Mother Earth's Garden

Nasturtiums are one of my favorite cool weather blooms. They enjoy the cool weather of spring and fall. They’re fairly fast and easy to grow from seed, so now through August is a great time to sow a few Nasturtiums in your garden for fall color and blooms.
Use them to replace old plants, as you pull up spent plants from some of your other garden crops. They also work great for borders or containers.
If you plant a few Nasturtiums now they’ll reward you with beautiful red and orange blooms this fall. It’s not just their blooms that I love, …read more

2 Comments

I always enjoy nature’s colors year round, but I absolutely love it when she puts on her fall colors. Today I have a beautiful fall destination for gardening, and outdoor fans.
Morton Arboretum located near Chicago Illinois has over 4,000 plants, trees, and shrubs from around the world putting on their fall color show from early September through late October.
Check out the splendor of this Angelica tree.

The Japanese Maples are only one of the trees and shrubs putting on a grand fall show for any and all visitors.

With nature’s breathtaking show as a backdrop, the …read more

No Comments

I used to share gardening links here on a regular basis, but I haven’t posted too many links lately. I guess that’s part of being a gardener in the summer, there’s never enough time!
I have a fun website to share with you today. Ideal Bite is loaded with tips on the easiest produce to grow, container gardening, and anything to do with growing your own grub.

The site also has bite-size ideas for light green living, covering everything from biodynamic wine to organic cosmetics to seasonal recipes from local chefs.
It’s loaded with sassy fun ideas, that are perfect for …read more

No Comments

I love Monarch Butterflies. They seem to “arrive” in our area about this time of year and hang around until fall. I try to at least include some butterfly favorites in my garden and I keep my garden butterfly friendly by not using any chemical pesticides that could damage their delicate systems.
We always have plenty of milkweed, and thistle growing in our field to attract them. We also have plenty of butterfly weed, and a butterfly bush just for the Monarchs. The butterflies also love the bee balm, and Russian sage that are in full bloom this time of …read more

No Comments

This was the haul from yesterday from the garden. It doesn’t seem like much, and it’s way less than I usually have this time of year. We also have onions ready, but I’ve been going out and plucking them as I need them for cooking, since at this stage they’re still growing.
 
I’ve been picking the tomatoes when they start to turn ripe, because by the time they get ripe they start splitting and rotting on the bottom. I think it’s from the damp cool conditions we’ve had this summer.
I do have quite the variety of tomatoes going on though. …read more

1 Comment

I think the meadows and wildflower fields look like Mother Nature’s quilt this time of year, with beautiful flowers blooming in bright beautiful colors. Here is Mother Nature’s quilt from far away.

Here are some of the individual pieces of this meadow quilt. A few of the flowers she sowed together include, bee balm, black eyed susans, purple and white coneflowers, and chicory.

I’m not sure of the name of this flower? If anyone knows please let me know.

Isn’t it wonderful how Mother Nature sews all these wonderful pieces together to make her beautiful quilt?

No Comments

We’ve had a cool wet summer this year. The temperatures so far in July here in the Ohio Valley have been way below normal, with a couple days not even reaching 70`F.

It seems like it’s slowed my tomatoes way down. We’ve only had a few red tomatoes so far. I’m not really complaining too much. We usually have 90` and high humidity this time of year. It’s been kind of a nice break, if you’re partial to cooler weather.
The nights have been crisp and cool, and feel more like spring or fall. It’s been really nice to …read more

2 Comments

It’s that time of the year again. When I’m scurrying around, trying to preserve all the fruits and vegetables in my garden for later. The time when I have squash, green beans and other produce overflowing on my counters and in my fridge.

Over the last couple years I’ve written several posts on how to preserve part of that harvest, with some yummy recipes thrown in there too. I thought I’d revisit some of those posts since we’ll all soon be in a canning and freezing frenzy.

Hot Pepper Jam
Freezing Peppers
My grandma’s recipe for canning red  beets
Freezer Pickles
Zucchini cobbler
Freezing Blueberries

I’ll …read more

1 Comment

I mentioned the other day that we just returned from a trip to North Carolina. I already showed you the beautiful Crepe Myrtle trees in full bloom, but I wanted to show you some other images I captured while I was there. North Carolina is in zones 7 and 8, so they’re much warmer year round than my zone 5 Ohio garden.
I’m so jealous of some of the fabulous plants they can grow there year round. I would love to be able to grow palm trees.

Or keep hibiscus outside all year round.

I saw this fabulous rosemary …read more

1 Comment

The butterflies love the Russian Sage in my garden when it’s in full bloom, and I do to. It’s stunning tiny purple blooms blend together to look like a purple wave.

Whenever the Russian Sage is in full bloom I always see butterflies and humming birds hovering around the blooms.
Russian Sage is easy to grow. It enjoys full sun, and well drained soil. The plant gets a little bigger each year, but doesn’t spread so much that it’s overwhelming. It is a tall sprawling plant, so you’ll want to give it room to grow if you add it to …read more

No Comments