Seed Bomb dispensers

Seed bombs are all the rage in gorilla gardening. This group on SO Cal, had the ingenious idea of taking some old candy machines and making seed bomb dispensers out of them.

http://www.urbangardensweb.com/2010/04/11/sweet-idea-for-seeding-urban-gardens/

Recycled Bird Bath

Today we put up a birdbath made out of an old satellite dish that was otherwise destined for the dump. I got the idea from instructables

What's reat about the bird bath is that now there is a use for the old stump in our backyard.

Portland Central Library RoofTop Garden

 See more of Bay Area Tendrils report on the Portland Central Library's Rooftop Garden...

http://bayareatendrils.blogspot.com/2009/08/living-carpet-of-texture-color-eco-roof.html

Peak Season for Food

Eating food that is in season locally, reduces the amount of food that needs to be flown and trucked into your local grocer from other parts of the country or world.

Check out this cool interactive map from Epicurious that tells you what is in season in your part of the country for any time of the year!


I also found this great seasonality chart, published in the guardian which is specific to the UK. One thing I really like about this chart, is that it includes seasonal meat, which Is something I don't think we in the U.S. have any concept of anymore.

Plant a Row for the hungry

http://www.gardenwriters.org/Par/

Hydroponic Garden Pots

These great pots use a soil-less potting medium and feed the plants hydroponically, allowing the roots to gather nutrients without using a lot of soil to do so, and allowing the gardener to grown a large amount of plants and veggies in a small space.

http://www.cleanairgardening.com/hydroponic.html

lazy gardening

use any land you may have in the city to grow food.

Someone else does all the work, you get fresh veggies...

http://www.myfarmsf.com/about.html

green lawnmower you can build yourself

it's not cheap!

http://www.arttec.net/Solar_Mower/Parts/List.htm

Rebates for Gardening

Gardening Green Week

Some counties like Santa Clara offer big rebates (Up to $1000 for residential landscapes!) for landscaping with drought-tolerant plants (off of their approved plant list) so you cut back or eliminate water usage in the garden.

Gardens

Gardening Green Week

Jepson Herbaria - Berkeley http://ucjeps.berkeley.edu/

Overfelt Gardens Native Plant and Wildlife sanctuary 368 Educational Park Drive, San Jose, Ca 95133http://www.sjparks.org/Parks/Regional%20Parks/OverfeltGardens0107.asp

Filoli Gardens 86 Canola Road Woodside CA (650) 364-8300 x507 http://www.filoli.org/

Strybing Arboretum Golden Gate Park 9th Avenue and Lincoln WaySan Francisco CA 94122 (415) 661-1316 http://www.sfbotanicalgarden.org/

U.C. Berkeley Botanical GardenCentennial Drive Berkeley CA 94720(510) 643-2755 http://botanicalgarden.berkeley.edu/

East Bay Regional Botanical Garden Tilden Regional Park Wildcat Canyon Road Berkeley CA 94708 (925) 631-6614 for events and classeshttp://www.nativeplants.org/

Sierra Azul Nursery and Gardens 2660 East Lake Avenue (Hwy 152) Watsonville, CA 95076 (831) 763-0939 http://www.sierraazul.com/

U.C.S.C. Arboretum U.C. Santa Cruz Santa Cruz CA 95064 (408) 427-2998www2.ucsc.edu/arboretum/

Gardening Groups

Garden Green Week

California native Plant Society
http://www.cnps.org/

Master Gardeners
http://mastergardeners.org/

Nurseries

Garden Green Week

Bay Area nurseries with CA Natives:

- Annies Annuals (Richmond)
- Natives Here Nursury (Berkeley)
- Orchard Nursury (Lafayette)
- Yerba Buena Nursery (Woodside)
- Mostly Natives (Marin)
- California Nursery (Fulton [Santa Rosa])


Wholesale:
Native Son (So. Cal)
Las Pilitas (So. Cal)
North Coast Native Nursery (Petaluma)

Gardening with natives

Very few of the nurseries that carry native plants seem to be open on the weekends for any length of time.

I was feeling a little down about my goal of creating a hummingbird/butterfly garden with CA Natives, but this weekend, I actually found some. I revisited a nursery I had previously not thought well of (visiting them in January is apparently not a good time). and they had two sections of CA natives. on was tucked way back in the carner, and had 4" pots of plants, not a huge selection, but enough (I bought 3 - a california fuscia, a scarlet monkey flower, and chinese houses plant)and then there was a larger section with 1 & 5 gallon pots that were more shrubs and trees.

Then, I noticed that one of the pots I bought form that nursury had the name of another nurseury in the area that I had been menaing to go to annie annuals, and seeing that Annies carried CA natives, made me want to go there.

Annies is HUGE! and they have a larger section of CA natives I bought about 7 CA Natives (and 3 non-natives for another place in my garden). I'm feeling much better about my plan now.

Interesting blog on veggie growing

A canadian blog with some good links!

http://veggie.ca/profile/index.html

Urban Farm

1/10 acre farm in Pasadena, CA

http://pathtofreedom.com/

Horticultural Blog

A blog by the suthor of the book above, it looks like a british book, but the blog is informative and interesting.


http://perrone.blogs.com/

Growing Vegetables

I didn't realize that our frost date was so early here in Cali. I'm behind on planting my veggies (well some of them).

I found a link to the Farmer's Almanac Frost calendar http://www.almanac.com/garden/frostus.php check out the frost date for your area. If you are planting seeds, you should start some plants indoors read your packet for specific instructions (ususlly 4-6 weeks prior to the last frost date in your area.

Ball seed starters

http://www.ballseed.com/SH_ellepot.aspx

Ordered Seeds

I ordered some seeds from Parkseed, they should arrive next week. I ordered a bunch of organic vegitable seeds, and then some perennial flowers for a butterfly/hummingbird garden I want to plant in the front yard.

My plan is to plant them soon in planting trays that I have left from last year's purchases, and when those run out, I'll make paper oragami cups, or use used paper cups for planting. Then I'll be able to give away extra plants that I won't be using.

Abby Poulette's blog

Who's Abbey Paulette you ask? well she's the web editor for organic gardening, and her blog is great.

http://www.goodnplanty.com/