Just started to grow. This year is very late in the east central Saskatchewan.
Many plants benefit from a head start by sowing indoors during late winter and early spring. For a few crops, notably peppers and tomatoes, this indoor start is an absolute requirement if growing from...
For many of us growing up, lettuce represented the primary source of vegetable greens in our diets. Lettuce is absolutely standard in sandwiches and burgers, and makes a simple, inoffensive base for salads. Its flavour is...
Generally speaking, most garden beds benefit from a mulch of organic matter in the form of well rotted manure or compost. A mulch is a surprisingly thin layer that is applied to the surface...
As a vegetable crop (as opposed to a grain crop), the potato is the world’s most important foodstuff, so there are many interesting facts about potatoes. The starchy tubers of the potato plant are...
Grazing deer can be a major nuisance for gardeners in Coastal BC, on the Gulf Islands, and in the interior portions of the province. Vegetable gardens, full of tender greens and food, should be...
For the best success with seeds, we need to understand them and how they work. Seeds come in as many different packages as the plants that produce them. They may be enormous and clunky...
You’ve selected your seeds, you’ve invested in unfamiliar seed starting equipment, you’ve planted the seeds — and now the damn things are coming up! What to do?!
There’s nothing quite as perfect as a ripe tomato – that distinctive fresh, green smell of a sun-warmed fruit that bursts in the mouth. It speaks of the summer’s heat like nothing else in the garden...
Plant Hardiness Zones offer general guidance to the kinds of plants that will survive winter in a given area. The warmer the climate, the higher the number of the zone.
The ingredients in our Beetle Bank Blend Wildflowers combine to attract beneficial insects and provide them with habitat in which to shelter and reproduce. This forms a natural environment that can be planted around...
Thyme is a woody perennial shrub that has been used as a culinary and medicinal herb for thousands of years. Many species of thyme exist, and nearly all are native to the region around...
The holidays are over but the weather outside is still pretty frightful. Here on the coast it is altogether wet — the ground is sodden and squishy. Elsewhere, snow is falling, and the ground is...
Edible flowers can be used to add a splash of colour to all kinds of foods, from salads to desserts to fancy cocktails. A single borage petal, carefully placed, can really enhance a slice...
Squirrel Tail Grass begins the season as a fairly unremarkable grassy plant, but once the warm weather and long days of summer arrive, it sends up remarkable, silky, silvery grey panicles on 60cm (24")...
Monkshood is a very traditional perennial for the cottage garden. The plant is so well known for its toxicity that it plays a role in ancient Greek mythology, and folklore from Europe to India....
Different bees and pollinators benefit from specific types of flowers. Whether a flower is deep or shallow, red or yellow, generous with nectar or stingy... These all impact the attractiveness to different pollinators. We...
Understanding the relationships between specific types of flowers and specific pollinators helps to explain why biodiversity is so important. The greater variety of flowers (including vegetables and herbs) in the garden, the wider range...
Fenugreek is an annual herb that is native to the Mediterranean region. Seeds found in ruins in modern day Iraq were carbon dated to 4000 BCE. It grows best in fertile soil in full...
It’s a beautiful summer day. Since sowing your tomato seeds in Spring, you’ve been nurturing your container garden, preparing for harvest. There is nothing like a juicy, summer-ripened tomato fresh from the garden. Finally,...
Prior to the potato’s arrival from the New World, turnip was the root-crop of choice for cool, wet soils, so many northern European cultures have significant relationships with this vegetable. It says a lot...
These two culinary herbs are very closely related, with flavours that are almost indistinguishable. They represent two of about 20 species of Oregano, all members of the mint family, Lamiaceae. They offer a good...
All butterflies (including moths), as well as a wide range of bees, flies, beetles, and even hummingbirds, will feed on the nectar-heavy flowers of all milkweed varieties. The Monarch, however, seeks milkweed out on...
What the heck is xeriscaping? Simply put, xeriscaping is a system of landscaping with water conservation as the priority. In areas that receive little rainfall in the summer, some thoughtful xeriscaping will allow flowering...
Most of the vegetables we eat on a regular basis are cultivated adaptations from some older source. A good example is broccoli, which is the very same species of plant as cabbage, cauliflower, Brussels...