Coming up . . .

Planting time - - finally

Garden centers and nurseries are fully stocked, of course, but gardeners have other places to shop, too. Check out neighborhood garden sales. You might find some out-of-the-ordinary plants and be able to walk home.

For example --This Saturday, the Eastmoreland Garden Club (Unit 1) is holding their Annual Mother’s Day Weekend Plant Sale. Drop by Eastmoreland Garden Park (at the corner of SE Bybee Blvd. and 27th Av., across from the Eastmoreland Golf Course) between 10:00 am to 2:00 pm.

You’ll find a wide variety of perennials, tomatoes, native plants, and more. Plus, it’s a family-friendly event with a children’s planting table. Local gardeners will be on hand to help you find some thing new for spring. All proceeds will be used to promote gardening in the area.

So, keep your garden eye out for the new and unusual - right in you own backyard.

Reduce – Reuse – Recycle

Each Earth Day we focus on, well, the earth. How we can live better on the planet – energy efficiency, water conservation, waste reduction – in all areas of our lives.

Many of us connect with the green world around us through gardening. On Thursday, at Montgomery Park in Northwest Portland, the Multnomah County Master Gardeners and the West Multnomah Soil and Water Conservation District (WMSWCD) will be available to help others connect with the green world.

From 9:00 am to 11:00 am the WMSWCD staff and volunteers will actually install a native plant garden at Montgomery Park. Visitors can see how these plants could fit into their own gardens and learn how to enhance their backyard habitat.

Master Gardeners will be on hand in the building lobby to answer home garden, landscaping, and lawn questions and help resolve pest problems. The Multnomah County Master Gardener office (open weekdays from 10 to 2) is on the 4th floor of Montgomery Park – Room 450.

For more information on WMSWCD projects (fighting invasive plants, bringing gardens to schools, encouraging native pollinators, and more), check out their website.

For gardening questions in any of the three metro counties, contact your Master Gardeners by phone, email, or visiting. Start here!

DIRT! The Movie

Let the soil beneath your feet inspire you. Tonight on Oregon Public Broadcasting you can see dirt from many perspectives – both global and personal.

We know how important to our gardens our backyard “dirt” is. Find out how our relationship to the soils around the world have impacted and will continue to impact us.

It’s a fascinating, intriguing, educational look at a busy world just beyond our doorsteps.

Oregon Public Broadcasting
Independent Lens
11:00 pm

Coming up . . .

Metro’s Natural Gardening Guru - Carl Grimm

Saturday we’ll get the chance to talk to Carl about all the gardening information Metro has available.

On the website, you’ll find all the tips you need for making your own compost and even plans for building your own garden debris compost bin. And if you want to try your hand a worm composting for kitchen scraps, you’ll find help there, too.

Metro also has several sites open for visitors. From the Zoo’s Backyard Make-over exhibit, demonstrating easy steps to bring nature into your yard, to the Natural Techniques Demonstration Garden in Southeast Portland. Find out more here.

For a copy of the Grow Smart, Grow Safe guide to lawn and garden products, the native plant guide, and a money saving coupon for natural garden products, click here.

So Much to Learn - - -

but there are so many opportunities to do just that. Wherever you want to follow your gardening passion, there are fellow gardeners willing to help you along.

My Garden Doctor partner, Dave Etchepare, is hosting an Edible Landscape Fair at Dennis' 7 Dees, on March 6th, at the Eastside location (6025 SE Powell Blvd).

This is a great chance to ask experts those questions you always wondered about or to get help starting something new. Discover knowledgeable folks on food forests, organic vegetable gardening, native edibles, growing food in containers and much more. Children will not be bored – they'll find special activities just for them.

Formal classes will include:
Grow your own Delicious Fruit! With Jim Gilbert
Edible Natives with Metro
Permaculture Class: Plants that Give You Bang for the Buck(et)
Permaculture Class: Farm Hands without Hands

See the full schedule here.

Check out the bare root edibles – ready to transplant – and the newest blueberry – Pink Lemonade. Can you really have a pink blueberry?

And don’t miss a chance to have your pruner sharpened up (you have been pruning haven’t you?) and your soil acidity checked (it may be time to lime!), thanks to the Portland Rose Society from 1:00 to 3:00 pm.

Look for Dave!

Grow your own mushrooms - easy!

I’m not sure anyone thinks of mushrooms when they think of gardening. But vegetable gardeners are growing their own food, and mushrooms are food, so why shouldn’t we play in that garden, as well?

Those button mushrooms (white or brown) standard in the grocery aisle are grown in large, dark houses on a compost. The more exotic portobellos, shiitake, oyster mushrooms (among others) are grown similarly on their own favorite compost, in beds, bags or jars, under varying temperature and humidity conditions.

But you don’t have to have a large, dark house to grow mushrooms. There are table-top kits available by mail order and (occasionally) at local home and garden shows. These are easy to care for and such fun to watch grow. And then you actually get to eat mushrooms you grew yourself!

I wouldn’t say that they save money (much like regular city vegetable gardens), but they are no more expensive – pound for pound – than store-bought mushrooms.

Here are some mail order resources:

I got mine from: Fungi Perfecti
Olympia, Washington
http://www.fungi.com/
Kits for oyster, shiitake, wine caps, cinnamon caps, and almond Portobello

Territorial Seed Company
Cottage Grove, Oregon
http://www.territorialseed.com/
Kits for shiitake, oyster, button, maitake

Gardeners Supply Company
Burlington, Vermont
http://www.gardeners.com/
Kits for shiitake, Portobello, oyster, button

Coming up . . .

Weeds, Worms, and Winter Damage

How can it be that our recent freezing temperatures burn and blacken many favored plants, but the weeds are never damaged? In the vegetable patch, in the rock garden, in the driveway cracks, our winter weeds just keep coming. I think the two most common ones are the chickweed and the little bittercress or shot weed. Letting them go to seed only means more work next season. When weather permits, get out there with a sharp hoe or hand-pull the ones you can reach.

The cold doesn't seem to bother the worms either. They are happily pulling leaves down into the soft ground all over the yard. They must do this at night, 'cause I never seem to catch them at it during the day. Another good reason to cover beds with fallen leaves. Earthworms are able to move them and other organic matter deep into the soil.

What about those plants that have trouble with the freezing temperatures? My lovely scented Daphne has a good proportion of leaves with cold injury. However the flower buds are beginning to open and look just fine. Once the bloom is over, a bit of pruning will remove the bad leaves and new spring growth will fill in quickly. And my winter honeysuckle has opened its first sweet blooms. No cold problems for this charmer!