Check out our latest newsletter here.  Happy Winter!

The Sunflowers

by Mary Oliver

Come with me
into the field of sunflowers.
Their faces are burnished disks,
their dry spines

creak like ship masts,
their green leaves,
so heavy and many,
fill all day with the sticky

sugars of the sun.
Come with me
to visit the sunflowers,
they are shy

but want to be friends;
they have wonderful stories
of when they were young -
the important weather,

the wandering crows.
Don’t be afraid
to ask them questions!
Their bright faces,

which follow the sun,
will listen, and all
those rows of seeds -
each one a new life!

hope for a deeper acquaintance;
each of them, though it stands
in a crowd of many,
like a separate universe,

is lonely, the long work
of turning their lives
into a celebration
is not easy. Come

and let us talk with those modest faces,
the simple garments of leaves,
the coarse roots in the earth
so uprightly burning.

I saw these hand-drawn garden markers in a friend’s garden when she was giving me a tour and instantly loved them.  I will be putting a link to this Etsy site on my website too:  http://www.etsy.com/shop/camppineneedle

The artist is Maura Condrick who lives on the Cape.  Her markers are drawn and stamped on natural cedar shingles and are inspired by old seed packets and botanical prints.   She will even custom design a marker by request and can do flowers too!

I’ve learned what a problem it can be if vegetables aren’t labeled properly, especially before they’ve germinated.  It’s so easy to forget what’s been planted where.  Plus, these rustic looking pieces of real art just make the garden even more beautiful.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tt-KHUITId8&feature=share

And here is an article about her from Mother Earth News:  http://www.motherearthnews.com/Organic-Gardening/2004-02-01/Ruth-Stouts-System.aspx

Maybe the robins know the best spot for our gardens… 

Now is the time to test our garden soil!  It is the most important piece of the vegetable garden puzzle.  Without healthy, nutritious soil our plants won’t leaf out and grow big and strong or produce the nice big vegetables we see at the farmer’s markets.  And in fact without healthy soil our plants will be more susceptible to pests and diseases.  Healthy soil is generally the answer to most of our vegetable gardening challenges.

Vegetables love organic matter.  They need generous helping of nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium as well as other minerals and nutrients.  Fertilizers can provide this but our plants don’t do as well with blasts of nutrients from fertilizers.  It’s better to give them real compost which is like a time release vitamin for your plants.  They will get the doses they need over the time they need it. 

You can make your own compost at home and you can buy organic compost at your garden nursery.  Composted manure is excellent for vegetables, as is composted food waste and either or both of those combined with the “browns” of composted leaves and twigs and dead plants make a delicious mix to add to any garden at this time of year.

Testing your soil is a great start to the garden season.  I use the UMass lab:  http://www.umass.edu/soiltest/  On this website you’ll find links to instructions for sampling and how to send in your sample.  There are different levels of tests.  I usually choose the most basic, the Standard Soil Test for $10, which gives me information on pH, Extractable Nutrients, Extractable Heavy Metals, and the soil’s Cation Exchange Capacity (the measure of your soil’s ability to hold and release nutrients).  For an additional $5 you can also learn about what percent of your soil is organic matter.

Worm poop (as my kids call it) is one of the best soil amendments around.  So maybe watching where the robins feast is a good tip.  Happy Spring.

p.s. do you remember the book The Secret Garden?  It was the robin who showed Mary the way!

http://www.bedfordtowntaxi.com/?p=3903

front yard farm in Boulder, CO

There is a growing movement I’m calling Yard Farming of people looking to turn their own front or back yards or any swath of green into food production.  Businesses like Community Roots in Boulder, CO are “cropping” up all over!  Community Roots is an urban farming project founded by farmer Kipp Nash, which has ”successfully converted 13 front and back yards, and church lawns into vegetable gardens for neighbors and CSA shareholders, with surplus for the Boulder Farmer’s Market and food for families in need – while creating increased community connections among neighbors at the same time.”

From Heather Flores’ book, Food Not Lawns:  “The average urban lawn could produce several hundred pounds of food a year.  Whether you live in an apartment, in the suburbs, on a farm, or anywhere in between, growing food is the first step toward a healthier, more self-reliant, and ultimately more ecologically sane life.”

There are lots of organizations and businesses yard farming in our area and across the country – here are just a few:

The Food Project‘s Community Programs, Boston

The Neighborhood Farm, Needham

Rad Urban Farmers, Arlington

Your Backyard Farmer, Oregon

Food Not Lawns, an international movement hub site started by Heather Flores from Oregon