Month: August 2016

Root Maggots–Brassicas’ worst enemy!

cjdavidshofer

I live in Ketchikan, Alaska where I garden intensively all over my yard with mostly fruits, and vegetables. This is my second season gardening on my property and it has been a bountiful year so far with garlic, onions, potato’s, lettuce, spinach, raspberries, strawberries, cherries, and gooseberries–to name a few. I love watching the garden evolve and grow over the spring and summer–how bare soil can grow into such lush, delicious greens that fill up your belly. As things grow, so do pests and diseases along with other small problems Read More …

When to Harvest in a Typical Southeast Alaskan Garden

emprado

Harvest Time! The last few months have been chalked full of preparation, planting, and weeding and now it is time to harvest the rewards. New gardeners can find it difficult to determine when exactly to harvest each vegetable at the peak of freshness. So I have done some of the research for you and have compiled a list of fifteen vegetables to help you get the most of each vegetable found in a typical Southeast Alaskan garden. Also to make it easier the list is in alphabetical order. 1. Asparagus Read More …

Easy Blanching for Winter Feasting

Jenna Miller

The Wonders of Food Preservation As delicious as fresh produce straight from the garden can be, most of the time we hobby gardeners have too much to eat all at once, and we must choose what to do with the extra! Some give their surplus garden bounty away. The other day, a co-worker of mine offered to buy my extras from me. But the best choice in my mind is to preserve them for winter eating! There is nothing like the satisfaction of knowing I have a freezer full of Read More …

See Weeds? Try Seaweed!

rkboettcher

THE COMPLETE PACKAGE My neighbor has been saying for years that we should try seaweed in our garden. I brushed it off until a recent beach walk had me looking at the shoreside debris in a different light. The sea grass snaked along the coastline in rows that reminded me of hay drying in the fields right before the baler came to scoop it up. I did a little online research first and then just felt silly for living and gardening here for years and never using it! It’s free Read More …

Peas Be With You

nrambo

Well, it is now nearing August and my first Interior Alaska garden is thriving more than I ever imagined it would. I planted a little bit of everything to see how it would all do. My most thriving vegetables happen to be my lettuce and snap peas. I planted the last week of May, and my snow peas were the last thing I thought would do so well in my raised beds. Week after week, night after night, after watering them I would check to see if there were any Read More …