ELLSWORTH — Do you crave a house full of fragrant, colorful flowers and a kitchen counter laden with freshly picked tomatoes, herbs and greens? Start planting seeds now. But first, read this article. “Seed starting is actually the easiest part of the growing process to control,” said Mary Blackstone, who has had her hands in …
When the grass starts to grow, it’s time to plant potatoes, or so the old saying goes. But how many gardeners are rushing out to plant a vegetable so humble, homely, lumpy and brown? Historically, the potato is an important survival food that has seen humankind through times of war and famine. But nothing to …
The famous homesteader Helen Nearing once told me that gardening was her tennis, her golf and her calisthenics. “I bend, stretch, leap and drop every day,” she explained. Helen had built a stone house in her 70s and was still growing her own food in her 90s. Her husband, Scott Nearing, who died at 100, …
According to Albert Einstein, time is relative. I once saw a TV interview in which he said, by way of explanation, that time passes more quickly when you spend it with a beautiful woman. As we all know, time nearly stands still when you are waiting to find out when your delayed plane will take …
ELLSWORTH — The University of Maine Cooperative Extension is offering a four part course in pruning woody landscape plants at the Hancock County Extension Office in Ellsworth. The course is scheduled for Saturday mornings, March 24 and 31 and April 7 and 14, from 8:30 to noon. In each session there will be both classroom …
The 21st century has seen many old European salad crops — such as arugula, mache and radicchio — become popular in America, boldly going where only iceberg lettuce had gone before. Sorrel, oddly enough, has yet to arrive. In France, it’s as popular as spinach, and in the days when Paris was ringed with market …
ELLSWORTH — They just grow up so fast — cabbage and kids, that is. Holden Elementary School student Aidan Howe grew a giant cabbage and won himself a $1,000 savings bond from Bonnie Plants. Aidan was one of 4,086 Maine children to participate in the National Bonnie Plants Third Grade Cabbage Program. He was randomly …
The stack of mail was heavy with seed catalogs throughout December and January. Now it’s noisy with the swish and rattle of seeds. Seductive little envelopes whisper “Plant me” to the winter-weary gardener. Yet it’s still too early for most spring planting, outdoors or in. Resist those voices. Seedlings sown prematurely grow tall and spindly …
New ethnic vegetables enter the culinary scene all the time, and the best become multicultural, eventually. Tatsoi, for instance, may not be a household word yet in your kitchen, but in mine it refers to an Asian green, international in scope. When I overwinter it in our unheated greenhouse, I use it almost every day. …
“Oh, oh, oh…,” our dinner guest murmured. “Where did you get these lovely little leeks?” In June it would have been a compliment, but that November, thanks to a delayed planting, my leeks were a pitiful size, lovely or not. With winter varieties, size counts. You want a beefy leek, a stouthearted leek to hold …
