Since we’re coming up on seed-starting or possibly even mesclun-growing season, some inspiration from the NYTimes on “Living Off the Land in Maine, Even in Winter“:
IT was early February, when the 10-hour day returns here on the 44th parallel, and Barbara Damrosch could see it in the brighter green leaves of her tatsoi and spinach growing in the unheated greenhouse attached to the house she shares with her husband, Eliot Coleman, at Four Season Farm.
Mr. Coleman, 73, began farming here on Cape Rosier, a rocky peninsula in Penobscot Bay, in 1968, on 60 acres of forested land he bought from Scott and Helen Nearing for $33 an acre. …
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By the time they eyed each other over the tomatoes, Mr. Coleman had already published his first book, “The New Organic Grower,” and taken delegations of scientists to Europe to observe the success of intensive organic farming. Ms. Damrosch had appeared on “The Victory Garden,” the popular WGBH public television series that promoted composting and intensive gardening, and she had published a book, “Theme Gardens.” Over the years, they have both continued to write: Ms. Damrosch’s book “A Garden Primer” is a bible for gardeners; Mr. Coleman’s “Four Season Harvest” and “The Winter Harvest Handbook” explain his organic methods in detail…
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This time of year, there is a mad race to seed all kinds of crops. Spinach, salad greens, arugula, cabbages, beets and many other hardy crops are grown in the unheated greenhouses. Seeds of heat-loving tomatoes, peppers and cucumbers are started in flats in the one heated greenhouse. As early crops are harvested, the transplants of heat-loving crops will take their place, remaining under the protection of the hoop houses, which can be vented front and back…
I’m prejudiced, because Damrosch’s Garden Primer was the book I used for courage when I first started gardening 25 years ago. Guess I should buy a copy of the revised edition and try pushing my self-imposed limits some more.
So, here’s a question: I know cut-and-come-again hardy greens are supposed to be a very simple project, but I have no faith in my ability to tell edible crops from potentially poisonous wind-blown ‘volunteers’. Now that every grocery store carries a wide variety of pre-bagged greens, is the home-grown taste premium worth investing in a waist-high planter and some plant cover to try growing my mesclun?
Next week, I’m planning a list of this year’s tomato plants…
Sunday Morning Garden Chat – Hardy GreensPost + Comments (31)