Garden Tour Favorites I loved sharing my top five favorite flowers with visitors to my garden on the Mary Lou Heard Garden Tour this past Saturday. As I chatted with dozens of the visitors, many ‘oohed’ and ‘aahed’ over the same plants which luckily were blooming on cue for the tour. So here’s some more […]
A Backyard Orchard for Everyone
Grow good fruit! I’m excited to give talks on creating a Backyard Orchard this month at Disney Parks ‘Food and Wine Festival’. There’s nothing like the taste of fruit that you have grown yourself ripened to the peak of flavor . Follow these tips to create your own backyard orchard, even if you don’t have a […]
How to Create a Stunning Wildflower Garden Anywhere
Seed ‘bombs’ are fun to make, share, and sow! January rains bring prime conditions for wildflowers like California poppies to germinate, grow and thrive. A fun project for a rainy day for kids and grownups alike is to make seed ‘bombs’: portable, easy to sow spheres of wildflower seeds and planting mix. Make up a […]
Garden Ideas from the Solar Decathlon
College Students Create Innovative and Sustainable Gardens Every two years the U.S. Department of Energy sponsors the Solar Decathlon, a competition of college teams to design and build houses powered by the sun. The event is being held this month at the Orange County Great Park in Irvine (last days open to the public are […]
Garden Tips from a Backyard Farmer
Farm to Table in Montana As mentioned in previous posts, when I’m on a vacation, I always keep my eyes open for cool garden venues to visit. This month I went to one of my favorite places in the world, the Swan Valley area of Montana (not too far from Glacier National Park). We rented […]
Making Pickles: Super Easy, Super Delicious!
Got Cucumbers? Make Pickles! I grew up eating my Aunt’s homemade pickles but amazingly I never tried to make them myself until last summer. I have limited veggie garden space so I only grew one kind of cucumbers: the slicing kind. But last year I had a free package of pickling cucumber seeds so I […]
Free Succulents Garden Workshop
‘Sensational Succulents’ Workshop at the Orange County Great Park If you want drought tolerant, low maintenance, but colorful and interesting plants in your pots or garden, succulents are a great choice! University of California Cooperative Extension Master Gardeners will demonstrate how to create beautiful succulent gardens in containers and your yard. Taking cuttings, propagation, […]
A Gardener’s Trip to Santa Barbara County
I recently spent a fun weekend trip to the Santa Barbara county towns of Buellton, Solvang, and Los Olivos. We rode bikes from Buellton through Solvang and on to Los Olivos, about a 20 mile round trip. It’s a great area for gardeners to visit with lots of wineries, olive oil tasting, even a lavender […]