Hello and thanks for joining me in the virtual garden.
In the last several weeks gardening is suddenly a trendy topic. Everyone is using grow-bags, building gardens out of rain gutters or starting tomatoes on windowsills. We are all finding ways to re-engage or become engaged in raising food as it becomes a pastime and possibly a necessity.
Below is a photo of my friend Kathy Zipp who has built what she calls the lazy gardener's table. It is a wooden box lined with plastic where she keeps extra seedlings. She cuts and eats the micro-green-sized plants or transplants them into her garden.
I have been gardening my whole life so I am glad to help anyone who has questions. Just EMAIL me a voice memo to askdonna@donnabalzer.com. If you are unsure how to make a voice memo CHECK OUT THIS LINK.
Time to Start Warm Crops!
Yes I know the cool winds and even snow are just behind us in some regions but today it is time to think about growing warm season crops. Tomatoes and beans and luxurious things like squash and cucumbers (shown above) are ready to start indoors for planting outside later this month.
This year I am growing my own wash cloths... yes I am growing Luffa. It is one of the hardest crops to grow because it has to be started indoors in March, babied along for three months and then planted outside when the weather warms. When the squash-like fruit are ripe you peel them to reveal the "washcloth" beneath. I'll let you know how many washcloths I grow by fall!
Bags Full of Food
After I taped a podcast episode with Dean about growing strawberries and other food in grow bags, Dean released an online class for gardeners called CONTAINER GARDENING SECRETS so if you need help to find the right container, soil or fertilizer from a guy who grows a lot of food take this online class today. The thing about Dean is he didn't just take a class on this yesterday. He is living the farming life and grows food for a living.
If you want to buy root pouches to grow food this summer CHECK OUT MY ONLINE SHOP or email me (info@donnabalzer) for a shipping quote if you want several bags. I have sizes and styles in stock not listed on my web page ready for your garden this spring.
Perfect Berries
The new rain gutter installation inside my greenhouse is shown above. Growing and eating the first berry from the greenhouse or garden is the stuff gardening dreams are made of. Picking a perfect berry is a thrill (see my first greenhouse harvest below).
Standard 10-foot lengths of eaves-trough with end caps from Home Depo are the guts of this garden. Holes were drilled into the gutters for drainage. Gutters are spaced a foot apart on the vertical. All gutters are sitting on metal brackets inside my greenhouse for the longest possible harvest.
Frustrated Gardener
Pillbugs are everywhere - especially if you edge your garden beds with wood. This big fella, also called a rolly-poly, chewed a big hole through a berry laying on the ground outside in my garden last fall. I am so glad most of my berries are growing in grow bags or rain gutters this year. Berries sitting on a wet soil surface are sitting ducks for rot and pests of all kinds.
Media!
Listening to podcasts is one way to learn to garden vicariously! I have 12 PODCAST episodes completed now and the newest edition (coming soon) is all about growing strawberries in rain gutters. Right after I taped this episode with The Plant Charmer, Khaled Majouji, I went out and bought berries and rain gutters and installed them in my greenhouse (see photo above.) Am I having fun yet? Definitely. Right after Khaled on rain gutter gardening in Montreal I chat with Steven Biggs about growing Figs Where You Think You Can't (read Northern gardens.)
Become a small C celebrity! If you want to ask a question on my podcast I would love to get it by voice memo. If you haven't done this before believe me it is easy. Just go to your phone (I have an iphone and it is called voice memo app) and record a little message with your name, location and question. Then send it to me by email and I will include it on my podcast ASAP. Easy Peasy.
I need your help. "Helping Gardeners Grow" is on Apple ITunes, Spotify and Google Play. Please Subscribe, Rate and Comment on the show so I can grow this podcast. Thanks to Monica who took that extra step and posted a review!
This Spring I am also writing for The Calgary Herald (starting Saturday May 16) and answering gardening questions on CBC radio NXNW in Vancouver. Listen for me on May 3, 2020. Check my APPEARANCES PAGE FOR ALL THE DETAILS and remember you don't have to be in BC to listen to CBC in BC. Just listen online.
Do You Need a Greenhouse?
I was visiting a client (yes with social distancing) and snapped this photo of the garden and greenhouse I designed for him last year. We are finally installing the greenhouse plants and soil this season. If you need a greenhouse to grow more food make sure to let BC Greenhouse Builders know you heard about them from me. When you buy a greenhouse and mention my name they will give you a free 3-Year Gardener's Gratitude Journal!
Stay well and garden always....
Donna
email: info@donnabalzer.com
Do you need help from the "NO GUFF" Gardener?
Grow food FASTER. Start Living a HEALTHIER and HAPPIER life today!
