Tag Archives: Plants

How to Protect Your Fall Garden from Cold Weather & Strong Winds

by WFLDamaris Posted on September 20, 2017

Regardless of which hardiness zone you live in, fall weather can pack a punch. Whether it?s sudden wind storms or plunging temperatures, your garden needs to be prepared. Check out some of the following tips to get your garden in top shape for the cold season ahead.

Keep Your Soil Moist

If you?ve had a dry summer, it?s always beneficial to give your garden a thorough watering before cold weather sets in. Cooler fall temperatures reduce evaporation, which helps water absorb into the ground more easily than in the heat of summer.

Moist soil is ideal during cold snaps because it holds heat longer and insulates roots better than dry soil. Just be careful not to overwater; very wet soils can promote rot and disease.

Mulch Your Beds

Another excellent way to keep heat and moisture in your soil is to apply a good layer of mulch to any exposed areas in the fall. This will also help protect any tender surface roots.

One of the easiest methods of mulching is to leave plant debris on the ground. Any fallen leaves can be left on top of your soil, as well as the remains of any annual or perennial plants that have died back for the year.

Many other types of mulch also work well, check out these great mulch choices for your yard.

Cover Tender Plants

Plants that are borderline hardy in your climate zone often need to be wrapped or covered before freezing temperatures start.

You can use any fabric that breathes for wrapping, such as burlap, commercial frost blankets or your old blankets from home. Landscape Ontario has helpful step-by-step instructions on how to wrap a plant.

If you have smaller plants that don?t need a full wrapping, such as vegetables, you can use a fabric row cover instead. Row cover is a light material that?s sold at most garden centers. It can be placed directly over your tender plants and weighted down on the edges with rocks, bricks or staples. You can also install short hoops over your plants for the fabric to rest on. PVC or other thin, flexible materials are good for hoops.

Protect Container Plants

Plants grown in containers are less cold tolerant than plants in the ground. The limited amount of growing medium in a pot has far less temperature buffering capacity, so plunging temperatures can spell disaster for potted plants.

Bring potted plants indoors for the cold season when possible. Even moving them into your garage or other non-heated space may be enough protection, depending on the plant and your hardiness zone.

If you need to leave a container plant outside, at least move it to a protected location, such as up against your house or under dense trees. Wrap it well in fabric, and remember to wrap the pot as well. Containers can easily crack during cold weather when left to the elements.

Don?t Fall Prune

Do you have any plants that consistently have tip damage in the spring from cold damage over winter? You can avoid this by simply not pruning them in the fall. This year?s growth will take the brunt of the cold and protect the core of your cold-sensitive plants.

Tuck Your Veggies in for Winter

Many root vegetables like leeks, parsnips, carrots, beets and garlic overwinter well when they?re left in the ground and covered for the cold season.

You can cover them with straw, fabric row covers, dry fallen leaves or other dry material or fabric. Avoid covering with extra soil or anything that will absorb excess water and promote rot. It?s also beneficial to allow the soil to remain somewhat dry. This reduces the chances of excess water in the soil freezing and heaving, which can damage your crops.

Create Windbreaks

Windbreaks are typically tall, dense plantings of trees and/or shrubs. These block strong winds, which helps moderate temperature changes in your yard and prevents physical damage to outdoor plants.

Windbreaks can also lower heating costs for your home. It?s estimated that winds during the cold season can account for up to 30 percent of your heating bills. These winds can be significantly reduced with an effective windbreak.

Permaculture and Sanity has a great description of how to design and establish a windbreak.

Artificial structures, such as fences, sheds and walls, also make excellent windbreaks.

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are solely those of the author and may not reflect those of Care2, Inc., its employees or advertisers.

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How to Protect Your Fall Garden from Cold Weather & Strong Winds

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10 Hot Ideas for a Drought-Resistant Garden

by KerstinBowling Posted on August 9, 2017

Cutting back on water doesn?t mean the end of your garden. You can take many steps to reduce the water needs of your yard without sacrificing beauty or practicality. Try some of these suggestions to make your garden more resilient in the face of drought and summer heat.

1. Prepare your soil appropriately.

Organic matter helps your soil retain water as well as supplying nutrition for your plants. It?s best to mix compost, manure, shredded leaves, lawn clippings or other organic materials into your soil before you plant anything.

An exception to this rule is when you?re planting plants that are native to desert areas. Cacti, succulents, agaves and similar plants have adapted to living in dry soils, which are typically low in nutrients. You don?t need to add any extra organic matter for these plants, using regular topsoil is fine.

2. Install permeable surfaces.

Pathways and driveways made from materials like pebbles, bark chips or irregular stones will allow rainfall to pass through and absorb into your ground. Whereas, solid cement or pavement surfaces often direct extra rainwater onto the street instead of capturing it on your property.

3. Choose water-wise plants.

You don?t have to limit yourself when deciding what to plant in your garden. Many modern hybrids and varieties of plants are bred to be drought-resistant.

Using plants native to your area is another great option. These will already be well-adapted to your local climate and able to withstand water fluctuations.

The Okanagan Xeriscape Association has an excellent plant database of many different drought-resistant annual and perennial flowers, as well as shrubs and trees. You can also ask your local garden center for recommendations.

4. Reduce or remove your lawn.

Watering the lawn uses about 50 to 75 percent of a home?s water use during the summer. And this is usually treated, drinkable water. You could significantly reduce your water costs and conserve this precious resource by simply removing unneeded areas of lawn, or cutting it out altogether.

If you use your lawn as an area for recreation, consider putting in synthetic lawn or other material that doesn?t require water. There are also alternative groundcovers that can handle some foot traffic and need less water, such as thyme, clover, creeping Jenny, yarrow or chamomile.

5. Cover your ground.

Exposed soil will lose more water to evaporation than soil covered in some way. Groundcover plants, rocks, wood chips or other mulches add an attractive layer over your soil and keep in moisture.

6. Provide shade.

An extra layer of protection overtop your garden will block the sun and reduce evaporation from the ground. Structures, like arbors, raised decks, gazebos and pergolas, can all provide needed shade for plants and animals.

Planting drought-tolerant trees and shrubs is another great option. Ginkgo, red maple, hawthorn, honey locust and western redbud are all trees that can handle limited water. Hardy bushes include butterfly bush, lilac, rose of Sharon, holly, forsythia and sumac.

7. Water selectively.

When you?re planning or rearranging your garden, always try to group plants according to their watering needs. For example, vegetables or fruit trees need adequate water to develop their crops. You can easily group these together in one area of your garden, leaving the other areas to more water-wise plantings and pathways.

An automatic watering system can also be helpful. You can design the system to deliver water exactly where it?s needed and nowhere else. An automatic system can also prevent overwatering. These guidelines can help determine how much to water your plants.

8. Collect rain water.

Rain water can be collected in anything from a bucket to an underground cistern. Regardless of the amount, saved water can be put to use around your garden and will help reduce your water bills.

You can also design your garden to passively collect rainwater. Try placing plants at the bottoms of your eavestroughs or next to rocks and pavers to catch the runoff.

Related: 10 Uses for Rainwater

9. Weed your garden.

Weeds take precious water away from the plants you want to grow. Weeds are much easier to remove when they?re small, so short patrols of your yard to remove weed seedlings on a regular basis are actually more efficient than putting off weeding until it becomes a large project.

10. Build raised beds.

Certain types of raised beds are excellent for retaining water despite being more exposed to the elements.

Keyhole beds are typically circular, raised beds with a composting tube through the middle and a notch in the side. They look like keyholes when viewed from above. Keyhole beds were developed by a humanitarian aid organization in southern Africa, where they were proven to effectively grow food crops in their unforgiving climate.

H?gelkultur is a style of making raised beds filled with decomposing wood. The wood provides long-term organic matter and nutrients to the plants planted overtop. It also stores water. RichSoil has detailed instructions on how to build a h?gelkultur bed.

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are solely those of the author and may not reflect those of Care2, Inc., its employees or advertisers.

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10 Hot Ideas for a Drought-Resistant Garden

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How to Control All Types of Garden Pests Without Using Chemicals

by TrishaCrombie Posted on May 17, 2017

Each year, homes in the United States apply approximately 171 million pounds of pesticides on gardens and lawns. You can avoid many of these toxic chemicals by using natural pest control methods instead. Taking a preventative approach will also save you time and money in the long run.

For all pests, the best defense is vigorous, healthy plants. Make sure your plants have plenty of water, nutrients, sunshine and attention. You can also boost beneficial microorganisms in your soil by applying compost tea, which is shown to help reduce damage from insects and diseases.

These are some easy and effective ways to control common garden pests.

Bugs and Insects

Insect pests can seem to move into your garden overnight. Preventing them from getting started in the first place is especially important.

Get to know your bugs. If youre not sure who youre dealing with, catch a few bugs in a clear plastic bag and take them to your local garden center for identification. You can plan the best defense once you know your enemy.
Grow organically. Many broad-spectrum insecticides will kill beneficial insects as well as the bad ones. Keeping your yard chemical-free will encourage good populations of predatory bugs.
Install row covers. A row cover is a cloth thats hung over a garden bed like a tent. It protects the plants underneath from flying insects. This is particularly helpful for plants in the cabbage family to protect against pests like cabbage moths and loopers.
Use companion plants. Planting certain plants together has been shown to help deter pests. Check out some of the best companion planting pairs.
Choose appropriate plants. Select plants that will flourish in your local conditions. Plants in wrong locations will become stressed and attract pests. Also try planting varieties that are resistant to pests in your area.
Wash your plants. If you see unwanted visitors, washing them off with your hose or other water sprayer can be surprisingly effective.
Plant decoys. You can outsmart pests by growing plants theyll eat instead of your crops. For example, if you plant nasturtiums near your vegetables, aphids will often attack the nasturtiums and leave your other plants alone.

Slugs and Snails

These soft-bodied mollusks love fresh and succulent plant parts, especially leaves and young seedlings. You can do a lot to keep them out of your prized vegetables.

Remove them by hand. Wear an old pair of gloves while you do this, or use tongs or chopsticks. Theyll be covered in slime by the time youre done, so use something disposable. After youre done, you can manually squish your invaders, drown them in a bucket of salt water or throw them on the road.
Put out beer traps. For some reason, slugs and snails are attracted to the smell of beer. You can use this to your advantage. Slug Off has a great description of how to make your own slug beer trap.
Use a lure. A lure is any object that slugs and snails will crawl under to seek shelter from the days sun. You can then collect and dispose of them each day. You can use anything as a lure, such as cabbage leaves, an overturned pot, a plate or a plank of wood.
Get some ducks. You may not think of ducks as vicious predators, but they love eating slugs. Theyll keep your slug population in check.
Spread scratchy materials. Slugs and snails are deterred by rough materials like sandpaper, diatomaceous earth, crushed eggshells or wood ashes, because theyre hard to slither across. Spread these around plants you want to protect or around the edges of garden beds as a barrier.

Fungal Diseases

Keeping your plants clean and dry is the key for preventing fungal diseases like powdery mildew, leaf spot, rusts and blights. This will prevent their spores from spreading.

Water plants in the morning. Any excess water on your plants can evaporate during the day. Watering at the soil level is also helpful because it keeps water off the leaves altogether.
Give your plants space. Good air flow in between plants will prevent moisture buildup and potential fungal problems, especially for vegetables and other closely-planted annuals. Also weed regularly to keep areas open.
Rotate your vegetable crops. Dont plant the same veggies in the same place year after year. This invites soil-borne diseases. Check out the Old Farmers Almanac guide to easy crop rotation.
Remove infected plant debris. If youve had a fungal infection, make sure you remove the affected plants from your property. Dont leave them on the ground or compost them, which could spread fungal spores.
Harvest regularly. Fruit and vegetables left to spoil on the plants will encourage fungal invasion.
Clean your tools. Wash any tools youve used with infected plants or soil. Wash with soap and hot water and dry thoroughly before storing your tools.

Foraging Animals

Deer, rabbits and squirrels can be very cute visitors in your garden, but these and other furry critters can do a lot of damage to your plants. Your best defense is to make your property as uninviting as possible.

Get a cat or a dog. Even if your pet would rather snuggle with you than chase an invading rodent, often their presence is enough to scare away potential four-legged pests.
Keep your yard clean. Garbage, standing water, piles of yard trimmings and other debris can all provide food and homes for visitors.
Put up fencing. The height of your fence depends on the type of animal youre trying to keep out. A one- or two-foot high barrier is fine for rabbits, voles and most other rodents. Whereas, a deer fence often needs to be at least eight or ten feet high. Its also helpful to bury the bottom of your fence at least 6-inches to prevent critters tunneling underneath.
Sprinkle deterrents around your property. Some excellent options are human hair, hot pepper flakes, human or animal urine, kitty litter, blood meal or fabric softener.
Use pungent plants. Garlic, chives, onions, hot peppers, marigolds, sage and yarrow are well-known for their pest-repelling scents.
Startle your visitors. Many garden props can scare off animals, such as floodlights or noisemakers triggered by motion sensors, flags waving in the wind, radios playing, hidden fishing lines or water sprinklers.

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are solely those of the author and may not reflect those of Care2, Inc., its employees or advertisers.

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How to Control All Types of Garden Pests Without Using Chemicals

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20 Houseplants That Clear Toxins From Your Home

by Ilariaujg Posted on April 26, 2017

Bringing a bit of nature into your home does more than brighten the atmosphere. Introducing houseplants into various rooms in the house can help reduce the chance of getting seasonal sicknesses (such as the common cold), remove airborne contaminants (volatile organic compounds, or VOCs), reduce the chance of headaches, lift your mood, decrease your blood pressure, reduce allergies, improve sleep and much more.

The 20 plants listed below are specifically known for their air purifying properties. And while an open window may feel like all the fresh air you need, did you know that everything from toilet paper to common household cleaners can contain chemicals and release toxins like formaldehyde? Or that VOCs like benzene can be released into the air by everything from the paint on your walls, to the printed material found in your home?

So why not breathe a bit easier and enjoy the beauty of a new houseplant at the same time! A warning for pet owners: some common plants can cause toxicity in pets. Please check this list of common poisonous plantsbefore bringing home a house plant.

(All plants listed will clear CO2 and may clear more VOCs than noted.)

1.Golden pothos

Golden Pothos(Scindapsus aures): clears formaldehyde and other VOCs.

2. Ficus alii

Ficus Alii (Ficus maeleilandii alii): Good general air purifier.

3. Spider Plant

Spider Plant (Chlorophytum comosum): Clears benzene, formaldehyde, carbon monoxide and xylene.

4. Lady Palm

Lady Palm (Rhapis Excelsa): Good general air purifier.

5. Snake plant

Snake Plant (Sansevieria trifasciata Laurentii): Clears formaldehyde.

6. Aloe Vera

Aloe: Clears formaldehyde and benzene.

7. Moth Orchid

Orchid (Phalaenopsis): Clears formaldehyde.

8. Dwarf/Pygmy Date Palm

Pygmy Date Palm (Phoenix roebelenii): Clears formaldehyde and xylene.

9. Chinese evergreen

(Aglaonema Crispum ‘Deborah’): Clears air pollutants and toxins.

10. Chrysanthemum

Chrysanthemums(Chrysantheium morifolium): Clears benzene.

11. Gerber daisy

(Gerbera jamesonii): Clears trichloroethylene and benzene.

12. Red-edged dracaena

(Dracaena marginata): Clears xylene, trichloroethylene and formaldehyde.

13. Weeping fig

Weeping Fig (Ficus benjamina): Clears formaldehyde, benzene and trichloroethylene

14. English ivy

(Hedera helix): Clears airborne fecal-matter particles.

15. Azalea

(Rhododendron simsii): Clears formaldehyde.

16. Heart leaf philodendron

(Philodendron oxycardium): Clears formaldehyde and many other air pollutants.

17. Warneck dracaena

(Dracaena deremensis ‘Warneckii’): Clears pollutants such as those associated with varnishes and oils.

18. Boston Fern

Boston Fern (Nephrolepis exaltata Bostoniensis): Clears formaldehyde. | Image credit: melissa b. via Flickr

19. Bamboo palm

(Chamaedorea sefritzii): Clears benzene, trichloroethylene and formaldehyde.

20. Peace lily

(Spathiphyllum): Clears formaldehyde, benzene, trichloroethylene, toluene and xylene.

Sources:
Science Daily
Mother Nature News
Sustainable Baby Steps

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are solely those of the author and may not reflect those of Care2, Inc., its employees or advertisers.

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20 Houseplants That Clear Toxins From Your Home

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Grow Your Own Goji Berries

by LFYRainaovkmua Posted on August 24, 2016

Goji berries dont have to be a high-priced, exclusive superfood. Theyre actually easy to grow in your own garden.

Native to Asia, goji berries (Lycium barbarum) are also known as wolfberries. They are a member of the nightshade family, which includes tomatoes, peppers and potatoes. The majority of commercially produced goji berries are grown in China. These are most commonly available dried and can be considerably expensive.

By growing your own goji berries, you can have an abundant supply of fresh, local, organic berries that are almost impossible to find in a store. Gojis are a perennial shrub that will come back every year, which means youll have an ongoing supply of this healthy berry for free.

Whats So Great About Goji Berries?

Traditional Chinese medicine has used goji berries for thousands of years. Some suggest goji berries can help diabetes, hypertension, menopause and even malaria, but research is still needed to support these claims.

A 2008 study did show that consuming goji juice for 14 days increased feelings of wellbeing and improved neurological performance and gastrointestinal functions. Other studies have found that consuming goji berries may help prevent macular degeneration, promote longevityand boost your immune system.

In addition, goji berries are high in antioxidants and nutrients. A one-ounce (28 gram) serving of goji berries has 50 percent of your daily recommended vitamin A, 14 percent of your iron, 9 percent of your fiber, as well as high amounts of selenium, copper, riboflavin, protein and vitamin C.

Tips for Growing Goji Berries

Goji berries are hardy to USDA zone 5. They form a loose shrub thats 4 to 7 feet (1.2 to 2.1 meters) tall with long, vine-like branches. The small, purple flowers start in spring and will continue through the summer. This gives you a consistent crop of berries from early summer until frost.

1. Where to Get Plants

Garden centers are starting to carry goji berry plants as their popularity rises. You can also get young plants from mail order catalogues or online.

Its easy to start your own from seed as well. Try buying some packaged seeds or simply plant some of the dried berries you can buy for eating. Soak the berries for a couple hours before planting them in a potting soil mix. Keep the pots moist at room temperature and they should germinate in 2 to 4 weeks.

A small shrub will start producing berries within one or two years. A seedling will take about 3 years to make berries.

2. Soil and Location

Goji plants can handle a wide range of conditions. They prefer a moderately moist, well-drained soil, but they are also fairly drought tolerant.

The berries will produce and ripen the best in full sun.

You can also grow gojis in containers. Make sure to use a pot at least 18 inches (45 centimeters) wide to accommodate the full size of a goji shrub. It should be able to overwinter outside in USDA zones 6 and higher.

Mature Goji Berry Shrub

3. Support Structures

Goji berry shrubs have long, arching branches that hold up better with some structural support. A simple T frame works well, where you sink a post at both ends of a row of goji berry bushes, put one or more cross bars on each post to look like a T, then attach strong wires between the cross bars along the row. This will contain and support the branches.

You can also train gojis onto a trellis, fence or any other solid structure.

4. Pruning

Due to their vigorous growth habit, gojis can be pruned anytime to control their height and shape. Its also beneficial to thin out at least one third or more of the branches in late winter. This will allow more light into the shrub during the growing season, which helps to increase the number of berries and ripening speed.

Gojis will often send out suckers as they get older. Youll probably see small goji shoots growing a few feet away from the main plant. You can simply pull these out or transplant them to an area where you want more gojis.

Goji Berry Branches

5. Harvesting and Storage

The young berries take a few weeks to ripen, so wait until theyre a nice dark orange or red shade before picking. The best way to judge when to harvest the berries is by their sweetness. Fresh gojis always have a bit of tanginess to them, but they sweeten up as they ripen. If you feel theyre still too tart or sour, give them a few more days to ripen and then sample again.

You can dry goji berries for storage in a dehydrator or by laying them out on paper in a warm, well-ventilated area for a few days. Fresh goji berries also freeze well. They can be packed into freezer bags and frozen directly without any pre-treatment.

6. Uses for Goji Berries

Goji berries can be eaten fresh or cooked. Theyre nutritionally dense and have a strong flavor, so you dont need to use a lot in any particular dish. They go well in smoothies, trail mixes and desserts, or as a garnish for cereals, salads or yogurt.

Try putting them in an apple crisp, carrot cake or another baked treat. They can also make a tasty addition to casseroles and soups.

The only risk found for goji berries is that they can interact with some medications, so check with your doctor before adding them to your diet.

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are solely those of the author and may not reflect those of Care2, Inc., its employees or advertisers.

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Grow Your Own Goji Berries

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How Much Do You Actually Have to Water Your Plants?

by ArlenEusebio23 Posted on June 29, 2016

Efficient watering practices can save you a lot of time and money, as well as preserving our planets resources. A bit of planning and a good understanding of your soil will help your plants thrive on less water.

What kind of soil do you have?

The main components of soil are sand, clay and organic matter. A good balance will give you a crumbly, easy-to-dig soil that takes up water easily.

Dig a few small holes around your yard to see your soils structure. A soil with too much sand is grainy and drains very quickly. Sandy soils benefit from adding lots of organic matter to hold in the water.

Clay soils can feel like concrete when theyre dry and will absorb water very slowly. Once clay soil is wet, it can become dense and oversaturated with very little oxygen or space for plant roots. Adding gypsum (calcium sulphate), sand or organic matter will help break up clay soils.

For containers, its best to use commercial potting mixes based on peat moss or coconut fiber. Both of these are organic materials that hold water well and are still light enough for pots and hanging baskets. Soil straight from your garden is usually too heavy.

How to Judge When Your Plants Need Water

1. Container Plants

Lift up your containers or hanging baskets when possible to gauge their water content. If theyre too large to lift, use your finger or a soil probe to check how far down the pot has dried out. Its time to water when the container is dry about half way down.

Add water until it comes out the bottom of the pot. Check back in 5 to 10 minutes to see if the water absorbed. If the container still feels dry, keep adding water in small doses until the soil is saturated.

2. Outdoor Areas

The roots of perennial plants, shrubs and trees generally grow in the top 12 inches (30 centimeters) of soil. The roots of lawns and annual plants, including most vegetables, are typically in the top 6 inches (15 centimeters) of soil.

These are the depths youll need to water to for each type of plant. The actual amount of water you need to apply will vary depending on your soil structure.

When you water an area for the first time, use your finger or a shovel to check the soil every few minutes and see how far down the water has penetrated. Take note of how long it took to reach the needed depth.

Continue to monitor your soil and keep track of how long it takes to dry out again. Drought-tolerant plants will be able to handle drying out to the bottom of their root zone. Whereas, plants with higher water needs should only dry out to around half the depth of their root zone.

This will give you a basic idea of how long you should water each area of your garden and how often.

The last step is to make sure your watering system is as efficient as possible. Try the following tips to get started.

How to Reduce the Amount You Water

Water at cooler times of day. You can lose a lot of water to evaporation when its hot. Morning is often the best time to water because its the coolest time of day. You can also set your automatic irrigation system to run during the night.

Dont panic. Its normal for some of your plants to wilt in the mid-afternoon sun to conserve water. Wait until the sun goes down to check whether or not the wilt is permanent. If your plants dont perk up again by morning, its time to water.

Choose drought-tolerant plants when possible. Many varieties of ornamental annual and perennial plants do well with limited water. You can also get lawn seed mixes designed for dryer conditions.

Group plants by water needs. This can make watering much easier. For instance, you can group drought-tolerant plants together in a difficult-to-access corner of your yard, or plant your most water-demanding veggies at the front of your beds near a hose.

Have a flexible watering schedule. Take advantage of cooler weather periods to reduce how often you water. Also keep in mind that young seedlings or new plantings will have smaller root systems than when mature. These will need shallower, more frequent irrigation until they get established.

Water slowly. Too much water at one time will simply run out of a container or off the soil surface in garden beds. When watering by hand, go over a container or outdoor area a few times rather than trying to do it all at once. Or look for an automatic irrigation system that can deliver smaller amounts of water over longer periods of time.

Make use of technology. Many automatic irrigation systems can make watering more efficient, such as drip irrigation, soaker hoses or overhead sprinklers. Automatic timers are also very useful. You can get simple timers that are battery powered or more complicated systems that are wired into your house.

Track your water. A general recommendation is to apply 1 to 2 inches (2.5 to 5 centimeters) of water to your garden per week. This is easiest to track with automatic irrigation systems that deliver set amounts of water. You can also check hand watering by attaching a flow meter to the hose spigot. About 60 gallons (227 liters) will provide 1 inch (2.5 centimeters) of water over 100 square feet (9 square meters).

Keep your ground covered. A layer of mulch, ground cloth or rocks will help stop evaporation from the soil and keep it moist. Planting a living ground cover is another great option.

Focus on the roots. Water should be applied as close to the root zone as possible. Water left on the leaves is often lost through evaporation. It can also cause sun damage on a hot day or promote leaf diseases. Try to get underneath the plants when youre hand watering, or choose drip irrigation systems instead of overhead sprayers.

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are solely those of the author and may not reflect those of Care2, Inc., its employees or advertisers.

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How Much Do You Actually Have to Water Your Plants?

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How to Create a Wildflower Garden

by EJPStefanie Posted on May 2, 2016

Wildflowers can be an excellent low-cost and low-maintenance option for your garden. Like any garden, some set up is required at first. But with some basic planning and preparation, you can create a beautiful wildflower garden that will flourish for years to come.

Why go wild?

In order to highlight the value and benefits of wildflowers, the first week of May is designated as National Wildflower Week in the United States.

A wildflower garden is lower-maintenance than a traditional ornamental garden because you dont need to spend as much time keeping it tidy. It requires less mowing and fossil fuel input. You also dont need to apply any pesticides or synthetic fertilizers because wildflowers are typically pest-resistant and do well in a variety of soils.

In addition, wildflowers tend to be drought-tolerant and require less water than many of their cultivated cousins. Wildflower gardens can also provide valuable habitat for pollinaters and other beneficial insects and wildlife, as well as preventing soil erosion.

Preparation

1. Site

A few points are helpful to consider before planning your wildflower garden:

How large is your space? You could have mass plantings on a rural property, whereas a small patch of flowers is more apt for a city lot.
What direction is your garden facing? The amount of sun it gets throughout the day will affect how you use it and what to plant. Overall, a sunny location is best for wildflowers.
What is your purpose for the site? Determine if you want a purely wild space or if youd prefer walkways and seating areas where you and visitors can appreciate it.

Your wildflowers will have the best start possible if you remove all existing vegetation from the planting area. Otherwise, its easy for weeds to take over and choke out your wildflowers.

The easiest ways to do this is either physically with a shovel or sod remover, or by a process called solarization. To solarize the area, mow it as short as you can, water it well, then cover it with a layer of thick plastic sheeting. Leave it in place to bake for 6 to 8 weeks. It will be obvious when its done as any previous plant life underneath will be brown and dead. You can remove the plastic and clear away the debris.

2. Soil

Have a close look at your soil on the site. If the soil is low in organic matter, perennials are a good choice. These are plants that come back each year. Poorer soils will allow the perennials time to establish and get the upper hand over many aggressive weeds.

Annual plants are more appropriate if you have soil thats rich with nutrients. Annuals last for only one growing season and die over winter. They are usually fast-growing enough to compete on their own against weeds.

Either way, start by tilling the surface of the soil to a depth of 3 inches or less to break it up for easier planting. You can do this by hand with a shovel or use a mechanical tiller for larger areas. Its beneficial to work some bone meal or rock phosphate into the soil as you till to encourage root development in the seedlings.

You can also add lots of organic matter and compost to the soil, especially if youre planning to use annual flowers.

Poppies andLarkspur

3. Choosing Your Plants

Many wildflower seed mixes are available in stores. If you need larger amounts of seeds, you can order bulk seeds by weight through mail-order seed companies.

You can also check if your local garden center carries a mix of flowers native to your area. These will naturally grow better in your soil and climate.

If you cant find a commercial seed mix you like, its often easier to make your own. Feel free to mix perennials and annuals to see which do better in your location. These are some popular wildflowers you could try:

Yarrow (Achillea millefolium) 25 to 35 tall, perennial. Available in shades of white, pink, red and yellow. The short, ferny leaves make a good ground cover.
Black-eyed Susan (Rudbeckia hirta) 35 to 45 tall, often a short-lived perennial, although reseeds well. Make excellent cut flowers.
Cosmos (Cosmos bipinnatus) 30 to 45 tall, annual. Come in shades of pink, purple and white. Sweet fragrance.
Blanket Flower (Gaillardia spp.) 20 to 35 tall, perennial. Showy blooms can be a mix of orange, red and yellow.
Cornflower (Centaurea cyanus) 30 to 40 tall, annual. Bright blue flowers.
Marigold (Tagetes spp.) up to 36 tall, annual. Make sure to use the taller varieties, there are many shorter types that could get overshadowed by larger plants.
Poppies (Papaver spp.) 20 to 40 tall, with many annual and perennial varieties and colors available.
Golden Tickseed (Coreopsis tinctoria) 30 to 40 tall, annual. Abundant yellow flowers with red centers.
Wild Lupine (Lupinus perennis) 15 to 30 tall, perennial. Dark blue flower spikes. The roots of lupines can fix nitrogen in the soil.

4. Planting

First, calculate how much seed you will need for your space. A good estimate is to buy a half-ounce of seed for every 100 square feet of planting space or a quarter pound for every 1000 square feet.

Rake the surface of your prepared soil to create some depth to plant your seeds in. Sprinkle your seeds evenly over the surface of the soil. Birds might eat a portion of your new seeds, so make sure to sow them heavily. Rake the bed lightly again to cover the seed.

Water the whole area well and keep it moist until the seedlings are at least a few inches tall. Adding a light layer of straw, peat or compost mulch will improve moisture retention in the soil.

Most wildflower seeds will take one to three weeks to germinate.

Cosmos

4. Maintenance

Weed seedlings typically germinate along with your new wildflowers. Weeding these out will help encourage the plants you want. If you cant recognize the weed seedlings, its alright to leave them. Weeds are often out-competed by the wildflowers as the area becomes established.

Its recommended to mow wildflower gardens once a year. When the annuals have all gone to seed in the fall and the perennials are going dormant, the whole area should be cut down to a height of 4 to 6 inches. You can do this by hand for a small area, or with a lawn mower or other cutter for larger spaces. A mowing helps all the seeds reach the ground for next year, recycles the organic matter and prevents any woody perennials from taking over.

The annual wildflowers may seed themselves year after year. But if youre seeing too many bare areas, you may need to add more seed as your wildflower garden ages.

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are solely those of the author and may not reflect those of Care2, Inc., its employees or advertisers.

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How to Create a Wildflower Garden

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Can Human Bodies Become Compost?

by pl9Hq2ZC Posted on April 17, 2015

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Can Human Bodies Become Compost?

Posted in FF, GE, LG, ONA, Uncategorized | Tagged bodies, cremation, dying, Eco, green, Plants, project, uncategorized | Comments Off

The Science of Turning Plants Into Booze

by BobbyeDeLaConda Posted on July 4, 2014

Mother Jones

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It’s the 4th of July, and you love your country. Your likely next step: Fire off some small scale explosives, and drink a lot of beer.

But that last word ought to trouble you a little. Beer? Is that really the best you can do? Isn’t it a little, er, uncreative?

Amy Stewart has some better ideas for you. Author of the New York Times bestselling book The Drunken Botanist: The Plants That Create The World’s Great Drinks, she’s a master of the wild diversity of ways in which, since time immemorial, human civilizations (virtually all of them) have created alcoholic drinks from the sugars of their native plants. “We have really good evidence—like analyzing the residue on pottery shards—really good evidence of people making some kind of alcoholic beverage going back at least 10,000 years, and probably much longer than that,” says Stewart on the latest episode of the Inquiring Minds podcast.

In other words, human beings pretty much always find a way when it comes to getting hammered. Indeed, you could argue that learning how to do so was one of the first human sciences. In a sense, it’s closely akin to capturing and using solar energy: Making alcohol, too, hinges upon tapping into the power created by the sun. “It is not much of an exaggeration to claim that the very process that gives us the raw ingredients for brandy and beer is the same one that sustains life on the planet,” writes Stewart in The Drunken Botanist.

Amy Stewart. Delightful Eye Photography

Here’s how it goes: The sun pours down vast amounts of energy upon the earth and fires the process of photosynthesis in plants. Plants take in sunlight, water, and carbon dioxide, give off oxygen, and produce sugars.

It is from these sugars that the world’s diverse alcohols—ranging from cane alcohols to agave alcohols to tree bark alcohols—spring. But human cultures, spread across the world, had very different plant species to work with, so the resulting alcohols are also very different. “There’s all these processing steps you have to take to get at the sugar, but people were highly motivated to do that,” Stewart explained on Inquiring Minds.

One of the most interesting processes, originating in ancient Mexico, involved cutting into the stalk of the huge agave plant to get its sap to flow. But then, the agave sap seekers would cover up the puncture, letting sap pile up up, only to release it again—after which they would repeatedly scrape the plant’s insides, a process “which irritates the plant so much that sap begins to flow profusely,” explains Stewart in her book. One agave plant, Stewart reports, can generate more than 250 gallons of sap.

Once you’ve got a hearty supply of plant sugar, in the form of agave sap or whatever else, the second vital step of the alcohol process involves yeast. In the process of fermentation, these tiny microorganisms take sugar and break it down into carbon dioxide and ethyl alcohol. For yeast, the alcohol is a waste product. For us, apparently, it’s a necessity. In the case of agave sap, the tradition is to let it ferment not only in yeast but a special kind of bacteria that lives on the agave plant. The result is pulque, a whitish, sour and low alcohol liquor sometimes compared to yogurt. (Using different processes, and different species of agave plant, gives you tequila and mezcal.)

But that’s just one of the myriad ways in which humans make alcohol. Forget your grapes-to-wine and your grains-to-beer pathways—they’re so unoriginal. “When you look at what the whole world drinks, you get a very different picture,” observes Stewart. “Around the world, sorghum is probably the plant used to make alcohol more than any other.” It is used to make anything from home-made beer in Africa to a high proof liquor called maotai in China.

So what are the implications for your July 4 libations? Stewart encourages making patriotic choices—but, the right patriotic choices.

First, here’s a drink that’s probably a lot less patriotic than you think: Some spruce beer claiming to have been invented by Benjamin Franklin. The history of liquors, writes Stewart, is “riddled with legends, distortions, half-truths, and outright lies,” and one of them involves Franklin. I’m always highly suspicious of any story that involves a Founding Father,” says Stewart. “You always want to look at that stuff with some scrutiny.”

The claim is that Franklin invented spruce beer, a very old drink that, Stewart explains, explorers actually used to fight scurvy because spruce trees contain ascorbic acid. When Franklin died, a recipe for spruce beer was found in his papers. But it turns out Franklin had merely copied the recipe from a book called The Art of Cookery Made Plain and Easy, published in 1747 by an Englishwoman named Hannah Glasse.

Franklin “never intended to take credit for her recipe,” says Stewart. “But nonetheless, you will see these microbreweries all over that do Founding Father beers, and they’ll have this Benjamin Franklin spruce beer. And I’m sure that they are never going to go back to put Hannah Glasse’s face on that bottle.”

So what’s a more authentic patriotic drink? Stewart gave us a recommendation, and a recipe.

“Two of the things that we drank a lot of in our early days were hard cider, apple cider, and corn whiskey, like bourbon,” says Stewart. “Those are very American drinks, and very much part of what the Founding Fathers were drinking. So, the two of them together actually make a drink called a stone fence.”

Here’s the recipe, as explained by Stewart on the podcast:

A “stone fence,” prepared at the Inquiring Minds podcast mixology laboratory.

All you do is take hard cider, which is the lightly alcoholic, fizzy kind of cider, and pour it in a glass with some ice, and add a little splash of bourbon, like an ounce, ounce and a half at the most. And give it a good stir. And that’s the drink.

Now, people really experiment with this drink. Sometimes they’ll do something a little bit like a mint julep, where they’ll add some mint, and some simple syrup, and maybe a little squeeze of lime juice to it. Sometimes people will add a little bit of fruit syrup, like cassis, or I don’t know, blackberry liqueur, or something like that, to make it a little bit of a fruitier, kind of red drink.

So it’s a nice template to explore. You’ve basically got something kind of fizzy and dry, and you’ve got the bourbon as a base alcohol. And then you can sort of add to that. But the nice thing is, it’s reasonably light. You can really dial back the bourbon, and have something that you can drink during the day when it’s hot.

So enjoy yourself (safely) this July 4—and when you have a drink, remember that alcohol production is a global scientific endeavor, based on an understanding of botany and also of the world’s diverse cultures.

“Knowing a little bit about what the plants are, and where they come from, and how they got turned into alcohol, you actually can make a better drink if you know some of that stuff,” says Stewart.

To listen to the full Inquiring Minds interview with Amy Stewart, you can stream below:

This episode of Inquiring Minds, a podcast hosted by neuroscientist and musician Indre Viskontas and best-selling author Chris Mooney, also features a conversation with Mother Jones reporter Molly Redden about how the Supreme Court flubbed reproductive health science in the Hobby Lobby case, and of Facebook’s troubling recent study that involved trying to alter users’ emotional states.

To catch future shows right when they are released, subscribe to Inquiring Minds via iTunes or RSS. We are also available on Stitcher and on Swell. You can follow the show on Twitter at @inquiringshow and like us on Facebook. Inquiring Minds was also recently singled out as one of the “Best of 2013” on iTunes—you can learn more here.

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The Science of Turning Plants Into Booze

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12 Fascinating Fruit & Vegetable Relatives

by aniaxff2 Posted on August 6, 2013

More here –

12 Fascinating Fruit & Vegetable Relatives

Posted in FF, GE, ONA, Uncategorized | Tagged food, fun, green, lawns & gardens, life, Ona, Plants, Raw, vegan, vegetarian | Comments Off

Tag Archives: Plants

Keep Your Soil Moist

Mulch Your Beds

Cover Tender Plants

Protect Container Plants

Don?t Fall Prune

Tuck Your Veggies in for Winter

Create Windbreaks

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1. Prepare your soil appropriately.

2. Install permeable surfaces.

3. Choose water-wise plants.

4. Reduce or remove your lawn.

5. Cover your ground.

6. Provide shade.

7. Water selectively.

8. Collect rain water.

9. Weed your garden.

10. Build raised beds.

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Bugs and Insects

Slugs and Snails

Fungal Diseases

Foraging Animals

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1.Golden pothos

2. Ficus alii

3. Spider Plant

4. Lady Palm

5. Snake plant

6. Aloe Vera

7. Moth Orchid

8. Dwarf/Pygmy Date Palm

9. Chinese evergreen

10. Chrysanthemum

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