Search Results for: label/rooftop gardening/page/2/2011/04/making-it

519 results

Hops in Southern California

Mr. Homegrown
Beer, Gardening, Herbs, Hops
9 Comments
...arming experiment ended in the spring of last year after we accidentally plopped some home built scaffolding on top of the tiny vine while undertaking the heinous task of scraping and painting the front of the house. Planting it in terrible soil doomed it to failure anyways. We’re experimenting with growing both Cascade and Nugget hops in a big self irrigating planter with the hope that we can transfer them to the ground next year or the ye...

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In Chaos Order, In Order Chaos

Mr. Homegrown
Gardening, Thoughtstylings, Vegetable Gardening
4 Comments
Periodically Mrs. Homegrown and I teach vegetable gardening classes. For the students, I’ve been looking for a way to illustrate nature’s complex, non-linear dynamics that, paradoxically, seem ordered. I stumbled across this cool sculpture that neatly summarizes the idea of “in chaos order, in order chaos.” Imagine each of the hammers standing in for one of the systems in your garden, insect life, nutrients, microbes, f...

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Straw Bale Garden Part III: Adding Fertilizer

Mr. Homegrown
Gardening, Straw Bale Gardening, Vegetable Gardening
22 Comments
After watering our straw bales for three days our next step is to apply a high nitrogen fertilizer. We’re following West Virginia University Extension Service’s Straw Bale Gardening advice. They suggest a 1/2 cup of urea per bale or “bone meal, fish meal, or compost for a more organic approach.” (I think they mean blood meal as bone meal does not have much nitrogen in it.) Choosing the organic approach, we’re water...

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Grow Italian!

Mr. Homegrown
Gardening, Vegetable Gardening
RLeave a comment
It’s almost time to start planting seeds for the most productive growing season in Southern California – winter. While our friends in the cold parts of the country will be freezing their asses off we’ll be picking gourmet salads (sorry to rub it in). Since the climate here is like southern Italy, we like to plant Italian varieties. Which brings us to the source of many of our seeds at the Homegrown Evolution compound, Seeds fr...

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SUSTAINABLE LA @ Farmlab/Under Spring

Mr. Homegrown
Miscellaneous
RLeave a comment
...omething from the Wolfpack Hustle kids. From the announcement: Sustainable LA is a celebration of Angelinos engaged in the green revolution. The one-hour program consists of short films on a variety of topics including urban gardening, environmental awareness and community activism. In keeping with the grassroots nature of many of these organizations, emphasis is on issues awareness, practical information exchange and hands-on participation....

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Altadena Heritage of Abundance

Mr. Homegrown
Events
2 Comments
Our backyard last week (some ugly stuff framed out of the picture!) We’ll be doing a talk tomorrow morning as part of a sustainability series in Altadena, CA. We’re going to talk about self irrigating planters, chickens, bees and vegetable gardening. Here’s the 411: Saturday, May 30 from 9 to 11 a.m at the Altadena Community Center First in a series of events, workshops, and home tours on sustainable living. Reserve your plac...

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Another Panel Solar Cooker

Mr. Homegrown
Solar
3 Comments
Poyourow demoing her solar cooker design There’s no one size fits all solution when it comes to the world of solar panel cookers. All have their advantages and disadvantages. I got an email from author Joanne Poyourow, leader of the amazing Los Angeles Environmental Change Makers, with a simple and effective design she came up with. Pouyourow’s cooker comes together much faster than the CooKit design that I blogged about earlier th...

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Let’s Get Biointensive

Mr. Homegrown
Gardening, Vegetable Gardening
9 Comments
...e triangles in different sizes to assist in planting. Using scrap wood, I made triangles in 3, 4, 6, 8, 12, and 15-inch sizes, taking the spacing suggestions in Jeavons’ charts for the seeds I had planted in flats. When it came time to transplant the seedlings I used the triangles to create hexagonal blocks of tightly spaced veggies. Cutting a notch in the corners of the triangles would be a slight improvement and allow for easier planting....

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Events in Los Angeles This Weekend: SIP Workshop and Maria’s Garden

Mr. Homegrown
Events, Self Watering Containers
1 Comment
re’s the location: Playa Del Oro at 8601 Lincoln Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90045 Sunday Anne Hars, who lives a few blocks from us, helped save another neighbor’s garden from a management company that wanted to remove it. Tomorrow, Sunday the 15th, Anne has organized a work party to tidy up the garden and she’s looking for volunteers and a few donations of pots, mulch and soil. The fun begins at 9 am at 421 North Coronado Street....

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Biochar: Miracle or Gimmick?

Mr. Homegrown
Gardening, Vegetable Gardening
10 Comments
e for some crops. Yet, there was a decrease in growth in some plants and higher yield in others. In the Arboretum and St. Paul campus sites, we noted similar results, but more crops seemed to decline with biochar than without it. There’s nothing new about biochar. It was in use by native peoples in the Amazon region before Columbus. Hopefully this study will help clarify what types of soils and what crops benefit most from its use. Do you h...

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