Buying The Farm

Grafting heirloom tomato plants onto disease-resistant tomato plants. I need a closer-up view of the cuts that are needed, but holy cow this is a Very Cool Thing.

Grafting Greenhouse tomatoes.

I use a lot of recycled plastic containers for my indoor garden.  You Grow Girl advises sticking to these plastics for safety:

1 – PETE

2 – HDPE

4 – LDPE

5 – PP

and avoiding these:

3 – PVC

6 – PS

7 – PC

The numbers refer to the symbols pressed on most plastic products, indicating their makeup.

Terrific little article on beekeeping in NYC, with some fun quotes:

The citys urban bee mavens inhabit their own entomological universe, sharing useful information about mite cures or re-queening protocols that is, replacing a jaded queen bee. As might be expected, they are also given to apiary humor. There are puns about the, well, plight of the bumblebee and requests to lend me your comb; and, yes, there are questions about whether to bee or not to bee. Mr. Solomon, a graduate of the Harvard Business School, has been known to tell hive masters that he has a degree from the Harvard bee school.

On a recent afternoon on her rooftop, Ms. Goodman unhinged the hive cover and she and Mr. Graves began examining the individual wooden bee frames, wedging out big pieces of honeycomb. Being from New York, it boasts a bouquet that is more floral — sweeter — and has a lighter taste, said Mr. Graves. He noted that the bees forage in Central Park, at rooftop planters, outside florists shops and in community gardens, rather than at upstate clover fields or deep-South orange groves.

But it isnt the easiest thing in the world to sweet-talk skeptical New Yorkers into buying urban honey for $5 a pound. You would think that New York honey might have a rather strong flavor, said Judith Cramer, a computer-science teacher who had stopped by Mr. Gravess cart at the Union Square Greenmarket specifically to buy New York honey as a gift for a friend who lives in England.

Actually, its rather sweet, Mr. Graves said.

No, you’d think that New York honey would be quite aggressive as far as honeys go, Ms. Cramer said with a laugh. You know, its the honey that says, Whats it to you? …

I loved this closer:

Back on the roof, Mr. Bukiet sighed as he surveyed the spectacle of his wife and children poking into their two big-city beehives.You raise your children in Manhattan, you think theyll be the ultimate urbanites, and instead you get a bunch of naturalists, he said, deadpan. Where did I go wrong?

via Beekeeping in New York City.

I’m into the exciting phase of my first garden: Seeds are starting (or, in the case of the edamame, ready for high school already!) and the weather’s been beautiful. We’re getting closer to the actual planting!

The bag gardening method I’m adopting, while faddish, hasn’t developed as deep a literature for things like plant spacing. My research has involved a lot of bouncing between sites. Luckily, though, one result was this website.

The concept is to plant at least one container of vegetables, and they’ve very helpfully prepared short, illustrated cheat sheets for some commonly-grown plants. Not everything is on here, but for amateurs like myself, it’s an excellent primer.

http://www.onepotpledge.org/getgrowing.html

Yesterday I let slip that I’m planning my first actual garden. It occurred to me that I hadn’t explained how this came about!

In a fit of new year’s resolve, I spent the first week of January visiting dozens of gardening websites, one of which linked to Sharing Backyards – a North American take on the much bigger, much more entrenched Landshare program, which – though huge in Britain – hasn’t yet taken root in Canada. (I’m exhausting my gardening metaphors, here.)

Sharing Backyards offered more locations in Toronto than I expected, but was pretty woeful in the suburbs, where I live. Lo and behold, though, there was one listing not 10 minutes’ walk down the street from me, and the homeowner and I hit it off immediately. The backyard isn’t huge, but as first-time gardeners and first-time backyard lenders, we agreed it’d be more than enough for experimenting, and we’re both excited for Spring.

http://sharingbackyards.com/

Mother Earth News offers this handy online garden planner. I’m sure, for experienced gardeners, it’s a bit too simplistic, but for pale green thumbs like me it’s very useful. You can lay out your garden and have a list of sowing/planting/harvest times generated automatically. Not everything is represented, and it’d be nice to have some companion planting suggestions (dos and don’ts!), but for one just starting out this is a nice little resource.

http://www.motherearthnews.com/garden-planner/vegetable-garden-planner.aspx

I’d read about Mangelwurtzels (say that three times fast) a few years ago, and am still intrigued by them. They’re a species of beet which, historically and by the suggestion of my local seed catalogue, are fit for animal fodder, not human consumption. Some investigation shows that people do grow them for home use, and one shares a tip about forcing their leaves for a nice gourmet entree.

This is an interwsting thread to me as I have been growing them for a few years now for my own consumption.

Incidently, I found out by accident that if the stored roots are left to sprout in a covered container, the blanched shoots produce a gourmet sprouting dish.

http://www.idigmygarden.com/forums/archive/index.php/t-1095.html

I’m investigating sharing a space with a local homeowner. She’s got a few fruit trees but most of the ground is in shade. I found this list of shade-happy plants which gives me some hope our potential crop won’t be entirely composed of microgreens.

**EDIT** Turns out she’s a he, and the shade isn’t as bad as I thought. Still, plenty of space to put shade-tolerant kale!

http://www.motherearthnews.com/shade-tolerant-vegetables-zm0z11zsto.aspx

Nerve compression plus a total inability to tackle hills without getting off to push mean I never mount a bicycle unless I have to. Exercise in general is not a favourite pastime of mine. Laundry? Eh. It’s just one of those things you’ve gotta do.

Combine all three, though, and we have a multitasking device I could get behind.

Behold, the bike-powered laundry unit!

http://www.bikehacks.com/bikehacks/2012/01/green-power-bike-washing-machines.html

Food Garden International’s Roger Doiron gives an entertaining talk on how backyard gardens can help change and save the world.

http://www.ted.com/talks/roger_doiron_my_subversive_garden_plot.html?awesm=on.ted.com_RDoiron&utm_campaign=&utm_medium=on.ted.com-static&utm_source=direct-on.ted.com&utm_content=awesm-publisher