Fruit & Vegetable Gardening

I love Greek salads, but I’ve ruined a few by tossing in cucumbers with tough skins and big, chewy seeds. Fortunately, making a tender Greek salad instead — with fresh, homegrown cucumbers — is simple. Now, I just include a few English long cucumbers in my garden each year. I love Greek salads, but I’ve … Read more

“Elephant ears” is the common name for a group of tropical perennial plants grown for their large, heart-shaped leaves. Most of these herbaceous species in the arum or aroid family (Araceae) that are offered as ornamentals belong to the genera Colocasia, Alocasia, and Xanthosoma, although there are others that have similar appearance and growth habits. … Read more

Basil flowers are delightful in salads and for tea, but plucking them also benefits the growth and aroma of the green leaves that are so tasty in cooking. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works. When a basil flowers, most gardeners quickly remove the … Read more

I recently helped out on a project for a local folklorist looking for information on broom lore, and wound up with easily twenty pages of notes on the topic from a wide variety of sources. I thought that today I would share a few of the commonly held beliefs regarding brooms, as well as look … Read more

The Perfect Planting Time for Pomegranate Trees Pomegranates are a delicious and nutritious fruit that can be grown in many backyards. However, in order to get a good harvest from your pomegranate tree, it’s important to plant it at the right time of year. Choosing the optimal planting time can make all the difference in … Read more

Once you start rooting your fig cuttings, you may begin to wonder if there are any other fruit trees that grow well from cuttings, like figs do. Well, if that’s you I’m glad to tell you that you’re in the right place because I’ve rooted, and attempted to root, several other different kinds of fruit … Read more

Growing tomatoes in pots levels the home garden playing field, bringing a crop of homegrown ‘maters within reach for almost anyone, regardless of real estate. Growing tomatoes in pots levels the home garden playing field, bringing a crop of homegrown ‘maters within reach for almost anyone, regardless of real estate. Thats because you can grow … Read more

We’re often told that once a brassica bolts, that signals the end of its life. Time to pull it up and toss it in the compost bin (or, if you’re like me and subscribe to the lazy gardening philosophy, you just cut it down and use the old foliage as mulch). But to me, those … Read more

For most folks, gardening is a seasonal activity. We get our seed catalogs in the mail in December, and we spend the winter planning for our spring and summer gardens. But there’s an additional six months that you can utilize to feed yourself and your family, and you don’t have to be a Master Gardener … Read more

If you’re thinking about adding blackberries to your garden this year, I would love to go on record saying that you will not regret the decision to grow these tasty fruits. As a family who eats some type of berries daily with our breakfast, blackberries have become one of my favorite fruits to grow. With … Read more