Here’s a riddle: how do you grow vegetables without a vegetable garden? Answer: polyculture. Which means that you either tuck the tomatoes and lettuce into with your existing flowerbeds, or you bring herbs and flowers into the vegetable patch. Yes: not only does this method do away with rows, which segregate one vegetable from another; it does away with separate beds, which segregate flowers from herbs from vegetables. My guests this week are David Deardorff and Kathryn Wadsworth...

Some organic gardeners swear by manure. Others swear they’ll never touch it. To the first group, it’s the ultimate one-stop soil conditioner, complete with built-in fertilizers. To the second, conventional manure is contaminated with hormones and antibiotics, and even organic manures can contain human pathogens. Both groups are right, and the only way to make […] The post The Manic Gardener – Minding Your Manure appeared first on WebTalkRadio.net.

Some organic gardeners swear by manure. Others swear they’ll never touch it. To the first group, it’s the ultimate one-stop soil conditioner, complete with built-in fertilizers. To the second, conventional manure is contaminated with hormones and antibiotics, and even organic manures can contain human pathogens. Both groups are right, and the only way to make an informed decision about whether or not to use manure is to become better informed about it. So just how wonderful a conditioner is...

Doug Tallamy is not an idiot, so when he talks about a new national park that extends across the entire continent, he’s not proposing to bulldoze cities or tear up freeways. No; he’s talking about converting half the space that now goes to lawns to more productive plantings—plantings that attract insects, especially native ones. And […] The post The Manic Gardener – Landscaping for Wildlife appeared first on WebTalkRadio.net.

Doug Tallamy (http://udel.edu/~dtallamy/)is not an idiot, so when he talks about a new national park that extends across the entire continent, he’s not proposing to bulldoze cities or tear up freeways. No; he’s talking about converting half the space that now goes to lawns to more productive plantings—plantings that attract insects, especially native ones. And what plants attract native insects? Native ones, of course. As the chair of the Department of Entomology and Wildlife Ecology at the...

People in northern climes, with their short growing seasons, often try to get a jump on the season by starting their plants, especially their vegetables, indoors—on a windowsill, or in a greenhouse, a cold frame, or a basement. But though many of us start our own plants, a lot of us don’t do it particularly […] The post The Manic Gardener – From Seed to Seedling appeared first on WebTalkRadio.net.

People in northern climes, with their short growing seasons, often try to get a jump on the season by starting their plants, especially their vegetables, indoors—on a windowsill, or in a greenhouse, a cold frame, or a basement. But though many of us start our own plants, a lot of us don’t do it particularly well. Many seeds refuse to sprout, while others get off to a terrific start, then keel over, victims of the dreaded damping off disease. Judy Owsowitz ...

When you first see them, soil blocks are both unremarkable and fantastic. They’re just cubes of dirt, after all—big deal—but they function like a pot of earth twice their size or more. In fact, the headline could read: Pots Obsolete—Soil Blocks Replace Plastic. Implausible? Perhaps. Impossible? No. Unlikely as it sounds, a cube of free-standing […] The post The Manic Gardener – Potless Plants: Starting seeds with Soil Blocks appeared first on WebTalkRadio.net.

When you first see them, soil blocks are both unremarkable and fantastic. They’re just cubes of dirt, after all—big deal—but they function like a pot of earth twice their size or more. In fact, the headline could read: Pots Obsolete—Soil Blocks Replace Plastic. Implausible? Perhaps. Impossible? No. Unlikely as it sounds, a cube of free-standing soil can sprout a seed, support a seedling, even grow a full head of lettuce. How is this possible? And why don’t the darn things just fall apart,...

Most of us are familiar with the term “food security,” meaning simply that people should have enough to eat. But Charles Levkoe, a doctoral candidate at the University of Toronto, explains why this term doesn’t go nearly far enough in defining people’s rights in the realm of food. “Food security” does not ask us to […] The post The Manic Gardener – Where it All Comes Together—Or Falls Apart appeared first on WebTalkRadio.net.

Most of us are familiar with the term “food security,” meaning simply that people should have enough to eat. But Charles Levkoe, a doctoral candidate at the University of Toronto, explains why this term doesn’t go nearly far enough in defining people’s rights in the realm of food. “Food security” does not ask us to consider the wages or welfare of the people who work in the fields and factories that produce the food; it does not address the quality or cultural appropriateness of the food for...

It’s not yet spring, but with days growing perceptibly longer, the season of the seed catalogue has arrived. Many backyard gardeners still rely on packets from the grocery store or from the gardening center at a big box store, where all the carrots are orange and all the beans green. But there’s an extraordinary array […] The post The Manic Gardener – Seeds for the Season appeared first on WebTalkRadio.net.

It’s not yet spring, but with days growing perceptibly longer, the season of the seed catalogue has arrived. Many backyard gardeners still rely on packets from the grocery store or from the gardening center at a big box store, where all the carrots are orange and all the beans green. But there’s an extraordinary array of gorgeous, enticing flowers, herbs, and vegetables out there, specially bred or else researched and saved by heirloom and organic seed growers. On today’s show, I’m joined by...

We all know that Texas is in the midst of a terrible drought with no end in sight, so it makes sense that irrigating lawns and gardens is restricted there. But in fact water is running short in areas far wetter than Texas. Aquifers are depleted and water tables have dropped in states as damp […] The post The Manic Gardener – Water-wise gardening appeared first on WebTalkRadio.net.

We all know that Texas is in the midst of a terrible drought with no end in sight, so it makes sense that irrigating lawns and gardens is restricted there. But in fact water is running short in areas far wetter than Texas. Aquifers are depleted and water tables have dropped in states as damp (and as far apart) as Florida and Oregon. Are we going to lose our gardens—and our lawns? Thomas Christopher, an expert on sustainable gardening, says no—not if we plant wisely and water as if it...

January is a not the best time to start a compost pile, but it’s a great time to learn about how compost works. This week I talk with two experts at the University of Pennsylvania, Tom Richard (http://www.abe.psu.edu/fac/richard/overview.htm)and Rick Stehouwer (http://cropsoil.psu.edu/directory/rcs15), about some of what goes on inside a compost pile and what happens when you add the stuff to soil. Tom and Rick give understandable explanations based in solid science to questions like why...

Some people think this: Native plants are tough, hardy, drought-tolerant, and easy going, free of those picky preferences that plague domesticated garden plants. Stick ‘em in the ground and they’ll grow. Others think this: Natives are messy, unkempt, overgrown, weedy, undisciplined, and invasive. And they lower property values. Still others believe this: Natives take too long to become established: if you go down that path, you may as well declare your garden a bloom-free zone and have done...

Sure, you know the difference between a perennial and an annual. But are you aware that perennials, unlike diamonds, are not forever? Some only live for a few years. And a perennial in the south may be an annual in the north. So—are you sure you know the difference? If you have any doubts about your command of this or other common botanical distinctions, check out today’s show with Toby Day, Extension Horticulture Specialist at Montana State University in Bozeman, Montana. In this first of...

We’ve all heard of habitat restoration. But how do you do it? What is actually involved—and why would anyone bother, if it takes years of strenuous work and pays little or nothing? Most of the savanna and prairie native to the Midwest are gone. But native plantings are being re-established by many private landowners, my father-in-law Rick Durbin among them. Three generations of Durbins are currently working on the project, so for years I’ve been hearing about prescribed burns and battling...

If you live in North America, chances are that you’ve never heard of Bokashi. Yet it may be the answer to your composting prayers. It’s cheap, easy, and so small-scale that you can do it indoors, all winter, in a bin under your kitchen sink. Jenny Harlen of Jenny’s Bokashi Blog (http://bokashiworld.wordpress.com/)joins us from Sweden, a veritable Bokashi hotbed, to explain how it works, how to do it, and how it benefits you, your garden, and the environment. If this sounds suspiciously...

Why would an organization dedicated to preserving our seed-saving heritage not save seeds? And why would such an organization concentrate on developing new seeds? And why, oh, why would a graduate program in breeding plants focus so exclusively on genes that most students in it can’t tell a rutabaga from a dandelion? My guest this week is Jared Zystro, who describes how a catastrophic fire helped the Organic Seed Alliance (http://www.seedalliance.org)realize that the best way to preserve...

Imagine this: Your neighbor invents fire and patents it so that you can't have any unless you obtain a license--for a fee. Furthermore, your license requires that you put your fire out each morning and buy new coals from your neighbor each evening. Or you get sued. Bad enough? It gets worse. One day, his fire escapes and burns your house down. Then he sues you for patent infringement. After all, you now have fire not covered by your license. Absurd? Yes. But there's a close (and disturbing)...

If you thought worm castings an odd fertilizer, brace yourself: the new kid on the organic fertilizer block is insect castings, or frass. Daniel Jazvac, one of the co-founders of Prime Nutrients Ltd (http://www.primenutrients.ca/index.php)., calls this fertilizer the “missing link” of organics. Here’s why: insects play a crucial role in recycling organic matter everywhere, and some species produce clean, rich castings, yet they have been almost universally ignored by organic researchers and...

In the course of this interview, Steve Solomon (http://soilandhealth.org)covers a lot more ground than the tame “organic fertilizers” title suggests. This American-turned-Aussie gardener and garden writer defines the lovely phrase “to put into healing grass,” gives a bit of history about the British garden “allotment,” critques Elliot Coleman’s seven-year garden rotation, describes the odd Oregon problem of root-eating symphylans, and takes a detour with William A. Price, a dentist whose...

Try this on for size: you live in the city, and you don’t have a yard. But you want to grow your own food. What do you do? Twenty-five years ago, or even ten, chances are you’d have been out of luck. These days though, many cities across North America positively bristle with helpful organizations for the aspiring urban gardener. In Seattle, Liza Burke introduces us to Seattle Tilth (http://seattletilth.org/), which offers a range of educational courses, gardening opportunities, programs for...