Your Backyard Garden Information Source
Kale Also known as borecole, this hardy vegetable is a member of the brassica family. Varieties include the Scotch kales, cottager’s kale, thousand-headed and asparagus kale. All are grown for winter supplies of greens. They are particularly recommended to gardeners in very cold areas where winter cabbage and sprouting broccoli are difficult crops. Sow seeds in the open on a […]
In May gardening begins in earnest. April weather is too uncertain for many vegetables to be planted in the open and even early May cannot be trusted far. By the end of the month, however, practically the first planting of everything we wish to include in our program is in the ground. Tomato plants must be guarded carefully against frost, […]
Asparagus This delicious vegetable is expensive to buy but easy to grow. The shoots are cut below soil level when they are about 10cm (4in) long, but all cutting must cease soon after the middle of June to allow the plants to develop over the summer and build up the crowns for the following spring. Asparagus plants must not be […]
Onions When the seeds are to be sown directly in the soil where the plants are to grow, the bed should be well prepared. Digging and manuring will have been carried out during the late autumn or winter and the soil needs raking before sowing so that the bed is level, even and free of large clods and stones. Sow […]
ARTICHOKES: CHINESE, GLOBE, AND JERUSALEM There are three distinct kinds of Artichoke grown as vegetables: the Jerusalem Artichoke, for its tubers; the Globe Artichoke, for the young flower heads, and the young shoots, which are blanched to provide “chards”; and the Chinese or Japanese Artichoke, for its small tubers. The name Artichoke is a corruption of the Italian articiocco, itself […]
Although the calendar may say spring, here in the north country, March only hints at the warmer weather to come. For gardeners this can be a frustrating month with late season snows, fluctuating temperatures, and mud limiting outdoor activities. One way to shorten the waiting period until the gardening season is to force branches of spring flowering shrubs like forsythia, […]
HELIANTHUS – Sunflower (From helios-sun; anlhos-flower) The Sunflower is bold, he is tall, has a lot of bluster and bravado about him, but he is not coarse; no, he does not intrude upon us. We like to have him look over our fences; we like to watch him looking down toward his feet to see how tall he has grown. […]
In the 70’s, my father would pack all of us in the station wagon, and drive for what seemed an eternity to visit my relatives. I was pretty young, but I can remember two details quite vividly. My brother getting me to ask, “Are we there yet?” and, visiting my Grandparents. My Grandma was an avid cook and gardener. While […]
TOMATOES All gardeners take pride in vine-ripened tomatoes. In addition to traditional red tomatoes, you can grow tomatoes that ripen to yellow, orange, and even purple. Small cherry tomatoes are ideal for salads and fleshy paste tomatoes cook into a rich, thick sauce. Tomatoes are not difficult to grow provided they get plenty of sun and warmth. PEPPERS Peppers are […]
Planting the vegetable seed There is no part of the garden work which calls for such nice judgment and careful attention as the sowing of seed. Most of the failures originate right here, and a large share of the blame devoted to the seeds and seedsman, if traced back to its original source, would be found to rest on the […]