Seven Years Gold Compost

As Christmas drew near a  friend asked if I his Christmas gift had been delivered. I said no deliveries and then waited every day for my treat to arrive. I did get a Package Too Big notice from the Post Office and picked up this bag of compost that had a mailing label right on the bag. I assumed it was some sort of sample from the Seven Years Gold company, although it did seem an odd time of year to be sending compost samples to Massachusetts.  But when my friend arrived for dinner after Christmas he said he couldn’t wait any longer to tell me what was on its way to me – horse manure!  Seven Years Gold wasn’t a sample it was my friend who paid attention when I said one of the best gifts I had gotten for my first vegetable garden 40 years ago was a load of rotted horse manure. Friends like this are not easy to come by.

Christmas Books

Of course all my friends and family know I love books – and that high cooking and baking season lasts all winter. The stove helps keep the house warm. I was familiar with Nigel Slater (British) from his many inspiring and useful cookbooks, but Yotam Ottolenghi was new to me. Nigel Slater was prompted to write Tender: A Cook and His Vegetable Patch this latest book by his new(ish) passion for gardening. Yotam Ottolenghi’s book, Plenty: Vibrant Vegetable Recipes from London’s Ottolenghi, takes a vegetarian approach. I have already made his flavorful Mushroom and herb polenta. Delicious and easy.  Although I had never heard of Ginette Mathiot or her cookbooks that are considered  the Joy of Cooking of France, I am ready to delve into The Art of French Baking (The definitive guide to home baking by Frances favorite cook book author). I must say the recipes look very easy. We shall see.

Finally, there is a book for bedtime reading. Writing the Garden: A Literary Conversation Across Two Centuries by Elizabeth Barlow Rogers is not the anthology of selections I first thought. There are snippets from each of the authors mentioned from Thomas Jefferson and Gertrude Jekyll to humorists like Karel Capek and artists like Robert Dash, but Rogers gives us a sense of the life and personalities of each. I am savoring each section.

Now here is a question. Although not apparent from a photo, two of the cookbooks, Plenty and The Art of French Baking have padded covers. Is this a new trend? A new style in books? Does it make the books more wipe-able?  Any ideas?

Christmas Trees at Kringle Candle Company

This Christmas may be over, but all these gifts, including a candle from the Kringle Candle Company, will keep the memory alive for many years.

ADDENDUM – One way or another I have gotten comments and questions about horse manure – and I found interesting information and comparisons here.

In the ‘olden days’ garden catalogs did not arrive until after the new year, the first sign that spring will eventually return. Now my mailbox is already full of garden catalogs describing all kinds of plants, books and tools, every company hoping for some of those holiday dollars that are so important to business in these difficult days. The catalogs are really tempting because many gardeners are like me, greedy for a new plant, or a new book and new information. The trick is to find the right plant, book or information.

Sometimes you know a gardener has a particular passion. I have one friend who always welcomes a handsome pot for her container plantings. However, unless you know that a gardener has a particular enthusiasm a gift certificate is a great way to make sure the gardener in your life gets exactly what she, or he, really wants. Over the years I have gotten a few lovely plants as gifts, and enjoyed them for a while, but chosen as they were by non-gardeners, they were not as hardy as they needed to be for the gardens at the end of the road. I have gotten tools as gifts, but again, non-gardeners are not always able to assess the quality or utility of a given tool. In the case of plants and tools, gift certificates make the perfect gift. And think of the pleasure the recipient will have considering the possibilities before it is actually time to acquire the item itself.

New information can come in a variety of ways. Books, of course. Our local book shops have a good supply of dependable and beautiful garden books. I have written in this column over the past year about many excellent books I have found from “Holy Shit: Managing Manure to Save Mankind” by Gene Logsdon and “50 Beautiful Deer Resistant Plants: The Prettiest Annuals, Perennials, Bulbs and Shrubs that Deer Don’t Eat” by Ruth Rogers Clausen to the “Encyclopedia of Container Plants: 500 Outstanding Choices for Gardeners” by Ray Rogers. I might even mention my own book, “The Roses at the End of the Road.”

Some of us will think of magazine subscriptions that bring us loads of new information and inspiration every month. I have long been a subscriber to Organic Gardening, Horticulture Magazine and Fine Gardening. Over the years it has been nice to see how mainstream magazines have been paying more attention to organic methods. I have a new subscription myself to Green Prints: The Weeder’s Digest, a quarterly magazine that is a family operation with Pat Stone at the helm and wife Becky handling circulation. You can log on to www.greenprints.com for sample articles, and the monthly electronic newsletter.

Another way to gain new information, support important garden and educational activities, and gain a variety of benefits is by giving a membership to a horticultural or plant society. The Massachusetts Horticultural Society (www.masshort.org) membership will give a free ticket to the Blooms! Garden show in Boston in March, free or discounted tickets to many botanic gardens across the country, free subscriptions to magazines, discounted workshops and programs at the Elm Bank Gardens in Wellesley.  They also have a research and circulating library at Elm Bank which is a wonderful resource.

Right in our own backyard we have Nasami Farm which belongs to the New England Wildflower Society (www.newfs.org). Nasami’s many greenhouses propagate thousands of native plants for sale in spring and fall. NEWFS members get discounts on plants, programs and free admission to the beautiful Garden in the Woods and a subscription to the Society’s publications.

I also belong to the American Horticultural Society (www.ahs.org) because it means I get their excellent magazine The American Gardener, but there are other benefits like discounted admission fees to many botanic and public gardens across the country, seed swap, and discounted publications and programs. Their extensive website contains information for members only, but even non-members will find a great deal of useful advice on this site. All these organizations provide education for children and adult gardeners, helping us all to be better stewards of our land.

There are also special plant societies from the African Violet Society of America to the American Hosta Society and American Rhododendron Society. There are even more specialized groups like the Historic Iris Preservation Society. What plant is your gardener passionate about? There is bound to be an appropriate plant society.

Consumables make great gifts. We gardeners can use up fertilizers and potting soil at a great pace. I think my container loving friend would be thrilled to find a pot filled with potting soil, perlite, organic fertilizers like Neptune’s Harvest or Espoma Rose Tone under her Christmas tree. So would I. This may not seem glamorous, but it is such a useful gift, acknowledging all the gardener’s needs and desires.

One of the best garden gifts I ever received was a load of rotted horse manure for my first garden. I was so grateful. Nowadays we don’t need to count on a friend with a farm. We can order, or get a gift certificate for a load of rich compost from Bear Path Farm or Martin’s Farm. The need for compost never ends.

This bag of gifts may not contain much glamour but it sure contains the promise of many pleasures all year long.###

Between the Rows  December 10, 2011

Succulent Container Gardens by Debra Lee Baldwin

Houseplants have never been my strong suit. I rarely get cyclamens or amaryllis to rebloom, and I even gave up my everblooming abutilon this summer. I simply could not get rid of scale. I had to put it out of its misery.

And yet I have kept succulents alive and in good shape for decades. My jade tree is over 20 years old. It survived being moved to my daughters’ houses while we were in China, and it survived a winter in our unheated Great Room which caused severe frostbite. However, with a little spring warmth, radical pruning and gentle watering it revived and remains beautiful and indomitable.

I also have an orchid cactus and Christmas cactus that are probably about 15 years old. Still alive and healthy, and blooming on schedule with very little help from me. So you can imagine my pleasure when I opened “Succulent Container Gardens: Design Eye-Catching Displays with Easy-Care Plants” by Debra Lee Baldwin ($29.95) published by Timber Press.

Who among us is not familiar with the sempervivium hen and chicks? This common succulent is only one of the 100 genera, 275 species, and 90 varieties of succulents that Baldwin presents, alone and in combination, in containers plain and fancy, large and small, indoors and out, in a book that will inspire everyone who has ever put aside the idea of keeping houseplants alive for more than a year or two.

Baldwin gives advice about how to choose attractive pots for various succulents, looking at form and color. It is the varied forms of all these succulent species that fascinates me. I may not have been familiar with the terms graptovenerias or pachyforms or aeoniums, but now I love the graptoveria rosettes, the amazing exposed root of the pachyforms, and the graceful string of pearls, a senecio. And we haven’t even begun talking about spiky cactuses or agaves or trailing sedums.

There are over three hundred photographs of succulents potted in every style from traditional, classical, whimsical and moderne. They can make a sculptural statement planted alone, or arranged in a miniature landscape.

I have always looked at group plantings of succulents and wondered about how to arrange them. Baldwin gives advice about planting mixtures, and most importantly for me, advised that any planting should be full. These plants grow slowly so to keep a container from looking kind of pathetic, enough plants, or a big enough plant should be put in at the very beginning.

My Garden, The City and Me

Baldwin’s book makes me want to run right out and buy a big potful of succulents, but Helen Babbs’ charming little book of essays, “My Garden, The City, and Me: Rooftop Adventures in the Wilds of London” ($18.95 Timber Press) sends me to the armchair in front of the fire with a cup of tea to imagine her life in London where she lives in a gritty neighborhood and builds a garden in the three square meters outside her bedroom door.

Babbs is a young woman who is very aware of the ways that nature inhabits even the busy metropolis. Her London is set firmly within the greater natural world of plants and wildlife. She plants a garden in the hope that it will provide encouragement and sustenance for the birds and butterflies, for bees and other pollinators that are so important to her life, the life of the city, and the life of the planet.

Her book begins with a seed swap while winter is still ruling, then takes us through the seasons, through the days when, all unaware, she steps on her new seedlings and to full summer when she writes, “The roof has looked at its prettiest florally over the last few weeks. The flowering tobacco has been joined by yellow evening primroses, prongs of purple lavender and deep orange nasturtiums. I recently inherited a courgette plant that has five fluorescent flowers now.”

Her descriptions of the Thames and London’s historic parks and the wildlife she finds there are equally poetic. She writes about a damp autumnal ramble on the famed Hampstead Heath. “A sudden downpour left the leaf fall slick and gleaming, and the lichen on the tree trunks fluorescing lime green. Glossy droplets balled on fat, pink berries. When the rain returned, tree canopies made protective umbrellas over our heads.”

You don’t have to be a lover of English novels as well as gardens to enjoy this book, but it won’t hurt.

As her first year as a gardener closes she cannot help thinking of the coming spring  and growing carrots growing in a pair of leaky red wellies and potatoes in a hessian sack. I can absolutely identify with that kind of dreamy planning.

Babb ends with a short list of Things to Read and a list of Places to Go. I, for one, would not mind following in her London footsteps.

Between the Rows  -  December 3, 2011

And inside the house work continues on my kitchen renovation. Fortunately, I can use the sink and the stove again! This is baking season.

It is also Giveaway Season. Tomorrow I celebrate four years of blogging, of learning, of meeting other skilled and helpful bloggers by giving away a copy of Debra Lee Baldwin’s inspiring and useful book, Succulent Container Gardens, and a copy of my own book.  Click here and leave a comment. You still have today and all day tomorrow to have a chance to win these two books. I will announce the winner, chosen at random on Wednesday, December 7.  Good luck.

Many of us know Mary McClintock as a writer who delights in good local food, celebrates the farmers who raise it, and brings us advice from the cooks who really know what to do with it. I know I have enjoyed her Wednesday food column, Savoring the Seasons, ever since it began  nearly four years ago. I’ve learned a lot about vegetables unknown to me including the gilfeather turnip.

During her California youth McClintock probably didn’t spend any more time thinking about vegetables than any other child in her neighborhood, although she enjoyed working with her mother in their garden and attending farmer’s markets where they could buy fresh local food – before that was a catch phrase. Her mother also taught her about preserving food. Together the two of them would pick apricots and peaches and then turn them into golden apricot jam and peach chutney.

Playing on the Hawaiian beach where the family lived for a couple of years, and learning the names of plants in the California woods from her mother instilled a deep love of the outdoors in McClintock.

McClintock’s life has been filled with many jobs and many academic adventures. “Important people in my life showed up at the right moment to steer me into my next educational institution or path. . . .  Two high school teachers spent two years talking to me about the wonders of Mt. Holyoke, including that I could ride horses, canoe and be part of the Outing Club. I thank them every day of my life for getting me to Mt. Holyoke,” she said.

Joan Rising, a teacher at Greenfield Community College “steered me to GCC’s Outdoor Leadership Program when I was wanting to pursue work as an outdoor leader and didn’t know how to get there.”

The work McClintock did in Springfield with very difficult teenage boys in an outdoor program made her realize she didn’t have the knowledge of education and psychology that would make her more effective. One of her colleagues in that program was a student at the University of Massachusetts School of Education and led McClintock to attend and study Organizational Development for a Master’s Degree.  She said the important thing about this program for her was that it could be applied to any field, not only outdoor leadership, but to the issues of social justice that were so important to her.

Over the years, but especially during and since her years at UMass she has worked both as a professional and as a volunteer on issues elated to women, disability rights, and lesbian/gay/bi rights.

McClintock explained that these two professional threads in her life are vitally connected. “The oppression of people is completely and totally parallel to and comes from the same impulse as the oppression of the natural world/earth/environment. Reading a book called Woman and Nature by Susan Griffin in the late 70s or early 80s was the first time I understood the connection between the oppression of people and the oppression of the earth. It has been a foundation of my understanding of the world and my activism ever since. All of my social justice work relates to my environmental work and vice versa, “ she said.

Always interested in good food, she became really involved with local food. in 2001. She was inspired by Gary Paul Nabhan’s book, Coming Home to Eat, about the wisdom and pleasure of eating local food, and a workshop led by John Hoffman who farms at the Wilder Brook Farm CSA. Soon she started a local food group who enjoyed potlucks together. As word spread she joined the group organizing the first Free Harvest Supper in 2005.

When Juanita Nelson came up with the idea of a winter farmers market, “we all thought she was crazy,” McClintock said. To promote this crazy project Nelson and McClintock decided to write monthly articles for the Recorder. “Along the way I thought there were so many topics to write about that I could probably write something every week,” she said.  That was the birth of Savoring the Season which debuted in the Recorder in July 2007.

Through all the changes in her life whether she was sea kayaking in New Zealand or Alaska, editing and indexing books, or running an editorial and research business called BetterYou Than Me, McClintock’s mother enjoyed hearing about her adventures, “although she really liked it when I had work she could actually describe to her friends,” she said. “I sent her my own writings and she was always a great fan.”

When Elizabeth Welsh passed away last year McClintock wanted to find a way to honor her. That was not hard to do. McClintock had worked part time at the World Eye and when Welsh came to visit a lot of time was spent with McClintock’s World Eye family.

“My mother loved libraries and reading,” McClintock said. She also thought about the books that had inspired her over the years. The perfect memorial would be books purchased at the World Eye, and donated in her mother’s name to the Greenfield and Conway libraries. The books have to do with gardening, food preservation and sustainable living, topics important to mother and daughter. The books were carefully chosen with the help of the librarians to avoid duplication, and enhance their collections.

The books are on library shelves and ready to be checked out, ready to inspire and teach.

Books Donated to the Greenfield Public Library

by Mary McClintock in memory of her mother, Elizabeth Welsh

Berry Grower’s Companion by Barbara L. Bowling

Canning, Freezing, Curing & Smoking of Meat, Fish & Game by Eastman

Field Guide to Edible Wild Plants by Peterson

How To Make and Use Compost:  The Ultimate Guide by Nicky Scott

Museum of Early American Tools by Eric Sloane

Perennial Vegetables by Eric Toensmeier

Pruning Made Easy by Lewis Hill

Putting Food By (5th ed) by Greene, Hertzberg, & Vaughn

Secrets of Plant Propagation by Lewis Hill

Stalking The Healthful Herb by Euell Gibbons

Transition Handbook: From Oil Dependency to Local Resilience by Rob Hopkins

Wilderness Medicine, Beyond First Aid by Forgey

Compost, Vermicompost and Compost Tea, by Grace Gershuny will be published in April, 2011:

I like Stephanie and Nan giving us a peek at their own garden designs.

Through Storey’s generosity I am Giving Away a copy of this book next Sunday, December 19. All you have to do is leave a comment on this post if you want to participate in the Giveaway. Maybe you can tell me about the thing you find most difficult about design, a success or a disaster.

Ellen will be celebrating the publication of her own book, The New England Habitat Natural Garden, this spring. Two hoorays and congratulations to Ellen.

Don’t forget, tomorrow there will be my third Giveaway – of particular interest to those who have, or want to have, a beautiful perennial garden.

Thank you Storey Publishing for being so generous and helping me celebrate my third blogoversary.

I have barely begun my shopping, but I admit that much of my shopping is done in the bookstore.  On the other hand many gardeners like to get plants – or gift certificates for plants to be used in the spring.  I did let a comment slip about how many new roses I’d like in the spring.

Fountains and birdbaths attract the birds, but they are also a beautiful ornament in the garden.

Of course some things wear out and need to be renewed from time to time. Gloves. Clogs.  What do you need or desire?What’s on your Christmas list? Plant society memberships?  Garden magazine subscription? If you want books be sure to comment on Monday’s post, and next Monday’s post, and the Monday after that. Storey Publications we love you for helping me celebrate my third blogoversary!

Gardening has long been one of the nation’s most popular pastimes, but recently with our difficult economy, and worries about the energy costs of agribusiness, many people are turning to the vegetable garden, for fresh food, food savings, and energy savings. Those who have cared for flower gardens may know something about the importance of good soil, but find that much more is required of a vegetable garden.

Barbara Pleasant has just come out with an excellent book for the beginning vegetable gardener, Starter Vegetable Gardens: 24 No Fail Plans for Small Organic Gardens (Storey Publishing $19.95). A key word in this title is small.  Starting small is important to success, but it is also a difficult concept for those who are fired up with enthusiasm for a new project.  I speak from experience.

Another key word is plans. Pleasant begins by laying out plot plans for three different small gardens and carries them through a three year cycle which will see a careful enlargement, and soil improvement.

These plans, created by an experienced gardener, have the benefit of indicating how many plants of a given vegetable will fit in a given space,  give advice about succession planting, fertilizing, and composting.  In these small gardens many vegetables will be planted as seedlings from the garden center which means the new gardener can have the satisfaction of seeing the garden well planted and set up in just one weekend. Beginners benefit from that first dose of accomplishment.

I have one piece of advice to add to Pleasant’s. She, along with most other garden writers, talks about using a few sheets of newspaper or a single sheet of cardboard to begin a no-till garden. It is possible that if you turning a really nice lawn into a garden this may work, but I am always fighting witch grass and I find this slight barrier is not enough. There is no need to fear using lots of newspaper or two or three layers of dampened cardboard. Within a year it will all have broken down and disappeared; your worm population will have soared. Worms love living under cardboard.

Of course, those first three plans are just the beginning. Out of all the 24 there is bound to be a plan that will appeal to the new vegetable gardener, one that fits his available space, his needs and constraints, and his taste. One of the best pieces of advice any gardener can follow is to grow what he likes whether that is peas and tomatoes, or daffs and daisies.

In addition to garden plans Pleasant talks about ways to manage any garden from seed starting, plant supports, watering basics, mulch, fertilizers, insect friends and foes, diseases and harvest. This primer is full of good advice that will stay with a gardener well beyond the novice years.

Whether you are a novice or experienced vegetable gardener, harvest time means time to get going in the kitchen. Vegetables fresh from the garden are going to taste delicious no matter how simply they are prepared, but Andrea Chesman has given us

Recipes from the Root Cellar: 270 Fresh Ways to Enjoy Winter Vegetables (Storey Publishing 18.95).

Whether you have your own little root cellar or buy your vegetables at the market, there is real pleasure in eating with the seasons, choosing all those winter vegetables, some that are familiar like cabbage, potatoes, squash and beets, and some that are slightly less so like rutabagas, daikon radish, parsnips and celery root.

Chesman begins with a review of all the winter vegetables including dried beans, and then moves on to different categories of dishes. There are salads and pickles, soups, simple vegetable dishes, vegetarian main dishes like Rumbledethump that combines baking potatoes, cabbages, onions and cheese, then main dishes with meat, poultry or seafood, and baked goods and desserts. Think of pumpkin waffles, and almond-squash quick bread as well as maple-apple tea cake.

My daughter is hosting the Thanksgiving feast this year, and as I prepare for my part I am browsing through Chesman’s book. I have already decided that I will bring (among other things) a Festive, Fruity Coleslaw that adds dried cranberries, pistachios and clementines to the cabbage.

Actually, Chesman reminds us that many roots besides carrots can be shredded. Shredded raw beets have become standard at salad bars, but turnips and daikon can also be shredded to make a delicious winter salad with cabbage with nary a scrap of lettuce or tomato in sight.

Some of the recipes are familiar, but with a twist like Two-Potato Latkes with white and sweet potatoes, and Thai Coconut Curry with Shrimp – and lots of root vegetables, but some are quite new to me like the Turnip Puff which promises to be light and elegant.

Carrots are a favorite root vegetable at our house, summer or winter. My husband requires a lunch-time carrot every day. Chesman includes information about the virtual World Carrot Museum, and sprinkles charming quotations and kitchen tips throughout. There is also an excellent index.

How many cooks and gardeners do you have on your gift list? ###

My most local membership is in the New England Wildflower Society because their propagation operation and nursery are so close by. An individual membership is only $50, for which you get free admission to the famous Garden in the Woods in Framingham, discounts on workshops and lectures, discounts at Nasami Farm and in the Gift Shop. NEWFS also participates in a Reciprocal Admissions Program that will give you free or reduced admission to over 200 botanic gardens, arboreta and conservatories. For full information click here.  I haven’t yet gone to the Garden in the Woods, but more and more is happening at Nasami Farmb where the new LEED Gold Native Plant Center is now open. Very exciting.

My national membership is in the American Horticultural Society. My main benefit from the AHS is their magazine, The American Gardener. I mine the magazine for ideas for my garden and for my garden column.  My November/December issue just arrived with articles by Rosalind Creasy on edible landscaping for small spaces, Carole ottesen on growing moss, Rita Pelczar on outstanding conifers, Kris Wetherbee on a new view of garden cleanup, and Karen Bussolini on winter perennials. Even in cold zones. Of course there is also lots of information about all the good work that the AHS does in so many different areas.  An individual membership is only $35. The AHS website has lots of information for all gardeners, but members have a special section and special services.  Click here for more information on membership.

My third membership is the Massachusetts Horticultural Society. I do get subscriptions to Organic Gardening and Garden Design with my individual $50  membership, as well as the Leaflet newsletter and a ticket to the Boston Flower Show. Reciprocal admission benefits, too.  MHS maintains the beautiful Elm Bank Gardens bordering the towns of Wellesley and Dover. For full membership information click here.

Obviously, all of these memberships provide me with benefits, but my membership benefits each society in supporting their gardens, The Garden in the Woods, River Farm, and Elm Bank, in the work they each do in conservation, volunteer projects, and education. And that work is a support to me as well. Hard to tell where the benefits begin and end.  If you haven’t joined a plant society before, consider it now. There are many state horticultural societies, and individual plant societies. These societies are a great fund of information and put us in touch with other gardeners and plant enthusiasts.

Give yourself, or a gardening friend, the gift of a membership. It’s value and pleasure will last all year.

Visit Cindy MCOK at My Corner of Katy to see who else has Three for Thursday. You never know what will turn up.