Baltimore celebrated urban gardening over the weekend with food, music and seed balls at the Urb Ag Gala.
There were seedlings everywhere for everyone, planted in shoes, hats, newspaper and cardboard six-pack containers.
The folks over at the blog, Baltimore DIY Squad, have pictures!
EAT YOUR VEGETABLES: Maryann James posts on vegetable gardening every Tuesday.
It's the middle of August, one of the slowest times of year. The newsroom is quieter, as people go on vacation rotation, and the vegetable garden is yielding little drama as my tomatoes and peppers and herbs quickly and quietly show themselves. With that mood in mind, some gardeners look inward.
Garden Rant's Susan Harris, a first-time container veggie gardener, posts her lessons in her first year of growing. Her biggest lesson:
But like all gardeners, I'm already scheming about what I'll do differently next year and one BIG answer is to grow container-sized plants.
I agree, though most of my plants were container-sized plants (of seeds from the same Renee Susan mentions in her post). My biggest lesson so far: Water counts.
It seems simple, but I have made it complicated. This year, I ignored all suggestions about studying where sunlight hits on your balcony, kind ideas about water management, and gentle warnings about using terra cotta pots.
Next year, I will pay more attention to where the sunlight hits in my gardening area. And if I'm using the same pots, I will invest in mulch. And perhaps even some kind of watering system. (If I can find a way to make my own plant nanny, my cheap butt will be a plant nanny fool.)
Perhaps then my cucumbers will actually flourish, instead of sitting forlornly in a pot with sad blooms and no cukes.
In these dog days of August, what veggie garden lessons are you meditating on?
Photo by WTL Photos @ Flickr
I have garden envy. One of my friends, overwhelmed by the idea of gardening, decided to forge ahead and plant her own garden this year. I went with her to the garden store -- where I bought a cucumber and pepper plant for the Veggie Challenge -- and coached her as she picked her plants and herbs, a pot or two, and an EarthBox.
Months later, my plants are struggling along as i try to keep them hydrated and healthy, and her plants -- cantaloupe, Lima beans and cucumbers -- are EXPLODING! It's amazing!
I'm happy for her, but yeah, I'm a little jealous. OK, a lot jealous.
The EarthBox is basically a pre-fab self-watering system. It comes with fertilizer and all the tools you need to build it. All you have to add is water, potting mix and your seedlings. But it's a little pricey. It's not too bad -- my friend bought hers for about $60 -- but at that point in the season, when I'd already bought oodles of pots, it was just too much me.
Flickr apparently has an EarthBox group -- feel free to check it out for yourself. If you're too frugal to buy a box, some kind folks have published instructions on how to build your own. (The photo above is one person's tomatoes from a DIY box. She has a photo set detailing what she did.) I may make my own before I leave on vacation in a few weeks to make my watering solution more manageable.
Anyone had success with EarthBox or made their own? I'm curious.
Mr. Brown Thumb over at Chicago Garden offers this tip for saving soil, water and cash by filling up extra space in your containers with your recyclables:
I filled the bottom half of the pot with empty plastic soda bottles. In total there are six 2 liter bottles acting as a false bottom in each pot. Then I covered the top of the empty soda bottles with newspaper, but you can also use landscaping fabric or something like cheese cloth.
At first, I scoffed -- wouldn't you just buy the right sized pot in the first place? (I won't even complain about using But then I reread his post -- he's using a wider pot for his pepper garden. In other words, they need width, not depth. So, fine. It's a nice idea -- for some plants. Others -- tomatoes come to mind -- need as much space as they can for roots to grow and stretch out.
Anybody else tried this before? Do you have a better solution?
EAT YOUR VEGETABLES: Maryann James posts on vegetable gardening every Tuesday.
Remember when I said I had no buds? Well, the balcony garden is finally blossoming. The hot peppers (above) are blooming all over the place -- despite what Rodale's warned about already blooming plants -- and the cucumber blooms (left) are looking a little fragile but determined to hold on. My sunflowers (below), a dwarf variety great for containers, have brightened up the balcony.
EAT YOUR VEGETABLES: Maryann James posts on vegetable gardening every Tuesday.
A couple of weeks ago, lovely commenter Felicia volunteered her gardening stats -- second-year gardener, first-time commenter, -- and admitted to a problem in her abundant vegetable garden:
Last year I had so many tomatoes, cukes, cilantro, mint and a few okra. This year I was much more adventurous and planted peas, green beans, cukes, tomatoes, basil, habanero peppers and oregano that bloomed from last year. Anyway, I am so excited, but I found that the rabbits and squirrels are eating away at my veggies!! I am so bummed out! any ides how to get rid of the critters? (in a humane way of course)
Word is that the White House is having similar problems. Their solution: natural pesticides and fine netting. Garden Variety readers have also weighed in on the squirrel issues before. Their suggestions? Get a dog (or at least, spread neighbors' dog hair around). Use mothballs. Sprinkle coffee grounds or pepper.
Brent Staples at Slate wrote about his fight with squirrels a few years ago and ran through a laundry list of non-working solutions, at least for him:
+ Galvanized mesh and canvas.
+ Red pepper.
+ Fox urine and mountain lion urine. (Like pretty much everything else, you can get this off the Interwebs.)
+ Importing a family of hawks. Yeah, you read that right.
Hawk importing aside, I'd recommend trying garden guards such as netting or mesh around your plants. A good sprinkling of red pepper probably wouldn't hurt either -- hot pepper plants are known to be natural pesticides themselves.
Photo credit: Baltimore Sun staff
EAT YOUR VEGETABLES: Maryann James posts on vegetable gardening every Tuesday.
I hope your vegetables are growing well, intrepid gardeners! The response last week to the veggie challenge was amazing -- I'm excited to hear about the progress of your arugula, cucumbers, herbs, peas and green beans. Keep me updated.
As promised, I got two new vegetable plants to hold up my part of the vegetable challenge: I'm trying cucumbers again and testing out a hot pepper plant. The cucumber plant has been nestled amongst the boisterous, nosy nasturtiums; I may have to move them if they distract my cucumber plant too much. I love the fuzzy feel of the cucumber leaves; I'm excited to watch more of its prickly leaves unfurl.
I discovered, a bit too late, that I bought too seedlings, not one. Where's the other seedling, you ask?
EAT YOUR VEGETABLES: Maryann James posts on vegetable gardening every Tuesday.
My vegetable garden is boring me. They're all just sitting there, quietly growing. My basil -- which releases a heady scent every time I inadvertently brush its leaves -- is outpacing the tomato plant in its container. The parsley is holding its own in my other pot, but neither of my tomato plants have shown one hint of a flower.
And speaking of flowers, none of my flowers have flowered yet either. I'm ready to start a stare-down, me vs. plants.
They're all seemingly waiting for the word from God to start splashing color on my balcony. It's nearly July, and I'm worried.
If you couldn't tell, patience is not my strong suit.
Since I'm a container planter, I have few weeds to keep my attention. And being up on the 7th floor, I also have little by way of pests, except for this one ...
EAT YOUR VEGETABLES: Maryann James posts on vegetable gardening every Tuesday.
My veggies, lettuces and flowers are quietly growing, soaking up the abundant rain and sunshine we've been having lately. They've been doing so well, actually, that I'm overdue for spacing them out and transplanting my eager sunflowers, zinnias and nasturtiums to new homes. And I've still yet to retry my cucumbers. It's already too late to change my mind on repeating my beets experience (above) from last year.
I'm also overdue on answering a question from Kathryn on late planting. (There's a lot of tardiness in that sentence.)
She writes:
On that late start note, what can I still be planting this weekend that will give me something to harvest in October. I was thinking butternut squash.
Squash is a great for June planting and fall harvest; beans, peppers, eggplant, tomatoes and pumpkins are also great choices. If you're feeling extra ambitious, you can also grow corn! And I don't mean for just the garden plotters out there -- one of my favorite urban gardening bloggers, Life on the Balcony, can show you how to grow corn in a container, too.
It's also not too late to start thinking of winter. You can get a start on broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cabbage and cauliflower, too.
EAT YOUR VEGETABLES: Maryann James posts on vegetable gardening every Tuesday.
One seedling was grown from seed indoors (perhaps because its planter was impatient to start growing things) and another sown outdoors, once it was warm enough. One seedling grew tall and spindly, the other grew squat and dense.
Which one survived once they were transplanted to its final container, nestled next to my robust tomato seedling?
EAT YOUR VEGETABLES: Maryann James posts on vegetable gardening every Tuesday.
I'm a foodie first, gardener second. In fact, my love of food is the main reason I started to grow vegetables in the first place -- what better way to ensure tasty food than to grow it yourself?
However, I have found that there are many people, especially in the city, who want to plant and just don't know where to start. Enter the foodie connection: epicurious.com.
Epicurious mainly offers recipes and entertaining guides, but they've branched out (ha! get it?!) and are now offering a handy guide for wanna-be vegetable gardeners. They break it down into three parts:
+ What you need to start.
+ How to grow certain veggies (plus recipes).
+ Assorted gardening tips.
Tip #1, "Read your seed packet," could have helped me avoid my cucumber disaster.
As Susan says, it's not too late to get your garden together. So get going!
EAT YOUR VEGETABLES: Maryann James posts on vegetable gardening every Tuesday.
After a week or so of neglect, I did some tending to my balcony garden yesterday, thinning my lettuces, spacing out my nasturtiums, and thinning out the parsley experiment I started weeks ago.
However, my most significant task was setting out my two tomato plants! I planted them outside -- after hardening them off for weeks, and planted basil in one pot and parsley in the other. It may be my only foray in companion planting this year (I attempted to plant nasturtiums and cucumbers together), and I'm eager to see the results.
Companion planting can be an organic solution to vegetable gardening, if you pair the right plants together. (Check out the combination of beans and marigolds at left.) As one gardener points out, the right flowers and herbs can attract polinators, deter pests, encourage good insects, and generally make your garden much prettier.
I consulted Golden Harvest Organics' extensive list of companion plants when I was planning out my garden, but I'm sure you experienced gardeners have created your own lists by now. What are your favorite veggie combinations?
(Photo by KirrilyRobert @ flickr)
EAT YOUR VEGETABLES: Maryann James posts on vegetable gardening every Tuesday.
As I mentioned in my previous post, my cucumber seedlings did not make it. I bought all my seeds from Renee's Garden in early spring, including this bush slicer variety, a compact bush variety of cucumber that is recommended for container gardens. My dreams of cucumber vines climbing up my balcony railings were dashed, but my hopes of crisp juicy cucumbers were still high.
I planted in early May and thick cotyledon leaves quickly sprouted, but then the deluge -- our week of rain -- happened. I also fear the spurts of cold weather we've been having this year also contributed to their demise.
I'm going to try again, though. For future reference, here's some basics on cucumbers:
EAT YOUR VEGETABLES: Maryann James posts on vegetable gardening every Tuesday.
I'm trying to grow all my veggies from seed this year. It's an emotional roller-coaster. The constant worry over whether the seeds will take, whether the seedlings will thrive and survive, and whether I'm giving them enough light, water and care is almost too much for my delicate constitution.
But with most of vegetables and flowers sprouted, I've come to another worry spot: thinning. My crop of beets was middling last year, likely because I didn't thin as I was supposed to. I stumbled upon an old New York Times piece last year describing the thinning process:
If all the sprouts were allowed to grow, they would be too crowded for roots to form. So the gardener thins beets, leaving an inch or so between plants, and eats the sacrificed seedlings mixed with other tender spring greens.
I ignored it -- What if I pick the wrong seedlings to discard? How can I play Roman Emperor, letting some sprouts live and others die? All of them should have a chance to prove themselves! -- and paid for it. By not making a decision, none of my beets performed well, because they didn't have the space to grow.
So, how do you thin your plants? I had a brief chat with Josue Lopez, Urban Agriculture Educator for the Baltimore Cooperative Extension. He only had time to talk about beets and lettuces, but he gave me these tips on sowing and thinning:
Continue reading "Difficulties with thinning" »
EAT YOUR VEGETABLES: Maryann James posts on vegetable gardening every Tuesday.
Though I grew up in rural Virginia, playing in the rows of my grandfather's vegetable garden as a child, I didn't consider vegetable gardening until I was in Baltimore, living in an apartment with a concrete balcony and a no backyard.
Enter container gardening.
I grew tomatoes and beets last year; this time around I'm a little more ambitious, growing tomatoes, cucumbers, basil, parsley, lettuces and arugula, all from seed. I think I may be heading for a bumpy ride: My tomato seedlings (at left) are thriving, but my parsley is looking a little worse for wear. I'll soon be transplanting my tomato and basil plants outside, planting them in some old and new pots.
But reader Kristin Bailey has run into the same problem I ran into a few months ago: What do you do with old soil?
She writes:
Continue reading "Do you ditch the dirt?" »
EAT YOUR VEGETABLES: Julie Scharper posts on vegetable gardening every Tuesday.
I live in a skinny, crumbling apartment above two nightclubs in Mt. Vernon.
It gets a little noisy at night (one side plays unse-unse, the other boom-chaka-laka), but the rent is cheap and I love the high ceilings and old-fashioned details.
The best part of my apartment is what lays outside my kitchen door: a long stretch of roof just for me.
Last year, tired of not being able to see anything green from my windows, I planted my first garden here. I lugged bags of potting soil and stacks of pots up the stairs and planted flowers, herbs and some vegetables.
As soon as the first shoots appeared, the roof was transformed. Butterflies, bees and birds arrived. Morning glory and moonflower vines wrapped around the bars on my windows.
On rainy nights, the smell of rosemary and mint blew in my bedroom. The gray urban space became an oasis where friends joined me to drink wine and talk by candlelight until late in the night.
This year, I'm planting twice as many flowers and herbs as I did last year, and experimenting with lots of new vegetables. My strawberries are on the brink of turning pink and the first moonflower shoots have muscled out of the soil.
I'm composting for the first time and, like a good recessionista, improvising planters out of everything around.
It brings me great comfort to know that despite all the turbulence and tribulations in the world, seeds still sprout and shoots still grow.
Susan Reimer has spent 16 years writing about raising kids - among other topics - in her column for The Baltimore Sun. And every time son Joseph or daughter Jessie passed another milestone - driver's license, college, wedding or a move to a new military duty station - she has planted another garden. Now she will be writing about those gardens - and yours - here on Garden Variety. 
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