Podcast

August 20, 2019 Pass-along Plants, the Patron Saint of Beekeepers, Edward Lee Green, Gettysburg Milkweed, the Plant Quarantine Act, Robert Plant, Edgar Albert Guest, Rose Recipes from Olden Times by Eleanor Sinclair Rhode, Pick Herbs, and Nerine undulata

“You don’t have a garden just for yourself. You have it to share.” – Augusta Carter, Master Gardener, Pound Ridge, Georgia Pass-along plants have the best stories, don’t they? They have history. They have a personal history. One of my student gardeners had a grandmother who recently passed away from breast cancer. Her mom was no green thumb. But, when her daughter started working in my garden, she let me know that her mom had some plants, and her dad…

August 19 National Potato Day, Jane Webb, Phlox from the Massachusetts Horticultural Society, Ellen Willmott, Willis Linn Jepson, Henderina Scott, Ogden Nash, Healing Herbs by Michael Castleman, Fall Herbs, and a Letter From Elizabeth Lawrence

Today is National Potato Day. Here are some fun potato facts: The average American eats approximately 126 pounds of spuds each year. And, up until the 18th century, the French believed potatoes called leprosy. To combat the belief, the agronomist Antoine Auguste Parmentier became a one-man PR person for the potato. How did Parmentier get the French people to believe that the potato is safe to eat? Good question. Parmentier cleverly posted guards around his potato fields during the day…

August 16, 2019 Zucchini, Magness Holman, François-Andre Michaux, Serviceberry, Francis Darwin, Kenneth Woodbridge, Sylvia Plath, Sara Baume, Sue Monk Kid, Plant Parenting by Leslie Halleck, Bee Balm, and the Secret of Stourhead Garden

Are you swimming in zucchini yet? Emily Seftel, of The Tennessean, wrote an article in 2006 that was titled Gad zuks! – which I think is hilarious; we don’t use that term enough, do we? Anyway, the article started this way: “Zucchini, the summer squash, is the Rodney Dangerfield of the produce world it gets no respect.” Then, the article goes on to share some recipes, which were offered by Chef Laura Slama who said, “When you’re cooking with zucchini,…

August 15, 2019 Garden Turmoil, Karl von Schreibers, Elias Magnus Friesz, John Torrey, Walter Crane, Geoff Hamilton, W.H. Auden, The Gardens of Emily Dickinson by Judith Farr, Pickerel Weed, and Sylvia Edlund

Last week was one of turmoil in my garden. We decided to put new windows and siding on the house. Then we decided to enjoy the ravages of a hail storm which dumped ping pong ball sized hail on the garden for about five minutes – the entire storm lasted 30 minutes. I always remind new gardeners that we never garden alone. We’re still gardening and partnership with Mother Nature, and in this partnership, Mother Nature still has her way.…

August 14, 2019 Saint Werenfrid’s Day, the Liberty Tree, Forest and Stream, Ada Hayden, FTD, Edgar Walter Denison, Thomas Gunn, Tulipomania by Mike Dash, Lined Pots, and the Canning Lid Shortage of 1975

Today, August 14, is Saint Werenfrid’s Day. Werenfrid is the patron saint of vegetable gardens. He is often portrayed as a priest holding up a ship with a coffin in it or displayed as a priest laid to rest in his ship. Werenfrid is also invoked for gout and stiff joints, which, if you’re a vegetable gardener, those three sometimes go together. Brevities #OTD Today, in 1765, a crowd gathered under a large elm tree in Boston. The group…