Search Results for: label/medicinal plants

287 results

3D Greetings

Mr. Homegrown
Thoughtstylings
6 Comments
Homegrown Evolution’s holiday gift to our readers is a headache. Well, to be precise, we offer you three dimensional images of two of our favorite garden plants. Above, the prickly pear cactus (Opuntia ficus-indica) and, below, spearmint (Mentha Spicata). To view these two images in three dimensions follow these instructions, specifically the bit about “parallel viewing”. Be persistent, like all good things it might take some p...

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Nitrogen Deposition

Mr. Homegrown
Vegetable Gardening
RLeave a comment
...forests, shrublands, deserts and grasslands. The invasion of weeds is a huge problem for maintenance of our fragile biodiversity, which is already impacted by development.” The photo above shows the leaves of some of the bean plants at the SurviveLA compound. We believe that the dark droplets are diesel particulate and other crap that comes out of the tailpipes of all those trucks that lumber through our neighborhood carrying cheap crap from Chin...

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Seaweed, Salmon and Manzanita Cider

Mrs. Homegrown
Reviews
4 Comments
Mrs. Homegrown here: I fell into temptation and bought Seaweed, Salmon and Manzanita Cider: A California Indian Feast at the Theodore Payne Foundation this week. I should know by now not to look around that book store. Like Ulysses, I should tie myself to the mast–pay for my native plants and get out. Somehow it never works. Seaweed, Salmon is a pretty little book. Paperback, thin, but coffee table worthy, because it’s so interesti...

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Least Favorite Plant: Ficus benjamina

Mr. Homegrown
Least Favorite Plant
7 Comments
...wers of the City of the Angels. But Schoenholz’s photos do make a persuasive case for what could be termed “outsider topiary.” To be fair, Ficus benjamina is not without some benefits. It’s one of the plants NASA studied for its use in improving indoor air quality. But as the horticultural equivalent of the Nagel print, perhaps it’s time to replace a few of them with its edible cousin Ficus carica. Ficus fans and fo...

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Avatar: I’m not lovin’ it.

Mr. Homegrown
Thoughtstylings
34 Comments
...at Doug Harvey describes as the “Gaia Hypothesis Shrub”). The blue folks also have fiber optic connections in their pony tails, kinda like this: In Pandora’s jungle, everything is bioluminescent and all the plants are networked with the fiber optic shrub. Even the flying lizards have fiber optic appendages. The tall blue smurf folks can plug into these connections and control the flying lizards and five-legged horses. Oddly, wh...

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About Us

Root Simple is Kelly Coyne and Erik Knutzen, authors of The Urban Homestead (Expanded and Revised Edition): Your Guide to Self-Sufficient Living in the Heart of the City (2008) and Making It: Radical Home Ec for a Post-Consumer World (2011).  They live in the heart of Los Angeles, in a little bungalow set on a 1/12 acre lot where almost all of their land is devoted to growing edible or otherwise useful plants and trees. Their obsessions include...

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Spore 1.1

Mr. Homegrown
Thoughtstylings
7 Comments
...kly basis, according to the performance of Home Depot stock. If the Home Depot stock does well, Spore 1.1 gets watered. If Home Depot stock does poorly, “Spore 1.1.” goes without. Because Home Depot guarantees all of their plants for one year, if one rubber tree dies, another will be substituted in its place....

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Our Winter Vegetable Garden

Mr. Homegrown
Garden Design, Gardening, Seeds, Vegetable Gardening
6 Comments
...Beets “Bietolo da Orto Egitto Migliorata” A repeat from last year, these are tasty red beets. Buck’s horn plantain also known as “Erba Stella” An edible weed. Stinging nettles One of my favorite plants. It’s begun to reseed itself in the yard. Useful as a tea and a green. For more information on when to plant vegetables in Southern California, see this handy chart. And let us know in the comments what you̵...

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Are Raised Beds a Good Idea?

Mr. Homegrown
Gardening, Vegetable Gardening
44 Comments
...the raised beds I have in the parkway, pictured above, have performed poorly. So poorly, that I’m going to remove them soon. If a soil test shows high heavy metal levels I’ll just go with some ornamental/insectary plants.  Above, broom corn (Sorghum bicolor ) doing just fine straight in the ground. A partially sunken bed. Extra points for finding the stinkhorn mushroom. This bed is somewhat of a compromise. I cut the bed i...

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Saturday Linkages: Pig’s Milk, Hot Sauce, Clutter

Mr. Homegrown
Saturday Linkages
3 Comments
...nal Materials for Crop Production: http:// extension.agron.iastate.edu/compendium/ind ex.aspx  …   Cross-contamination: washing chicken or any meat is a bad idea | barfblog: http:// bit.ly/M4pybB   Making hot sauces with wild plants: http://www. urbanoutdoorskills.com/wildfoodlab.ht ml  …   How to Restore an Heirloom Axe | The Art of Manliness http:// artofmanliness.com/2012/07/17/how -to-restore-an-heirloom-axe/  …   Of all the linkages this wee...

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