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The big sale at the Fairfax Green Plant Park that lperry mentions in earlier pages, I think, will be held on May 19 this year.

Has anyone used Gardman products before? I am thinking about buying their containers for gardening, since I'm on a rental property...

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A question for the avid gardeners: where should I go to get good prices on landscape plants? Is there any nursery that will offer a quantity discount? I'm going to be buying a very large number of broadleaf evergreens and conifers in the next several months. Thanks for any ideas.

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I'm only familiar w/ my local place- Holly,Woods, & VInes-they have an excellent selection, & if you get a 'garden rewards' card for $15., you get 15% off. For straight up quantity, HD or Lowes are your best bet, if you plant & water properly. If you can wait, you can sometimes get better deals in fall, when nurseries are looking to unload stock.

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Earth Sangha is having a native plant sale on Sunday, May 6, 2012.

http://www.earthsang...pnsale0512.html

Rather than go to a big box store for native plants, I recommend Nature by Design. This is a wonderful, ecologically responsible, native plant nursery in Alexandria. The grounds are shady and pleasant, the employees knowlegeable and helpful, and the plants are beautiful. If you go soon you can smell the native azaleas - heavenly.

http://www.nature-by-design.com/

I have a butterfly garden, and butterflies really love native plants. So do hummingbirds and bees. If you are growing vegetables that need to be pollinated, say, tomatoes, or fruit, say, blueberries, you will benefit by attracting pollinators. Nature by Design has quite a few suitable cultivars but Earth Sangha may have even more, if only for the one day.

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I just set up a new 8' x 8' raised bed in a sunny spot of the yard. Plan to fill it with LeafGro from Rels on Layhill Road.

If I get extra LeafGro and spread it around low spots in my yard to help with drainage, will I just be fueling the weeds that grow there? Is it an inefficient use of LeafGro, in other words? Would I be better off just using top soil for the drainage issue?

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I just set up a new 8" x 8" foot raised bed in a sunny spot of the yard. Plan to fill it with LeafGro from Rels on Layhill Road.

If I get extra LeafGro and spread it around low spots in my yard to help with drainage, will I just be fueling the weeds that grow there? Is it an inefficient use of LeafGro, in other words? Would I be better off just using top soil for the drainage issue?

Leafgro is a fantastic product and I used to use it every year when I had a large yard. I would not waste it on those low spots -- unless you want to encourage the most beautiful weeds you've ever seen, or you want to plant valuable plants there.

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Leafgro/pine fines/manure, all are wonderful amendments to your soil, but if you're looking strictly at drainage, you need swales & additional topsoil (cheapest you can get), I'd also start composting & using leaf mulch-it hurts to see all your great amendments being washed out of your yard....

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Compost question: I started a natural, worm-free compost. I see some white mold in it, so I googled about it. Search results yielded that pile is lacking moisture. Does this mean I just pour lots of water or need to drill bigger holes, or just turn my pile over? Thanks.

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Compost question: I started a natural, worm-free compost. I see some white mold in it, so I googled about it. Search results yielded that pile is lacking moisture. Does this mean I just pour lots of water or need to drill bigger holes, or just turn my pile over? Thanks.

What type of container? Where is it located? Does the bottom part seem moist?

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What type of container? Where is it located? Does the bottom part seem moist?

8-gallon DIY drilled container located outside. Bottom part seem moist. It seems to be working because I lifted it to shake it up a little and found lots of beetles and grubbers underneath.

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If it were me, I wouldn't worry about the mold & dump the compost you have already into the garden-but I am a casual composter-started out all gung-ho- bokashi, turning & watering, then slacked off- time is the best composter. I dump my coffee grounds in the yard, & if I wait too long, I see a little mold, but I just spread them out over the beds...

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8-gallon DIY drilled container located outside. Bottom part seem moist. It seems to be working because I lifted it to shake it up a little and found lots of beetles and grubbers underneath.

Turning it may not be a bad idea. I wouldn't drill holes bigger until a last resort as you could get too much rain.
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Anyone else freaked out by the cool spring we're having? True to form, I have lots of seedlings that I've picked up here & there, & cold-hearted gardener that I am, almost all of them have been tossed out to fend for themselves. Unfortunately, it's mostly plants that like warmer weather-tomatoes, basil, lemongrass, coleus...stil working on the yard, hauling mulch, weeding, trying to find a spot for those overgrown tomato plants-Beefmaster & Juliet...

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Last spring I planted garlic cloves for green garlic, then I ended up traveling when most of it was ready. True to form, I didn't divide it in the fall, so this early summer crop is approximately four hundred thousand small heads of garlic. Here it is drying in the oven. (Ignore the filthy pizza stone.)

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In better news, now that I know how to prune ever-bearing raspberries, the early crop is coming in!

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If you plant only one tomato plant, I would recommend Sun Gold cherry tomatoes for this area. They have been unbelievably productive for me ripening earliest in the season and going well into the fall until the first freeze. During most of the summer I pick a dozen a day from a single plant, so there are enough for both cooking and preserving. I wish the black cherry tomatoes were this prolific!

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I'm not sure why I continue to drag around sprinklers-I feel like I'm gently poaching the grass I have left. The sungolds are about the only tomato in the EBs I have any hope for, lots of little green tomatoes...everything else looks like parched earth....maybe a few more peppers....

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Yellow tomato plants carefully settled into the soil with manure and wood ash, trellised with the Florida weave. Pink beefsteak tomato volunteered and was staked but otherwise ignored. Gardening: the humbling experience. At least there are still tons of green ones on the plants I put in.

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I have already conceded defeat this summer- the Sungolds continue to pop out tomatoes, lots of Thai chiles, herbs are fine, everything else has gone to hell (I take that back, there are still lots of unripe figs on the trees)....

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We've done pretty well this summer with Korean cucumbers, Marketmore cucumbers, Ichiban eggplant, and tomatoes. Got a batch of San Marzano's ready for sauce making tomorrow.

Serrano peppers look really good. Hope I can get pics of plants full of red peppers. Cayennes were enormous.

How do you post pictures here? All I can post when I click Image is a URL, and when I did that the picture was enormous, not a thumnail.

http://npmusic.org/Serranos1.jpg

http://npmusic.org/Serranos2.jpg

http://npmusic.org/Serranos3.jpg

http://npmusic.org/Cayenne1.jpg

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Has anyone tried eating the tubers from their ornamental sweet potato vines? some internet sources say they're bitter, but as the vines are essentially selected varieties of the vines used to grow sweet potatoes commerically, it seems like they would be worth trying. On the other hand, i'm wondering why, if they actually are any good, people don't either eat them more or donate them to food shelters, the vines seem to be in half the container gardens/sidewalk plantings i see....

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I used to work at HWV,a large garden center, & heard stories about when the guys cleaned out the overhead planters along the fence of the ipomea vines (a miserable job), they tried taking the tubers in the back & roasting them over the barrel fire pit. The report was they weren't worth it....

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Did anyone else run out last night and this morning to pick all the ripening tomatoes before the rain? I know you're not supposed to be able to dry farm here, but the past few summers have been perfect. I think I can hear the brix dropping on the green ones still out there...

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Year #4 with the Charentais melons, and I finally got it right, picking this big one (about 1.5 kilos) at the peak of ripeness, just as the blossom end started to split. Two more that are the typical smaller size are still on the single vine that made it through the heat and drought. I've had big split ones, tiny non-split ones, but never got things right to have big, ripe, unsplit ones. Well, one, anyway. :) Cette année, j'ai la main verte.

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The garden doesn't know it's fall.

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Last weekend I got in the radishes, beets, and turnips, tomorrow will be the lettuce, arugula, mâche, and kale. The weather looks as if it will be cooperating to keep everything from bolting. Now we just need Mother Nature to give us a few months without a freeze.

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Remember I planted potatoes in May and rabbits ate 'em all up? (Might have been a groundhog, which I spotted during the summer!)

Well, the plants have rebounded. Nice plants about a foot tall. On an off chance, are they producing potatoes? And how would I know if and when they are ready to harvest? Any real hope of that?

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I used to love walking around my yard in the spring, seeing things come up-now, my backyard is a wasteland, I don't totally blame the puppies, there's lots of tree roots, but it's compacted mud. I did go out today, & use the yard weasel, to try & break up the hardpan, so I can put down some grass seed ( probably futile), but it's spring, & hope springs eternal....

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This will be the 4th summer at our townhouse in the city. We don't have tons of outdoor space but are blessed with a corner lot that gets good southern/southeastern exposure. Each year I've tackled one section: initially it was just getting the space under control and weeded and severely cut back; two years ago it was digging up the east side of the porch and putting in raised beds; last year I put in underground drip irrigation with spray heads for the potted stuff; this year I completely dug up the front side that gets the most sun and amended the soil (very high clay content). Usually we get to late May/early June and I'm just getting around to thinking, "Hmmmm, maybe we should think about getting some tomatoes and eggplant in the ground". But this year I had a plan. A Plan! Direct sow some early growers like radishes, kale, broccoli rabe, spinach and start some tomatoes, peppers, leeks, etc. from seed inside. Once the early crops are ready to harvest we can dig them up and swap in the real summer plants. This is going to be great!

The weather hates my ambition.

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To benevolent, helpful, tech-savvy gardeners.

The Zoo (also known as Home Depot on a spring weekend) ran out of the organic soil I needed. I quickly checked reviews of a competing brand which received an emphatic thumbs down across several gardening forum websites. It will be better to shop elsewhere or wait for a replenished stock.

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^uh, I'm afraid to ask, but say what? What is "organic soil"?

Peat? There are histosols, but it could also be regular potting soil with organic fertilizer in it.

Something evil ate all my celery and celery root seedlings, but left the tomatoes and peppers alone. Slugs with a taste for bloody marys, no doubt.

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Bad planning left me with no choice but to put very young seedlings into the ground Thursday. They got a good watering-in, then were left alone until Monday morning when I got back, and to my delight all survived weather, slugs and rabbits. A bitter spring: endive, radicchio, escarole, mache, lettuce. Also radish, carrot, and potato. Tomato seedlings are struggling; probably it's time to replace the bulb in the grow lamp. Need to start the basil and parsely already. Vegetable gardening is hard for me because I'm always busy with other things when the garden needs the most attention, but usually by May or June I'm very pleased to have perservered.

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I need to move a fig that has grown quite large & is crowding & shading the windmill palm behind it (I know, poor planning on my part). Whoever said figs need to be babied has not met my thugs, this is Sandy's Strawberry Verte from the the now defunct Paradise Nursery. I know this is not the best time to try this, & I may need an axe to get it out, but It should survive, right?

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^this is a more complicated issue than you may expect. First, if the tree has started to leaf out it's really too late. You would probably lose this year's fruit and possibly the tree itself. With a well-established woody plant of any type, the best thing to do is root-prune it well in advance of the move. You can google this for specific instructions. You could start the root pruning now and then move it next autumn after it's gone dormant, or in the spring two weeks or so before it breaks dornamcy. Whenever you move it, try to do in on an overcast, cool day (reduces moisture loss through transpiration). I'm not saying you won't be successful if you do it now, but it's risky. If you have strong helpers dig a big damn root ball to get as many roots as you can. Make sure the new hole is already dug and the soil prepped, and move it fast.

I have no experience with growing figs; the above advice is general to trees and shrubs.

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You are absolutely right, but I've got to move this fig, I don't even care if I lose it. I'll take lots of cuttings (I'll have lots for the picnic, I pruned my Violette de Negronne yesterday, trying to move another plant that was placed badly). I'm going to try & hire some husky HS boys to dig it out, & dig a few more holes for me. I'll root prune the other fig (Conadria) & move it in the fall.

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