Pakistan Mulberry Fever

May 26, 2014

...r the weekend. Now I need a regular Pakistani mulberry fix. If I wanted to plant one Bay Laurel Nursery has several varieties. It’s mostly a warm climate plant but some varieties do better in lower temperatures. Here’s what Steve had to say about his six year old tree which he thinks is the “Cooke” variety: It has totally thrived and become huge. I have to top back huge vertical branches every year after harvest season and tie limbs down laterally...

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Is Purslane the New Kale?

Mr. Homegrown

June 27, 2014

Food, Foraging, Gardening, Vegetable Gardening

29 Comments

...water than what falls naturally from the sky here). You can eat the whole plant: stems and leaves. It has a salty and slightly lemony flavor reminiscent of New Zealand spinach. There’s always a huge bin of it at Super King, our local Armenian supermarket. In Armenia it’s gathered in the wild and used either raw in salads or lightly sauteed. There’s even a World Cup tie-in. The color of the plant in South America is associated with green/white soc...

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Can our landscapes model a vibrant future? Not according to the LA DWP.

Mrs. Homegrown

July 7, 2014

Garden Design, Gardening, Lawns, Water and Power

18 Comments

...t with nature to be too much trouble. No doubt they’d replace those sickly plants with synthetics if they didn’t suspect they’d all get stolen in the night. This is not the kind of model we need, DWP. Next time you change up your landscaping, consider consulting one or more of the many brilliant plant people and designers in this city. Call us if you need numbers. Consider using permeable surfaces and contoured landscaping to capture every drop of...

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The Miraculous Lavender

Mrs. Homegrown

July 25, 2014

Gardening, Herbs

14 Comments

...re getting no irrigation. There’s no plumbing beneath the staircase, either. Yet the lavender keeps getting bigger. I’m going to have to pull it soon, before it ruins our stairs. But I don’t want to, because it’s so determined to live. And this goes to show that when a plant wants to grow somewhere, when it establishes itself according to its own rules, it is unstoppable. Soil type, recommended water, sun exposure– all these things mean little in...

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How’s that Tomato Grafting Project Going?

Mr. Homegrown

July 21, 2016

Gardening, Vegetable Gardening

4 Comments

...in different sizes. That would give some flexibility in when to graft the plants. Despite my cascade of errors I still have tomato plants (though probably not grafted ones) and I learned some valuable lessons should I attempt this project again next year. I’m thinking that instead of tomatoes, which have done fine in our garden in the past, I might try grafting peppers or eggplants which we have had trouble growing. How are your tomatoes doing th...

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