Get Off Your Ass and Plant a Survival Garden!

...why you need a copy of our So-Cal homegirl Pat Welsh’s Southern California Gardening Guide which deals with more than just vegetables. Looking like an extra from the gardening club scene in the Manchurian Candidate, Pat Welsh has written a book with a handy to-do list for each month, useful since maintaining a vegetable garden here over a year-round growing season can get complicated especially if you want to keep a steady stream of produce on the...

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Is Urban Homesteading Over With?

...th our industrial agriculture system. Gardening It seems that searches for gardening of all kinds–I tried “vegetable gardening,” “vegetable seeds,” “rose pruning” and “lawn care,” are down. I think this may reflect a demographic shift–an older generation dying off. We need to get young people gardening! Bread Baking No wonder I can’t seem to offer enough bread baking classes. Bicycles Cycling is down, but I’m sure this reflects disenchantment with...

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De-Cluttering the Garden

...e stream.” Heed Hereclitus’ enigmatic saying and you’ve got the essence of gardening and nature: periods of equilibrium punctuated by change, sometimes fast, sometimes slow. De-cluttering our tended gardens is to work in imitation of and in concert with nature. So what would be some de-culuttering steps in the garden that welcome and work with change? First would be getting rid of junk such as construction debris and those failed projects Kelly al...

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019 Garden Nerd Christy Wilhelmi

...ardenerd” Christy Wilhelmi of Gardenerd.com. Christy is also the author of Gardening for Geeks and has a podcast, The Gardenerds Tip of the Week. During the show we discuss: Biodynamics Biointensive/French Intensive Alan Chadwick’s Garden at UC Santa Cruz John Jeavons Double digging vs. no-till A documentary about Ruth Stout Breaking up soil with permaculture method The power of mulch Square foot gardening Peat moss vs. coir Growing carbon and com...

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Straw Bale Garden Update: Success!

...input of outside resources in the form of straw and fertilizer, straw bale gardening is a great solution for beginning gardeners or for those cursed with bad soil. And the skunks that have decimated my previous vegetable gardens are unable to get up on the bales. I’m considering trying another straw bale garden during our winter season. And I’m also pondering building boxes to put the bales in to make the garden look a bit neater. Compare the stra...

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