Have Your Salads Started to Bore You???

Not any more...just add the above flower its leaves in any of yours and it will add color and some peppery aroma/flavor to your salads. Wondering what this flower is? it's called Nasturtium. It has vitamin C, it has anti viral properties and is natural antibiotic.Very easy to grow and require very little water to grow after established from seed. You cans till plant them...they will bloom for you in mid to late August on until frost. They are a handsome plant to use in your landscape as well. They come in variety of colors such as the red above. you will find them in jewel tones, and normal tones reds, oranges to yellows. You can find them in vine form ( up to 6 feet) and to 12" and above Up to 6 feet. The vines are great in window boxes and planters. The shorter ones make a great filler or a salad garden specimen. The perfect thing is these are not poisonous. If you have kids or pets, they love to watch them grow and if they happen to eat them- no problem. Go have some fun and grow some spunk and color for your Summer salads.


Here is link to a cool blog Herbs are Special http://www.herbsarespecial.com.au/isabells_blog/nasturtium-natural-antibiotic.html

here you can read more about the plant.

ATTENTION GARDENERS- POTATO BLIGHT

Just in the news and it concerns anyone who gardens and especially those who are growing potatoes.

See the link below or read the cut and pasted article from yahoo news below the link.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20090710/sc_nm/us_blight_usa

Potato famine disease striking home gardens in U.S.

By Julie Steenhuysen Julie Steenhuysen – Fri Jul 10, 5:22 pm ET
CHICAGO (Reuters)

– Late blight, which caused the Irish Potato Famine of the 1840s and 1850s, is killing potato and tomato plants in home gardens from Maine to Ohio and threatening commercial and organic farms, U.S. plant scientists said on Friday.
"Late blight has never occurred this early and this widespread in the United States," said Meg McGrath, a plant pathologist at Cornell University's extension center in Riverhead, New York.
She said the fungal disease, spread by spores carried in the air, has made its way into the garden centers of large retail chains in the Northeastern United States.
"Wal-mart, Home Depot, Sears, Kmart and Lowe's are some of the stores the plants have been seen in," McGrath said in a telephone interview.
The disease, known officially as Phytophthora infestans, causes large mold-ringed olive-green or brown spots on plant leaves, blackened stems, and can quickly wipe out weeks of tender care in a home garden.
McGrath said in her 21 years of research, she has only seen five outbreaks in the United States. The destructive disease can spread rapidly in cooler, moist weather, infecting an entire field within days.
"What's unique about it this year is we have never seen plants affected in garden centers being sold to home gardeners," she said.
This year's cool, wet weather created perfect conditions for the disease. "Hopefully, it will turn sunny," McGrath said. "If we get into our real summer hot dry weather, this disease is going to slow way down."
FUNGICIDES WILL CONTROL BLIGHT
According to its website, the University Maryland's Plant Diagnostic Lab got a suspect tomato sample as early as June 12, very early in the tomato growing season, which runs from April-September.
McGrath said the risk is that many gardeners will not recognize it, putting commercial farms and especially organic growers at risk.
"My concern is for growers. They are going to have to put a lot more time and effort in trying to control the disease. It's going to be a very tough year," she said.
"This pathogen can move great distances in the air. It often does little jumps, but it can make some big leaps."
McGrath said the impact on the farmer will depend on how much the pathogen is spread. "Eastern New York is seeing a lot of disease," she said.
She said commercial farmers will be able to use fungicides containing chlorothalonil to control the blight.
And while some sprays have also been approved for organic use, many organic farmers do not use them, making it much harder to control.
"If they are not on top of this right from the very beginning, it can go very fast," she said.
(Editing by Maggie Fox and Lisa Shumaker)

HAS ONE AND HAS WON

The subject line( has one and has won) is what the garden e-mail "should" have said about Brother Ballstaedt's winning cucumber! Ask him about his portable garden on wheels too!

Jennie D.

NOT TOO LATE- MESSAGE FROM JENNIE- Galatians 6:7

Be not deceived; it's not too late to plant a garden! You can still plant hot-weather loving cucumber seeds, green bean seeds, tomato plants,zucchini seeds, pepper plants and other yummy stuff. Yields will be alittle later and somewhat less, but you can still reap bountifully whatyou sow! It doesn't take much space to nurture a tomato plant or pepper plant in a pot on an apartment balcony. Tuck a cabbage plant, pepper plant or tomato plant in your flower garden for a tasty treat.

The French Intensive Biodynamic method developed by Alan Chadwick really does work; for instance, you can grow as many carrots in one square footas you can in a 12 foot row in a regular garden. We used his method for years in our backyard city garden and still do for many of our 2X2 gardenboxes.Cucumbers are easy to train in a tomato basket or a pot with a trellis if you don't have much room. (Brother Ballstaedt has already one the prizefor first cucumber of the season so the pressure if off the rest of us!)Bush green beans look lush and lovely in any landscape and are heatlovers. You can plant bean seeds 3-4 inches apart in pockets throughoutyour landscape or you could grow in rows as close as 12" to 18" apart.

You go vertical and plant pole beans (stringless is best) with foursix-foot long 1X 6's. Tie together at the top, weave string betweenthe poles, leaving an opening at the front, then plant 3-4 beans at thebottom of each stick for a bean teepee. Your little ones will love the shady shelter and learn to love eating green beans in the process!Garden centers will be eliminating/ reducing their stock of tomato plants,pepper plants, eggplant, etc very soon! I stopped by Darby CreekNursery on Scioto Darby last week. I asked them if they would be having an end of the season sale on their garden plants, they said it would be another week or two and they would be reducing prices drastically. Itold them I would keep checking back because many people were interestedin gardening and needed the resulting food but couldn't afford full priceplants. Take the attitude that it never hurts to ask for a discount in today's economy if it allows you to help and serve others. (After thatlast ditch sale, they usually toss what's left in the trash or on theircompost heap---hmm, free plants for the asking maybe?)

The greatest gardening book I can recommend is the Holy Bible. It has information on sowing and reaping, walking in the garden in the cool of the day, tips on what ground is best to sow your seed upon and detailed descriptions of a garden being created. The most significant garden eventin the history of the world took place over the brook Cedron and somewhere near the Mount of Olives as the Lord stood between us and Heavenly Father, to plead and intercede for our salvation.

Some other good garden books are available to checkout from the library---get yourself on the waiting list---Latter Day Saints aren't the only ones interested in gardening, nurturing our children, feeding ourfamilies quality food and saving a bundle these days! Here are a few suggestions:

For Adults:THE POSTAGE STAMP GARDEN BOOK by Duane and Karen Newcomb (small scalegardens, usually only 4X4, practical but prolific)FRESH FOOD FROM SMALL SPACES by R.J. Ruppenthal (apartment, condo, urbansolutions for gardening, container gardens and more)LAST CHILD IN THE WOODS by Richard Louv (evidence linking the lack ofnature in children's lives to obesity, ADD and depression)

To share with your Children:SUNFLOWER HOUSES, INSPIRATIONS FROM THE GARDEN by Sharon Lovejoy (a greatreminder of the beauty of Creation and fun ideas)ROOTS, SHOOTS, BUCKETS AND BOOTS by Sharon Lovejoy (terrific mini themedgardens and projects for kids with tasty bonuses)SUNFLOWER HOUSE by Eve Bunting (a lovely book about "growing" a magicalrefuge just for children)

Jennie D