Gardening tagged posts

Thanks to the University of Maryland/Maryland Grows for this informative article about disease-resistant vegetables.

I mentioned in my post last month that many of the pepper plants I grew from seed this year were infected by bacterial leaf spot. I did my best to remove diseased material from the garden. However, undoubtedly some of it still lingers in the soil and might survive to infect plants next year, so I will plan to grow varieties that are resistant to this disease.

And no, I don’t just have a list of these varieties in my head. I’ll have to do some research. Maybe you’ve faced this problem too...

Thanks to the University of Maryland/Maryland Grows this informative article on tiny tomatoes.

Just a quick post this month to shout out the virtues of the first tomato plant to produce ripe fruit for me this year: ‘Veranda Red’ patio tomato.

This little cutie is only 18 inches high. In fact, it would be shorter if it was growing in full sun instead of the partial sun on my deck. I have other plants with green fruit ready to turn red that are less than a foot high. The container team at the Derwood Demo Garden has a plant only about six inches high that has ripe fruit.

Patio tomatoes as a group mature at less than two feet. They grow well in smaller containers like window boxes or gallon pots...

Thanks to the University of Maryland/Maryland Grows this informative article on how to prevent vegetable diseases.

Vegetable Diseases

When it comes to vegetable diseases, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Many diseases can be stopped before they start with smart garden practices.

Spring rains cause spots, dots, and fuzzy blots to pop up in everyone’s vegetable patch. That’s fungi having fun. But whether our weather is wet or dry, fungi, bacteria and viruses stand ready to harm plants. 

So, how do you keep them at bay? Be informed and watchful. Look at your plants often to spot small problems before they get big and use the following tips to prevent disease problems.

If you have repeat offenders – diseases that show up year after year – look for di...

How I get a jump start on my summer flower garden

Thanks to the University of Maryland/Maryland Grows this informative article about winter sowing.

Winter sowing is a technique gardeners can use to start growing seeds outdoors during the winter months. If you have limited space for starting seeds indoors,winter sowing might be an option for you, depending on what you want to grow.

I first tried winter sowing last year with several types of flower seeds. Winter sowing works best for plants that are cold tolerant or even require a period of cold in order to germinate...

Thanks to the University of Maryland/Maryland Grows this informative article about adapting to climate change. All images are from University of Maryland/Maryland Grows.

How are Maryland gardeners adapting their gardens and green spaces to climate change? We posed this question to our colleagues in the University of Maryland College of Agriculture and Natural Resources and several of them shared examples of everything from composting and food gardening to planting trees and native plants, installing rain gardens, and more.

Action on climate change is needed on a large scale, and our individual actions at home and in our communities all add up too...

Thanks to the University of Maryland/Maryland Grows this informative article on what to do when your seedlings grow too big

I started my peppers too early.

Every year I warn fellow gardeners not to rush on getting seeds into pots for warm-weather vegetables. Tomatoes, in particular, outgrow their indoor space under lights much faster than you’d think. However, you can make this mistake with many plants that shouldn’t go outdoors until the chance of frost is past and the soil temperature is at least 60 degrees F. There’s often a several-week gap between the average-last-frost day that you used to count back from when calculating start dates and the actual day that it’s safe to put the plants in the garden. That can go either way, of course...

Thanks to University of Maryland College of Agricultural and Natural Resources for sharing this informative article about gardening.

Outdoor Yard and Gardening Tips

• Cut iris flower stalks down to the crown when they are finished blooming. Leave the foliage alone. If your iris are over-crowded after flowering lift and divide them. Check rhizomes for iris borer. 
  
  
• Practice IPM(Integrated Pest Management)in your landscape. Do not spray your trees and shrubs preventively. This kills the predators and parasitoids that are helping to keep destructive pests under control.
  
  
• Water newly planted trees and shrubs until they become established (for about 2 years), especially in the summer and fall...