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May 18-19: The Unusual Tropicals and Annuals Sale at The Scott Arboretum

Jessie Keith — Mon, 13 May 2013 18:23:00 GMT

Image care of The Scott Arboretum

Plant lovers in the Philadelphia area would be remiss to miss the Unusual Tropicals and Annuals Sale at The Scott Arboretum on the campus of Swarthmore College. The public event will be held on Saturday, May 18th (noon to 3:00 pm) and Sunday, May 19th (10:00 am to 2:00 pm). Arboretum members and Tropical Sale Special Friends get the advantage of sale previews.

Featuring over 200 wonderful and hard-to-find tropicals, tender perennials and annuals, this sale will be certain to have something new and unusual for every plant enthusiast. A bevvy of plant experts will also be on hand to answer questions, and there will be specialty container plantings for the winning. Plants are offered in limited quantities, so get there early!

Brickwalk Tulips Aglow

Jessie Keith — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 18:42:23 GMT

Last Saturday was tulip day at Longwood Gardens. I've never seen the place so hopping with people, apart from Christmas time when the crowds are unbearable. Everyone came out to see the Brickwalk tulips in their prime, and the sunny clear blue day made the flowers absolutely glow. Despite the hundreds of people at the garden, I managed to get a few shots that made it look deceivingly quiet and peaceful.

Ahhh back to reality.

Gardening in Late-Term Pregnancy (or Watermelon Belly Gardening)

Jessie Keith — Sun, 21 Apr 2013 18:09:00 GMT

I found this two-and-a-half-year-old unpublished blog while managing and re-organizing past blogs. It was fun to read with pregnancy far behind me. I'll never forget the raging heat of that summer. It kept throwing me into Braxton Hicks contractions. Anyway, I decided the piece deserved publishing after all this time.

(Originally written on August 25, 2010 just two weeks before birthing my second daughter. )

This morning as I crawled along in the hot sun weeding, my eight month preggy belly weighing every move and making me feel like a pot bellied pig rooting in the dirt, I questioned whether I'd overdone it again this year garden-wise.

In winter, I become crazy for spring and dream of being Mrs. Health-Conscious Super Mom supplying wholesome, fresh produce to my family. When all the seed catalogs hit the mailbox, I get excited (too excited) and buy and plan like a fiend. It all seems harmless when the first indoor seeds get planted, but by the time real outdoor work starts, reality sets in. The work load generally peaks by mid to late-summer. It's hard work getting everything weeded, fed, watered and picked. Add in a toddler, full time work, a house to manage and late-term pregnancy, and the garden starts to feel daunting--especially in the hottest days of summer when tomatoes, melons, peppers, eggplant, cucumbers and squash produce nonstop.

It's easy to understand why so many of my fellow community gardeners at Bellevue State Park Community Garden are in their later years unencumbered by school age children. Admittedly I feel a twinge of jealousy seeing them relaxing in lawn chairs under the trees with cool drinks in hand, chatting about this year's crop of 'Big Boy' tomatoes or 'Dr. Martin's' lima beans. Then again, I adore motherhood when it doesn't make me feel like a lumbering watermelon woman only able to move in slow motion.

Trials and tribulations aside, the work's got to get done. I'm wayyy too proud to let my beds become total weed patches (I'm a professional gardener dammit! I can do this no matter what. Right?). So, that means early mornings and evenings watering, weeding, and picking because there's no wayyyy I'm going out in the humid hot hell of the 2010 Delaware summer. And as long as I sprinkle a little BT on the kale for cabbage loopers or pick off the occasional Colorado potato beetle from my eggplants, I'm taking care of the pest problems. Right? (Ignore the yucky Mexican bean beetles and striped cucumber beetles.)

On the plus side, my nearly four-year-old daughter has been lots of fun and a real help in the garden. Her favorite endeavor is picking cherry and currant tomatoes (Lycopersicon pimpinellifolium) for collecting and eating. And she always manages to find cool, shaded garden spots to nestle down in. The shaded, straw-lined allee created by our monstrous caged tomatoes is a very pleasant place to sit and enjoy a cool drink away from the sun.

In my earlier blog about gardening while pregnant, I forgot to mention preggy gardeners should plant high and trellis anything trellisable. It's tough to bend down over and over to pick enough beans for supper (go pole!) or watermelons, for that matter. And, forget about leaving the garden with any semblance of cleanliness or dignity. Weeding means plopping down and scooting or crawling along from one weed to the next. (I tried a little garden scooty chair for the compromised and didn't like it.) Wielding a hose while so frontally girthy is a disaster. One can't avoid muddy hose lashes. Oh the things we learn.

Spectral Scarecrows

Jessie Keith — Sun, 21 Apr 2013 17:21:45 GMT

The resident scarecrows at The Bellevue State Park community garden have a flair for the strange and macabre. But I can't help but like them. (As long as they don't hop down and start singing, "if I only had a brain.")

"I could while away the hours, conferrin' with the flowers consultin' with the rain"

Miniature Daffodils

Jessie Keith — Tue, 16 Apr 2013 22:23:43 GMT

Sniffing a tiny 'Minnow' flower

There's something about miniature anything that draws kids, and every year my 'Minnow', 'Hawara', and 'Baby Moon' just cry out to be picked by the little ones. They also make the prettiest fairy bouquets and are easy-as-pie to grow.

There are lots of daffodils or jonquils that are very tiny. My favorites have wonderfully small flowers with even teenier coronas (central crowns). Usually the delicate 'Minnow', with its tiny orange corona and pale tepals, blooms first followed by the nodding primrose yellow 'Hawara' and crazy small golden 'Baby Moon', but this year bloom times are wacky, and they all flowered at once.

This fall I plan to expand upon my mini daffy plantings. The must-plant list includes the floriferous and tiny 'Little Flik' along with the pale yellow and cream 'Pipit.'

Brent and Becky's Bulbs carries a lot of miniature daffodils worth having as does Van Engelen.

Small colored bottles and jars make pretty vases

The impossibly small flowers of 'Baby Moon' are the size of my fingertips.

A sweet vase of 'Hawara' blooms

What's the Hybrid Hullabaloo?

Jessie Keith — Sun, 07 Apr 2013 22:54:45 GMT

The 2012 AAS winning Faerie Hybrid watermelon is one I will try this year. Image from the AAS

Why do mutts stay healthier and live longer? Why does hybrid sweet corn taste sweeter? Why do hybrid lilies have bigger flowers? Why do hybrid tomatoes exhibit more disease and pest resistant? The answer is hybrid vigor or heterosis (the tendency for a crossbred organism to have qualities superior to those of either parent), and for some reason it has developed a bad rap.

In the seed world, heterosis is nature's way of saying, "Mix up those genes!" Not all hybrids exhibit heterosis (some even exhibit outbreeding depression), but those that do have a clear advantage in the field. This is one of the first things students learn in plant genetics class. So why do so many garden seed companies now advertise: "NO HYBRIDS! Hybrid-free seed! Only safe healthy seeds sold here." I'm not sure. Maybe it sells well, but logistically it makes no sense.

"There's no reason why consumers can't happily grow both home selected variants and expertly selected hybrids."

Heirlooms are touted as the more diverse alternative, but new hybrids are equally diverse and there's no reason why consumers can't happily grow both home selected variants and expertly selected hybrids. Anyway, "open pollinated" does not equal "non-hybrid" but instead means seed is a result of random cross- or self-fertilization. And many cultivated crops like tomatoes are not genetically diverse to begin with.

Either way, the bad press inspired me to make the case for garden variety hybrids, which is all gardening consumers can get. (GE seed is only available to farmers growing for big agriculture. Garden seed companies don't sell it and never have.)

Plant hybrids have been essential to us since the beginning. For thousands of years farmers have intentionally or unintentionally used selection, hybridization, and in some cases heterosis, to push crops towards greater yields and more desirable fruits. Selection for bigger, better grains, fruits and flowers has led to apples, wheat, rice, tomatoes, corn and roses as we know them today, among other essential food crops. Without genetic mutation, selection and hybridization, we would not have broccoli, cauliflower, or head cabbage (all human-made variants of Brassica oleracea). Heterosis has even been key in the breeding of honeybee lines.

"In many ways, hybrids are greener because they require less care."

When modern genetics came into being, contemporary plant breeders tapped into a good thing. Hybrids exhibiting heterosis naturally produce higher yields, more nutritive crops, and tend to be naturally more disease and pest resistant and resilient to environmental stresses, like heat and drought. In many ways, hybrid crops are greener because they require less care and make organic gardening more productive and easier.

So why the negative press? Poor information and faddishness seems to be the culprit behind the hybrid hullabaloo. Conspiracy theorists, wrangling with the GE crops controversy and influenced by the glut of engrossing but grossly inaccurate information available on the web, have wrapped new breeding technologies up with old and damned the whole lot. The truth is hybrid plants have been with us since the ages and continue to influence our lives every day. None of us could live without them.

"Keep hype out of the garden."

That's why I maintain a balance in my organic garden. I love heirlooms, and even collected my own heirloom seed, but I also grow hybrids to ensure my bases are covered. I plant for fun, quality produce and keep hype out of the garden. There have been plenty of years when my heirloom tomatoes have succumbed to virus or blight while my hybrids continued producing good fruit. The same with heirloom and virus-resistant hybrid cucumbers, peppers and squash. Mixing it up is good. Both heirlooms and hybrids are good for the garden and table and exist in the garden peaceably.

A good starter book on the subject is Noel Kingsbury's book Hybrid: The History and Science of Plant Breeding. It provides a well-rounded history of plant hybrids and their influence. I also enjoyed a NY Times article that came out a couple of years ago titled Heirloom Seeds or Flinty Hybrids by Michael Tortorello because it provided a look at the political and social underpinnings of the anti-hybrid movement. I also try to keep track of studies that give us greater and greater understanding of what plant heterosis is and how it works.

"Both heirlooms and hybrids are good for the garden and table and exist in the garden peaceably."

'Blaze' is another hybrid I will invite into my garden this year. Image from the AAS

Kew's Millennium Seed Bank: Saving the World's Seeds

Jessie Keith — Fri, 22 Mar 2013 14:19:37 GMT

(Photo Courtesy of Kew Gardens)

On my one and only visit to Kew Gardens in 2002, I sat with a group of Kew researchers musing over the vision and value of the Millennium Seed Bank. Some called it a "white elephant" while others saw it as Kew's most important project. I agree with the latter judgement. Some of the world's most naturally diverse regions are the most under threat for extinctions and loss of genetic diversity, making protective banks of seeds increasingly important. To drive this home, Kew postulates that one in five of the world's plant species faces extinction. That's dire.

The Millennium Seed Bank Partnership is the largest off-site seed bank project in the world partnering with over 50 countries across the globe. So far they have banked 10% of the world's seeds for wild populations. This is an awesome achievement. Even more lofty, they aim to bank 25% of the world's bankable seeds by 2020.

These numbers should impress because seed banking is a difficult, complex, time consuming, expensive business. Each seed has its own biology and window of viability. In fact, the seeds of many tropicals are very difficult to bank and only have a viability window of days or weeks. Imagine trying to keep maintain viable banks of seeds for tens of thousands of different plants with unique and challenging seed viability windows! From seed collection to cleaning and storage to producing new seeds, its a long, daunting process.

And seed banks like the MSB serve the world community every day (they're not just for doomsday scenarios). Banked seeds are actively used to restore destroyed and damaged natural areas worldwide, and seed banks provide plant researchers across the globe invaluable access to their seeds and expertise. Even everyday gardeners can learn how to save and bank their own seeds at banks like the MSB.

There are lots of ways to support the Millennium Seed Bank. The easiest way is to give by adopting a species. US dollars are also accepted and converted. I also encourage folks to sign up for the Kew News Alert, which always provides interesting news and unexpected articles about the world of seeds and plants.

Organic Soils and Fertilizers (or OMRI and Veriflora Certifications)

Jessie Keith — Sun, 24 Feb 2013 14:19:20 GMT

My new job with Sun Gro Horticulture has me deeply immersed in the potting soil and fertilizer industries. In a short time, I've learned a lot about certification processes with respect to environmental and organic status--namely what constitutes an organic soil or fertilizer and what distinguishes it as "sustainable."

Most gardeners don't check when they buy growing amendments, fertilizers or potting media, but some are better for the environment than others. The first step in determining approved organic status for a medium is looking for an OMRI (Organic Materials Review Institute) listing. In 1997 the Organic Materials Review Institute was founded to provide organic manufacturers, growers, suppliers and certifiers a rigorous independent product review that complies with USDA organic standards. And the process is truly rigorous. All of a company's processes and products are scrutinized for organic integrity under the OMRI List process, so growers can be confident they are truly growing with approved organic materials.

A Veriflora Certification delivers something different. Veriflora is a seed to store agricultural sustainability certification program. Specifically, the certification determines: 1. Environmental Sustainability; 2. Social and Economic Sustainability; and 3. Product Integrity. Like OMRI, Veriflora is a neutral third party entity with no vested interest in the companies they certify, so consumers can count on the integrity of the certification.

Gardeners interested in organic growing and sustainability should look for these certifications before buying potting media or fertilizers because they provide a better way to grow.

Cultural Step-By-Step: Tomatoes

Jessie Keith — Sat, 23 Feb 2013 22:07:35 GMT

Tomatoes are the most popular warm-season crop but can be surprisingly tricky to tend to full productive glory. They require at least 6 hours of full sun per day, are fertilizer and water hogs, and produce fruit most vigorously when days are warm (between 78 and 92 degrees Fahrenheit) and nights moderately warm (at least 70 degrees Fahrenheit). Vining (indeterminate) types require caging or trellising, while bush (determinant) types may or may not need staking, and both benefit from seasonal pruning. For temperate growers, late winter is the best time to plant homegrown tomato plants from seed for spring planting.

Tomatoes come in all colors, shapes, and sizes and flavor is surprisingly variable. In my family's garden we choose a couple of slicers, sauce tomatoes, salad tomatoes and cherries each year. This year's pickings include the American heirloom bicolored slicer 'Virginia Sweet', French salad tomato 'Crimson Carmello', and orange and yellow beefsteak 'Gold Medal'. Our sauce tomatoes are the Italian powerhouses 'Franchi's Italian Pear' and 'San Marzano Redorta', and our cherries include the sweet sweets 'Orange Paruche', 'Sun Gold' and 'Chadwick's Cherries.' All are beautiful and have exceptional flavor.

A jolly tomato harvest from a couple of years back with 'Speckled Roman', 'Franchi's Italian Pear', 'Gold Medal' among them.

Common Name: Tomato

Botanical Name: Lycopersicon esculentum (syn. Solanum lycopersicum L. var. lycopersicum)

Days to Harvest: 65 to 85 days after planting

Light: Full sun

Soil: Rich, porous, friable loam

Common Problems: Tomato hornworms, damping off caused by Pythium and Phytophthora fungi, cool temperatures (cause fruit toughness, cat-facing, and stop productivity), Colorado potato beetles, blossom end rot (a physiological disorder caused by calcium deficiency), splitting/cracking (Caused when plants get excessive water or temperatures dramatically fluctuate when mature or nearly mature fruits are on the vine.)

Planting Time: After the last frost date in temperate zones.

Fertilization: Feed at planting time with an organic fertilizer formulated for tomatoes, as these always contain sufficient calcium. Your fertilization regime will vary based on the fertilizer you choose.

Days to Harvest Timeline:

Starting Seeds

It takes around six to eight weeks to grow tomatoes from seed to plantlet. Start seeds indoors for best results. In 5 to 12 days your tomato seeds should germinate. Germination is best in warm temperatures (68° and 75° Fahrenheit (20-24° Celcius)). A heat mat for seed starting will dramatically hasten tomato seed germination. Sow seeds in cells filled with seedling mix and lightly sprinkle a bit on top to cover. Gently moisten the cells with water and place right under the warmth of grow lights. (For full details see Veggie Seed Starting.)

Tending Seedlings
Tomato seedlings are very delicate and have two lanceolate seed leaves. True leaves start to appear in 2 to 3 days. Continue to keep plants lightly moist and feed lightly with diluted all-purpose fertilizer, once the seed leaves have appeared. To avoid leaf burn, lift grow lights up as seed leaves get closer to the bulbs.
(*Grower's warning: Don't allow soil to be saturated. Wet soil can encourage fungal disease and cause seedlings to rot or "damp off.")

Moving Small Plants
Small plants should be around 8 to 10 inches tall after 42 to 56 days and garden ready. Before planting outdoors, plantlets need to be hardened off for at least a week. (Hardening off means acclimating seedlings from their cushy indoor growing conditions to the windy, sunny outdoors where temperatures fluctuate greatly. Indoor grown seedlings are very tender, have weak stems and need time to adjust to full sun. If directly planted outdoors they will fry.)

Amend planting beds by digging and turning the soil deeply and adding rich compost and organic granular fertilizer formulated for tomatoes. Plant around 4 feet apart and mulch with a two to three inch layer of compost. Young plants can be planted deep, with only a couple of nodes with foliage above ground, but leaves should be gently removed from all stem parts that will be covered with soil. Indeterminate tomatoes should be fitted with a sizable tomato cage right away. Water regularly to keep plants moist, not wet. Days to harvest vary, but plants usually begin to bear fruit 65 to 85 days after planting.

Tomato cages are most essential for indeterminate tomatoes and support vines and fruits.

Container Growing
Tomatoes are such aggressive feeders and water hounds, you have to give serious attention to container grown plants. Start with a really large pot. (Here's a cute 20 gallon one on Etsy.) Determinant tomatoes are best, but indeterminants will work too if you keep them caged and pruned. A good organic water-holding potting soil is perfect for container culture. Container grown tomatoes need to be watered daily and fed more frequently, but if you give them ample attention, they should thrive and produce beautifully.

Harvesting Mature Plants
Tomatoes can be harvested green for fried green tomatoes and chutney, but they are best picked fully colored and ripe. Some tomatoes are naturally easy to pull from the vine when mature, while others like to cling to the vine. I always keep a pair of harvest sheers on hand for clingers. If you accidentally harvest a few fruits with a bit of green, let them stand on a sunny window for a couple of days and they will ripen up right away.

Some good pickings from last year's garden.

Preparing Tomatoes
This is the easy part. Lavish burgers with big, hearty tomato slices, eat them fresh in salads or make homemade tomato sauce and salsa. To extend the season, we freeze tomatoes and sauce for winter, but this requires at least 10 healthy tomato plants to provide enough to put up.

A mix of 'Snow White', 'Matt's Wild Cherry' and 'Sweet Million' cherry tomatoes in a salad.

Thank You Proven Winners

Jessie Keith — Sat, 02 Feb 2013 13:19:07 GMT

I wanted to extend a thanks to Proven Winners for sharing a needed image of their reblooming lilac Bloomerang Purple® for my latest article titled "Lovely Lilacs", which will appear in the May issue of The Old House Journal. It's a beautiful, unique lilac that will rebloom throughout the growing season where summers are moderate. To learn more about this attractive lilac, view the Proven Winners video below.

Bloomerang Purple® in full glory (image by Proven Winners)

2012 Vegetable Successes

Jessie Keith — Mon, 14 Jan 2013 19:46:44 GMT

The 2012 summer growing season was a trial. Scorching heat and drought placed an exceptional challenge on garden vegetables, and the unusually warm winter kept garden critter populations at an all time high. So I am proud to recommend any of the new vegetables I tried that managed to thrive in my garden last year.

2012 was the year of the hardshell gourd, and all my gourds proliferated with zeal. If you ever need a large trellis plant that will stay lush and green through harsh summer weather, choose a Lagenaria siceraria cultivar. I've yet to find one that's not adapted to high heat and drought. My favorites were the miniature bottle gourds, 'Mini' (`2") and 'Mini Mini' (`4"). The bowl-shaped 'Large Corsica' and three-foot-long 'Snake' were also fun and super cool. The gourd seeds came from Foothills Farm, and all were high quality and true to description.

Drying 'Mini' gourds all in a row.

Hot weather quickly made the carrots taste strong and gamey. The most successful heat-resistant cultivar was the long, straight, palest yellow 'Lunar White.' The roots looked pretty and were slow to bolt, despite the scorching weather, but they were not good for fresh eating. Instead I sliced and cooked them up with peas. When prepared in this manner they were tasty.

High heat made these 'Lunar White' carrots taste strong and gamey.

I have several tomato standbys ('San Marzano Redorta', 'Franchi's Red Pear', 'Gold Medal' and 'Sungold'), which leaves room for only a couple of new cultivars each year. Of last year's new trial plants, I grew the medium, red and yellow bicolored 'Tye-Dye' slicing tomato and the deep orange beefsteak, 'Goldie.' The 'Tye-Dye' tomatoes were hugely prolific and pretty, but their mildly tart and sweet flavor was average. On the other hand, 'Goldie' produced very delicious fruits with a full, robust sweet flavor, though the plants were not as prolific as I would have liked. Still, I would grow 'Goldie' again. (All my tomatoes thrived in the hot weather.)

A mix of tomatoes from last year including small, gold and red 'Tye-Dye' (top center).

For hot sauce making, I grew four different hot to hottish peppers. The most prolific of these was the relatively mild Habanero lookalike 'Trinidad Spice', but sadly its peppers tasted like peppery fuel oil and burning rubber to me. I made one pot of sauce with them and tossed it. The Serrano Tampiqueno chile peppers I grew were nearly as prolific and very tasty--both fresh and cooked in sauce. When mixed with the deepest red, very flavorful and sweet 'Jimmy Nardello' peppers, the sauce tasted even better. Finally, I grew lots of big, glossy, deep green 'Ancho San Martin' peppers, which had a slight kick and lots of flavor. All were A+ except for the yucky tasting 'Trinidad Spice' fruits.

Pepper pickings including the puckered yellow 'Trinidad Spice', which tasted terrible.

It was not a good year for cucumbers largely due to excessive numbers of cucumber beetles and the incredible heat stress placed on the plants. The only cultivar that marginally stood up to the onslaught was the Persian baby cucumber 'Green Fingers.' It produced enough small, crunchy, sweet, seedless cucumbers for a couple of dishes of cucumber salad. I plan to grow them again this season in hopes that the weather and the beetles will be a little kinder.

The new beet I grew turned out to be an outstanding selection for greens as well as roots. The Franchi Sementi Egyptian heirloom 'Egitto Migliorata' produces flattened beets that are very sweet with little to no earthy flavor. I quickly discovered that the beet greens are also sweet and delicious and the plants wonderfully heat tolerant. I left several beets in the ground all summer and they continued to produce delicious greens past the first frost. I highly recommend this superior beet!

For years I've wanted to grow the melon 'Zatta', so I broke down and finally bought the pricy seeds. Each vine only produced a few small melons, but the fruits were sweet, fragrant and a lot of fun for the kids to pick. I will plant this one again. (Read to full blog about 'Zatta'.)

My daughter holding the ugly but good 'Zatta' melon.

The only new kale I grew, 'Trochuda Beira', was absolutely prolific and stunning until the harlequin beetles decimated the plants in early to midsummer. (Read my full blog about harlequin beetles.) I worked very hard to save them but eventually decided it was not worth the time or energy. It was heartbreaking to watch such enormous, vigorous plants get sucked down to withering sticks.

Hopefully, the new year will bring milder weather, regular rain and the winter will freeze up a bit more to kill off some of those garden pests that are sure to return with a vengeance.

Excellent Gingerbread Cookies

Jessie Keith — Fri, 07 Dec 2012 13:27:41 GMT

For years I sought out the best gingerbread recipe and finally settled on an conglomerate of recipes gathered from a variety of places. Here's the recipe I fixed on:

Excellent Gingerbread

Wet Ingredients:

3/4 cup salted butter
3/4 cup sugar
3/4 cup dark molasses (not black strap! Grafschafter syrup is also good and makes a lighter cookie)
1/4 cup warm water

Dry Ingredients:

1/2 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons ground ginger
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon cloves
1/4 teaspoon ground cardamom
healthy pinch of salt
3 1/4 cups sifted flour

Cream butter and sugar until fluffy then mix in the molasses and water. Sift the dry ingredients then add them to the wet until fully combined. Flour your hands and pull the dough together into a flattened ball and chill for at least 12 hours.

Before you roll the cookies, preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Flour up a board and pin and cut your dough in two. Roll out the dough to around 1/4 inch thickness. Be sure to keep the board and pin floured to stop the dough from sticking. Cut out your shapes and reroll any excess dough, though try not to overwork it as this results in tough cookies.

Place the rolled cookies onto a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper and bake for eight to ten minutes, depending on how large or thick your cookies are. The less baked, the chewier the cookie. Allow the cookies to cool before decorating.

Make basic cookie icing in a variety of colors, gather the holiday sprinkles, and bring in the kids (if you have them) for some decorating fun.

Marian Keith's Ghoulish Christmas Pumpkins, 2012

Jessie Keith — Wed, 05 Dec 2012 11:55:29 GMT

Every year my sister, Marian Keith, decorates her grotesquely declining jack-o-lanterns and photographs them. It has become an eagerly awaited family holiday tradition. This year's photo does not disappoint. The blackened maws of the rotting squash just scream with Christmas cheer.

"Jack-o'-lanterns Wassailing" by Marian Keith

German Christmas Market Joys

Jessie Keith — Thu, 29 Nov 2012 14:52:35 GMT

Almost every sizable German town has a Weihnachtsmärkt. These glittering street markets ooze with good cheer. Smells of steaming glühwein and feuerzangenbowle (German mulled wine drinks), lebkuchen, roasted chestnuts, sizzling sausages, flammkuchen (German onion and ham pizza) and kartoffelpuffer (potato pancakes) scent the market labyrinths, tempting even the most picky eaters to dig in. And loads of craftsman selling beautiful handmade wares tempt visitors to open their pocketbooks and spend. But above all Weihnachtsmärkte are for children and may offer live music and performances, rides for the kids, and beautiful displays--usually with giant krippen (nativity scenes) and small petting zoos.

Every other year my family has the good fortune of visiting Weihnachtsmärkte in the northern cities of Hannover and Hameln, but this year we will have the new experience of visiting markets in the southern Rhine cities of Dusseldorf and Cologne. Apparently, the markets of the predominantly Catholic South are a bit different from those in the largely Lutheran North. We are very excited, and my girl's stockings will be all the better for it.

In the spirit of the holiday season, here are some happy Christmas Market pictures of ours from years gone by:

Hameln at Christmas

The Christmas Market in Hameln, Germany

Christmas market rides for the children

Seed Catalogs for Every Gardener

Jessie Keith — Tue, 13 Nov 2012 14:15:28 GMT

Seed catalog season is approaching, one of my favorite times of the year. It's the time when loads of catalogs enter the mailbox (or appear online) filled with new plants for the growing.

Seeds are a personal passion. I'm not embarrassed to say I have a box filled with a backlog of over 100 packets of seed--still viable. That doesn't stop me from investing in a new batch each year. With that in mind, I thought I'd share some of my favorite vendors. Some offer seed that's cheap but good ("cheap but good" vendors are marked with an asterisk), and most are Garden Watchdog approved.

Flower Seeds
Diane's Flower Seeds (Great selection, good prices and high quality)
Select Seeds (Unique and beautiful flowers and good quality seed)
Summer Hill Seeds

Heirloom &Vegetable Seeds
Baker Creek Heirloom Seed
Fedco*
Franchi Sementi (They give 5x the seed of any other vendor)
Johnney's Selected Seeds
Kitchen Garden Seeds
Pinetree Garden Seeds*
Renee's Garden Seeds
Seeds of Change
Seed Savers Exchange
St. Clare Heirloom Seeds
Territorial Seeds (They have a few negative GW reports, but I've always had good luck with their seed)
Turtle Tree Seed

Old-School Seed Vendors (The companies my grandparents bought from.)
Harris Seeds (Since 1879)
Gurney's Seeds & Nursery
J.W. Jung Seeds (Since 1907)
D. Landreth Seed Company (Since 1784)
Park Seed (Since 1868)
W. Atlee Burpee (Since 1881)

Unusual Seeds
J.L. Hudson, Seedsman (A wacky assortment of stuff)
Rare Exotic Seeds (They have a few negative GW reports, but an outstanding selection.)
Western Native Seed (A GREAT source for Penstemon seed.)

Woody Plant Seed
The Angelgrove Tree Seed Company
Sheffield's Seed Company

Native Plant Seed
For suppliers nationwide run a search on the NPIN native wildflower supplier search.

Rose Rosette Disease (RRD)

Jessie Keith — Wed, 07 Nov 2012 00:57:18 GMT

Roses infected with RRD develop shorter internodes and rough-textured, reddish leaves that are more linear.

Sometimes the best way to learn about a new plant disease is to see it for the first time in person. While passing a neighbor's rose, I noticed it had the most irregular tip growth imaginable. The unusually reddish leaves were dense, fine and the growth reminded me of a stunted witch's broom (a physiological abnormality caused by various diseases). I took a couple of photos of the strange shoots and leaves, took them home and quickly identified the problem via a basic Google search--Rose Rosette Disease (RRD).

There's a reason I didn't recognize it right away. This disease, which is thought to be caused by a virus spread by eriophyid mites, has only recently been troublesome to cultivated roses. It was originally found in 1940 on the invasive multiflora rose (Rosa multiflora), and to this species it is deadly. Data supports it is equally as deadly to garden roses--and Knock Out® roses have been shown to be particularly susceptible. As with most plant viral diseases, there is no cure for RRD.

There are lots of roses in my garden, so I'm hoping the disease won't come my way, but anything vectored by insects can't be contained forever. I wonder how much time I have?

Virginia Tech has a great write up on RRD. Give it a read.

Rosa 'Radcon' (PINK KNOCK OUT®) is one of the roses known to be sensitive to RRD

A rose branch infected with RRD showing witch's-broom-like growth.

Sandy Makes Mincemeat of Delaware Trees and Neighborhoods

Jessie Keith — Tue, 30 Oct 2012 18:37:23 GMT

A neighbor's tree fell engulfing their whole backyard! What a mess.

I had some ridiculous notion that Hurricane Irene had culled most of the trees destined to fall in our area, but it appears quite a few were just weakened for the next major hurricane to come. In our Wilmington, Delaware neighborhood loads of branches and trees fell last night due to Hurricane Sandy's high winds, which reached up to 40 miles per hour.

Lots of canopy branches were snapped.

The streets are a mess due to tree and water damage. Half of my neighborhood was without power for 17 hours last night. The other half still lacks power, so friendly neighbors are sharing their electricity as shown by the slew of electrical lines snaking across the road from one house to the next.

FEMA, local governments and the Red Cross are working around the clock to clean up the mess and help those in need. Please show them your support with a donation or volunteer help.

Lines connect neighbors with power to neighbors without.

My daughter doing a hurricane dance.

Someone's stray screen in the shrubbery.

Batten Down the Hatches for the "Frankenstorm"

Jessie Keith — Mon, 29 Oct 2012 13:42:24 GMT

The storm of storms is coming our way. Every business and school across Delaware will be closed, there's a driving ban, the bottled water has been almost completely sold out in stores for days, and the rain has been coming down since Sunday. It's hard to know how to prepare for storms like this. In the garden, we took in all the kid's outdoor toys, and placed outdoor potted plants in safe spots. I also picked the last of my pretty dahlias and tried to finish planting all my bulbs before the storm hit (not successfully). Otherwise we're stocked up and ready. Bring it on!

(Let's just hope Halloween is spared for the kids...)

High winds have just begun whipping about our trees and tall amaranths. The wind and rain also prematurely devastated the beautiful fall leaves on the trees.

Tasty Green Tomato Chutney

Jessie Keith — Fri, 19 Oct 2012 15:21:58 GMT

The last of the summer tomatoes always hang on the vine hard as rocks and pale green, but they are still useful. One great way to process them is by making green tomato chutney. An English favorite, this chutney is slightly spicy and sweet and tastes great on sharp cheddar cheese sandwiches or burgers. It can also be mixed with mayo for a sandwich spread.

Some might throw green tomatoes away, but what a waste! Green tomatoes can be fried or used to make chutneys or even green salsa.

Spicy Green Tomato Chutney

Ingredients

2½ pounds green tomatoes, washed, seeded and chopped

1 large sweet onion, finely chopped

1 cup sultanas (golden raisins), lightly chopped

1 cup light brown sugar

1 teaspoon freshly grated ginger

1/2 teaspoon ground allspice

1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

2 teaspoons salt

1 cup malt vinegar

1 large cayenne pepper quartered and seeded (spicier or milder peppers can be used)

Thoroughly mix all ingredients in a bowl and transfer to a large saucepan set to medium heat. Simmer and occasionally stir for 30 to 45 minutes until the chutney is caramelized and has cooked down to a moderately thick consistency. The chutney will become thicker as it cools. Keep warm on low heat until you are ready to aliquot and can the chutney. This recipe should make around five 4 oz jars worth.

Spitzkohl, Spitzkraut, Filderkraut or Funky Pointy Cabbage

Jessie Keith — Wed, 03 Oct 2012 13:30:29 GMT

The huge, funky heads of spitzkohl are drawn up to sharp points, making them look like huge teardrops or cone heads.

The unusual spitzkohl cabbage is a German heirloom just making its way into American gardens. In fact, last year was the first time I'd seen it highlighted in home and garden magazines where it was promoted as a decorative cabbage (For outdoor use only. Nobody wants their home smelling like old cabbage). But it also has exceptional crunch and a sweet cabbage flavor, which is why I like and grow it.

The cool, pointy heads take a long time to grow and develop, 100 to 160 days depending on the cultivar and growing environment (dwarf selections develop faster), so it's typically a fall crop. There are lots of American seed vendors that carry spitzkohl seed. The dwarf cultivar, 'Caraflex', is being sold at Johnny's Seeds and large-headed filderkraut is sold by Territorial Seed Company.

Fall is the best time of year for cabbage. Once the first light frost hits, the heads develop a pleasant sweetness and milder flavor and the leaves of spitzkohl are particularly crisp and sweet. Cabbage this good deserves to be made into slaw, but it’s also great for sauerkraut, cabbage rolls or soup.

The large heads are easier to work with if cut in half

One of my favorite basic slaw recipes is slightly sweet, a little vinegary and not too creamy, ideal for this tasty cabbage.

Spitzkohl Coleslaw

Dressing Ingredients:

1/3 cup vinegar
heaping teaspoon spicy German mustard (Lowensenf is best)
2 tablespoons good mayonnaise
1/4 cup sugar
1/3 cup canola oil
Salt and Pepper to taste
I dislike celery seed but it can be added to taste, if you like it.

Salad Ingredients:

1 small spitzkohl head cored and shredded (~6-7 cups)
2 tablespoons grated sweet onion
2 carrots peeled and grated

Mix veggies and dressing, and allow the salad to chill in the fridge for at least two hours. It tends to taste better the next day.

Spitzkohl slaw pairs well with fried golden redfish and potatoes.

Cabbage rolls are also popular with my family. Here's an authentic German recipe similar to the one my late mother-in-law made:

German Cabbage Rolls

Ingredients:

1 head spizkohl
1/2 pound ground pork
1/2 pound ground beef
1/4 cup fresh bread crumbs
1 egg
2 tablespoons mild German mustard
1 tablespoon fresh chopped parsley
2 chopped shallots
1 tsp salt
1 tsp pepper
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 tablespoons white wine
1/4 cup chicken broth
10 to 12 toothpicks

Steam the cabbage head whole, in a large enough pot to accommodate it, until the largest outer leaves become pliable enough to be removed and folded. You'll need around 10 to 12 leaves. Mix the meat, egg, mustard, parsley, shallots, salt and pepper until fully combined. Form into small, elongated patties around 3 inches long.

To make the rolls, place the patties at the base of the leaves, fold the leaves over and in and roll them as you would a burrito. It helps to hold finished rolls together with toothpicks--one pick per roll.

Place the olive oil in a pan set to medium heat and place the rolls in the pan. Allow them to caramelize for 5 minutes then add the broth and white wine. Reduce the heat to low and cover with a lid for around 10 minutes. Remove the lid, turn the rolls and allow the liquid to cook off. Once the rolls start to caramelize again, remove them from the pan and serve.