March 29, 2007

Raised Bed Gardening: Willow Branches

Say cool. I've never seen anything like this before: raised planting beds made out of willow branches. And the prices are not as expensive as using cedar. Be sure to use good soil!

The mastergardenproducts.com site is interesting. They have bamboo too. Readers' caveat: the site loads very slowly.
Willow Raised Beds

Permalink | Comments (0) | Posted to Garden Design | Organic Gardening | Propagation

June 22, 2006

Sink Top Compost Crock

Gardens love compost. We've covered some great outdoor composters like the multi-purpose wine barrel a few days ago, but this is a nice one for your kitchen sink. Love that beautiful blue, like the sky on a summer day when you're out digging the compost into your favorite bed of flowers. At the very least you'll feel so righteous!
Pretty Crock Composter

Permalink | Comments (0) | Posted to Indoor Gardening | Organic Gardening

June 17, 2006

Composting Flower Wine Barrel

Nice! A container garden grown in a converted wine barrel (Bordeaux, solid oak) that functions as a first class composter. This is from a company called SunFrost (interesting name) that specializes in energy efficient refrigerators and freezers. They also carry several heliodons, in case you've been looking for a source. (If we don't know what a heliodon is, then undoubtedly we don't need one, do we?) Their product is aptly called a "Scrap Eater," and the website has a nice overview of composting with kitchen scraps and a great diagram of the way this one works. No price on the website, but you can call them or wait for me to do it and tell you what I've found. :-)
The Scrap Eating Composter

Permalink | Comments (0) | Posted to Container Gardening | Organic Gardening | Tips and Techniques

June 17, 2006

Backyard Chickens

Gardeners are such smart people! Did you know that more and more urban gardeners are raising chickens in their backyards, not as pets necessarily, but as garden helpers? No kidding. Many communities across the land allow city folk to keep a few chickens, and people are using them for insect control (they eat bugs and dig up worms) and to fertilize lawns and gardens. Take Seattle. You can have one bird for every 1000 square feet, which means three chickens on the typical 50X100 foot city lot. The worries about sanitation, avian flu and undesirable odors disappear when you have such a small number of fowl together. And guess what, you get eggs too!
I could write pages about all the fun things people are doing, but one of my favorites is the "chicken tractor," a bottomless pen that encloses and protects the chickens and can be moved from area to area so the chickens can do their work and leave their droppings behind–chicken manure, the easy way. We can do this, friends. There are whole websites devoted to this hobby like backyardchickens.com and thecitychicken.com (see links below). The City Chicken site has a gallery of chicken tractor photos. Handy gardeners can build their own hen houses and tractors.
I first read about this in the May/June issue of "Natural Home and Garden," unfortunately not on the web, which tells about the city of Diest in Flanders, Belgium, that gave three chickens each to 2,000 homeowners, not for eggs, not for manure, not for pets, but for...garbage collection! According to the article, chickens are omnivores and can consume something like nine pounds of garbage in a month, so Diest is trying chickens to solve the expensive problem of what to do with biodegradable trash. If they eat leftovers, that tells me that feeding them isn't going to cost any money.
Chickens can make really good pets if you pick the right variety and, no, you don't have to have a rooster, unless you and all your neighbors thrill to the sound of crowing at 4:30 am every day. To have fertile eggs you need the male, but hens lay unfertile eggs all by themselves. If you have small children, you could start by hatching some chicks in the kitchen, and they could have the fun of seeing them grow up. Then you'll have some to share as you spread the word about backyard chickens.
The City Chicken
Chicken Info
Chickens in Seattle
A Chicken Tractor

Permalink | Comments (0) | Posted to How-to Instruction | Organic Gardening

December 12, 2005

The Sprout Garden

The latest news says that grocery store-bought sprouts are prone to salmonella. Can it be true? Even organic? My resident sprout aficionado was crestfallen, so I searched the web for a sprouting kit. You can use a large mason jar with cheesecloth if you're desperate, but I thought it would make a nice CHRISTMAS gift if I found something a little more substantial. There is one called the Biosta for $29.95 that looks nice in the photos, but it doesn't come with anything, so I opted for this version from Handy Pantry, which has lots of stuff. This basic sprouting kit includes the sprouter itself (3 trays and 4 drainboard/covers), jar lid, booklet called "Sprouting for Health" plus 20 oz. of various organic seeds to sprout, all for $42.95. Since an additional five ounces of organic broccoli sprout seeds is $9.95, the Sprout Garden looks like a good buy. Plus I like the name. (Check back in January for a first-hand report on how it worked.) This vendor also has jars and a sprouting sack as well as a large supply of organic seeds.

The Sprout Garden
The Biosta Sprouter

Permalink | Comments (0) | Posted to Organic Gardening | Seeds

November 29, 2005

Phototron 9

Here's a 21" x 51" indoor greenhouse, with lighting panels to mimic the sun so you can actually propagate outdoor plants in your home or office. Picture real live roses growing in the living room. The Phototron 9, shown here, comes with bulbs, soil medium, plant nutrient, germination bulb, reflective hood shield, and "complete instructions" for $555.95 (why not just say $556, for heavens sake?). It is made by a company called Pyraponic Industries–"still the original, still the best"–so their motto goes. This product might be a nice gift for a gardener who can no longer spend time outdoors and misses seeing favorite plants close up.
Phototrons from Pyraponic Industries

Permalink | Comments (0) | Posted to Indoor Gardening | Organic Gardening

November 11, 2005

Natural Home & Garden Magazine

This home and garden magazine specializes in everything "natural," a word used ever more loosely as the macro culture zeros in on the benefits of clean living. As for contents, think Martha Stewart's environmentalist little sister. At $19.95 this might be a sweet gift for your organic gardener friend or someone who wants to sound like one. The November/December issue is all about bedrooms–natural fiber mattresses, green designers balancing between Zen simplicity and luxury, and ten ways to make your bedroom an environmentally friendly sanctuary. There's a clever how-to on making an ice/greens/candle centerpiece, and they also have a nice little article about recycled package wrappings that I enjoyed, although the idea of having a gift wrapping party sounds pretty bizarre to me. These people must have too much time on their hands. Nice mag, though.

Natural Home&Garden

Permalink | Comments (0) | Posted to Books, Videos, DVDs | Gift Ideas | Magazine Articles | Organic Gardening

November 09, 2005

Starting Seeds DVD

If the book highlighted in the previous post seemed too esoteric, here's another way to help a gardener friend learn about the subject. It's a little more expensive at $19.99 but looks like it would be easier to understand in a short time. How about adding a gift certificate to one of the seed vendors like Burpee, Park

Seeds, Heirloom Seeds, Johnny's Seeds, or for something different, Seeds of Change (all organic)? You could do it all for under $50.

Starting Seeds DVD
Johnny's Seeds
Seeds of Change

Permalink | Comments (0) | Posted to Books, Videos, DVDs | How-to Instruction | Organic Gardening | Seeds