Green Beans are in Season
With all the scares going around about fresh produce and its’ sources, it is more important than ever to know where your food comes from and how to safely preserve it for your family. We have plenty of green beans in our garden, but if you don’t, the local farmer’s markets and farmstands are sure […]
It’s Zucchini Season
We have such a short growing season in central New York; we really need to make the best of it and put away as many things as we can for the long winter ahead. It is so nice to have food you have grown and preserved –it gives such a feeling of accomplishment. Our zucchini […]
It’s Scape Time
If you are growing hardneck garlic in your garden, the scapes will be ready soon. Scapes are the edible flower stalk of the garlic plant, with a texture similar to green beans or asparagus. It is important to cut the scapes after they curl, as that will send the energy back to the bulb and […]
Considering Planting Native Plants?
The month is nearly over, but it got me thinking about why native plants are important and the language we use to talk about them. What do we mean when we say a plant is ‘native’? We mean that a plant evolved in a particular geographic area, with its climate, and with other living things […]
Is Your Stored Garlic Starting to Sprout?
It happens every year. We grow too much garlic. (Then again – can you really have too much?) This is the time of year when it begins to sprout in storage. Our solution: homemade garlic powder. It is strong, additive free, and almost tastes like fresh garlic. The only things you need are a food […]
Where Stories and Seeds Take Root
Among the shelves of stories in our local libraries, there is now space for even more knowledge to grow. To begin, a seed library is a place where you can borrow seeds for free, just like you borrow books. You grow the plants, and if you can, save some seeds and return them so others […]
Spring Gardening: Choosing Your Seeds – The Key to Gardening Success
Sorting through a pile of beautiful, full-color seed catalogs it is difficult to make final choices about what to grow in our gardens. The illustrations are all beautiful showing the ripe veggies grown under ideal conditions, and the catalog makes it seem like a great result is a foregone conclusion. However, picking the right plant […]
Spring Gardening: Seed Catalogs and Planning Your Garden
Looking outside at the blowing snow and icy conditions, it is hard to imagine that spring will ever come. Yet spring is just six weeks away, which means it’s time to begin preparing for the garden season. One of the first—and most enjoyable—tasks is paging through seed catalogs and selecting crops for the coming year. […]
Spring Gardening: Mid-Winter Blues, Counting Seeds Edition
It has been an intense winter here in upstate New York—the first truly hard winter we’ve seen in many years. So far, we’ve endured several good-sized snowstorms, long stretches of bitter cold, and the usual seemingly endless cloudy days. But there is hope. We’re now in the first week of February, the days are slowly […]
Planting for the Planet
Near the Little Falls Marina, a community project is finally in bloom. The Native Pollinator Garden was designed to support local ecosystems and beautify the area. Spearheaded by Master Gardener, Sharon Giammaria, in partnership with Rotary Club of Little Falls, the garden provides an essential habitat for bees, butterflies, birds, and other pollinators. A garden […]