Going to Seed

...en up all that anxiety, and I revel in this time. The insects feast on the flowers which bloom on our lettuce, our arugula, our radishes, our mustard, our fennel. Predatory wasps hunt alongside lady bugs and diligent bees of all types. We have more birds than ever in our yard, and they love our overgrown, browning beds, because of course they’re eating the seeds or the bugs on the ripening plants. They would not, however, allow me to take any pict...

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In Praise of Backward Compatibility

The garden of nerdiness has many flowers: comic book nerds, computer nerds, fantasy nerds, sci-fi nerds–too many to list. After fifty years I’ve finally recognized my own personal nerd category. I’m an electromechanical nerd. This tendency manifests in an obsession with old telephones, the ability to thread a 16mm projector, fantasizing about the mimeographed version of Root Simple and spending evenings watching films about old office equipment....

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087 Foraging Controversy with Lisa Novick

...r of Outreach and K-12 Education of the Theodore Payne Foundation for Wild Flowers & Native Plants. We contacted her after seeing her blog in the Huffington Post, Forage in the Garden, Not in What’s Left of the Wild. In that post Lisa expresses her concern about foraging and suggests that people grow native plants in their yards and in public spaces. While our conversation is California-centric, I think, the principles we discuss apply to other re...

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Help Plant a Garden — and Help a Local Eagle Scout

...headerboard (9am) composting the planting areas (morning) planting trees, flowers, vegetables (afternoon) assembling benches (all day) It’s a fun chance to work with an (exuberant) team of young scouts and to help get another section of food gardens built. Start time is 9am, and we’ll continue all day until it’s done. Bring your own garden gloves. If you’d like to help with assembling benches, bring your own toolbox. Although much of the project...

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Saturday Tweets: Subterranean Heating Systems, Achocha, Tree Beekeeping and Valentine’s Day Cocktails

...— Root Simple (@rootsimple) February 11, 2017 Living Home Podcast 86: Redeem Your Ground – https://t.co/PqUrYU5Pgh via @Shareaholic — Root Simple (@rootsimple) February 11, 2017 Raspberry Frappe, 1970 –Vintage Cocktail Friday https://t.co/jeodIFxf47 — Root Simple (@rootsimple) February 11, 2017 6 Flowers to Grow in the Vegetable Garden https://t.co/wcRz7RcI4g — Root Simple (@rootsimple) February 11, 2017 A Coffee Renaissance Is Brewing, and It’s A...

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