About a month or so ago, a friend took me on a fleamarket trip out of town where I picked up several treasures that would find new purpose in my garden, including this old cast iron tea pot. Drilling a hole for drainage was no easy feat. Uli has lots of experience using cast iron …
Kangaroo apple (Solanum laciniatum) is another in a line of marginally edible, strange solanums that I am growing this year. I say “marginally edible” because the fruit is edible when ripe and poisonous when green. Still, I’m not convinced it’s worth eating. Edible and worth eating are two different things entirely. Morelle de balbis fruit …
Hello. How are you? It’s been quiet here for a bit. Deadlines and such. I will probably be a little light on posting for a while longer, but I am just over the hump. I’m gonna make it after-all! Perhaps when this is all said and done I should make a trip to Minnesota just …
This pretty blue flower is shoofly aka Apple of Peru (Nicandra physalodes), a strange solanum that I am growing for the first time this year. I purchased the seeds last year at the Montreal Seedy Saturday but was unable to grow them as I quickly ran out of space. I’m STILL trying to find space …
To review: here’s what they looked like a week and two weeks after I sowed the seeds back in January. It’s hard to believe, but three short months ago the lithops seedlings were only just beginning to show their distinct colouration and patterns. Now look at them!
Since moving in, Davin has been taking morning cellphone photos of the yard. We’ve compiled shots taken between January and June into a quick timelapse movie that mark the changes thus far. The last shot is dated for two days ago. We have since done even more work and you will notice when I update …
The starting never stops. This has been our mantra from the moment we plunged our shovels into the earth and began the arduous process of digging up the bumpy, grassy backyard. Each new session in the garden feels more like a step towards another beginning than a real step forward. First raised bed built: The …
This unknown red variety bloomed a few weeks ago. I bought it at a garden shop in early spring, but it did not come with an accurate tag. I almost didn’t buy it as I was saving space for ‘Black Barlow’ a variety I had been coveting for ages. But wouldn’t you know it, I …
Back in late April I mentioned our plans to become self-sufficient in salad fixings. I said, “Starting next month (or so), I don’t want to buy a single head of lettuce ever again, if I can help it.” A month or so later and we are on the way. Over the last few weeks we’ve …
Ascending up to the front door of our new place is a series of cracking concrete steps. They are fully exposed to the sun and I predict that in combination with the metal railings, they should prove to be a hot spot by mid-summer. Since moving in I’ve been contemplating what to grow there. The …
If memory serves (the older I get, the less accurately it does), I met Margaret Roach online three years back, when she emailed me to introduce herself and her (then) new blog, A Way to Garden. Of course, I recognized her at once as the garden editor of Martha Stewart Living magazines (and later editorial …
When I last spoke of the Office Tomato, I described a plant that was quickly headed towards its final days. It had three ripe fruit and I was hoping to keep the plant going long enough to turn out a forth. Amazingly, I managed to keep it alive to get not only a forth, but …