Saturday Linkages: Loving LA and Gardening

September 7, 2013

...Heritage Agri-tourism as a Strategy for Promoting the Recovery of Heirloom Vegetables, Grains, Fruits http://garynabhan.com/i/archives/2240 Tiny Gardens in Greenwich Village by Susan Harris http://gardenrant.com/2013/08/tiny-gardens-in-greenwich-village.html?utm_source=feedly … I love LA Christopher Nyerges loves LA: http://christophernyerges.blogspot.com/2013/08/to-love-la.html … 10 Things To Get Over About Los Angeles And 10 Things It Will Teach...

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Eight Things to Consider When Saving Vegetable Seeds

Mr. Homegrown

September 24, 2013

Gardening, Seeds, Vegetable Gardening

18 Comments

...be advantageous if you’re having trouble in your garden.] 2. Know how the vegetable is pollinated It’s much easier to save the seeds of self-pollinating vegetables such as beans, peas and tomatoes. Remember that bees can fly for miles–anything pollinated by insects have to be isolated or caged to prevent cross-pollination. And many vegetables have weedy cousins. Try to save the seeds of carrots without caging and you may get a carrot/Queen Anne’s...

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Kent’s Composting Tips and Secret Weapon

Mr. Homegrown

October 27, 2006

Composting, Gardening, Vegetable Gardening

...ver cat food gets into the mix, even oily stuff, but mostly it’s the usual veggies, fruits, paper napkins, etc. Though experts say no fats should go in, I’ve yet to see (or smell) a problem. Each time I add new kitchen scraps, I add 1-2 shovels-full of dry leaves and some water if needed, turning and mixing the old and new stuff with a cultivator or shovel to aerate the pile. The proportion of dry to wet material is important. There should be enou...

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A Plea for Plastic Vegetables

Mr. Homegrown

September 22, 2014

Thoughtstylings

2 Comments

...I work for a TV show in New York and we are in need of several artificial vegetables and vegetable plants. Please let me know if you carry any of the following: 1. Purple Bulb Shaped Eggplants and Eggplant plants 2. Green and yellow squash (zucchini) 3. Cucumbers 4. Red Hot chilly Pepper Plants 5. Red Cherry Bomb Plants 6. Yellow Banana Pepper Plants 7. Green bean (string bean and lima bean) plant that is vine-like that I can weave onto a trellis...

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Why it’s Better to Pressure Can Tomatoes

Mr. Homegrown

October 30, 2014

Food, Food Preservation, Gardening, Tomatoes

8 Comments

...ed and less acidic foods that need to be canned in a pressure canner. Most fruits have a lower, i.e. more acidic pH and can be water bath canned. Tomatoes, on the other hand, are often near the 4.6 pH level and USDA tested recipes will call for adding either bottled lemon juice or citric acid (I prefer citric acid as the taste is more neutral). I used to think that this issue was because different tomato varieties vary in their acid content. It tu...

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