Growing Peppers – Part 2: Rain, Preserving, Seed Saving, Eating is the 59th episode of Late Bloomer |Urban Organic Garden Show. If you watched Part 1, you won’t want to miss the conclusion of my pepper story. It’s New Year’s Day and 37° and Kaye recounts fall pepper events in the Late Bloomer garden. Raccoons […]
Loveliness After the Rain & More on our Water Woes. Last night’s light shower was nothing more than a blip on the radar of California’s vastly reduced water supply due to four straight years of drought. Still, the sight of dripping flowers in the morning light cheered me. I attended a Sierra Club Angeles Chapter water forum last night […]
What could be more convenient than farm fresh produce to your door? Because I have such a small garden in my front yard, there is a lag between seasonal harvests. I fill in this gap with a farm box from Farm Fresh to You. I often am inspired by the recipes they include in the box, but […]
Growing Heirloom Tomatoes Part 3 comes on the heels of Part 2! In this episode, Kaye contends with sprawling vines as colorful tomato varieties are enjoying their first harvests. Kaye is not a carpenter! But, she builds a tomato support for two sprawling vines after getting her Gary O’Sena plant under control. With sizzling original music […]
Growing heirloom tomatoes part 1 covers heirloom seeds, seeding, planting, and managing to care for many more seedlings than ever imagined. Stay tuned for parts 2 and 3! Click through to YouTube for highest resolution. I planted over 200 seeds this year, 150 of them tomato! Nine varieties were from Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds and the […]
Growing Parkway Kale is the latest offering from “Late Bloomer.” If you are short on space, you can utilize your parkway to grow hearty, nutritious kale. Kaye covered her brassicas with red voile (purchase at a fabric store) to keep cabbage moths from laying eggs on them. Cabbageworms can devastate your brassicas. Kaye builds community […]
Growing Sweet Peas was my main preoccupation with my third winter garden. I grew four varieties last year and had such good luck, I tripled the number of vines and doubled the number of varieties. In other words, I went for broke! All through December, I had gorgeous white and magenta blossoms. Beginning of January, […]
After the rain, the Late Bloomer Garden comes alive! You may have heard about the drought in California. Well, we got a proper hosing the past few days. It coincided with cool season crops mature and lush. My new rainwater barrel is full along with several overflow trash cans, and the soil got a deep […]
Winter Harvest is Beginning! Cool season crops are maturing in Southern California. It’s time to finally see the fruits of my labor, started back in October. It sounds like I’m bragging, but, as much for my own edification, I wanted to list all that I have growing in my tiny front yard garden. Most of […]
Screening Winter Greens is now a key component to pest and varmint management for my cool season greens. What farmers have known for decades – cover crops to prevent flying pests laying eggs on brassicas and more – is rarely put into practice in a front yard garden like mine. However, after daily plucking and squishing […]
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