From Ancient Egypt King Tut is alive and well, very well in fact. I’ll cut to the chase: This particular King Tut is a variety of papyrus (Cyperus papyrus) that I planted a year ago in spring. Papyrus doesn’t tolerate temperatures down to freezing, so this far north King Tut is billed as an annual. […]
Row, Row, Row My Boat, and Then! Paddling down a creek — Black Creek in Ulster County, New York — yesterday evening, I was again awed at Mother Nature’s skillful hand with plants. The narrow channel through high grasses bordered along water’s edge was pretty enough. The visual transition from spiky grasses to the placid […]
Why Are Pots Thirsty? With recent rains of more than 3 inches over the last couple of days, you’d think that the last thing on my mind would be having to water anything. But you’d be wrong. Plants in pots — and I have plenty of them, some ornamental and some tropical and subtropical fruits […]
Also on that same date, at the same location, in the morning . . . a presentation on: THE SCIENCE, ART, FUN, AND TASTY FRUIT OF ESPALIER Come and explore the theory and the practice behind the pruning and orienting of branches to create an espalier. This decorative form offers high yields of high quality […]
Some (Only) Like It Cooked Before the black currant (Ribes nigrum) season totally winds down, I suggest you try to get a taste of the fresh berries. Do so if you’ve never tasted them. And do so even if you have tasted them and found them bad tasting. Why taste them if you haven’t? Because […]
Past is Present . . . No! . . . Present is Future Gardening is so much about planning for the future. Dropping seemingly dead, brown specks into a seed flat in spring in anticipation of juicy, red tomatoes in summer is fun and exciting. But now, in the glory of summer, I don’t particularly […]
(The following is a adapted from my recent book, The Ever Curious Gardener: Using a Little Natural Science for a Much Better Garden, available through the usual outlets as well as, signed, from me at www.leereich.com/books.) Plants’ Dilemma in Beating the Heat Last week, with a spell of dry weather, I wrote about irrigation; then […]
Too Much or Too Little? The current deficit of rainfall reminds me of the importance of watering — whether by hand, with a sprinkler, or drip, drip, drip via drip irrigation — in greening up a thumb. Not that watering is definitely called for here in the “humid northeast;” historically, cultivated plants have gotten by […]
Green Thumb Not Necessary Every day, for some time now, my strawberry bed has yielded about five cups, or almost 2 pounds of strawberries daily. And that from a bed only ten feet long and three feet wide, with a double row of plants set a foot apart in the row. Good yield from a […]
