South Pasadena Homegrown Exchange
Exchange knowledge, fruits, veggies, seeds, cuttings, gear, yardshare
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Photoset reblogged from Grow and Eat
Edible Landscape Update
Blueberries started ripening this week! We harvest a bowl full every day. I highly reccommend growing blueberries. The shrub is pretty in the landscape, and it gives you an organic food that can be pricey at the store. Grow 2 or more plants (they need to grow near each other to pollinate) in full sun in rich, well drained soil.
We have more Chard growing than we can use. I’m going to give some to friends & neighbors. Chard looks really pretty in the garden, and it’s delicious in so many dishes. Any recipe you can think of where you might use spinach, you can use chard instead. I’m going to make a Chard Lasagna later today with homemade ricotta cheese.
The lettuces are all getting big and I harvest from them every day. I have lettuces growing here there and everywhere, in all shapes and colors. The red ones are amazingly beautiful in the garden!. When it gets hot they’ll start to wilt and die away, so I’m enjoying salad from the garden while I have it.
The purple beans are from a dried purple bean pod that dropped last fall. I love volunteer plants. Beans like warm temps, but these are in a protected spot so they think it’s summer.
Beets are another crop I will always grow from now on. This is my first year growing beets successfully. Give them plenty of room to grow, loose loamy soil, water well, and fertilize when needed. The leaves are delicious in a salad when they’re small, and sautéed when they get a little bigger. I can’t wait to pull beets out of the ground!
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Photo reblogged from A Thorny Thicket
The calm cuteness before zucchini domination! (Taken with instagram)
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Count on more beet greens for the next exchange. Their leaves are so pretty, I love to kneel down and admire the purple against the green….until my daughter whacks me with her shovel to get me back on track. Ah, but the moment was nice nonetheless. ;)
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Photo reblogged from Edible Gardens LA
Practical and aesthetically pleasingBamboo poles and bird netting protect a plum tree from being stripped of fruit by wildlife in Laurel Canyon.
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Link reblogged from A Thorny Thicket
I had the pleasure of hosting our first meetup this last weekend. It was truly amazing that in just a month you could find 40 like minded individuals to gather and share thoughts, concerns, motivation, and best of all exchange plants, produce, seeds, a trellis, herbs, etc. Topics that were tossed…
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Photo reblogged from Garden Up - Urban Gardening & Living
5 biodegradable seed-starting planter-pots to DIY
Like many of us, the gardening plans of Michele Pacey (mentioned previously here and here) include growing plants from seed.
In a recent blog post, Michele describes her seed-starting setup: seeds planted in biodegradable newspaper “pots,” which are placed indoors on foam meat trays while the seeds germinate.
After seedlings have sprouted, the plants — pots and all — can be planted in soil.
To make your own biodegradable seed-starters:
- Roll newspaper pieces around a jar and close the ends, as Michele shows in this short video, or roll pieces of newspaper around something like this.
- Fold newspaper pages, origami-like, into pots. For folding tutorial, see the For Greenies blog.
- Cut pieces of paper towel or toilet paper tubes, adding four slits on one end, then fold end pieces together to form a closed bottom. (Photo via girlgearstudio.) Ends also could be left open, as pictured in this earlier Unconsumption post.
- Use eggshells, as mentioned here (with description for blowing out eggs).
- Use citrus peels. (Found here.)
Another idea: Create mini-greenhouses from cut plastic bottles. Simply place bottle tops over plants. (Found on Poppytalk.)
What household waste do you use for starting seeds?
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Quote reblogged from A Thorny ThicketI came across this photo while changing my facebook profile to timeline. I’m now convinced, based on this pic, that I’ve over planted my raised bed again. Note to self: next spring look at previous years summer photo to keep greedy garden plans in check!
