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Comment by Chief Walks on December 25, 2019 at 3:22pm

DIY Plant Markers – Fun Ideas For Making Plant Labels In The Garden

Labeling plants is a practical endeavor. It helps you be sure which is which, especially between varieties that look similar. Imagine picking a few leaves of lemon mint, thinking you were getting peppermint. It could be a culinary disaster. Making plant labels doesn’t have to cost much, and it can be a creative, fun task. Here are some ideas for inspiration.

Why Homemade Plant Markers
First, you can choose not to label your plants, but that can lead to confusion, especially when growing plants with different growing conditions. Labels will help you keep different varieties and types of plant identifiable so you can provide the right water and fertilizer.

You could just buy those plain white plant labels at the garden center, but DIY plant markers have a few benefits. You can make your own for less money, depending on the materials, and recycle what you would otherwise throw out. Homemade plant markers are fun and let you be creative. And creative, attractive plant labels will add an interesting new visual element to your beds.

Homemade Plant Label Ideas
If you’re drawing a blank on how to make some nice-looking plant labels instead of using store-bought markers, we’ll help you. Here are some creative ways to label plants. Use these ideas or let them inspire you:

*Wooden clothespins. For a rustic theme, write the name of plants on clothespins and attach them to wooden dowels or the edges of pots.
*Carved sticks. Another rustic approach is a great choice if you like to carve or whittle. Pick out some sturdy, straight sticks. Cut the bark away from one end and either write or carve in the name of the plant.
*Wine corks. Save your wine corks, and stick them to the ends of wooden dowels or skewers. Write the names of your plants right on the cork.
*Painted rocks. Painting and hiding rocks for others to find is a fun trend these days. Instead of hiding yours, put them next to plants with the names painted in bright, fun colors.
*Old terracotta pots. Like most gardeners, you probably have old pots lying around, maybe even shards of pots. Put them to work as plant markers. Use small pots turned upside down, or wedge shards or trays from the bottoms of pots into the dirt near your plants with the names written on them.
*Wooden spoons. Take a trip to your local thrift store and pick up assorted wooden spoons. Write or paint plant names on the spoon end and stick them in the dirt.
*Metal spoons. Pick up some random but pretty spoons from the thrift store or an antique shop and press plant names into them for a quirky plant label. You can get find letter punches at any hardware store.

Comment by Chief Walks on December 25, 2019 at 3:20pm

Ways to Put Your Christmas Tree To Use

Although taking down the Christmas tree isn’t nearly as fun as putting it up, you can recycle or reuse the tree and its branches in a number of ways. Here are some tips:
Place the Christmas tree in the garden or backyard and use it as a bird feeder and sanctuary. Fresh orange slices or strung popcorn will attract the birds while they sit in the branches for shelter. Make sure all decorations, hooks, garland, and tinsel strands are removed.
To prevent the tree from rolling away in winter winds, secure the trunk to the ground with wire or twine or use stakes dug into the dirt.
A Christmas tree is biodegradable; its branches may be removed, chipped, and used as mulch in the garden.
Chop or grind smaller branches for wood chips to use in flower, tree, and shrub beds.
Larger branches can be cut into smaller bundles for winter protective mulch around newly planted perennials and small shrubs. Be sure to remove the branches in spring when the plants begin to grow again.
Recycle your tree, many communities have tree recycling locations.
The major uses for recycled trees include:
Chipping (chippings are used for various things from mulch to hiking trails)
Beachfront erosion prevention
Lake and river shoreline stabilization
Fish habitat
River delta sedimentation management

Next year, you could get a rooted (ball and burlapped or containerized) tree and then plant it in your yard after Christmas.
Before planting, make sure to remove the burlap and twine from the rootball. Nurseries often chemically treat the burlap to discourage root growth.
It’s also a good idea to pre-dig the hole in the late fall while the soil is still soft.
Important: Never burn your Christmas tree in a fireplace or woodstove. Pines and firs are softwood and burn very quickly, but the heat is lost almost immediately. Burning the tree also may contribute to creosote buildup.

Comment by Chief Walks on December 15, 2019 at 12:54pm

Unheated Greenhouse Growing: How To Use An Unheated Greenhouse
In an unheated greenhouse, growing anything during the cold months of winter may seem impossible. Alas, it is not! Knowing how to use an unheated greenhouse and what plants are better suited is the key to success. Read on to learn more.

Using an Unheated Greenhouse in Winter
An unheated greenhouse in winter will not only allow you to grow hardy veggies, but you can start tender annuals, propagate perennials, and overwinter cold-sensitive plants. Of course, it helps to know how to use an unheated greenhouse effectively and what plants will be most suited to this cooler environment.

During the day, a typical greenhouse will trap heat from the sun, which allows the plants inside to stay warm at night. That said, when winter nights get cold, frost damage in the greenhouse can occur without added protection.

What types of protection are there instead of greenhouse heaters? This can be as simple as the addition of one or two layers of horticultural fleece over your plants (Remember to remove coverings during the day so they do not overheat.), and place some bubble wrap around your pots to help insulate plant roots and prevent clay pots from cracking. Horticultural bubble wrap can also be used by layering the inside of your greenhouse. The much-needed sunlight will still come through but the extra layer of protection will keep your plants safe at night.

Keep an eye on the thermometer, especially when heading towards spring. In many regions, temperatures can be in the 30’s one day and in the 60’s the next (in a buttoned-up greenhouse it can be much higher). Plants don’t often recover from sudden overheat like that, so be sure to open the greenhouse if temperatures threaten to soar.

What to Grow in Unheated Greenhouses
When you have a temperature-controlled greenhouse, the sky’s the limit as to what can be grown through the winter months. However, if your greenhouse is a simple affair, lacking any heat, don’t despair. An unheated greenhouse can be used to grow greens during winter, start warm-season annuals, propagate landscape perennials, and shelter frost tender plants through the winter chill. Besides greens like spinach and lettuce, you can grow cold-tolerant veggies such as cabbage and broccoli in your unheated greenhouse. Celery, peas, and the ever-popular Brussel sprouts are also excellent cool weather veggie choices for unheated greenhouse growing.

Other winter greenhouse plants that thrive during winter months are root vegetables. Winter temperatures stimulate sugar production in some root veggies, so you end up with the sweetest carrots, beets, and turnips imaginable. Don’t stop there with your winter greenhouse gardening though.

Perennial herbs are another option, oregano, fennel, chives, and parsley do well. Cool-hardy flowers, like calendula, chrysanthemum, and pansy, not only thrive in a cold house but will bloom through the winter. Many annuals and perennials that may not be hardy in your climate outdoors will flourish in the greenhouse, even those that are seeded in fall will grow and produce a bounty of blooms in late winter to early spring.

Comment by Chief Walks on December 1, 2019 at 2:09pm

Disease-Resistant Plants – What Are Certified Disease-Free Plants

“Certified disease-free plants.” We’ve heard the expression many times, but exactly what are certified disease-free plants, and what does it mean for the home gardener or backyard orchardist?

If you’re wondering how to keep plants disease-free, starting out with disease-resistant plants is even more important than you may realize. Read on to learn more about buying disease-free plants.

What Does Certified Disease Free Mean?
Most countries have certification programs in place, and regulations vary. In general, to earn the label of certified disease-free, plants must be propagated following a strict set of procedures and inspections that minimize the risk of infection and spread of disease.

To be certified, plants must meet or exceed a certain level of quality and safety. Generally, inspections are completed at independent, certified labs.

Disease resistant doesn’t mean that plants are protected from every possible disease that could befall them, or that the plants are guaranteed to be 100 percent free of disease pathogens. However, disease-resistant plants are generally resistant to one or two diseases that most commonly afflict a particular type of plant.

Disease resistant also doesn’t mean you don’t need to practice proper crop rotation, sanitation, spacing, irrigation, fertilization and other methods to promote the healthiest plants possible.

Importance of Buying Disease-Resistant Plants
Once a plant disease is established, it may be difficult or impossible to eliminate, even with powerful, toxic chemicals. Purchasing disease-resistant plants can stop the disease before it starts, which saves time and money and increases the size and quality of your harvest.

Buying disease-free plants will probably cost you a bit more, but the small investment may save you untold time, expense, and heartache in the long run.

Your local cooperative extension office can provide more information about disease-resistant plants and how to avoid plant diseases common to your particular area.

Comment by Chief Walks on November 17, 2019 at 7:54am

DIY Insect Hotel: How To Make A Bug Hotel For Your Garden

Building a bug hotel for the garden is a fun project to do with the kids or for adults who are kids at heart. Building homemade bug hotels provide a welcome refuge to beneficial insects, which we could not have fruits and vegetables without.

I retired several years ago into a retirement community from off the farm. Even in this urban setting I still have four hotels in my yard.

Why Build a DIY Insect Hotel?
All insects don’t fly south when winter approaches, some board down the hatches and go into diapause, a suspended state of development kind of like hibernation. Homemade hotels for insects fill a role that many people think doesn’t need to be filled. After all, don’t insects find shelter and a place to raise the next generation on their own anyway?

It turns out that many gardeners are too tidy. Many of us remove all waste from our landscapes, and in the process wind up removing insect homesteads. Bee homes have become all the rage, and while bees are champion pollinators, other insects are beneficial to the garden too. Of course, ladybugs serve a valuable service by eating aphids, but parasitic wasps, lacewings, hoverflies, and even spiders all do their part to keep predator insects at bay. They all deserve a safe insect hotel to hide out in.

Building your hotel is part of garden art and part winter habitat for these beneficial insects.

When building a bug hotel, you may choose to focus on one species of insect or create hotels for multiple species of insect guests. Creating your bug hotel can be as simple or elaborate as you want. Providing a variety of plant materials will encourage a variety of insect friends.

It’s important to know how different insects overwinter; for instance, solitary bees (those that don’t sting or build a colony) prefer to nest in hollow stems over the winter while ladybugs overwinter in groups amongst dry plant material. Hoverflies overwinter as pupae in leaf debris, straw, or pinecones and lacewings in rolled-up corrugated paper.

How to Make a Bug Hotel
DIY insect hotels can be made out of recycled material such as bricks, drain tiles, pallets, and even stacks of old logs. Imitate nature to the best of your ability by adding leaves, straw, mulch, pinecones, and sticks to create “rooms.” Place your homemade bug hotels in a shady area that receives morning sun with afternoon shade, facing south or east.

Solitary bees need a hotel with hollow holes. Their hotel can be made out of bamboo sticks or hollow stemming plants set in drainage tiles, cans, or hollow logs to keep them dry or drill holes in a block of wood. Drilled holes should be at least six inches (15 cm.) deep and smooth to protect their delicate wings.

Bumblebees die out during the winter with the exception of the new queen. A simple bug hotel you can make suitable for the new royal is an upturned flowerpot filled with straw or garden debris. Building something to entice the ladybugs is as simple as packing some twigs and dry plant material together. This will provide them with shelter and food during the long cold winter.

Parasitic wasps are extremely beneficial in the garden and help to control pests. As with solitary bees, a piece of wood with holes drilled into it makes an excellent parasitic wasp bug hotel for the garden.

Comment by Chief Walks on October 31, 2019 at 8:25am

If you have ever longed to grow your own fruit, growing grapes is an excellent place to start. Grapes have been cultivated for thousands of years by home gardeners around the world, and you can do it too. They’re easy to grow, and they don’t require you to be an expert gardener or own a vineyard to produce sweet juicy clusters. They are excellent for fresh eating, jams, juicing, and winemaking.

Advantages of Growing Grapes

Grapes offer unique advantages over other fruit because they start bearing fruit in just 2 to 3 years, they don’t require a lot of space, they taste so good, plus they add ornamental beauty to your landscape with their splendid fall color. Homegrown grapes have exquisite flavors, that will rival any grape found at your grocer. They are low maintenance, needing little attention, other than an annual pruning, which increases fruit yields and size. They are highly nutritious, packed with antioxidants, vitamins, and minerals supporting eye, cardiovascular and cognitive health. Also, if you sell produce at farmers’ markets, you can add some additional cash to your back pocket, grapes bring top dollar, besides when you prune your vines, consider saving the trimmings to sell at flea markets, they are very popular for making decorative crafts.

Growing Grapes

There are two basic types of grapes, seeded and seedless, you might ask why would I want to grow seeded grapes? Well, the answer is seeded grapes will outperform seedless, with greater resistance to adverse weather conditions of heat, drought, and cold, ensuring reliable yields when growing conditions are less than ideal. Fresh Eating grapes without seeds is, of course, an advantage, you may want to consider planting some of each to enjoy the benefits that each has to offer.

Table or Wine Grapes

Grapes are further broken down into categories of table grapes and wine grapes. Table grapes are best for eating fresh, and usually much sweeter than wine grapes, which are designated mainly for winemaking. However, you can grow a table grape for winemaking or a wine grape for fresh eating, depending on you your taste preference. Also, cultivars are classified in terms of when they are ready for harvest, early, mid and late season. For example, in the upper Midwest, early-season grapes like Brianna will ripen the first part of August, Concord mid-season 3-4 weeks later, and golden Muscat a late-season grape will ripen even later. Growing grapes that ripen at different parts of the season is a great way to strategically lengthen your harvest time and enjoy fresh eating for several months.

Start Growing Grapes

Growing grapes is a rewarding experience, it is hard to compare the delight of picking your homegrown sweet juicy clusters to anything else. It just gives you that garden wellbeing feeling, you know what I am talking about, it’s growing it yourself, sustainability, less dependence on society, great tasting quality food, it’s that little piece of heaven that comes with living on a homestead!

Comment by PITA SIKSIKA WARRIOR on October 24, 2019 at 3:58am

thank you

Comment by Chief Walks on October 23, 2019 at 6:43am

My backyard grown sugar pie pumpkins are finally ripening and a few of the pumpkins ended up being somewhat small and weren't worth the effort to process into pumpkin puree. So, what to do with these little guys? I wanted to do something new and, not having grilled pumpkins before, I was quite excited to give it a try.

During grilling, the sugars in the pumpkin caramelize. The combination of sweet and salty, coupled with crisp rosemary, will give you a different way of thinking about pumpkin. After trying this, you just might find yourself dreaming of expanding your pumpkin patch next year.

Make sure you use sugar pie pumpkins or the equivalent for this recipe, you really don't want to eat a jack-o-lantern type pumpkin as they are stringy. If you aren't growing your sugar pie pumpkins you should be seeing them available in stores and farmers markets this month or, better yet, make a fun trip out of it and head out to a U-pick pumpkin farm. Don't forget to pick up a few extra for making your pumpkin puree for pies and breads later in the year.

Ingredients:
Sugarpie pumpkins (preferably on the small side)
Olive oil
Fresh rosemary, chopped
Sea salt

1. Heat grill to medium-high.

2. Wash and cut the pumpkins vertically into 3/4 inch slices. Remove the seeds and stringy parts. Brush both sides of each slice liberally with olive oil. Sprinkle with sea salt and rosemary.

3. Place the slices on the grill for about 5 minutes a side or until dark grill marks appear. Turn and grill the other side until you can easily pierce the pumpkin slice with a fork. You want to make sure that the pumpkin is tender.

4. Since some of the salt tends to fall off during the grilling process, serve with a small dish of additional sea salt.

Comment by Chief Walks on October 20, 2019 at 9:52am

Baby’s Breath Varieties: Learn About Different Types Of Gypsophila Plants

Clouds of billowy baby’s breath flowers (Gypsophila paniculata) provide an airy look to floral arrangements. These profuse summer bloomers can be just as pretty in a border or rock garden. Many gardeners use cultivars of this plant as a backdrop, where the floods of delicate blooms show off brightly colored, lower growing plants.

So what other types of baby’s breath flowers are there? Read on to learn more.

About Gypsophila Plants
Baby’s breath is one of several types of Gypsophila, a genus of plants in the carnation family. Within the genus are several baby’s breath cultivars, all with long, straight stems and masses of dainty, long-lasting blooms.

Baby’s breath varieties are easy to plant by seed directly in the garden. Once established, baby’s breath flowers are easy to grow, fairly drought-tolerant, and require no special care.

Plant baby’s breath cultivars in well-drained soil and full sunlight. Regular deadheading isn’t absolutely required, but removing spent blooms will prolong the blooming period.

Popular Baby’s Breath Cultivars
Here are a few of the most popular varieties of baby’s breath:
Bristol Fairy: The Bristol Fairy grows 48 inches (1.2 m.) with white flowers. The tiny flowers are ¼ inch in diameter.
Perfekta: This white flowering plant grows up to 36 inches (1 m.). Perfekta blooms are slightly larger, measuring about ½ inch in diameter.
Festival Star: Festival Star grows 12 to 18 inches (30-46 cm.) and blooms are white. This hardy variety is suitable for growing in USDA zones 3 through 9.
Compacta Plena: Compacta Plena is bright white, growing 18 to 24 inches (46-61 cm.). Baby’s breath flowers may be edged in pale pink with this variety.
Pink Fairy: A dwarf cultivar that blooms later than many other varieties of this flower, Pink Fairy is pale pink and only grows 18 inches (46 cm.) high.
Viette’s Dwarf: Viette’s Dwarf has pink flowers and stands 12 to 15 inches (30-38 cm.) tall. This compact baby’s breath plant blooms throughout spring and summer.

Comment by Chief Walks on September 29, 2019 at 11:58am

Why Are Barns Painted Red?
Ever wonder why are barns painted red in color? Red is (or, perhaps, was) a popular color for older barns due not to its color shade but for its usefulness.
Many years ago, choices for paints, sealers, and other building materials did not exist. Farmers had to be resourceful in finding or making a paint that would protect and seal the wood on their barns.
Hundreds of years ago, many farmers would seal their barns with linseed oil, which is an orange-colored oil derived from the seeds of the flax plant. To this oil, they would add a variety of things, most often milk and lime, but also ferrous oxide, or rust. Rust was plentiful on farms and because it killed fungi and mosses that might grow on barns, and it was very effective as a sealant. It turned the mixture red in color.
When paint became more available, many people chose red paint for their barns in honor of tradition.

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