read this 2011 Plantwise post about how to know when it is the right time to plant tomatoes and summer veggies - and what you can do to speed things up.)

That said, it's a fabulous time to buy warm-weather starts and coddle them in a sunny window or under grow lights until planting time. Buy locally-grown, organic heirloom and hybrid vegetable starts at the Incredible Edibles plant sale 2013 - a plant sale that supports the important and under-funded Multnomah County Master Gardener program. OSU Extension-trained master gardener volunteers are on site all day to answer questions and edible gardening workshops are scheduled throughout the day (find schedule here, on the website). There are also raffle tickets on sale for prizes like a GreenBed raised garden bed system, a 2-night stay at Portland Urban Cottage, and gift certificates to local restaurants, garden gear, plants and more (raffle prizes details on the website).

WHAT: Incredible Edibles Plant Sale 2013
WHEN: Saturday May 2, 2013 from 10 am to 3 pm
WHERE: Our Lady of Sorrows Church, 5329 SE Woodstock Blvd. Portland
COST: Free admission
Questions? Call 503-445-4608

Image: Thicket

It may be too early for tomatoes but it's never too early for inspiration. There'll be inspiration aplenty on Sunday at Thicket, where author Lorene Edwards Forkner offers a show-and-tell of projects from her book, Handmade Garden Projects, with demos and time for Q&A afterwards. Some of the items you'll learn to make include wire plant supports, a galvanized gutter planted with succulents, flame-free canning jar lanters, homemade fireflies, and hairpin fencing chandeliers.

Lorene is editor of Pacific Horticulture magazine, a quarterly journal of West Coast gardening, design and environmentalism for passionate gardeners and curious naturalists. She is also the author of five garden titles including the bestselling Handmade Garden Projects (Timber Press, 2011), and the newly released Timber Press Guide to Vegetable Gardening: Pacific Northwest.

WHAT: Handmade Garden Projects with author Lorene Edwards-Forkner
WHEN: Sunday May 5, 2013, 1 to 3 pm
WHERE: Thicket, 4933 NE 23rd Ave, Portland (just south of NE Alberta St.) / 503-318-0049
COST: Free

While you're there, check out the shop's selection of top-notch plants for dry shade. Owner Adria Sparhawk has made a study of plants that grow well in urban neighborhoods, finding that most city-dwellers face the challenge of at least one stubborn dry shade area, courtesy of large conifers, extra large eaves or old deciduous shade trees in the parking strip. Ask her what she recommends!

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Five Favorite Asian Veggies to Grow This Year

Fri, 05 Apr 2013 09:31:00 -0700

Image: Sue Berge

Crimson Lady Finger radish from New Dimension Seed Co.

The popularity of vegetable gardening has grown exponentially in recent years. Many new vegetable gardeners are also cooks - or aspiring cooks - longing to get ahold of vegetables they can’t easily find at local markets.

With a worldlier citizenry entering the US year by year, we have better representation of superb and varied varieties of vegetables from around the world. Sometimes, varieties from other parts of the world actually grow better in the Pacific Northwest than heirloom American varieties bred for the East Coast or Midwest of the United States.

Some of the most exciting new vegetable varieties for the Portland area are crops like Asian greens that thrive in our cool, damp "shoulder" seasons of spring and fall, as well as warm-season veggies like tomatoes and long beans that can quickly ripen in our relatively short, often hot summers.

China, for instance, is a rich repository of great vegetable seed varieties, according to Sue Berge, owner of New Dimension Seed, a Scappoose company devoted to Chinese vegetables.

Berge grew up in China, moving to Oregon in 1985 to go to graduate school at OSU. Frustrated with the difficulty of obtaining long beans, daikon radishes and other Chinese vegetable staples she loved to cook and eat, Berge asked her sister to send seeds from China. (That was many years ago: rules for mailing seed between countries are stricter today.) A former city dweller in Beijing, Berge herself didn’t have any idea how to grow the seeds. But with some experimentation and a lot of help from gardening friends and the County Master Gardeners Program, she soon became an accomplished vegetable gardener herself.

In 2001, she founded her business, New Dimension Seed, selling unusual Asian vegetable seed in hand-labeled packets at the Portland Nursery. Now on-line and available around the US, her company has grown to become one of only a small handful of US companies focusing exclusively on Asian seed.

According to Berge, there is an absolutely immense and diverse selection of vegetable varieties in China, with different varieties grown in various climates throughout the country, as well as specific varieties for different seasons. Berge specifically seeks out seed selections that will thrive in the Pacific Northwest climate. For instance, she says there are about a thousand long bean varieties growing throughout Asia, from tropical southern climes to short-season northern varieties. Not only are there differences in flavor, but long bean varieties grown in humid, subtropical parts of SE Asia won't thrive in northern China - nor would they thrive in the Pacific Northwest's short, but hot, dry summers. The key to growing success in our climate is to select seed traditionally grown in climates akin to ours.

Each seed packet includes a recipe for the vegetables within, and many more recipes can be found on the New Dimensions Seed website. Friend New Dimension Seed on Facebook and you’ll find regular recipe postings, as well, using New Dimension vegetable varieties.

So what are Berge's five favorite uncommon Asian vegetables that should be grown by cooks and aspiring cooks in the Pacific Northwest?

Asian Radish: “There are quite a variety of large and small Asian radishes…. The Crimson Lady Finger radish is my favorite. It is one inch in diameter and six inches long and is a spring planting variety. It can be planted from end of March to May. The Radiant Giant daikon radishes is red in the center and green on the outside, very sweet and crunchy. It is a fall growing variety, which should be planted in late summer. The Ivory Daikon radish is a long white radish, very mild - also a fall variety.”

Image: Sue Berge

Green Queen Kohlrabi from New Dimension Seed.

Kohlrabi: “I like kohlrabi very much! It’s probably European in origin but it is much-used in Asian cuisine, and is certainly an under-utilized vegetable in America. Green Queen Kohlrabi is an Asian variety that grows really well in our climate. The nice thing about it is you can eat it as small as the size of a golf ball, or you can let it grow as large as 5 lbs. and it is still tender. It is easy to grow and can be sown from now until late June.”

Baby Bok Choy: “Many people are familiar with baby bok choy, but not a lot of people grow them at home. It is a very easy to grow vegetable, rather like radish. It takes 30-40 days to mature. Grow baby bok choy in succession (sowing every few weeks) so you'll have a steady supply of the tender vegetable all through the spring and fall.”

Image: Sue Berge

Gai Lan from New Dimension Seed.

Gai Lan: “Also known as Chinese broccoli, Gai Lan is very easy to grow in our climate. It can be used same way as spinach when cooking (it is not as good raw). The nice thing about Gai Lan is that you can plant it once and harvest continually for over a month.”

Asian Cucumber: “My other favorite must-grow are the Asian cucumbers. I have several varieties in my seed line: Green Sword, the Stallion White and the C-C Cucumbers. They are all sweet and burpless, but each has its own special flavor. The Stallion White Cucumber is a favorite among farmers market growers.”

Image: Sue Berge

Stallion White Cucumber, New Dimension Seed.

New Dimension Seed can be found at many local nurseries including the Portland Nursery. Seed packets can also be ordered directly on line here.

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You Can Sew Your Own Way

Mon, 01 Apr 2013 15:00:00 -0700

Image: Kristin Belz

The view from the sewing studio mezzanine at Modern Domestic, a three-year old shop on NE Alberta that offers classes, machine rentals and everything you need to try out sewing.

DIY comes in different shapes and sizes, especially in Portland. You can grow your own vegetables, raise your own chickens, and sew your own clothes. Or you can support your fellow Portlanders by purchasing what they've grown and raised and sewn. Either one is morally defensible in our ethics-centered city.

But sometimes you might have a notion to break out of your comfort zone and do something yourself that you haven't done before. A great way to do this is to try your hand at sewing – which doesn't have to mean hand sewing or buying your own sewing machine. The sewing studio is where to go.

Modern Domestic is one of a handful of shops where you can go to use their sewing machines and/or learn to sew. It's a type of retail establishment that didn't even exist in previous generations, but seems tailor-made (pun intended) to Portland and the 21st century modern/throwback mash-up lifestyle.

I had a fantasy that I could just walk in off the street with some fabric and an hour or so later walk out with beautiful cloth napkins in hand. Turns out that's not a realistic expectation, but a similar goal would not be difficult to achieve. It might take a few hours. I'd make napkins with a "serger" – a special sewing machine that hem the edge of a single layer of fabric so it won't unravel. I only know this because my mother has a serger and has made napkins for me. Wouldn't she be surprised if I did such a project myself?

Do you have the urge to serge? Try this class. Modern Domestic and other studios around town offer a range of classes each month, often for about $30-$50 a session.

Here's a slide show tour of what Modern Domestic has and what you might try out.

Modern Domestic
1408 NE Alberta Street
Portland, OR

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Grow Easy, Delectable Portuguese Kale

Fri, 22 Mar 2013 08:52:00 -0700

Image: Renee's Garden

Portuguese kale

If you're a gardener in the Pacific Northwest, there's a good chance you've grown Scotch kale, Russian kale and even choice, delectable Tuscan kale, with those thick, crumpled, nearly black-green leaves. But few gardeners know about Portuguese kale - yet!

In Renee's Garden seed catalog, Portuguese kale is described as tender, sweet and more heat tolerant than other kale varieties. It has huge, paddle-shaped, blue-green leaves with thick, white ribs and grows 1-2' tall and wide. It is described as a robust grower, and I can personally attest to that based on its performance in my garden this past winter.

I received a free seed sample of Portuguese kale from Renee's Garden last year and planted it in my garden late last summer. I had been hunting for the kinds of greens I enjoyed in caldo Gallego, a classic soup of the northern Spanish region of Galicia. I hoped that greens originating from the Iberian Peninsula would help me recapture the special character of this traditional dish.

Earlier this month, I heard Lynn Rosetto Kasper's Splendid Table interview with Renee Shepherd of Renee's Garden in which she discussed her ten favorite new garden seed varieties. To my delight, one of Renee's 2013 picks was Tronchuda Beira, or Portuguese kale, and I remembered that I'd planted a whole mess of them in my own garden. When I went out to take a closer look, I saw that they were growing like gangbusters.

I don't know for sure if this is the same green that I saw so often over the tops of fences passing through Galicia (if you do know, please comment!) but if it isn't exactly the same, it's close enough for me. The flavor is mild, sweet and richly nutritious-tasting. It is perfect for raw salads and is a cinch to clean, unlike some of the ruffled kale varieties.It is also productive enough to harvest in quantity for soups and raw salads. Six large, tender leaves provided enough greens for an entire pot of soup!

Image: Renee's Garden

Portuguese kale

Kale is quite easy to grow, requiring fertile, well-drained soil and plenty of sunshine. Since our native soil is on the acidic side, sweeten the soil slightly by scratching some lime into the soil - this is good for kale and all its brassica kin. Fertilize kale with organic, all-purpose fertilizer during the growing season, from February through August. (Avoid fertilizing from September through early February to protect plants from frost.) Kale, like other brassicas, is a cool-season crop and grows best during the "shoulder seasons" of spring and fall. The flavor improves with frost, turning nuttier and sweeter. In summer's heat, plants often bolt - plus the flavor turns bitter and the fibers toughen.

For a spring harvest, sow seed February through April - and if you sow as late as May, cross your fingers for cooler weather in June. For a late fall-winter-early spring crop, sow another crop in August or September.

Portuguese kale will definitely be a staple in my fall to spring vegetable garden. Move over, lacinato kale - there's a new kale in town!

Order Tronchuda Beira (Portuguese kale) directly from Renee's Garden or check with your favorite local nursery for the Renee's Garden seed display.

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The Drunken Botanist Happy Hour

Tue, 19 Mar 2013 07:58:00 -0700

A pansy blossom decorates a lemon drop. Image courtesy of Amy Stewart

Join container gardening expert and owner of Cornell Farm Nursery Deby Barnhart for a celebration of Amy Stewart's new book, The Drunken Botanist: The Plants That Create The World's Great Drinks.

A mixologist will prepare four recipes from the book for tasting, and each guest gets their favorite cocktail to sip, as well as a "recipe kit" of six plants to kick-start their own cocktail garden. One lucky guest will receive an autographed copy of Amy Stewart's new book.

WHAT: Happy Hour (with plant gifts)

WHEN: Wednesday March 27, 2013 from 4-6 pm

WHERE: Cornell Farm Nursery

COST: $25 - space is limited so call 503-292-9895 or stop in to pre-register.

After happy hour, head on down to Powell's Books (NW 10th and Burnside) for Amy Stewart's reading at 7:30 pm, with a special appearance by House Spirits Distillery's Christian Krogstad, who will talk about the botanical nature of his delicious Aviation Gin, and a selection of cocktail-friendly plants with Deby Barnhart from Cornell Farm Nursery. FYI, there will be special door prizes. (Don't say I didn't tell you!)

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A Perfect Portland Cocktail Garden

Tue, 12 Mar 2013 10:04:00 -0700

With recent years' blossoming of interest in artisinal bitters and infusions and the growth of local micro distilleries, Portland has become home to a vibrant and lively cocktail culture. All we're missing is knowledge of the gardening side of cocktail culture. Which begs the question: what plants can we grow in our gardens that will provide inspired infusions, garnishes, swizzle sticks and muddling herbs for our mixed drinks? I asked Amy Stewart, author of The Drunken Botanist, what she recommends growing for the Portland cocktail aficionado's garden.

Here are six of her favorite cocktail plants, hand-picked for Portland's climate:

'Mojito' mint - According to Amy, it's the actual strain of spearmint grown in Cuba, which is only available because Canadian tourists were taking it out of their mojitos and bringing it home with them.

'Red Venture' celery - Amy says, "I would have never in a million years thought it worthwhile to grow my own celery, but this stuff is fabulous. The stalks are much smaller than those big green bunches you by the grocery store, so they actually fit in a drink, and they are beautiful dramatic red. The flavor's much stronger than regular celery, so it's great for muddling into a savory drink. And they will pretty much keep going all year round. You will find the once you have a steady supply of celery, you'll use it in everything."

Black currant - "The Pacific Northwest is great for any kind of berries, and I'm very excited about growing my own black currants to make cassis. Really, any kind of berry belongs in a Portland cocktail garden."

Mexican sour gherkin cucumbers - "Not technically a cucumber, but a very close relative. Each one is about the size of a grape or an olive. The flavor is a bit more tart than a regular cucumber, but they pair very well with gin and they make a beautiful garnish — and the vines are freakishly prolific, so this is one really worth growing."

Grafted tomatoes - "Portland's climate is kind of like mine [northern California], where summer comes late in can be kind of iffy. I am very excited about these tomatoes that are grafted onto sturdier commercial rootstock. This is what commercial tomato farmers do, but it only recently occurred to anyone to start selling them to home gardeners. It's the same concept as a grafted fruit tree — you'll get more disease resistance and therefore a more vigorous, productive plant. You can also get a combo plant with two varieties grafted onto one rootstock. I know it sounds like a freak of nature, but it's just very old-school technology — you're pretty much just mashing the cut stem of one plant up against another."

Stewart has put together six collections of cocktail-friendly plants to go with her book - the Drunken Botanist Plant Collection, grown by Log House Plants and available through Territorial Seed Company and at garden centers up and down the West Coast this spring. The collection is comprised of six different tray packs themed around particular spirits: the Old Havana Rum Garden, the Heart of Agave Tequila Garden, the Farmers Market Vodka Garden, the Old Tom Gin Garden, the Southern Belle Whiskey Garden and Mixologist's Simple Syrups Garden. According to Stewart, "the challenge was coming up with an assortment of plants that pair well with that spirit, but also grows in jumbo sixpacks. So I would normally want to put peaches with whiskey, but we can't exactly put a peach tree in a sixpack!" The pairings may not all be 100% conventional, but they are inspired and sure to delight. The same link, above, brings you to a list of other great plants that are essential for summertime cocktails. Recipes making use of all the plants are included (on the plant tags). Here is what Amy wrote about the collections on her website.

The plants should be available this spring at New Seasons Markets as well as a number of garden centers including Cornell Farms, Portland Nursery, the Urban Farm Store, Drake's 7 Dees, Portland Homestead, The Garden Corner in Tualatin, Good News Gardening in Hood River, Schedeens in Gresham, 13th Street Nursery in Salem, Garland Nursery in Corvallis, and Bird's English Garden in Ridgefield, WA

If you're intrigued about designing a cocktail garden of your own, check out Amy and her fellow bloggers' writings about it on Garden Rant here (the design of Amy's cocktail garden) and here (the design before-and-after). And here are tips on growing a cocktail garden, with lots more plant suggestions.

Of course, no writing about cocktail gardens would be complete without a seasonal recipe making use of the delectable late winter citrus:

Here's a drink I made for a gathering of librarians and booksellers in Seattle. I called it the Dewey Decimal 580, 580 being the section in the Dewey Decimal system devoted to the botanical sciences. I thought the librarians were going to be much more impressed with that than they were, but I guess they've seen it all. —Amy Stewart

Dewey Decimal 580
1 oz gin
1 oz Lillet Blanc
1.5 oz fresh-squeezed grapefruit juice (about 1/3 to 1/4 of a grapefruit, depending on size)

Shake over ice, serve over ice in short rocks glass. Garnish with a long strip of grapefruit peel.

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Start Your Own Seeds

Tue, 12 Feb 2013 08:28:00 -0800

Image: Kate Bryant

It's time to start your vegetables! Let this be the year you try it... it's simple, fun and doesn't have to be expensive if you stay on mission and only buy seeds for what you know you can grow in your garden this year.

This is an adaptation of a blogpost I wrote last spring. If you need more detail, drill down a bit with this blogpost and then, if you still need more detail, follow up with this longer article I wrote back in 2009 for Portland Spaces on starting vegetables from seed.

If you’ve never started vegetables from seed before, start small, with just a couple of seed varieties. Some of the easiest to start now are lettuce (can be planted outdoors, in the cool spring weather, as soon as it's about an inch tall), as well as the tender tropical vegetables like tomatoes and peppers (wait til late May-early June to plant out). In late April or early May, you can sow fast-growing squash, cucumbers, and melons indoors, for planting out in late May/early June. But to begin: Vegetables Round One: tender tropicals that need the biggest head-start (tomatoes, peppers and eggplant) and cool-season lettuces, mustard and mesclun green mixes.

Materials:

- Planting containers. Almost anything that holds potting soil can be used. To recycle nursery pots (2- to 4-inch size best) or flats, run them through the dishwasher or scrub them clean and dry them. You can also use purchased peat pots, yogurt cups or tin cans with holes punched in the bottom, or anything you can dig up that is non-toxic and holds at least 3/4 cup of soil.
- Drip dishes or trays for underneath pots. If you re-use old drip dishes or trays, wash them. Some recommend using bleach but I stopped doing that a few years ago and haven’t had problems yet. A dishwasher makes it easy.
- Potting medium. Avoid disease/insect issues and purchase seedling mix for seeding plants indoors.
- Seeds. If you’re using older packets, make sure to check that the seeds are still viable. Most seeds have a date and will say how long the seeds are viable if stored properly. If not, you can google it. Best to start indoors are leafy greens, onions, cole crops, and fruiting plants like tomatoes. (Root crops should be sown directly outdoors.)
- Labels. Re-use plastic nursery tags that have one blank side, buy new plastic tags or use popsicle sticks.
- Pencil. Pencil is most durable on plastic tags, as counter-intuitive as it seems.
- Lights. This is very valuable but not completely essential. If you have a very bright spot in a bright room, right next to a window, your seeds could get enough light… especially if we have unusually bright March and April. But a grow-light’s more reliable! I use shop lights and actually, mine aren’t even full spectrum – just regular shop lights. Full spectrum is better but you can get away with regular shop lights for short-term seed starting projects (versus trying to bring orchids into flower and such).
- Heat mats or cables. These are easy to find at local nurseries but if you’re just starting a few plants, get creative. Those plants that do best with bottom heat (eggplants, peppers, even tomatoes) can be put in a warm spot such as the top of an inefficient, old-fashioned fridge or even close to a heating vent. (Try setting them on bubble wrap or another insulating material to modify hot-and-cold fluctuations.) Move the tray into a bright spot once seeds have germinated.

What seeds to start - and when?

In the Pacific Northwest, the best time to start the slower-growing, warm-season crops like tomatoes, eggplants and peppers indoors is mid-February to mid-March. But choose quick-growing, small-fruited types and you can start them through late March. Most beginning gardeners find their tomatoes sown in February are getting leggy in late April, and yet it isn’t warm enough to plant them outdoors. If you have lights, warmth and are willing to baby them along, start at the beginning of February. Once you’ve done it for a few years, you’ll have a system locked in and can adjust your lights and have a succession of seeds going. For beginners, start with easy, small-fruiting jalapeno peppers, cherry tomatoes, and Asian eggplants now and plan to set them out in late May/early June. (Mid-May if you have an exceptionally warm spot near a building or use floating row covers, Wall-O-Waters or Kozy Kotes or other forms of season-extending devices.) Now’s also a good time to start cool-season flowers like pot marigold (Calendula ), poppies and love-in-a-mist (Nigella), herbs like parsley, cilantro and chervil, and cool-season vegetables that can be set out in 3-4 weeks including lettuce, kale, mustard and bok choi. If you’re feeling ambitious, start perennial flower seeds now. Check seed packets for details.

Get planting:

Wet your soil mix in a large bowl or tub. (It’s harder to wet the peaty seed mixes when they’re already in the pot – you’ll have to keep adding more soil, and it’s a pain, take my word for it.) Once the soil is thoroughly damp, gently press the seed mix into the trays or pots, taking care not to compact it too much. If the mix is chunky, mist or gently water to settle it. Now, label your pots so you don’t forget what you’re planting where! With pots labeled, sow your seeds, following the directions on the seed packets. Cover with soil to the depth recommended on the seed packets. Water gently with a spray bottle to settle seeds. Most seeds don’t need any light until they germinate so check on them regularly until you see the first seeds sprout. At that point, switch the lights on or just place pots in a bright spot.

For a more in-depth coverage of seed-starting, with diagrams and illustrations, read this I wrote on starting seeds indoors.

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Video: Clean and Sharpen Your Garden Tools Like a Pro

Wed, 06 Feb 2013 08:03:00 -0800

Image: Kate Bryant

Have you ever tried to open your clippers, only to find the blades hopelessly gummed together? Or, equally bad, have you tried to prune a branch but the clippers just smush it into a fibrous mess instead of cleanly snipping through it?

These common, frustrating experiences are completely preventable with a little annual garden tool care.

Take a peek at these two handy, five-minute videos outlining the best techniques and eco-friendly materials needed to properly look after your trusty gardening tools so they work smoothly every time you pick them up—and last for decades.

In the first video, Isabel LaCourse of Independence Gardens explains how to sharpen shovels and other large digging/weeding tools. The second video has Karen Wolfgang of Independence Gardens demonstrating how to sharpen clippers and loppers.

By the way, you'll see my name at the end of the videos: I was holding the video camera!

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