Tagged: Edible Plants

Animal repellant products / Community Gardening / Compost / Deer / Edible Plants / Garden Design / Garden Maintenance / Gardening on the Wild Side: Working in Harmony with Nature / Heirloom plants / Organic Vegetable Gardening / Raised Beds / Seeds / Spring

 by Elizabeth McCoy

The Real Magic- Starting With Seeds

  Growing our own plants from seeds opens up a wide horizon of choices never even imagined by those who depend on the big box stores for their starts each spring.   There are many varieties of vegetables, herbs, flowers, and trees that have never been marketed in our area as seedlings.  Even within a popular type of vegetable, like tomatoes, there are many delicious named cultivars, many of them heirloom, not in commercial production as seedlings. Malabar spinach, a vining...

Community Gardening / Container Gardens / Edible Plants / Herbs / Organic Vegetable Gardening / Therapeutic Gardening

 by Elizabeth McCoy and Karen Brooks

Therapeutic Gardening in a Botanical Garden

A Special Needs Gardening Program! A collaboration between our Master Gardeners and Arc, the Arc of Abilities Day Support Program is for adults with special needs.  The program teaches participants how to grow and use flowers, vegetables, and herbs that they cultivate in four large, raised beds year-round in the Williamsburg Botanical Garden’s Therapeutic Garden, and on rainy days in the Park’s Visitor’s Center. In a partnership that has lasted for more than five years, Master Gardeners meet with Arc...

Community Gardening / Edible Plants / Garden Design / Garden Maintenance / Organic Vegetable Gardening / Pollinators / Vegetable Gardening / Wildlife Gardening

 by Bill Dichtel

What Is Going on at the Historic Triangle Learning Garden?

  The Historic Triangle Learning Garden is one of many projects led by members of the James City County/Williamsburg Master Gardeners.  It is located  right behind the CDR building and next door to Waller Mill Elementary School, at 312 Waller Mill Road. Originally known as “Incredible Edibles,” the project changed its name to the Historic Triangle Learning Garden in 2021 to reflect a broader range of interests, including growing flowers, supporting pollinators, and practicing other aspects of organic gardening, in...

Edible Plants / Food Forest / Garden Maintenance / Gardening on the Wild Side: Working in Harmony with Nature / Invasive Plants / Larval Host Plants / Native Plants / Water Wise / Weeds / Wildlife Gardening

 by Elizabeth McCoy

What is a Weed?

A family of rabbits gathers each evening at dusk to nibble their way through the clover and creeping Charlie that populate our front ‘lawn.’  They prefer to nibble plants that we don’t cultivate and won’t miss.  A motley mix of volunteer species, interspersed with a few grasses, grow in the open space between the patio and hedge.  While we call it a ‘bee lawn,’ others might say our lawn is infested with weeds. What is a Weed? Any plant growing...

Animal repellant products / Birds / Deer / Edible Plants / Gardening on the Wild Side: Working in Harmony with Nature / Herbs / Larval Host Plants / Lepidoptera / Native Plants / Permaculture / Wildlife Gardening

 by Elizabeth McCoy

Who Is Welcome to Dine?

A Black Swallowtail butterfly feeds on Verbena bonariensis . When planning your garden and buying plants, is your first consideration who, or what, might eat them? If you are planting fruit trees, tomato vines, or salad greens you’re likely planning to share the fruits of your labor and investment with family and friends. Some friends of mine garden in a community garden, where much of the produce raised is donated to our local FISH organization. But food crops aside, when...