Your Small Kitchen Garden is for people who grow--or who want to grow--their own food, though in limited space. We explore how to grow vegetables and fruit with emphasis on expending little effort and energy. Please come share with us in our lazy garden.
I laid out seeds, envelopes, and envelope labels on a table in my billiards room. While I’m giving away Blue Hubbard squash, neck pumpkin, and paste tomato seeds, I also collected seeds from butternut squash, dill weed, and several types of peppers. Most of these will go to The Dinner Garden, a charity that provides seeds to family’s starting gardens in response to economic difficulties.
Two weeks ago, Your Small Kitchen Garden offered up sets of seeds to visitors who asked for them. I’ve been pleased by the response; more than 40 people have left comments requesting seed sets. A complete set includes six seeds of Blue Hubbard squash, six seeds of neck pumpkin, and twenty seeds of chili-pepper-shaped paste tomatoes.
In that post I joked that I’d judge comments on creativity and humor, and I’ve enjoyed the humor in some of the comments. However, the only criteria for receiving seeds are:
Leave a comment explaining which seeds you most want to grow
Complete a “Contact Us” form with your mailing address
Do these things before the seeds run out.
The Small Kitchen Garden Seed Project
I’ve been packaging seeds. To do this, I set up a small table in the corner of my billiards room and laid out all the seeds I saved last season. I designed and printed simple labels and stuck them on coin envelopes. As I started to count out seeds and package them it occurred to me: what if the seeds aren’t viable? I’d feel rotten to learn I’d sent seeds to so many people, and none of those seeds sprouted.
More than a week after planting, one of the three tomato seeds I planted to test viabiity sprouted. By the time I finished this post nearly 2 days later, all three seeds had sprouted. I’m mailing out more than 40 packs of these seeds in the coming week. If you left a comment on my post Free Seeds from Your Small Kitchen Garden, did you also send your mailing address to me via the web site’s Contact Us form? I noticed many visitors overlooked that important step.
So, I test-planted some tomato seeds and waited. Last March, when I started tomato seeds indoors, I had sprouts two days after planting! This January, there were no sprouts for over a week. Finally, on Monday, the first tomato seed sprouted. On Tuesday, two more sprouts appeared. These seeds are viable!
As the cutoff date for my seed giveaway approaches, I’ve packaged up several dozen sets of seeds. I’ve more to package, and I haven’t yet addressed all the envelopes, but I’m confident these seeds will perform when treated properly.
I’m excited to share the seeds; I hope that many of the people who receive them will write once or twice to tell me how their seeds do, and to tell me what they think of the produce they grow.
In the meantime, I’ve already started this year’s small kitchen garden; I’m going to try to keep my tomato seedlings alive indoors until April. I’ll build a tent around them to trap in some moisture and heat, and I’ll flood the tent with light. If things go well, I’ll transplant into larger containers once or twice, so I’ll have very large plants when it’s time to move them outdoors.
By “potting up” the plants this way, I may get a 30-day or better jump on the tomato-growing season. Who knows? Maybe I’ll harvest a few tomatoes in early July this year.
When I first posted about these unusual tomatoes, I called them “Italian” tomatoes. Since then, other people have suggested they are “Dutch” tomatoes. I had not heard the term “paste tomato” by 2008, but I understand now that the category of paste tomatoes includes those that are mostly meat with relatively little liquid. These are paste tomatoes. What’s more they have a striking resemblance to the Andes tomato I found in an online seed catalog. My neighbor has been growing them for years.
I started writing Your Small Kitchen Garden in August of 2008, and that emboldened me to visit a neighbor whose garden I had eyed from the road for more than a decade. I wrote about that neighbor’s garden in this blog on September 15, 2008 in a post titled A Large Kitchen Garden.
I very much enjoyed meeting these neighbors, and was fascinated with the unusual chili-pepper-shaped tomatoes they were growing. I was moved a bit when they handed me two of the curious tomatoes insisting that I should save the seeds and grow them in my own small kitchen garden in 2009.
Tomato Luck in my Small Kitchen Garden
I needn’t remind anyone what a miserable growing season 2009 presented in the northeastern and the southwestern United States. I got lucky: while late blight destroyed tomato patches all over Pennsylvania, I harvested several bushels of tomatoes before lesions appeared on my plants.
Among the tomatoes I harvested were dozens and dozens of those chili-pepper-shaped treats grown from seeds I saved from my neighbor’s gift. I raved about those tomatoes in my blog. They are awesome-sweet and flavorful, and I served many of them in my favorite tomato salad. As well, I canned gallons of sauce, diced tomatoes, and tomato halves. After all that, I also dried tomatoes using my toaster oven’s dehydrate setting.
I saved seeds. In fact, I collected seeds from, perhaps, a third of the uninfected chili-pepper-shaped tomatoes I harvested in 2009.
Growing Pains for Kitchen Gardeners
By the time blight hit my small kitchen garden, I had seen its effects on many other local gardens. Driving past my neighbor’s yard nearly daily, I watch his garden evolve through tilling and early growth and then go right into death throws. I never saw tomato plants there rise above surrounding vegetation and I wondered: did he lose his entire crop? Worse: did this miserable growing season break his streak of growing those lovely chili-pepper-shaped tomatoes? I wondered whether he had harvested seed… or whether he had seed left over from 2008 that he might try again in 2010.
My neighbor grew lima beans two years ago, but told stories of a giant variety of lima beans that they used to grow until the crop failed on year. I’ve seen giant lima bean seeds in catalogs, so I’m going to track some down and do some seed-sharing.
So, while preparing seeds to mail to readers who have participated in my free seeds giveaway, I thought I’d take a packet of seeds to my neighbor. I figured he might be glad to have fresh ones from 2009 so he could grow more of those cool tomatoes.
Gardening Friends
It had been a year and a half, but it took only a moment for my neighbors to remember me. We talked a bit about what a horrible season 2009 had been for kitchen gardeners, and I learned that their garden had suffered a lot from the constant rain. Turns out, being an in-ground bed, their garden doesn’t drain, so it does best during very dry years when everyone else must add water to get decent results.
It wasn’t clear whether my neighbors were seedless, but they seemed genuinely grateful for the seeds, and quite happy to talk about their garden and the coming season. He will be 82 years old next month, and still he’s figuring to manage his large garden bed.
I agreed to track down seeds for super giant lima beans and visit again before it’s too late to plant them. Apparently, my neighbors grew such lima beans years ago but things didn’t work out one season and they’ve lost the strain.
In any case, as I’m sure most gardeners would attest: talk with gardeners about gardening, and you’re making friends. That’s how it felt yesterday, and I’m looking forward to another visit.
I lack enthusiasm for weeding, so it might be hard to distinguish the food from the future compost in this photo. However, you can spot a spinach leaf in the foreground at the bottom of the frame under the rabbit’s eye; the rabbit is not eating it. This rabbit raised rabbit calves in my garden and left no evidence of munching on any of my vegetables.
How does this kitchen gardener amuse himself when his small kitchen garden is rock-hard frozen solid? For a day or two each year, he attends the Pennsylvania Farm Show. This year, he spent a lot of time among the rabbits. Rabbits?
Well… Your Small Kitchen Garden has quite a history with rabbits. In at least four of the sixteen springs I’ve grown produce in central Pennsylvania, rabbits have nested in my garden bed before I’ve started working it. Last spring I posted a photo of newborn rabbits I found while assessing my home kitchen garden.
Rabbits: Bane or Baloney?
Rabbits get bad raps from gardeners. I’m sure rabbits deserve their reputation, but I often speak in defense of the rabbits in my neighborhood. To begin, those rabbits are adorable. There are an awful lot of them, so I’ve had plenty of opportunity to watch them in my yard and garden.
I have never seen a rabbit eat any of my produce. I’ve had mother rabbits raise their puppies inside my rabbit fence and I’ve watched them sit among young lettuce and spinach plants without taking a nibble. I once watched a mature rabbit rest on my spinach as it devoured the flower stalks from a dandelion plant growing alongside the spinach plants.
In one day a woodchuck did more damage to my garden than all the rabbits have done in 16 years. Still, I don’t trust rabbits, so I’m glad that my woodchuck fence keeps them out. This one spent many minutes circling the garden and peering through the fence… it was adorable and entertaining.
My carrot tops have succumbed to rodents—in a single afternoon, something cut the greens to half their original heights in an entire 14 foot long row. I assumed rabbits were the culprits until I caught a woodchuck in the act the next day.
A Salute to Rabbits
I’m sure rabbits do an enormous amount of damage in kitchen gardens the world over… they have probably damaged my garden. However, as I said, I’ve never seen them eat my produce so I have no animosity toward them. And, since I find rabbits adorable to look at, it was great sport to hang out among the rabbits at the Farm Show.
I’m also pleased to know several rabbit owners through social networking. With them in mind, and as acknowledgement for the role rabbits play in so many kitchen gardener’s lives, I put together a video titled Sixty Rabbits. Long-time readers of this blog might remember last year’s Sixty Chickens video; this one is quite similar. It runs about three and a half minutes. I hope you enjoy it:
This 20 pound neck pumpkin went into canning jars and so far has produced a delicious pumpkin cake. I can’t promise your neck pumpkins will grow so large, but they’ll have a chance if they are offspring of this bad boy.
FREE SEEDS! Your Small Kitchen Garden blog is giving away a bunch of seeds to encourage kitchen gardeners everywhere, and to spread some fun. Do you remember that Neck Pumpkin and the Blue Hubbard squash I wrote about in November and December? Or, maybe you read about the amazing chili-pepper-shaped paste tomatoes I grew in 2009?
While you’re planning your 2010 kitchen garden, consider this: Until I’ve no more to distribute, I’ll mail a modest set of seeds to each person who leaves a qualifying comment in response to this blog post. A seed set will include six Blue Hubbard squash seeds, six Neck Pumpkin seeds, and 20 or more paste tomato seeds. It’s not a lot of seeds, but it should be enough for you to start your own tradition with these squashes and tomatoes (should you decide to do so).
Someone told me they read that a Blue Hubbard squash was the model for the alien pods in one of the Invasion of the Body Snatchers movies. This Blue Hubbard weighed in at 27 pounds. Leave a qualifying comment for a chance to receive six seeds from this squash.
Qualify for a Seed Set
Here’s how to get your seed set: Leave a comment in response to this blog post telling me you want to receive seeds and explaining (in one or two sentences) which of the three plants you most want to grow and why. While your comments will be judged on the basis of creativity and humorousness, the only criterion for selection is the order in which I receive them.
A neighbor has been growing chili-pepper-shaped sauce tomatoes for decades and these are from that family line. The tomatoes are nearly all-meat, and they taste terrific raw. Plants are indeterminate, and fruits can weigh from eight to 16 ounces.
In other words: first-come, first-served. When I run out of complete sets, I’ll send whatever combination of seeds remains until all the seeds are gone. I expect the Blue Hubbard squash seeds to run out first, then the Neck Pumpkin seeds, and finally the sauce tomato seeds, so if you want all three, leave your comment early. Oh, and please keep it at one seed set per person.
Receiving Your Seed Set
Once you leave a comment to this post, use the Contact Us form to drop me a note that includes your snail mail address. Make sure you include the same email address that you use in your comment; I’ll use email addresses to match each Contact Us form to a comment… so if the addresses don’t match, you might not receive your seeds.
This offer is good through February 5, 2010.
My Australian friend who goes by @GardenBy on Twitter brought to my attention that there may be issues with mailing live seeds to international destinations. I once researched import laws of shipping seeds to Australia and was discouraged by what I read (mostly that there was so much to read and interpret and I could never do an adequate job research such issues on a country-by-country basis). So… I regret that I must amend this giveaway with the restriction that I will ship seeds only to people in the United States of America and Canada. Thanks for understanding.
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Monday Jan 11, 2010
I was surprised recently by my garden blogging friend, punkrockgardens, when she awarded Your Small Kitchen Garden an “Honest Scrap” award. More correctly, I guess, the award was for me.
Recipients of the Honest Scrap award are supposed to reveal ten truths about themselves, and then extend the award to seven other bloggers. As a blogger, I tend to focus on “how-to” topics that reveal little about me personally… and almost nothing beyond my garden and my kitchen. So, this Honest Scrap award is license for me to share stuff that has no natural place in Your Small Kitchen Garden blog.
In other words, if you want gardening, please read the other posts in my blog. If you’re here for random, useless factoids about a kitchen gardener, here they come!
My grandmother’s suitcase holds enough gear to put on a magic show; it has performed with me since I was a teenager.
From Beyond my Kitchen Garden
I used to be a member of IBM… the International Brotherhood of Magicians. I did a few “professional” magic shows during my teen years, and I still enjoy doing magic from time-to-time.
My nickname is Doc. It has many origins not the least of which is my geekiness.
I very much don’t like being called Dan or Danny. My mom instilled this in me. She insisted she named me Daniel. She also didn’t grock with “Doc.”
My parents’ depression-era mentality has a big influence on me; I try to do things at low cost and I tend to save stuff that may be useful some day… then I end up buying new stuff because I can’t find the stuff I saved until after I buy new stuff.
I find it very hard to ask people for help, so I try to do a lot of things myself that I really shouldn’t.
The billiards table shortly after it arrived. Sadly, that wet bar to the right is still dry; it’s hard to finish building a billiards room once the billiards table is in place… whenever you have time to work on the room, there’s that table ready for a game.
From about age 11 I’ve felt strongly as though I’m on the wrong planet.
I really enjoy speaking in front of groups—especially about topics on which I’m well informed.
In my 20s I decided I would one day have my own pool table. In my late 40s I built a billiards room with a hardwood floor in what used to be a two-car garage. Now that I have a pool table, I never have free time (or does playing pool count as free time?)
Being a writer has been my most consistent aspiration, starting when I was in 3rd grade.
I hate how the Internet has devalued writers and promoted hideously poor-quality prose.
My chosen recipients for Honest Scrap awards are people whose blogs I especially enjoy, and I imagine I’d very much enjoy these people in person. Some write blogs that are so personal, they may be challenged to offer 10 new and different truths. No matter. For each I extend the award with no strings. I read your blogs and tweets cuz I love the honest scrap about which you already write.
Sure, you can see fresh produce all winter in any local grocery store… but can you see vegetables that have been awarded blue ribbons?
Winter owns central Pennsylvania, but even for a kitchen gardener there is respite: The Pennsylvania Farm Show opens to the public in Harrisburg on January 9. I wrote several posts about the 2009 Farm Show in Your Small Kitchen Garden last January. It won’t look much different this year… and that’s a good thing.
Kitchen Gardener’s Haven
The Pennsylvania Farm Show is all about agriculture. Sure, there’s a preponderance of exhibits and competitions involving farming: tractors, horse livestock trailers, cultivators, and harvesters. There are horses, cows, chickens, ducks, geese, rabbits, sheep, goats, and pigs… there are even llamas. If none of these appeal to you; if you’re interested only on growing and eating your own produce; the PA Farm Show still delivers.
You’ll find exhibits of gorgeous vegetables, mushrooms, fruits, and nuts. You’ll find honey products and demonstrations by apiarists. You’ll find gardening gear and supplies, exhibits of cut flowers and potted plants, and even “box gardens;” table-top displays assembled to resemble full-sized courtyards and backyard patios.
At the 2009 Pennsylvania Farm Show, there were dozens of tiny gardens planted in wooden boxes. It’s a compelling idea: can a landscaper create a miniature yard or courtyard using live plants, and pass it off as a full-sized garden in photos or video?
Food at the Farm Show
For a kitchen gardener, gardening and produce aren’t the whole story. The Pennsylvania Farm Show understand this and includes exhibits and vendors of all kinds of cooking-related products. You’ll find terrific cookware, hundreds of bottles sauces and seasonings, and a whole bunch of free samples of foods you might want to use in your own kitchen.
Even if your garden has suffered because of a pesky wabbit, it’s hard not to enjoy a stroll among the rabbit cages at the Pennsylvania Farm Show. This rabbit looked capable of devouring a 14 foot row of carrots in a single sitting.
The Farm Show has a Kitchen Stage where area chefs and culinary students perform cooking demonstrations… and even Iron-Chef-style cooking competitions. You can relax and leave the kitchen stage area with ideas to apply in your own kitchen.
Finally, the food court at the Pennsylvania Farm Show features food that’s produced in Pennsylvania: Honey ice cream and waffles; potato donuts, fries, and baked potatoes; milkshakes, ice cream, and fried mozzarella… the list is too big to include all of it here. I like to grab good eats at the food court and carry them to one of the livestock arenas where I can enjoy a horse show or competition while munching the local fare.
Join me at the Farm Show
I’ll be at the Pennsylvania Farm Show the afternoon of Tuesday, January 12. I expect to attend at least one other day as well… and I’d love to have company. So, if you have any interest in meeting up at the Pennsylvania Farm Show, please contact me. Use this blog’s Contact Us form, or send a tweet to @cityslipper.
Did I mention? IT’S FREE! There’s no charge to attend the Pennsylvania Farm Show, though to park anywhere near it, you’ll pay $10 per car… so take a family of five (or a bunch of friends), and get a day’s entertainment for $2 per person.
Your Small Kitchen Garden blog recently received a question about watering. The question was fairly general, and I ended up writing a detailed answer that would make a good post. So, here it is:
Rain in a Small Kitchen Garden
In early spring, young spinach sprouts pop out in the bottom of a furrow in my small kitchen garden. I deliberately plant in furrows and basins so water will collect around the plants and soak in there.
Ideally, it will rain on your garden, and that will reduce your need to water. Sadly, it may rain too much on your garden as it did for most of us in the northeastern United States in the summer of 2009. Once you’ve planted your garden, there’s little you can do when it rains too much; roots may drown where water collects and foliage may rot. Molds such as late blight thrive in wet growing seasons.
So, plan your garden with torrential rain in mind: don’t place beds in low spots. Better still, build raised beds that assure roots won’t steep in standing water should it rain heavily one year.
Optimize Water Use
Your plants will appreciate good drainage. As a favor to the environment (and to your finances if you use tap water in the garden), optimize the garden’s use of whatever water it gets. Assuming the garden bed drains well even in torrential rain, set your rows deeper than the surrounding soil. This means your plants will grow in the bottoms of troughs. For an individual plant such as a tomato, eggplant, squash, or pepper, create a small depression—a basin—with the plant in the middle of it. These low areas will collect rain or hose water and give it time to soak in around the plants’ roots.
How much Water is Enough?
As for knowing when you’ve watered enough? I wrote an earlier post on the topic titled Watering Your Small Kitchen Garden. My approach isn’t rigid; I simply try to keep the plants alive with the least amount of watering they’ll accept happily. I note the weather and I watch the soil and the plants. If there has been no rain in several days and the soil looks dry… or worse, leaves are starting to droop… I water heavily. If there is a sustained dry spell—several weeks or more with little or no rain—I change my watering strategy: I water lightly every morning. The idea is to provide just enough water on top so that any moisture that is already below the surface stays there.
Whenever I water, I target the soil line of my plants. If it’s a tight row of greens, carrots, peas, and such, I distribute water evenly along the row. If I’m watering individual plants such as tomatoes, squash, and peppers, I make sure the water lands where a plant emerges from the soil. There may be a relative desert between my tomato plants, but the soil extending a foot from the stem of a plant receives several light waterings a week during a dry spell.
Spot Water Your Small Kitchen Garden
It’s important to note: when I water, nearly every drop ends up in the depressions in which the plants grow. For heavy watering, I try to fill the trench that defines a row, or the basin holding an individual plant. After that soaks in, I fill the trench or basin again. For light watering, I may not fill the trenches and basins, but I direct the water into them.
Finally, I can’t emphasize enough the advantages of mulching close to your plants, and mulching heavily. Having a lawn, I believe, is a horrible affront to Planet Earth. However, as long as I have a lawn I’ll use grass clippings to mulch my small kitchen garden. Lawn clippings, fallen leaves, newspapers, cardboard, black plastic, pine needles, pine bark… come up with something that’s easy enough to manage that you’ll actually manage it. Mulch lets water through to the soil and significantly reduces the amount that evaporates on dry days.
I shot this sequence of photos one day when I was watering some newly-planted tomatoes. The photo on the left shows a tomato plant in its own basin freshly filled with water. Subsequent photos show the basin over the next 40 seconds as the water soaks in around the plant.
The Blue Hubbard squash I bought was 24 inches long and it weighed 27 pounds; 7 pounds more than the neck pumpkin it rests on in this photo… and, perhaps, 20 times the weight of the butternut squash from my own garden.
Some months ago I got all excited about winter squash and lamented that the only squash in my small kitchen garden this year was butternut. I bought a huge neck pumpkin at the farmers’ market, and a week later I bought a Blue Hubbard squash as the weekend flea market.
It’s been a long time coming, but here’s how I preserved the Blue Hubbard. This method is simple and valid for any winter squash you plan to use in pie fillings. If you want to freeze squash for later use mashed or in casseroles, leave it out of the blender; scoop the cooked squash directly into freezer containers.
I started by cutting off the rotten end of the squash. I removed about a half-inch margin of healthy-looking skin in case the rot had progressed farther through the flesh than what showed on the surface.
The Blue Hubbard Squash Review
I bought my 27 pound pod-people squash for $1.50. This resulted from a 25% discount offered when the seller discovered one end of the squash had started to rot. I had heard that Blue Hubbard is great for pies… but that seems to go for every winter squash I haven’t tried.
While the photographs and their captions tell the story of how to prepare squash for freezing, I didn’t freeze all of the Blue Hubbard. After cooking it, I scooped a sample to taste and was quite pleased. My Blue Hubbard was sweet and very flavorful; it has a much “squashier” flavor than the neck pumpkin. You could serve Blue Hubbard in place of butternut, and few people would notice.
The cut squash was gorgeous. I love the rich pastel orange that fades into pastel green near the rind. When I pressed on the flesh, it gave easily and fluid squirted from it, indicating rot. When I removed another inch of material, the flesh was firm.
I cut the remaining healthy Blue Hubbard squash lengthwise into thirds and picked out all the seeds to plant next year (I hope to give some away or swap with some of my readers). Then I used a spoon to scrape the stringy guts away from the flesh. I’ve no doubt you can eat this stuff, but I’ve never read anything encouraging me to do so.
I had to cut the sections of squash into smaller pieces to get them to fit into one of my largest cook pots. I stood the pieces on edge, and arranged them with air spaces between them. Then I added a few inches of water and covered the pot. It took about 45 minutes for the flesh to become soft all the way through on every piece. I used tongs to remove the squash from the pot, and then I scraped the cooked flesh away from the rind. Even cooked, the subtle pastel colors show in the squash on the spoon in the right-most photo.
Each scoop of cooked squash went into my blender (place the scoops directly into freezer containers if you intend to serve the squash as a vegetable… pureed squash is best for use in baking and soup bases). There was so much squash that I had to run the blender several times. I used the puree setting and made sure there were no chunks remaining in any load. Once I’d filled my largest bowl with pureed squash, I distributed the puree into freezer bags in 16 ounce batches; one bag is the appropriate amount for making a pumpkin pie. I wrote the date on each bag and set them all in the freezer… I’ll be able to make pumpkin pie, bread, cake, soup, and ravioli throughout the year.
A Yard Bird posed for photos next to the Small Kitchen Garden family Christmas tree before shipping out to a customer the week before Christmas. Thanks to all who have purchased Yard Birds in 2009. The artist has some new ideas he plans to express in his 2010 creations.
While my small kitchen garden sleeps through the winter, I’m enjoying a laid back holiday. We’ve had various visitors at dinners or sleeping over, and we’ve had some terrific meals including beef fondue on Chirstmas eve, and a very Thanksgiving-like turkey dinner on Christmas day.
I, the kitchen gardener, have had an ear infection, and so have not been as productive as I’d like. However, I finally pulled together a holiday greeting for visitors to Your Small Kitchen Garden blog. It’s a one-minute-long video of scenes on a snowy day in the kitchen garden. I made the video with thoughts of my gardening friends who live in southern climates or coastal states and never get to experience the proverbial white Christmas.
Even more, I made this holiday video with all of my blog’s visitors in mind: Thank you for reading, for leaving comments, and for providing encouragement for me to continue the blog. As the growing season wound down, so did the blog entries… but I have plenty of material I hope to write about through the winter, and I anticipate new projects in the spring will produce a whole new series of posts. Please, keep gardening, and enjoy the season!
It’s that time of year at Your Small Kitchen Garden when I muse about what gardening-related gifts I’d most appreciate receiving. Why do this? The question is out there: What are this holiday season’s best gardening gifts?
Of course, the answer differs from gardener to gardener. Last year, I posted a list that I’d be happy to offer as my picks for this year. You can read it here: Essential Gifts for the Small Kitchen Garden. However, pointing out last year’s list hardly seemed like a big enough job, so I pulled together a new list for this year. Please consider for your gardening acquaintances: my top gardening gifts for 2010. (But if you don’t spot the perfect gift here, check out last year’s list.)
Put a Dog to Work in the Garden
Turn your dog into a productive member of the family with this awesome gift that does double-duty for a gardener and dog owner: A worm composter for dog poop! Conventional wisdom is that you should not put dog droppings into a compost heap or garden. Living so closely with humans, dogs may carry diseases that can spread through their feces. However, this worm composting system efficiently converts dog poop into compost tea and rich, clean compost. Designed to handle the output of two medium-sized dogs, the tumbleweed pet poo converter is easy-to-manage and odor-free. Constructed of uv treated high impact polypropylene hardened plastic, the tumbleweed pet poo converter is certain to please any dog-owning gardener.
Row covers protect crops from insects, birds, rodents, and slugs. They also trap heat around plants and protect them from late frost in spring and early frost in autumn. In fact, row covers can extend the growing season by three or more weeks on each end of the season. Row covers make a great gift for any kitchen gardener.
For every gardener there comes a time for gardening gloves, and many gardeners defend their favorite brands. These are worth a look: durable latex palms protect your skin while knit backings let your hands breath. If you know a gardener asking for decent gardening gloves, these are bound to satisfy.
Many kitchen gardeners start seeds for crops that require a long season. Sure, they can buy flats of seedlings at nurseries and garden stores, but starting your own seeds reduces the chance of introducing disease and insects from outside sources. Also, garden stores stock but a few varieties of any crop, leaving local growers with limited choices. The StarterHouse is a handy utility for seed-starters. It’s compact and lightweight and it’s easy to set up and take down. This mini greenhouse is waterproof and UV resistant. It seals out cold and wind while trapping heat from late winter and early spring sunshine. Your kitchen gardener can start seeds outdoors, or use the greenhouse to harden down seedlings before transplanting them to the garden. In some climates, the StarterHouse may provide enough greenhouse effect to extend the growing season through winter.
Ratchet pruners provide a mechanical advantage to help you get through tough branches. With its reputation for producing fine cutting tools, Fiskars has a winner with these ratchet pruners. The high carbon steel blade holds its edge well, and the ratcheting action lets the gardener in your life cut easily through branches up to 3/4 of an inch thick. These are the perfect gift for anyone who prunes trees, bushes, and hedges.
Many pruning jobs require a bit more cutting power than pruning sheers – or even loppers – can provide. The Fiskars folding pruning saw cuts through relatively thick branches with little effort. The blade folds into the handle, creating a compact form that’s easy to carry in a pocket, apron, or bucket. This pruning saw has a ten inch high carbon steel blade and a hardwood handle. The blade locks into position, and releases with the push of a button.
Every gardener needs to haul stuff in and around the garden and yard. The WheelEasy collapsible garden cart makes hauling… well, easy. It can carry heavy, awkward loads – up to 6 cubic feet of stuff. The WheelEasy’s low profile reduces the difficulty of loading and the low center-of-gravity makes the cart both easier to balance and more maneuverable than other garden carts. Weighing only 21 pounds, it can carry over 350 pounds. The WheelEasy is a novel and versatile gift for your favorite gardener.
Want to give your gardener a garden cart, but the heavy-duty cart is a budget-breaker? Here’s a lightweight folding cart. It, like the WheelEasy (above), also handles awkward loads, rendering them balanced and maneuverable. However, the WheelEasy LA Garden Cart is lighter and has a smaller capacity: 150 pounds… still plenty strong to carry many loads. Your gardener will easily find room to store this compact workhorse when it’s not in use. This is a terrific gift idea.
Stylish? Maybe not. Practical? Absolutely. If your kitchen gardener has traditional planting beds, muck boots are an awesome addition to the gardening wardrobe. Every spring, my sneakers become unusable for normal wear because they get covered in mud from my garden. With a set of dedicated gardening muck boots, I’d step into the boots on may way to the garden patch, and step out of the muddy foot gear on my way into the house.
Your gardener doesn’t walk in the garden? Does he or she shovel manure or mulch? Ever walk the dog in rain or snow? A set of muck boots at the door can make many icky tasks a tad more pleasant. These boots have a lining that lets air circulate to reduce the buildup of moisture inside. While the boots are waterproof, they stretch enough for you to move naturally without straining your feet. They include a removable liner that provides support and comfort. The Hoser model muck boots stand 15″ high. Give your gardener muck boots this holiday.
While most gardeners will find plenty of use for muck boots, not everyone gardens in fifteen inches of muck. The Scrub model of muck boots stands only 9 inches high, but affords plenty of protection for most messy activities. LIke the Hoser model, these muck boots have a lining that lets air circulate to reduce the buildup of moisture inside. While the boots are waterproof, they stretch enough for you to move naturally without straining your feet. They include a removable liner that provides support and comfort.
Unless your gardener uses hydroponics or otherwise plants in containers, great digging tools always make great gifts. The Radius Garden Pro Digging Fork is lightweight and durable. The handle and grip are obviously unconventional, but they provide mechanical advantage, reducing stress on the gardener’s arms and back. Such a radical design looks pricey, but Radius tools are surprisingly inexpensive considering their quality.
While a garden fork is terrific for turning soil in a planting bed or working weeds out of the soil in the spring, sometimes your gardener must use a shovel. There’s none better than the Radius Garden Pro shovel. The pointed blade cuts through soil and roots and, of course, is handy for digging holes for trees, shrubs, and annual seedlings. The shovel also moves soil, compost, sand, and manure that a garden fork simply can’t contain.
So many visitors to Your Small Kitchen Garden come looking for raised planting beds. In a past post, I calculated the costs to build a raised bed yourself… and it’s not cheap. I’ve also provided affiliate links to raised beds for sale at Amazon.com… but those raised beds are scary expensive. Finally, I’ve affiliated with an on-line garden store that sells relatively inexpensive raised planting beds. Their Raised Garden Planter Kit comes in two depths: a 5.5 inch deep bed, or an 11 inch deep bed. These are made of resin textured and colored to look like wood. They should last for decades.
The kit includes steel corner posts to hold the retaining walls to the ground, and connectors to keep the panels from separating. These raised beds are easy to set up, and you can combine several kits to make larger planting areas. Each kit makes a 46″ square. Check them out; this is the best price I’ve ever seen for raised bed kits of this quality.
If your gardener’s kitchen garden isn’t so small, there are times when a mere wheelbarrow won’t be able to handle the load. A 14 cubic foot Garden and Farm Cart changes the way a gardener thinks about hauling. This cart holds up to 400 pounds – soil, manure, gravel, sand, compost, stone, firewood, water buckets, tools… it’s astonishing how easily you can move them around. My family had one of these at our weekend farm. Even as a kid, I could run a load of manure from the horse stall to the garden, or move a load of logs to transfer to the car. The garden and farm cart rolls on large bicycle wheels which make it very maneuverable. Give the gardener in your life a gardening hand truck.
Adorable, handcrafted, folk art. Yard Birds add whimsical flare to any garden, yard, or entranceway. Click here to find a Yard Bird for your kitchen garden.
Find the perfect gift for any kitchen gardener--or find products to help get the best from your own small kitchen garden. To save you time, we've selected products from Amazon.com that received the best customer reviews. Click here to visit our store and pick up the perfect gifts for any small kitchen garden enthusiast.
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