River City Harvest

What the heck is this?

I discovered this plant today, growing up my back fence.  Anyone know what it is?

The berries growing on it are about the size of a grape tomato, and the skin feels a lot like a pepper.

The seeds look sort of peppery too.  Anyone know what this plant is?  Are the fruits poisonous?

Want To Make Your Own Rainbarrel?

Don't know how?  No problem.  Tricycle Gardens   will show you how:

Make Your Own Rainbarrel! October 4th

Participants will receive a 55 gallon #2 plastic food grade barrel with all the necessary components to make a usable rain collector. Tools and helpers will be on hand to assist in the assembling. We will discuss and explain set up and maintenance of your rain barrel as well as offering a few suggestions for the more adventurous DIYers for converting heavy duty plastic garbage cans into functional rain collectors. We will discuss how the use of rain barrels can be a component in reducing our negative impact on our local waterways and help foster a stronger connection with the health and well being of our diverse and complex ecology. SPACE IS LIMITED, reservations required.
LOCATION: Tricycle Gardens Headquarters, 211 West 7th St (old Manchester)
TIME: 10am-2pm
COST: $65/barrel
RSVP: allison@tricyclegardens.org

Inspiration

Lately I've been thinking about my front yard a lot.  It gets great light, it's pretty big and it's level.  I think front yards have a lot of potential for edible gardening but it's tricky.  You have to pay a lot more attention to aesthetics or your neighbors will hate you. :)  A few weeks ago, when I discovered Freedom Gardens' site, I stumbled across their page, Liberate Your Yard , and I've found myself staring out the window at my front yard ever since.  Sometimes it's hard to re-imagine a space that we've been so conditioned to expect to look a certain way.  Front yards: grass lawn, some bushes near the house, maybe an ornamental tree, maybe some shrubs.  That's a front yard.  So how does a front yard become both functional (edible) and beautiful?  Well, as luck would have it, Regan sent me this great link (she read my mind?) to Edible Estates.  If anyone is looking for inspiration for creating an edible front yard this is a great site.  It's chock full of pictures, which show the progression of the transformation from boring to edible fabulousness, and some sets even include the hand drawn plans for how they put it all together.  My two favorite front yards were this one from Baltimore ...

...and this one from Maplewood, NJ :

Maybe one day I'll have a picture of my own edible front yard to post here.  Have any of you guys tried tranforming your front yards?  If you've got pictures or suggestions send them.  I'll post them here and we can all benefit from your successful experiences (or learn from your failures).

Canning Basics, Part 5

This is the final in the Granny Miller Canning Basics video series.  Sorry I've been so slow getting this up.  These first two weeks of September have been really busy.

September Gardening Events

Wednesday, September 11 Tricycle Gardens has a couple of things going on:

Fall Gardening and Winter Garden Prep Workshop  6:30 - 9:00 pm

This workshop will discuss: vegetables that do well in cooler weather, when to plant them, plants that “winter-over”, cover crops, harvesting, preserving the harvest, and winter prep. Cost $15. Location: 211 West 7th Street, RSVP to allison@tricyclegardens.org, or call 231-7767

Fan Community Garden Meeting  7:00 pm - 9:00 pm

Humphrey Caulder Community Center

Virginia Green Industry Council is sponsoring the 3rd annual Virginia Garden Festival, September 20, 2008 from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m:

2008 VA Garden Festival, Festival admission and parking free, held ‘rain or shine’

Sponsor: the Virginia Green Industry Council (VGIC)

September 20, 2008 from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.

at the Virginia Science Museum, 2500 West Broad Street in Richmond, VA

For directions, call (804) 864-1400  or see http://www.smv.org/visit/directions.asp

Lewis Ginter Botanical Gardens Fall Plant Sale (with composting workshop), Friday September 19, 2008 to Saturday September 20, 2008, 10 a.m.-6 p.m., Sept. 20, 9 a.m.-3 p.m.

Avid gardeners know fall is a great time for planting.  The Fall Plant Sale features more than 30 vendors selling plants ranging from well-known favorites to rare exotics.  In addition, Garden volunteers propagate and sell plants rom the Garden.

For the Fall Plant Sale, volunteers have focused on plants offering beautiful displays of fall color and specialty trees not available locally. Demonstrations of different methods of composting, including vermi (worm) and leaf composting, will be offered by master gardeners.

Admission to the Plant Sale is free; regular Garden admission is required to visit the Garden.  The Plant Sale is presented by the Garden volunteers.

(I'll  update this post if I hear about any other interesting stuff going on this month.  Feel free to add events to the comments if I've missed anything good.)

My Trip To Composterpalooza

I finally made it out to Willow Lawn today to pick up my shiny, new Earth Machine at the city's planned discount composter sale. 

It was close to 2:00 pm by the time I managed to get out there and, given the weather conditions today,  I was definitely surprised at how friendly and cheerful everyone appeared. I'm assuming at least some of the workers had been out there since the event began at 9:00am.  The whole thing looked like it was running pretty smoothly.  I had to fill out a reciept with my name and address and indicate which items I was paying for, give the nice ladies the money and show my reciept to the guys unloading the truck, who then gave me my new toys.   Also available were compost turners for $15 and small, lidded bins for keeping kitchen scraps in for $7.  I've already got a plastic bucket but I was glad to get that turner.  The bin is all plastic and, as you can see, it comes apart and stacks inside of itself.  It was very light and easy to shove into my fairly small car.  I didn't need any help to get it loaded.

Despite the nasty conditions there was a steady flow of people driving or walking up to get in line for the Earth Machine deal.  The woman who helped me said they had a great turnout today.  That's good news.  A good response today will hopefully encourage the city to try more events like this (rain barrel, maybe?) in the future.   

Did any of you guys make it out to Willow Lawn today?  The weather was so lousy, it had to have kept some folks away.  I'll be waiting for tomorrow and some dryer weather before I put this thing together and give it a try.

What to Doo with Doggie Doo

Okay...I know you're thinking I've gone mad, but I really am trying to think rationally here... I know I'm not the only one who has a dog that also has a garden in this city.....

I love to go outside in the morning with my cup of coffee and be greeted by new overnight growth on all my plants (it's a very proud moment, you see). Well, my beautiful Border Collie/Australian Shepherd Mix has recently taken a liking to my herb garden. So, as I'm gazing among the the Basil and Sage I see a humungous pile of poo right on top of my chives....oh, wait...there's more...Parsley...and Lavender...what the...???

So, my question is..."is it bad or unhealthy for you and your vegetable garden?" The answer is "Yes". Pets tend to harbor parasites, namely Roundworm & Whipworm, that can transfer to humans. You must be cautious and wash veggies and hands carefully if your dog gives the garden "presents".

Apparently, Vancouver does not allow dog waste in their city garbage or sewage. So, what is a person, especially one that has a garden, to do? Here's one solution presented by CityFarmer (you know how I love that site):

It doesn't seem that difficult. You can buy Septonic to help break down the composting process. It is environmentally friendly and not harmful to humans. It's available here.

There are a few commercial doggie waste composters such as Doggie Dooley ($90) and the Tumbleweed Pet Poo Converter (which uses composting worms). But, it seems to me the homemade kind might be just as good, if not better. Now, the question is: can I did a hole deep enough to put the container in?

Just a Reminder: Pick Up Your Discounted 'Earth Machine' Tomorrow At Willow Lawn

Don't forget to go and snag one of these babies tomorrow!

The Richmond Clean City Commision will be holding a one day event to help Richmonders start composting.

On September 6, 2008 from 9am to 4pm go to the Compost Bin Truck Load Sale at the Willow Lawn Shopping Center located at 1601 Willow Lawn Dr. You’ll find them in the parking lot between Kroger’s and Gold’s Gym.

Get $100 value for just $35! The Earth Machine is an 80 gallon capacity composting bin that fits in any vehicle. Made of recycled materials, over 2,500,000 of these machines are in use across the country!

Granny Miller's Canning Tutorials, Parts 3 and 4

Here's some more of Granny Miller's food canning instructional videos:

Part Three

Part Four

A Roundup of September Gardening Tips

Well, summertime is nearly over.  As I look ahead to fall I figured I'd try to find some good suggestions for what to do in September to keep the garden going:

From the Virginia Cooperative Extension there's a long list of suggestions including:

• Tomatoes need an average daily temperature of 65 degrees F or more for ripening. If daytime temperatures are consistently below this, pick the fruits that have begun to change color and bring them inside to ripen.

• Cucumber beetles, squash bugs, Colorado potato beetles, and European corn borers pass the winter in debris left in the garden. Remove dead plant material, and compost it or plow it under. This will limit your pest population next year to the insects that migrate into the garden.

• Plant spinach, lettuce, kale, turnip, and radish in early September as the last crops for your fall garden. Soak seed furrows well before sowing seed, and mulch lightly. Water the rows daily to promote germination and growth of young seedlings.

Backyard Gardener has a September To-Do list for each hardiness zone. (we're zone 7, by the way):

• Set out transplants of cool-weather vegetables
• Prune cane fruits such as raspberries and blackberries
• Plant winter pansies and fall annuals (calendula, dianthus, ornamental cabbage and kale)
• Plant peonies
• Plant fall-blooming bulbs to brighten up fading window boxes, planters and in drifts among ornamental grasses
• Continue to harvest herbs and flowers for drying
• Divide peonies, bearded iris and other spring- and summer-blooming perennials
• Plant bareroot trees and shrubs
• Order sweet pea seedlings for fall planting
• Plant herbs and groundcovers as the weather cools