Potted Herbs Beside the House

Thyme

We grow potted plants along a sunny wall outside our house. I probably will move the herbs to the main garden behind the house eventually. For now, it is very convenient to have them within easy reach of the kitchen, since several of the plants are herbs. We grow thyme, oregano, parsley, a little lettuce, tomatoes, and flowers. The tomatoes are from the "Little Tomato That Could," a plant that came up last fall. We nurtured it all winter long.

The mixture of herbs, tomatoes, and flowers attracts beneficial insects and predators to the garden. We haven't had problems with insect pests in this corner of the garden all summer.

Lettuce and Oregano

The Little Tomato That Could

One of the logs from a tree Don recently trimmed to give my vegetable-gardens more sun is quite pretty. I asked him to cut the log in such a way that I can move it to my garden and use it as a planter. I am thinking I will put some soil in the hollowed-out area and plant shallow-rooted crops like lettuce in the fall. It will be decorative and a little useful.

Marigolds Attract Beneficials

Carrots

Potential Container for Lettuces

Another View

Attracting Predators to the Garden

Black Swallowtail Caterpillars in my dill

I try to use eco-friendly gardening practices. This means I use lots of compost and minimize or eliminate the use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides, fungicides, and other "-cides"  when I garden. When I do use a chemical, I will use an organic one, and only if other options have failed. I try to attract birds, wasps, and other predators to my garden to eat caterpillars and other pests so that nature does much of my bug-killing for me. If I wanted to kill off the caterpillars in my dill,for example, I would hand pick them off and squish them. But it's the end of the season, the dill is bolting, anyway, the predators do need food, and I happen to like Black Swallowtail butterflies, so the 'pillars pictured get a break, at least from me.

It's amazing how fast caterpillars grow and how fast they eat up plants, though. They have enormous appetites. If I needed that dill, these caterpillars would be history, pretty as they are!

Sunflowers attract beneficials

The first rule to attracting predators is not to kill them. This is one reason why I use pesticides and other "-cides" very sparingly. "-Cide" is Latin for "kill." Pesticides on the vegetables I am going to cook and eat are not only bad for the health of my family, but they can easily kill off the "good bugs," birds, and other creatures I actually want to attract to my vegetable beds. If I must use a pesticide or other chemical, I use it sparingly and according to the directions on the label. I spray in the evening, after the bees and other pollinators have mostly gone to bed for the night.

Birds need water!

Birdbaths are an easy way to attract robins and other birds to your garden. Look for one that is easy to clean. It should be shallow at the edges and then gradually become deeper towards the middle. Birds need not only to drink fresh water, but they also need to take baths, too. They like to dip their feet into a birdbath and then gradually walk down to a depth that is comfortable for them before they actually start bathing.

Place your birdbath away from bushes or anything that can hide cats; birds feel vulnerable when their wings are wet. But try to put the birdbath near some low-hanging tree branches, fence posts, or other locations where the birds can shake off the excess water, look around, and preen themselves for a bit once they've finished their bath. Robins really like to visit my garden and birdbaths, and I like to see them, since they and their young have a huge appetite for caterpillars and other insects.

Speaking of insects, be sure to dump out the stale water in your birdbath every couple of days in the summer, and replace it with fresh water. This prevents mosquitoes from breeding in your birdbath. Be sure to check it frequently and replace water as it dries out, too. A dry birdbath does the birds no good! Keep the birdbath full so the birds keep their habit of stopping there frequently. Keep it clean so the birds don't get sick from the water.

Spicy Nasturtiums are not only flowers, but edible too!

Flowers will attract not only the pollinators that you need for your tomatoes, squash, and other vegetables to set fruit, but they will also feed and attract predatory insects. This year I have planted cosmos, nasturtiums, marigolds, and other flowers in and around my vegetable beds. Some, like the nasturtiums, are actually edible. So far the different kinds of flowers have been growing at different rates and blooming at different times of  year, which is great, because pollinators and predatory insects need food all season long. Marigolds and sunflowers have particularly strong reputations for being easy to grow and good at attracting beneficial insects and keeping the "bad bugs" away.

"Cottage Red" marigold

I recently read that mint plants attract beneficial wasps and predatory flies to the garden. We tend to think of wasps and flies as bad, but this isn't necessarily so. I moved my potted mint, which had started to flower, out near my vegetable beds. Every time I look I see predator flies and wasps of different sizes and colors greedily feeding at the nectar from these tiny mint flowers. I am careful to leave the wasps alone, and they don't bother to sting me.

Wasps love mint flowers

The wasps feed themselves from flower nectar, then they go hunting for caterpillars and other bugs to feed their larvae-babies. Just be sure to keep your mint in a BIG pot or contain it in some other way, because mint will take over your garden if you let it! If it goes to seed, watch for it germinating in unwanted places in the spring, and pull it up before it has a chance to establish itself. It easily becomes a weed.

First Tomato This Year

Our Winter Tomato Bears Fruit

 We harvested our first tomato from "Little Tomato That Could" this year. By this I mean the tomato plant that came up as a volunteer in one of my planters last fall. My husband, Don, refused to let me pull it up. He and I nurtured it all winter, and today it has borne us a big, edible-looking fruit. I was worried about a spot at the bottom of it turning into blossom end rot, but whatever the blemish is, it looks like it is just a little spot that can be trimmed off. Don loves tomatoes and will have the honor of the first bite. I hope it tastes good after such a long effort on all our parts!

The Little Tomato Last Fall

The close-up picture of the fruit at the top was taken with my new Canon PowerShot A1300 point-and-shoot digital camera. My beloved Nikon P60, the one I had toted all over Italy and all through my honeymoon, finally gave out on me. So far I am quite pleased with the new camera and the quality of the pictures it takes. It has a faster flash and takes more reliable pictures in dimly-lit rooms than my Nikon did. The older Nikon would take great pictures, but sometimes I had to fiddle a lot with the settings to get what I wanted. The new camera is a true point and shoot. Light, easy, and reliable.

The Little Tomato That Could, End of May

The Little Tomato's first fruit

It's been a month since I've updated my posts on the "Little Tomato That Could." This is a little plant that came up as a volunteer in one of my outdoor pots in November of 2011. Don Burke, my then-fiance, now husband, likes to rescue forlorn-looking creatures, and I've rarely seen a plant that looks as pathetic as that poor tomato did last fall. He stopped me from pulling it up. He nurtured it all fall and winter with reluctant help from me. The plant has gotten a little brittle, and the last time Don moved it, about half of it broke and fell off. Ever the optimist, Don took one of the broken vines and stuck it in some dirt in another pot. That part is still alive, but I'm not sure for how long.

The original "Little Tomato" has bounced back from the rough handling. It is even producing one early and large tomato, which is in that green-turning-yellow stage that tomatoes reach as they begin to ripen. I hope it turns red and that it avoids blossom end rot. The moisture content has been hard to manage in the pot that Don has been growing the plant in, especially with our summer weather so hot and dry. I don't have high hopes for it. I already see a little sunken area in the green tomato that looks like the beginning of the problem.

The Little Tomato That Could

The Little Tomato last fall

How to Grow Gardening: Paying It Forward and Local Foods

"A food desert is any area in the industrialized world where healthy, affordable food is difficult to obtain" (Wikipedia). I checked the U.S. government's Food Desert Locator, and to my surprise there are food deserts located not far from where Don and I live in Chesapeake, Virginia.


I am a local-foods enthusiast, so I have been wanting to play a role in helping other people grow fresh, local, sustainable food for themselves. If the people I help are in need, so much the better. I very much admire the work that Will Allen and his Growing Power has been doing in major cities, and I wanted to do something similar in some small way here. I also remember when I first moved into my previous house in North Carolina, a divorcee with lots of needs and barely two dollars to rub together in my pocket. I wanted a vegetable garden because gas was $4.00 a gallon and I wanted to avoid driving to Walmart for veggies I could grow at home. At that time members of the Freecycle community there took me under their wing and shared cuttings, seeds, and advice with me.

But how to start here? I am new to Chesapeake, and I know almost nobody in town.

My answer came in the form of a plea on the local Freecycle list. This particular request was for vegetable seeds, flower seeds, cuttings, and anything that could help someone who knew very little about gardening to get started. The request came from South Norfolk, an area of Chesapeake that is needier than other parts of the city.

I exchanged a few emails with the sender of the message. I learned that "Grace," as I'll call her, is disabled and hasn't been able to work in a few years. She wants to garden but has very little money to spend. She has a few pots but nothing over 8".

Today I got to "pay it forward" when I arrived with potting soil, seeds, cuttings of mint and oregano, some tools, a helping hand, pots of various sizes and shapes, gardening magazines, and advice. Grace and her housemate are lovely people, and it felt good to help them in some small way. I finally got the chance to play a role, however tiny, in spreading the local foods movement and to do it in in honor of all the gardeners and Freecylers who have helped me over the years. I also had a chance to clear some unused flower pots and containers out of my yard.

I will be on alert for other opportunities to grow gardening and local foods in my area. The world will be a better place if others will do the same. I'd love to see more towns with the giving, grow-your-own, self-sufficient spirit of the quaint little Todmorden in England.

Wool "Natural Growers Pack" for Container Gardens

Portulacas thrive in hot, dry conditions (source)

I bought another impulse item from my online local-foods coop this week.

My understanding husband has taken in stride my purchase of red wrigglers for vermicomposting and wool dryer balls to replace fabric softeners in our dryer. But this week he actually raised his eyebrows and looked askance at me. There's a first time for everything, I guess.

The $8.00 purchase was a "Natural Growers Pack," a "sheep manure compost fertilizer and water retention system" from Breeze Hill Farm of Powhatan, VA. What arrives is a gallon zip-lock bag filled with unwashed, untreated sheep's wool and a small packet of composted sheep manure to use as fertilizer. It is meant to be used in container gardens. According to the packet:

Our product reduces the need to water the plant 

and provides one of the best all natural organic fertilizers 

available to feed your plants for the entire growing season.

I always have trouble keeping outdoor potted plants sufficiently watered in our hot, dry Virginia summers, so I am hoping the sheep's wool will help. And anyone who reads my blog knows I'm a big fan of composted manure! The directions are to line the bottom of the container with the wool, mix the sheep compost in with the potting soil, add the soil on top of the wool, then add the plant. 

That's what I did, except I sprinkled some seeds on top of the soil in my flower box instead of transplanting plants. The seeds are for dwarf phlox plants and portulacas, also called moss rose. Both are hardy, and I am hoping they will grow in the same container. The sheep's wool took up so much room that I wonder if there's actually enough soil in there for the plants. I'll provide an update on how the system works after my flowers are established.

Update on 7/21/12: The wool does seem to keep the planter moist for more time than I would expect, especially in our unbelievably hot summer weather, but my plants have failed to thrive. the phlox has all died. I am not sure if it is something I am doing wrong that is unrelated to the wool "growers pack" or not. If others have any experience with this growing system, I would appreciate the feedback.

 Update on 8/25/12: I moved the flower box into full sun, and the portulacas are thriving and blooming beautifully. I wish I'd planted more of them. And the soil does stay moist longer than I expect. I'm not sure what happened to the phlox, but the moss rose seems to be making up for it. Overall I'd say the experiment has been a success. I'd try it again.

Phlox (source)