Grow Your Own Eat Your Own by Bob Flowerdew -Garden Book Review

A few days after Bulb by Anna Pavord arrived in the mail for me to review I got a copy of Grow Your Own Eat Your Own by Bob Flowerdew. While flipping through the pages I was charmed by the photography, design of the book and food styling for the recipes. Yes, I judge books by their cover and the whole look of the book is a bit of a shock for someone accustomed to the antiseptic (in a good way) design of books and magazines by Martha Stewart or Organic Gardening magazine. While they contain good information and are aesthetically pleasing, it sometimes bothers me to see hand models with perfectly manicured fingernails and oxford shirts in gardening publications. Where was I? Oh, yes.

Pink Adenium Obesum Flower

While I could consider this past summer a failure in the garden, for several reasons, one reason why it will go do down in history as one of the best growing seasons is because one of my Adenium Obesums was in bloom. It only had three blooms, but this pink Adenium Obesum flower was my favorite flower in the garden.

How To Collect Hollyhock Seeds

The first hollyhocks I grew in my garden were black hollyhocks in memory of an old neighbor who grew them when I was a kid. These hollyhocks were biennial, from seed they take two years to complete a life cycle, and I didn't save any seeds and so lost both of them.

Why didn't I save seeds from my hollyhocks? Not really sure why I didn't since hollyhock seeds are easy to collect. If you have a hollyhock in your garden that you really like, you should save some seeds from it every year and sow them.

Collecting and saving hollyhock seeds is very simple.

How to collect and save hollyhock seeds

How To Collect Hosta Seeds

Gardeners who grow hostas usually grow them for the foliage and because they lighten up shady gardens, but these perennial garden plants have just as impressive star-shaped flowers. The first hosta was introduced in my garden by way of seeds I swapped with another gardener online. In the fall I dug a small hole in the soil and placed the seeds, covering them with an inch or two of soil...the next spring I had hosta leafs!

I now have a couple of different hostas, all grown from seeds I collected once I learned how easy it was to gather and sow the seeds.

Hosta flower stalk: How to Collect Hosta Seeds.

How To Collect Calendula Seeds

Calendula is sometimes called pot marigold but shouldn't be confused with Marigolds from the genus Tagets. Since they are in the Asteraceae family they also don't develop a single seed pod that makes collecting seeds extremely easy for the beginner gardener/seed saver among us, but the seeds are just as relatively easy to locate as the Marigold seeds.

How to Collect Marigold Flower Seeds

Marigolds are common and inexpensive garden annuals, but that doesn't mean you can't, or shouldn't, collect seeds from your Marigold flowers for next year. This year was the first year in a really long time that I grew Marigolds in my garden. I grew them alongside a few vegetables and herbs as companion plantings. Over the weekend I found myself doing some cleaning in the garden and a took a few minutes to save a few seeds from my potted Marigolds for next year. Marigolds don't produce large or round seeds- which can make figuring out where the Marigold seeds are confusing for the beginner gardener or first time seed saver.

How To Plant Iris Rhizomes In Your Garden

This past weekend I transplanted a few clumps of "black" bearded irises in my garden. The first time I planted iris rhizomes I thought they were planted similar to canna rhizomes and planted them too deep in the soil. A couple of clumps of iris rhizomes never bloomed and some bloomed only sporadically over the next few years. While reading a garden book one day I learned that the reason for the poor flower production was probably due to planting the rhizomes too deep.

5 Funny Garden Articles in WWN

The next time you find yourself in the checkout line of your local grocery store skip the traditional gardening magazines and pick up a copy of Weekly Wold News to keep up with the most interesting gardening stories.

How To Collect Morning Glory Seeds

Morning glories are popular annual garden vines because they grow in a variety of soil conditions and in container gardens. The flowers usually last for a single morning and die in the afternoon, although on cloudy days, the flowers may last well into the early evening or night.Collecting and saving morning glory seeds from a vine in your garden, or one you may admire in another garden, is just as easy as growing them in your garden. Morning glories require very little attention in the garden and collecting seeds from a morning glory doesn't take any special knowledge.

Gardening Articles In Life Magazine-For FREE!

Google recently digitized the entire run of Life magazine as a weekly and made the archive available for free. I was curious if there was any content in this archive that would be of interest to gardeners and have found quite a bit. Some relevant at the time gardening news, tips, gardener, garden and plant profiles. Here are a few that I've found interesting in my searching over the past couple of days. If you find any that you particularly like feel free to share with the group.

Climbing Nasturtium "Moonlight"

A couple of years ago I saw pictures of a climbing Nasturtium in some garden magazines and was eager to grow this annual. Unfortunately, I'd never come across climbing nasturtium seeds for sale in the garden centers and nurseries I visit. One garden center was particularly brutal to visit. The seed rack display had pictures of climbing nasturtiums in a rustic garden, but no actual climbing nasturtium seeds for sale. This past spring when I acquired climbing nasturtium seeds from Renee's Garden seed company and was excited to grow them.

Lemon Cucumber

This past spring I got lemon cucumber seeds from Botanical Interests to grow in my garden. I decided to try the lemon cucumber seeds chosen because I'd never eaten one of these cucumber varieties before. Due to a series of gardening setbacks, I may not get a chance to eat a lemon cucumber this year, but I'm enjoying growing them.

I started my cucumber seeds late and then pretty much neglected the seedlings and planted them out even later. By the time the cucumber vines were about 10 inches long they were covered in blossoms, but there weren't many bees working in the garden. I watched as the blossoms unfurled, then withered without any signs of fruit being set. I panicked and started to hand-pollinate them, which has worked marvelously. Take that, stupid bees.

Lemon cucumber blossom & leaf.

How To Collect Four O' Clock Flower Seeds

Not far from my garden there is an empty lot with a hedge of Four O' Clocks that grow an flower like mad. I try not to pass the abandoned property very often because these plants just remind me just how much I stink at trying to get these seeds to germinate. I've tried for years to grow Four O' Clocks from seeds with little luck. On this abandoned property they grow in almost full sun, watered only by rain and they thrive.

The Seedy Side Of Independent Garden Center Show '09

Earlier in the week I attended the Independent Garden Center Show 2009 here in Chicago on the same site as the Chicago Flower & Garden Show. Over on Chicago Garden the first post is Independent Garden Center Show 2009. Followed by the post on products for gardening in small spaces, garden pots and planters, garden tools and plants and my favorite the Obama head planter. While the Independent Garden Center Show isn't open to the public I hope my posts give you an idea of what was on display and you may catch in garden centers in your area next year.

Troy-Bilt Lithium Ion Garden Trimmer

Earlier this spring I was given the Troy-Bilt TB57 Lithium Ion string trimmer to review. This spring Troy-Bilt also sponsored Chicago Spring Fling, a garden blogger symposium, which I was part of organizing. I mention this just so that you know from the start that the good will shown to me and other garden bloggers by Troy-Bilt may have influenced my thoughts on it. I don't think it has but I think as a reader of this blog you deserve to know this information.

Carnivorous Pitcher Plant Eating Bugs

Yesterday I was looking for a garden photo and while I didn't find that photo I did find these photos of a carnivorous pitcher plant from two years ago. I think I may have been waiting for a slowdown in garden blogging to share the pictures of the carnivorous pitcher plant and never got around to sharing them.

The photos were taken over a course of a few days and show insects being lured and trapped inside separate pitchers of the carnivorous plant. Lets take a short tour of the carnivorous plant and see the insects that fell prey to it.

ZZ Plant Propagation

Early in the growing season when the houseplants made the yearly migration to vacation outdoors my ZZ Plant (Zamioculcas zamiifolia) was damaged in the process. Instead of getting upset at one of my favorite succulent plants being marred I decided to take the opportunity to propagate this plant.

I've blogged before about how easy it is to propagate succulents from cuttings and especially single leafs. It is a great way to get new plants and since prices for ZZ Plants around here are pretty expensive I figured maybe I could make a few extra plants to share with friends and family that are always taking plants when they visit.

Adenium Obesum Flowers and Seed Pod

On a recent visit to the Garfield Park Conservatory I came across this potted Adenium obesum which made me realize just how much I've neglected my own Desert Roses this year. I have yet to officially try to bring them out of dormancy, even though they are leafing out on their own.

Chicago Spring Fling In Pictures

Didn't get a chance to take a lot of photos during Spring Fling but here are a few that I liked. My pictures of the Rick Bayless garden are over on my garden blog for ChicagoNow.com: Chicago Garden and my other post on the subject of Spring Fling is: Chicago Spring Fling in Words. Links in this post open in new window. If you hover your mouse over one of the garden photos you should get a description.

Chicago Garden

Welcome, to all the new followers of the MrBrownThumb garden blog. And "hello" to all the followers who have been reading for a while. If you live or garden in Chicago, or know someone who does, make sure to read the end of this post. Heck, even if you have no connection to Chicago make sure to read the end of this post.

Raise your hand if you've been watching the Life After People special on the History Channel. I love it! I could spend days watching this thing and never get tired of it. One of the things in particular that really interests me about the special is watching how plants will one day grow over everything that people have built. One of the episodes focuses heavily on Chicago and it has a few segments on how Wrigley Field will look once grounds keepers aren't around to maintain it.

Pictures I took of the television while watching the show.

Chicago Spring Fling In Words

Today was the last day for Chicago Spring Fling, and have been surprised on a number of occasions. Some people were exactly like what I was expecting and some nearly brought a tear to my eye with their generosity and warmth.

Slow Food Chicago Tomato Fest 2009

Marmande Tomato photo courtesy of Damien Casten

Spring Bulbs In The Garden

Let me beging by saying "Welcome" to all the new followers  & subscribers of the MrBrownThumb garden blog. 

Spring arrived in my garden a while back, but the only thing blooming then was a clump of daffodils so I decided to wait and make one post about the spring bulbs in my garden. I've posted before about cheap bulbs for your garden and how you can find them in places other than garden centers and nurseries. 

One Seed Chicago 2009

Houseplant BINGO! Part 2

OMG, did you hear that Ashton Kutcher got one million followers on Twitter? Yeah, I don't care either.

I was watching him on Oprah when I realized I was really immersed in a game of Houseplant BINGO! It looks like a Dracaena of some kind in the background.

Gardening Gloves From Ethel Gloves

Macy's Flower Show 2009

Macy's on State Street ushers in spring with the flower show Dream in Color. For someone like me, who professes to hate pink flowers in the garden it sounds more like a Nightmare in Color. So I was surprised at my reaction of Dream in Color, I actually liked it! The annual flower show at Macy's on State Street is a holdover from the Marshall Field's era in Chicago. Full disclosure; I once worked at Marshall Field's when I was going to school and I was one of the anti-Macy's crowd when they bought the beloved Field's. I swore up and down to anyone who would listen that I would never step foot inside of "Macy's." Today was the first day I have been inside the store since it stopped being Marshall Field's.

A week or so ago, Marisa Reeves (Media Relations Manager for Macy’s East, North Region), offered to set up a tour of the show for local garden bloggers with the Jon Jones (Visual Director for Macy's on State Street) & Todd Pope (Branch Manager for Green View's Oswego location). My Skinny Garden & Garden Girl found time in their schedules to attend. And that is how my boycott of Macy's & pink flowers ended.

Bean Bush Royal Burgundy One Seed Chicago

I've made my seed selection for One Seed Chicago. The bean I will be growing will be Bean Bush 'Royal Burgundy' from Botanical Interests because I think the pods will make interesting garden photos. Botanical Interests, like Renee's Garden, is a sponsor of Chicago Spring fling.

I'm the kind of gardener that will buy seeds from wherever I can, but these two seed companies are making me consider buying exclusively from and endorsing smaller seed companies in my gardening endeavors. Their embrace and support of garden bloggers is enough to make me come to this realization and their seed packets are impressive enough to seal the deal.

In the post 'Edible Gardening in 2009' I provided pictures of the seed packets from Renee's Garden to illustrate just how much seed sowing information is part of the seed packaging. Botanical Interests also uses the seed packets to provide good information on the seeds they sell.

Paper Tube Seed Collars For Direct Seed Sowing

I couple of years ago I purchased some ridiculously expensive seeds. I knew I was going to direct sow the seeds in the garden and I knew that eventually I'd forget where they planted and would probably get neglected. That same day I had made a number of homemade seeds pots, in particular some paper tube seed pots and I got the idea to take the paper tube seed pots outdoors in the garden.

Out I went into the garden with extra paper tubes, some seeds and a pair of scissors. I cut the paper tube into sections about an inch tall and sunk them into the soil, I then placed a couple of seeds inside of each of the sections of paper tube and watered them in.

Chicago Flower & Garden Show 2009

I think I've pretty much covered everything I wanted to cover for the Chicago Flower & Garden Show. Thanks to everyone at Sheila King Public Relations who extended me and my fellow local garden bloggers press passes to enter the garden show. The two images below is a panoramic view of part of the Chicago Flower & Garden Show. You can click on them for a larger look.

Dancing Stones

Dancing Stones is another garden installation at the Chicago Flower & Garden Show that like Reflections and Hope for the Healing Planet is Asian inspired.

Paradise in a Parking Lot

The Paradise in a Parking Lot garden is a departure from gardens like Reflections, Rooftop Garden of the Future & Hope for the Healing Planet. When I first saw it I during the media preview of the Chicago Flower & Garden Show I thought to myself that people would either love it or hate it.

Hope for the Healing Planet Garden

The Hope for the Healing Planet Garden exhibit at the Chicago Flower & Garden Show is another Asian inspired garden. It has a more natural feel to it than Reflections because it uses a lot of wood.

Greening Up

I've covered the Reflections garden and the Rooftop Garden of the Future at the Chicago Flower & Garden Show. This exhibit is called Greening Up and it is a four-season garden set around a replica of a typical Chicago garage. The display was divided into four quadrants and each quadrant showcased a different garden style. The garage in the center of all these gardens has a living roof.

Rooftop Garden of the Future

The Rooftop Garden of the Future is very different than Reflections, the Asian themed garden, but in some ways they are very similar. I'm a sucker for modern design but I'm not sure how I feel about this rooftop garden. The part of me that likes the use of austere lines, reflective surfaces and sci-fi channel lighting drools over this garden.

Reflections Garden: Chicago Flower & Garden Show 2009

One of my favorite featured gardens at the Chicago Flower & Garden Show is Reflections: A Spirited Garden of Asian Inspiration. The Chicago Flower & Garden Show guide tells us; "Asian gardens are entrancing, serene spaces-tranquil and timeless. Generally small in scale, they achieve considerable effect with a minimum of resources, relying on eco-friendly materials artfully arranged. Decorative touches include a Buddha and lantern fashioned from natural stone, while Japanese maple, ginkgo trees and weeping larch add to the contemplative mood."

Usually, copy exaggerates to sell something but in this case I don't think the copy does the product justice. This garden can't really be described in words and my pictures don't do it justice. Amidst the noise of the crowds, sound effects and the distracting lighting this garden give visitors to the Chicago Flower & Garden Show a place to relax. I recommend visiting this garden later in the evening when he crowds have dwindled so you can really appreciate it.

Garden Marketplace Chicago Flower & Garden Show

When I went to the media preview of the Chicago Flower & Garden Show a few of the vendors were unpacked and I was able to buy a couple of things but I had to wait until the first day of the show to see many booth. If you're attending the Chicago Flower & Garden Show here are a few vendors I think you should stop by and visit at the Garden Marketplace.

Media Preview Chicago Flower & Garden Show

Today I attended the media preview of the Chicago Flower & Garden show. It has been a number of years since I attended the Chicago Flower & Garden show so I wasn't sure what to expect. Below you'll find a few pictures to give you an idea of what the show looks like. I'm going to do something different than when I went to the Independent Garden Center Show. I'll take suggestions on what I should cover in this blog. Some of the displays left me scratching my head and some wowed me. The show stealer (IMO) is the light and sound display by Nathan Tomlinson from Chicago-based Sound Investment. It is a 24 minute show that starts off with birds chirping early in the morning and takes you through a Chicago thunderstorm and ends with a sunset. If you're attending the show make sure to look up. It shouldn't be missed.

Edible Gardening In 2009

I've been reading a lot about how growing your own fruits and vegetables is going to be huge this year. The bad economic news apparently has people turning to gardening to in an effort to feel like they have some control in their lives or they're turning to vegetable gardening in order to feed their families.

Whatever the reason people are turning to gardening it is welcomed news not only to the seed companies, who are reporting increases in sales, but to those of us who garden. All of a sudden family members who once made fun of my dabbling with plants and seeds are now calling and emailing me asking for advice. This year tiny urban garden in Chicago will be a lot more edible than it has in the past. I feel a bit like I'm jumping on the edible gardening bandwagon but in reality it is more out of necessity. Last year I was too busy to tend to my garden and this resulted in a lot of plant deaths-instead of replacing them with more perennials I'm going to fill the space with vegetables.

Google For Gardeners Update 2-12-09

Moments ago Google For Gardeners reached a milestone. I added the 500th site to the search engine dedicated to finding gardening and plant information through Google. Thanks to all the people who have submitted recommendations for the search engine and thanks to Google for allowing people like me to create a custom search engine out of their product.

Burpee Seeds At Home Depot 2009

A few years ago I requested a catalog from Burpee but I never got it. My zip code is probably not seen as very desirable to people in the gardening business so I pretty much stick to buying retail. That's the case with Burpee, I couldn't tell you what is in their catalog but I can tick off what I like that they're offering in retail settings. I really enjoying growing my own plants from seeds and I buy from whoever is selling them. This year though the Burpee seeds at Home Depot seem to be uninspired and there isn't much for an ornamentalist like myself to choose from.



I wanted to buy the Burpee 'Cypress Vine' seed pack I saw at Home Depot but didn't because it looked to be mislabeled to me. The name of the seed pack says 'Cypress Vine' but if you look at the photo of the plant is isn't what is commonly called 'Cypress Vine'-it is 'Cardinal Climber.' I already grow a mix of pink, red and white Cypress Vine and posted pictures of it in the post "When I collected Cypress Vine Seeds". You can look at the photos in that entry and compare them to the photos of the packet at Home Depot. I also have pictures of a pink and white Cypress Vine flower.They're in the same family and very similar looking except 'Cypress Vine' has the prettier shaped flowers (they look like 5 point stars) and nicer foliage than 'Cardinal Climber'. If I'm not mistaken I believe Burpee is also selling the mix of 'Cypress Vine' I already grow but I didn't bother to check the labeling and didn't notice this "mistake" until I was uploading the photo to this entry.

The Buzz On Bees

While going through my hard drive looking for photos to upload to my photo blog I've noticed a trend. I spend a lot of time in the garden photographing the bees that visit. I think I've mentioned here before that my favorite pollinator in my urban garden is the bumblebee but until recently I hadn't noticed that I had quite the bee fetish that my photographs seem to indicate I have. This epiphany of mine has lead to me deciding I want to be part of the solution and do my part in protecting bees. Below you'll find a number of links that you can visit if you want to become involved too. Your recommendations would be greatly appreciated.

Tell Me How You Really Feel

I started to write an entry on the back story to this email but it grew into a several paragraph long post/rant. I abandoned it because I couldn't find an ending to it that satisfied me or would pay off to the reader of all those grammatical errors I made. I've decided I'm going to start publishing some of the more interesting emails I get or am part of as a result of this garden blog.

The short story:

There's a seed swap/ seed sowing demonstration going on in Chicago that I wanted to attend and cover on this here gardening blog. Here is the email I sent:

I see you're doing a seed swap and seminar.I'm thinking of attending it- do you think photo would be ok so I can cover it on my gardening blog? I grow a lot from seed and post my tutorials using recyclables on my gardening blog. Mostly using things like plastic soda bottles and fast food containers to make greenhouses for the seeds. If you'd like an extra hand or another seed sowing example I'd be glad to help.

Here is the reply I got:

"hardly a seminar. more of a shared discussion.
it would be good to meet you - though am uncertain about the photo taking. would rather you didn't unless i knew why you'd want to blog about this and how that would serve the broader mission. to be honest, i am slightly put off by your labelling of images with your logo."

Ouch.

Sowing Poppy Seeds

A few years ago I was gifted a handful of poppy seeds by a gardener on a gardening forum I participated on. The seeds came with the instructions to just "scatter them in your garden in February" and the promise that soon I'd have more poppy seeds than I knew what to do with. Not knowing any better, I followed the instructions to scatter the seeds in February. I got more seeds later in the month and scattered those too.

Then around the middle of March I started to wonder if scattering the poppy seeds when it was still winter and snowing in Chicago was the best idea. This is how I sow poppy seeds in my garden. 

(Lavender Peony Poppy)

Anemone De Caen (Freebie)

Last fall I purchased a box of mixed bulbs at the grocery store and in it came 10 Anemone De Caen corms. I didn't plant them because I didn't have much luck with them 2 years ago when I did a mass planting of them in my garden. The ugly corms produce beautiful flowers that look like poppies and make great cut flowers but they don't overwinter in my garden. So instead of going through the motions with these corm I'm giving them away to a reader of this garden blog. I know it isn't much of a freebie but I'd rather not plant them or end up forgetting about them and find them growing under my tv like the Allium bulgaricum bulb. I'll pay for the shipping of the corms to you if you don't live in Chicago but only within the U.S.

Chicago Flower & Garden Show

After a two year absence from Chicago's Navy Pier the Chicago Flower & Garden Show will return March 7th-15, 2009. In 2007 it became the Chicagoland Flower & Garden Show after the show moved to Rosemont, IL in an effort to attract more visitors. All seems to be forgiven and forgotten- including that the city was suppose to but on the Garden in a City Show aimed at urban gardeners. I've tried looking up the domain for the show that was only held once in 2006 and it seems to be parked and for sale.

Garden Blogger Meetup May 29-31

Paper Tube Seed Pot Holder

It is the time of the year when many gardeners start to get restless and and our minds turn to thoughts of spring and summer in our gardens. To get us through these tough times we start sowing seeds indoors and raise the sprouts in the hopes that they'll be bigger plants that we can plant into our gardens and or containers in the spring and watch them grow into full-sized annuals, perennials, edibles and tropicals. Gardeners are pretty creative in the methods they use to start seeds and have come up with many different tricks to save money in the seed sowing process. We grow seeds in plastic bottles, sprout seeds in plastic sandwich bags, roll newspaper pages into seed pots, use paper tubes and eggshells to grow seeds.


Other items that can be put into your seed sowing arsenal are plastic containers that you get fast food in or food items from your deli or bakery. I recently came across this plastic container for cupcakes and as I was about to throw it away it dawned on me that I could keep it and use it to sow seeds. This makes a perfect paper tube seed pot holder because the container is made of a really durable plastic and the circles are almost the same size as the paper tube seed pots. The lid seals the containers pretty well and is a safeguard in case your seed pots should ever tip over. Another benefit of this plastic container is of course that it is transparent allowing light but it has a flat top so you can stack several of these on top of each other. I like the ability to stack them because they take up less space and I can shuffle the seed pots to the top of the stack as the seeds inside germinate.

Here, a close-up view of the paper tube seed pot holder shows that I've cut the paper tubes into three inch lengths to give some head space so that the seeds don't touch the plastic cover when they sprout.

The seed starting "soil" I'm using here is actually coconut husk that has been finely shredded. If it doesn't look familiar to you it may be because it is mostly seen as a dry circular disk that you get in products like Amaryllis bulb kits. I don't like to use it to grow my bulbs in so I keep the disks around and use them as my seed starting soil. You can also find the same material in pet stores sold as bedding for reptiles. It is pretty affordable and comes in a brick form that you submerse in water to make it expand. It works just like the peat pellets you'll find in garden centers and garden catalogs except it is very sustainable unlike the peat. When preparing my paper tube seed pots I like to moisten the seed starting "soil" not only because you have to with the coconut fiber but because it allows me to pack in the soil and make sure that each paper tube is filled tightly with soil. This will help a little keep your paper tube seed pots together longer.

This is just a terracotta pot with several paper tubes inside of it. I found it like this in one of the bathrooms. I had accidentally left the empty pot in a spare bathroom when I was bring in plants this past fall and had forgotten about it. A week or so later I went looking in the bathroom for the lost pot and found it stuffed with paper tubes. No, I don't have a helpful family-they're just lazy.

What are your seed starting tips and tricks?

Related Posts

Plastic bottle seed starter.
Sandwich bag seed starter.
Seed starter pot from newspaper.
Homemade seed pots.

Deceptive Garden

Winter Flower & Train Show