Tuscan kale

I've grow Tuscan kale before, but this plant doesn't quite fit.  It has the dark green crinkled leaves of dinosaur or Tuscan kale, but it keeps growing.  It's not Jersey kale (walking stick kale) -- I have seeds of that, but the leaves aren't right.It must just be a robust Tuscan kale plant...

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Summer Solstice 2012

Sunrise this morning as we greet the longest day of the year--6/20/12.Here's an informative solstice article over on the National Geographic website. Last year's onion harvest--Granex Sweet onions were yummy!Day length is an important consideration for gardeners, because plants are dependent on...

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Roan Mountain

I had the pleasure of being on an excellent birding excursion to Roan Mountain today.  The Roan Mountain massif straddles North Carolina and Tennessee in the Southern Appalachian Mountains of the SE US.  We saw interesting plants and plant communities (grassy balds and spruce-fir forests)...

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A more practiced fledgling robin

The fledging robin is looking much more practiced searching for earthworms and insects.  Our mulch must be rich territory -- we had at least 8 robins poking around this afternoon along with this fledgling and mom. I posted about them before (with equally ho-hum photos). They've been great...

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What if we grew food instead of turf?

I found this image on Facebook and shared it on both the Lawn Reform Coalition and Sustainable Gardening pages. While lots of people "liked" it, even more shared it on their own pages. I found even more shares on other pages--it's gone viral. So this simple idea seems to have captured people's...

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NWF Backyard Wildlife Habitat

Why not display your sign?I've had my sign for quite awhile, but it graces an edge of my (inside) study in the Piedmont. I saw this sign, prominently displayed on a mailbox) on a garden tour today (this garden wasn't on the tour).  But, it had me thinking about it.The National Wildlife Federation's...

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Pollinator WeeK: June 18 --24

A tiger swallowtail on goldenrod in a natural meadow.The US Senate unanimously approved the motion to designate the last week in June as pollinator week. Who says the Senate can't agree on anything? In the past five years the pollinator week celebration has become an international event. This year it's...

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