HOME AND GARDEN
The Gardener’s Sweet Spot
June, June, June! The month every gardener spends the rest of the year dreaming about. The longest days of the year. Generally reasonable weather with frosts behind us and droughts/flash floods still to come. And, after months of planning, sowing, potting up, and planting out, the garden is a go. We have finally hit the sweet spot. So time to sit back and enjoy the fruits of your labor? I don’t think so!
It may seem that the heavy lifting has been done by now, […]
Bringing the Outside In
For the two years I have been writing this column (how time flies), the focus has always been on sustainable seasonal flowers: how to grow them, where to source them, and why they are so important in our quest to reduce our great environmental clod-hopping footprint. Today is no different; although this month we are going to talk about the absolute joy of bringing the outside in, of why and how to bring all this seasonal beauty inside, as well as some tips on arranging […]
Important Lessons for the Growing Season
I love the April environment edition of Main Street Magazine. For it means I get to shout my mantra as the headline and not have to bury it subtly in the text! Readers, flowers are meant to symbolize love, sympathy, joy, and celebration, not be the poster child for massive carbon footprints, with a sideline in social injustice. Yes, you imported flowers, grown in artificial conditions, doused in chemicals for growth and storage, refrigerated and flown, I’m talking about you!
Pom’s soapbox
Nobody loves a flower more […]
Bear Creek Farm Nurtures Beauty from the Ground Up
“Up to this point, I had a black thumb,” laughed Debra Kaye, owner of Bear Creek Farm in Stanfordville, NY.
Bear Creek Farm first began when Debra was getting married in 2013 and needed someplace to get flowers from for the wedding. She asked a friend who owned a flower shop in Southampton, but he declined because Stanfordville was too far away for him to deliver. Instead, he urged Debra to start growing her own flowers on her land.
“So I […]
BIG FLOWERS AND BIG HEARTS AT TINY HEARTS FARM
Ask any flower farmer what is the most common misconception they hear about their business and nine times out of ten it will be “your fields must look so beautiful when they are all in full bloom.”
The thought of a field of billowing flowers? Well, that’s enough to make a flower farmer cry. Flowers blown fully open are flowers that are not going to harvest, store, or ship well – and are certainly not going to last long in the vase for the customers […]
THE KEY TO THE 2024 SEASON IS – GARDEN PLANNING
Congratulations – we made it through January! Now we’ve just got February and March to get through and we’re home free and back out in the garden. I’m guessing most people have not yet given a huge amount of thought to the garden so far this year. As I’m writing this, mine is deep under a foot of snow. It’s easy to think of winter as the down, even dead, time for gardening.
Physically, yes, it is. But it’s a fool who will live to […]
Gardening For Your Health
Ahh January – here you are again. My favorite month – not! Horrible weather, not enough daylight, no outside gardening, and all those infernal good intentions. Not that there is anything wrong with facing the new year with optimism, fortitude, and enthusiasm; it’s just that feeling come mid-February when we have maybe not kept on track, that is the problem.
While winning the lottery or looking like a Sports Illustrated cover girl may be some people’s heart’s desire for this year, it seems what most […]
