Consider a Drip System Drip irrigation can make successful gardeners out of the most negligent bachelors who can’t keep anything alive for more than a week. Drip irrigation enables serious gardeners to scale up their crops, conserve water and keep their crops thriving while they travel. Want to Grow Your...

Add Your Heading Text Here Let’s get you started on building your first raised bed. First we’ll look at what its walls need to do. Then we’ll consider the best materials. Requirements for Your Raised Garden Bed Walls The bed walls contain fertile soil over infertile ground. Any material that...

Potato Crop – Introduction 6 September 2023 – by Doug Weir – Mill Station Road – The Green Valley of West Sonoma County Are you a suburban gardner who wants fresh, premium quality potatoes?  Are you seeking the reward and satisfaction of growing potatoes yourself? Do you want to choose...

Eradicate Aphids from your Tomato Crop I’ve found five well known ways to eradicate aphids. So far I’ve put two of them to the test. First I’ve had some luck with spraying aphids off my tomato plants with nothing more than a blast of water. The second method I’ve tried...

Tomato Crop and Garden Update for 5 July 2023 While the update from May was quite dismal owing to the effect of cold night time air from the North Pacific Ocean, we’ve seen explosive growth over the month of June for all of our crops. If you don’t have time...

TOMATO CROP UPDATE 10th of May 2023, Sebastopol, California The photo above shows a San Marzano paste tomato seedling in its pot – kept indoors – compared to the same variety transplated at the end of April – near the base of the pot. Two weeks ago, at the end...

TOMATO CHECKLIST ITEM 6 – Plant the seedlings deep, partly burying their stems to encourage root formation. In a previous post (Checklist Item 3) we talked about hardening off your potted seedlings to acclimate them to the rigors of heat, cold, the sun, wind and infrequent watering. After two or...

TOMATO CHECKLIST ITEM 5 – PREPARE THE SOIL. The next task is to prepare your garden soil.   If you are starting with rich dark loamy soil consisting of sand, clay and organic material, then you may only need to enrich this with composted manure, or a small amount of fertilizer...

TOMATO CHECKLIST ITEM 4 – DECIDE ON CROP SITE. The photo above shows some of our current tomato seedlings today.  These are our Marzano Plum seedlings. Now let’s continue with the tomato checklist. With your tomato seedlings potted on, it’s time to demarcate the best tomato location for growing your...

TOMATO CHECKLIST ITEM 3 – POTTING ON. Previously we looked at setting up a nursery to germinate your tomato seeds.  Two or three weeks afterwards, you’ll need to transplant the seedlings from their nursery cups into half pint (250 mL) pots before the seedlings’ root system becomes too dense, and...

TOMATO CHECKLIST ITEM 2 – GERMINATE YOUR SEEDS. In our last post we went deep into how to select the best varieties of tomatoes.  Now we’re going to look and planting the seeds in a nursery before the growing season starts. Be sure to germinate your tomato seeds in an...

TOMATO CHECKLIST ITEM 1 – SELECT THE BEST TOMATO VARIETIES FOR YOU. It’s that time of year again to start your tomato crop. Here’s a checklist of 20 items to raise a bumper crop of tomatoes, listed in order from starting your crop through harvest. Select the best varieties  Germinate...