After an early warm up today I’m watching snow accumulate on our patio furniture and on the garden where lots of spring flowers are blooming. The early bloomers will survive, for the most part, but my real worries are about what this capricious weather will do to the fruit crops that are grown in this area. Last week, when temperatures began to plummet, I started to hear stories about apricots in full bloom and buds that were swelling on other fruit trees. This could be disastrous for area farmers who literally have a year’s income hanging on the trees. This is a major change in just two days ..read more

It’s the first day of spring and the weather here in Northern Michigan is unusually sunny and mild. March is definitely a capricious month for weather here but I’m hopeful that the “in like a lion, out like a lamb” holds true this month. Today is in the 50s so the dog and I’ll be going out soon to explore. (Typical March temperatures in our part of Michigan run between 22 and 40 degrees) Yesterday’s trek found a snowdrop in the yard — not pushing its way through the snow like most years but right in the middle of the grass. So it’s time to check out the woods and see if any of the native sprin ..read more

I’ve written before about not being a food gardener. Tomatoes and herbs in pots on the deck suit both my interest and my unwillingness to do battle with bunnies, squirrels, fox, coyotes and deer that would find a food garden just too attractive. But because we love fresh vegetables and because we love the idea of Community Supported Agriculture, for the past two years we’ve purchased a CSA share from Homestead Hill CSA. I knew this would be a great CSA to invest in because Pam, one of the owners, was the Master Gardener Coordinator when I took the class in 2007. She taught our vegetable garden ..read more

Last time I wrote a blog post I was headed to the garden for some quarantine activity. Unfortunately I overdid it and put my back out (this didn’t happen even 10 years ago). I looked for some guidance online and mixed hot soaks in the tub with careful stretching and some ibuprofen. And I obeyed the guideline that suggested giving my back two weeks to heal (it could have taken up to eight). Fortunately I’m back in the garden now and have cleaned out a lot of weeds that accumulated during my enforced “time off.” But I’m being very careful of my back and part of that is aided by using my garden k ..read more

I’m lucky to live in a county where there have only been 12 diagnosed cases of Covid-19. As our state opens up and our area opens up for tourism, I worry that we’ll see more cases diagnosed in our area. So I’ve decided that the safest spot I can be is in the garden. Last week I was talking to a friend I met professionally many years ago, catching up on her latest projects and activities and updating her on what we’re doing these days. In the conversation I shared with her that I had concluded that growing up as an only child on a farm where our nearest neighbor was one quarter mile away was pe ..read more

I just finished a great webinar with Dr. Doug Tallamy and want to give a shout out to the WWF-Canada for hosting it as well as to Dr. Tallamy for sharing his expertise. There is so much in Tallamy’s webinar that I can’t wait to review it when it gets posted on YouTube to refresh all the good information that’s currently swirling in my head. But for immediate gratification after today’s session, I went online, using a website he mentioned, to plan the replanting of one of our “front of the house” beds. Tallamy talked about how there are “keystone” plants that feed multiple insects, butterflies ..read more

Whether you’re volunteering in a community garden and collapse OR you collapse while working in your own garden, could first responders find the information they need to treat you safely? I posed that question to a high school friend who is a first responder and he told me that one of the first questions they ask a patient is if they are allergic to any type of medications. Of course, if the patient is unconscious, the responders need to look elsewhere for that information. If they’re responding in your home they will probably look first on the refrigerator. But what if you’re outside or worki ..read more

… Hands down it would be basil. I love it’s fragrance. I love it’s flavor. I love the varieties of basil you can grow. As a kid growing up in the country I didn’t have much of an introduction to cooking with herbs unless my mother was feeling experimental (not often.) And even when she was, there were no fresh herbs to be found unless there was a bit of parsley in the fridge. Basil? We never even had spaghetti unless it came out of a can so the idea of pasta with pesto was unheard of. It was the 1980’s before I really discovered basil and all that you could do with it. The credit for that goes ..read more

One of my favorite sixties songs was The Outsiders Time Won’t Let Me. I always thought that playing on the word Time with Thyme would be a fun title for an herb shop, but that’s about as far as I got with the idea. Today the concept of time plays more into my garden design than I would like to admit. There’s too much to do and only so many hours in the day so the formal herb gardens I might aspire to are just going to remain an aspiration. Plus, I just can’t do eight hour days in the garden anymore - my back won’t tolerate it. Also, I live on what’s left of the family farm, which is more suite ..read more

As the interest in growing food continues to skyrocket I’ve been pulling out some of my favorite herb gardening books. Although my food gardening is generally sporadic, herbs are something I grow each year. One of my favorite books to use when planning an herb garden or looking for a new herb to try is The American Garden Guides: Herb Gardening. Many herbs are not native plants. Does that mean you shouldn’t plant them for their culinary, medicinal or fragrance qualities? No. What it does mean is that you should be aware of both a plant’s positive and negative qualities. Also, know that some he ..read more