Search Results for: label/vegetable gardening

309 results

Foreclosure Garden Foreclosed

Mr. Homegrown
Gardening, Vegetable Gardening
12 Comments
Neighbor, artist and master gardener Anne Hars took over the front yard of a foreclosed triplex earlier this year and planted a vegetable garden. The triplex had fallen in to disrepair and had become notorious for housing a bunch of gang members.  The police evicted the gangsters and the building fell into disrepair. The garden Anne planted in the spring had just begun to bring forth its bounty. Then, this past week, an unpleasant man showe...

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That ain’t a bowl full of larvae, it’s crosne!

Mr. Homegrown
Gardening, Self Watering Containers, Vegetable Gardening
22 Comments
Mrs. Homegrown, justifiably, gives me a hard time for growing strange things around the homestead. This week I just completed the world’s smallest harvest of a root vegetable popularly known as crosne (Stachys affinis). Crosne, also known as Chinese artichoke, chorogi, knotroot and artichoke betony is a member of the mint family that produces a tiny edible tuber. While looking like any other mint plant, the leaves have no smell. The tubers...

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Mutant Squash

Mr. Homegrown
Gardening, Vegetable Gardening
RLeave a comment
...tomatoes we’ve ever eaten, with no work whatsoever on our part. But this summer they seem to have hybridized again and now yield less flavorful fruit. More information on the botany of pollination and advice on saving vegetable seeds can be found in this excellent article. Also of note, the new issue of Make Magazine, the Popular Mechanics of the geeky hipster art school crowd has a story on “hacking your backyard plants”. B...

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Whiteflies

Mr. Homegrown
Pests
2 Comments
...ds, but biodiversity in our tiny backyard means that the whiteflys don’t have many other options for feeding. What we could have done better is to have kept a closer eye on our plants. Daily inspection of more sensitive vegetables is always a good idea, but something we’ve been lax about lately. Keeping intensively planted annual vegetable beds close to places of daily activity means being able to stay on top of pest and disease probl...

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Boulder man faces $2000 fine/day for guerilla garden fencing

Mr. Homegrown
Gardening
8 Comments
...emove the impediments, since they’re on public property, Arthur said, if they’re not able to reach a compromise.” Myself and three other neighbors here in my Los Angeles neighborhood are doing exactly the same parkway vegetable planting Hoffenberg is doing. All it takes is one disgruntled and unhappy neighbor. We gotta change the paradigm folks–food not lawns!...

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Growing and Preparing Cardoons (Cynara cardunculus)

Mr. Homegrown
Gardening, Vegetable Gardening
20 Comments
It’s the ultimate pain in the ass vegetable to prepare and I’ll probably get in big trouble in native plant circles for even mentioning it, but just last night I fried up my first successful plate of homegrown cardoons (Cynara cardunculus). Not the most attractive blanching job, admittedly. All ready to prepare The cardoon is a close relative of artichoke, identical in appearance, except that the flowers are much smaller and t...

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Mistakes we have made . . .

Mr. Homegrown
Animals, Chickens, Permaculture, Thoughtstylings
13 Comments
...continue his relationship with our agent. It’s an inherent conflict of interest for the inspector to have a connection to either real estate agent. 6. Planting a lawn We weren’t always the Molotov cocktail tossing vegetable growing radicals that we are now. Just after we bought this place ten years ago we planted a lawn in the backyard. With some temporary fencing, we roped it off from the Doberman to allow it to grow. After a month t...

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The World’s Most Beautiful Okra

Mr. Homegrown
Gardening, Vegetable Gardening
9 Comments
If you live in a warm climate, okra is easy to grow and both beautiful and tasty. I spotted this variety growing at the Huntington Ranch: Burgundy Okra from Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds.The stems and seed pods are a deep and vibrant burgundy–a very stunning plant for your vegetable garden. While not as striking, this year I grew Clemson Spineless okra from seeds I saved. And thanks to a tip (can’t remember where I heard this) I’...

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Cornmeal Zucchini Pancakes

Mrs. Homegrown
Food, Recipes
9 Comments
...summer squash, but we used green zucchini. Cornmeal Zucchini Pancakes 1 1/4 cup cornmeal 3/4 cup all purpose flour 2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder 1 tablespoon of sugar 3/4 teaspoon salt 1 egg 1 cup of milk 2 tablespoons of vegetable oil 1 cup of grated zucchini, yellow or green, or yellow summer squash 3 tablespoons yellow bell pepper, diced fine (we skipped this) 3 tablespoons finely chopped onion Salsa for serving, homemade or store-bought,...

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