For The Motherly Gardeners

           I recently stumbled across a very neat little website for gardeners. If you are a mother and a gardener, you need to visit Bloominthyme.com. What a wonderful resource for women who like to incorporate their kids into their gardening. Diane, who runs the site, has gathered lots of information about gardening, through trial and error, in the Florida. Be warned on that note because the climate in Florida is very different than the rest of the US. She will probably be planting and harvesting at different times than the rest of us.

            The site also contains lots of recipes and links to other recipes so you can use your bounty. She also reviews products and has several pages devoted to children. Apparently she has some know of relationships and is a romance writer, but I won’t comment on those aspects. All around it is a good site. For women, it is an even better site.

Pruning Tomatoes

            I never knew it was done until last year. There are determinate tomatoes, indeterminate tomatoes and mixtures. Determinate tomato plants grow to a certain size then stop. Indeterminate plants keep growing into large bushes that fall over and need cages to prop them up. Mixtures do both.

            My “Early Girl” plant is living up to its name. It is already a large plant needing a cage to keep it upright. There are a half dozen or so tomatoes growing on it already. Last year this same variety grew and grew until it lopped over the neighbor’s fence. Not this year.

            The problem with just letting them grow is that the plant uses a lot of energy to do it. That energy could be going into bigger, better tomatoes. The suckers, shoots that grow from the branches and often fruit, can become so numerous that it is hard to find the ripening tomatoes.

Indeterminate plants need to be planned out a bit. There are many gardeners with lots of space that allow their tomato plants to grow all they want. They do require a lot of water and space as they get bigger, but if that is not a problem, go for it. You will have to search for those tomatoes, though, in the giant plant ball that ensues.

If you have a small space, there are two options. You can keep the indeterminate plant trimmed up (a job that requires daily inspection in the warmer months). Or you can buy a determinate plant usually noted as a “bush variety” on the packaging.

Below are a couple of websites I have found dealing with tomatoes. Check them out. By the way, it is not remotely too late to get some plants in the ground. Go to your local nursery this weekend and get started.

WeekendGardener

Tomatofest

Why Garden?

            It wasn’t that long ago that most people outside of urban areas had small vegetable gardens in their back yards. Potatoes, corn, carrots and lettuce were all vital parts of a comprehensive home garden. Patches of ground, small or large and everything in between were utilized and nurtured in order to supplement dinner tables all across the country. Nearly everyone outside the city was a mini-farmer. 

            In the last 10 years, the number of home gardens has increased substantially. According to the National Gardening Association from 2007 to 2008 the number of home gardens increased by 10%. From 2008 to 2009, it increased another 19%! Most likely fueled by the sluggish economy, people are looking for new ways to stretch their dollars. The average home garden offsets household food costs by $500. 

            The rural and suburban areas are not the only areas with gardens any more. Urban areas are filled with raised beds, container gardens and community gardens. If you have a patio or porch, you can grow some tomato plants and carrots. Vertical gardening and square foot gardening have made it even easier to have a bountiful harvest.

            Gardening is a great way to ensure inexpensive, healthy food makes it to your kitchen. It is also a vitally useful skill to have and to pass on to the future.

Penny Wise or Pound Foolish?

            I recently came across a website I thought I would share. PennyWise is a website devoted to frugality, but it incorporates a lot of old fashioned, country advice for living. I found a lot of good information in their Homemade/Handy section dealing with gardening, etc. Their recipe section is also full of old-fashioned advice that a lot of people have forgotten including how to stretch out those garden ingredients to last longer. 

When you have a minute, check them out.