gardening

Pollinator pathways

sbradford — Tue, 24 Mar 2026 16:19:52 +0000

Pollinator pathways

April 1, 2026

Imagine taking a statewide road trip only to find every highway restaurant, hotel, and gas station closed. For a traveler, being tired, hungry, and in danger of running out of gas makes the journey difficult, if not impossible. For the pollinators of Ohio (bees, butterflies, moths, and hummingbirds), that’s often the reality of navigating manicured lawns and concrete.

It’s not just a problem for bugs and birds. Whether on a commercial farm or in a gardener’s backyard, many of Ohio’s crops — cucumbers, pumpkins, and tomatoes, for example — depend on a healthy pollinator population. As wild, weedy spaces become more scarce, pollinators face increasing challenges. According to Ohio State University Extension, “Animal pollinators and bees in particular are currently facing many threats, such as lack of forage (flowers for food) and lack of suitable nesting sites.”

One way humans can help is by planting a pollinator pathway, creating an environment where those farm and garden helpers don’t have to work so hard just to get by.

A pollinator pathway is a grouping of native, diverse plants that help beneficial insects and birds survive in developed areas. Made up of plants that bloom in succession, they provide corridors of food and shelter from spring to fall. Typically located along roads, sidewalks, and yards, these pathways provide different landscapes needed to create bridges between habitat areas that might be too far apart otherwise.

Design your own pathway

Pollinator pathways don’t have to be special gardens. They can grow in everyday spaces like farm edges, small-town backyards, and roadsides between communities.

Pathways need two types of plants to create a supportive environment: nectar/pollen plants that provide food for adult pollinators and host plants for butterfly/moth caterpillars to feed on and grow. To make planting decisions easier, you can use the “three-by-three” formula: Pick three native species that bloom in each of the three seasons: spring (March–May), mid-summer (June–August), and late summer/fall (September–November). Different types of pollinators are active at different times of the year, so having a continuous bloom is critical.

When possible, it’s especially helpful if such groupings can be within 300 to 500 yards of another, creating that pathway of pit stops that pollinators need. By choosing to grow a pollinator pathway, you not only plant a vibrant, active garden but also choose to help sustain the creatures that keep farms, fields, and communities thriving.

Pollinator-friendly plants

Here’s a season-by-season list of native plants to get you started:

Spring

Willow (Salix species)

Wild columbine (Aquilegia canadensis)

Chokecherry (Prunus virginiana)

Summer

Common milkweed (Asclepias syriaca)

Purple coneflower (Echinacea purpurea)

Wild bergamot (Monarda fistulosa)

Fall

Goldenrod (Solidago species)

New England aster (Symphyotrichum novae-angliae)

Cardinal flower (Lobelia cardinalis)

Tags

wildlife

gardening

Green indoors

sbradford — Fri, 23 Jan 2026 18:42:57 +0000

Green indoors

February 1, 2026

Alicia Adams

In The Garden

Harvesting your own fresh, aromatic herbs provides a satisfying connection to nature and lets you bring garden-to-table zestiness to your meals. But most herbs need full sun to thrive, and Timothy McDermott, assistant professor and Extension educator at Ohio State University, says that in winter, a sunny kitchen windowsill isn’t enough.

But you can still get vibrant summer flavor all winter long by growing fresh herbs indoors under LED grow lights.

Why LED?

In years past, indoor gardening often meant bulky, hot lights that were as hard on your electric bill as they were on your plants. Modern LED lights, McDermott says, have revolutionized the kitchen garden. The slim, cool bulbs use up to 50% less energy than traditional fluorescents, yet deliver a full spectrum, which prevents plants from becoming “leggy,” or thin. The result is a sturdier, bushier herb that thrives on your countertop.

Choosing the right light

LED lights come in an assortment of sizes, shapes, and uses. For your indoor garden, choose an LED light that specifically says “grow light” or “for plants.” Make sure to look for these three things on the packaging:

Full spectrum: Bulbs that mimic natural daylight deliver the entire spectrum that herbs need during different phases of growth.

Temperature: Look for 5,000K (often labeled “Daylight” in the description) to encourage compact, bushy growth.

Wattage: Ignore the manufacturer’s phrasing that says what it looks like to the human eye (“100 watt equivalent,” for example) and look for actual power draw. For a single potted herb, an LED light with a 15W–20W LED bulb or panel is plenty. Otherwise, 20W–30W of LED power per square foot of countertop garden is a good guideline.

Easy-to-grow herbs

The easiest way to start your garden is to buy herbs that are already potted. Most major grocery store chains sell potted living herbs in their produce section. Fortunately, some of the most forgiving herbs to grow are also some of the most widely used in cooking:

Basil: tasty in hearty Italian dishes and also a wonderful topper for pizzas, pasta, and soups.

Chive: adds a mild onion-garlic flavor along with a pop of green to baked potatoes and eggs.

Rosemary: adds a slightly piney, earthy flavor to roasted meats and delicious depth to bread and soups.

Handle with care

Even with proper lighting, McDermott says, you still need to take proper care of your indoor herbs to keep them thriving. “Make sure you don’t overfertilize or overwater them,” he says. “Use a well-drained potting mix and fertilize them only if you’re positive they need it.”

Tags

gardening

herbs

Straight from the garden

sbradford — Fri, 28 Jun 2024 18:41:27 +0000

Straight from the garden

July 1, 2024

Catherine Murray

Good Eats

This month, whip up three delicious recipes with ingredients fresh from the garden, including Sorrel and Chive Pesto, Garden Gem Salad, Chai-Spiced Carrot Cake, and Chicken Cacciatore. Full recipes are displayed in the dropdowns below!

Sorrel and Chive Pesto

Lots of ingredients can be made into great pesto: basil, of course, as well as arugula, spinach, parsley, carrot greens, and fennel fronds; this one features sorrel and chives, two fast-growing and spreading perennials. Sorrel, while less commonly known, is easy to grow in Ohio and, like chives, is one of the first things to come up in spring and lasts all the way through fall. Sorrel has a tart, lemony flavor, perfect for pesto. Harvest herbs at the end of the season to make a large batch to freeze for quick dinners all winter long. Note: Sorrel comes in many varieties; one is red-veined, which would likely influence the pesto's color.

Yield

6 Servings

Preparation time

10 minutes

Cooking time

12 minutes

Total time

22 minutes

Ingredients

1 medium garlic clove

3 ounces unsalted walnuts or pine nuts

3 ounces Parmesan cheese (divided)

1 ounce chives

3 ounces sorrel leaves (thick or tough stems removed)

2 tablespoons lemon juice (up to 6 Tbsp, if preferred)

2 tablespoons olive oil (up to 4 Tbsp, if preferred)

1 pound pasta of your choice

Instructions

Cook pasta according to package directions and plan for the pesto to be ready before the pasta is done cooking. Place garlic, nuts, and 1 ounce of the Parmesan cheese in a food processor and pulse until finely minced. Tear chives into 3-inch pieces, add them to the food processor, and pulse again. Add sorrel leaves and pulse again — if the processor struggles to break them apart, scrape sides and rearrange them. Once a finely minced paste is formed, pulse in 2 tablespoons lemon juice and 2 tablespoons olive oil. Pulse until smooth, adding more oil to loosen the paste if needed. Taste: If flavor is dull or bitter, adding more lemon juice (or a dash of salt) should do the trick.

Transfer cooked, hot pasta to a large bowl and spoon some pesto on top. With a pair of tongs, mix to generously coat pasta with pesto. Just before serving, add a dash of lemon juice and sprinkle with thinly shredded Parmesan cheese. Refrigerate leftover pesto with a thin layer of olive oil on top to prevent oxidation and use within a week, or freeze for up to 3 months.

Notes

Per serving: 357 calories, 14 grams fat (3 grams saturated fat), 7 milligrams cholesterol, 129 milligrams sodium, 45 grams total carbohydrates, 3 grams fiber, 13 grams protein.

Garden Gem Salad

Yield

8 Servings

Preparation time

15 minutes

Cooking time

2 minutes

Total time

17 minutes

Ingredients

1⁄2 jalapeño (seeded and diced)

1 medium clove garlic

1 tablespoon honey

2 tablespoons lime juice

1⁄4 cup olive oil

1⁄2 teaspoon salt

1⁄2 teaspoon pepper

A few sprigs cilantro or chives, coarsely chopped

3 cups trimmed and cut fresh green beans

1 cup fresh corn kernels

1 medium cucumber (diced small)

1 cup diced fresh tomatoes (Roma or cherry preferred)

Instructions

Using an immersion blender, blend the first 8 ingredients (jalapeño through chives) to make dressing. Set aside. Bring a small pot of water and a dash of salt to a boil, throw in green beans, and blanch for 2 minutes. Drain and rinse with cold water until cooled. In a large bowl, toss vegetables together. Let sit 5 minutes, then drain excess liquid from vegetables. Toss vegetables with dressing and serve. Refrigerate leftovers; eat within 4 days.

Notes

Per serving: 108 calories, 7.5 grams fat (1 gram saturated fat), 0 milligrams cholesterol, 153 milligrams sodium, 10.5 grams total carbohydrates, 4 grams fiber, 2 grams protein.

Chai-Spiced Carrot Cake

Yield

16 Servings

Preparation time

20 minutes

Cooking time

45 minutes

Total time

1 hour, 5 minutes

Ingredients

1 1⁄2 teaspoons cinnamon

1 1⁄2 teaspoons cardamom

1 1⁄2 teaspoons ground ginger

1⁄2 teaspoon allspice

1⁄2 teaspoon cloves

1⁄2 teaspoon nutmeg

2 1⁄2 cups flour

1 1⁄2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

1⁄2 teaspoon salt

2 1⁄2 cups grated carrots (or parsnips)

1 cup granulated sugar

1 cup packed brown sugar

1 cup vegetable oil

4 eggs

Frosting

Additional Ingredients

8 oz cream cheese (softened)

4 T unsalted butter (softened)

3 c powdered sugar

2 T milk

2 t chai spice mix

Instructions

In a small bowl, mix together spices (cinnamon through nutmeg). Reserve 2 teaspoons of this chai spice mix for the frosting. In a medium bowl, thoroughly whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and the bowl of chai spice mix.

Preheat oven to 350 F. In a large bowl with an electric mixer, blend together carrots, granulated sugar, brown sugar, vegetable oil, and eggs. With a spatula, fold dry ingredients into carrot mixture until just combined. Pour into a greased 9x13-inch baking dish. Bake 40 to 45 minutes, or until tester comes out clean. Remove from oven and let cool.

With an electric mixer, blend cream cheese, butter, powdered sugar, milk, and remaining 2 teaspoons chai spice mix. Add milk to desired consistency. Frost cake when both cake and frosting are at room temperature.

Notes

Per serving: 388 calories, 18 grams fat (6 grams saturated fat), 50 milligrams cholesterol, 199 milligrams sodium, 54 grams total carbohydrates, 1 gram fiber, 4 grams protein.

Chicken Cacciatore

While chicken cacciatore is traditionally served over rice, pasta, or polenta, continue the garden theme with mashed potatoes or spaghetti squash instead.

Yield

6 Servings

Preparation time

25 minutes

Cooking time

30 minutes

Total time

55 minutes

Ingredients

3 pounds bone-in, skin-on chicken legs, thighs, and/or drumsticks (up to 4 pounds)

salt and pepper

3 tablespoons olive oil

1 medium onion (diced)

1 large bell pepper (stemmed, seeded, and chopped)

5 cloves garlic cloves (thinly sliced)

3⁄4 cup dry white wine

3 large tomatoes (up to 4)

A few sprigs fresh rosemary, sage, and/or thyme

1 tablespoon cornstarch

2 tablespoons water

2 pounds mashed potatoes

Instructions

Boil water in a small pot. Cut an “X” in the bottom of each tomato and carefully submerge them in the water for 60 seconds. Drain tomatoes and run under cold water to cool them down enough to handle. Peel and discard skin, then chop tomatoes and set aside.

Pat dry chicken and season with salt and pepper. Heat oil over medium-high in a large Dutch oven (or a tall oven-proof pan). Cook until browned all over, about 5 minutes per side. Remove chicken from pan and sauté onion and peppers until softened, about 7 minutes, then add garlic and stir for 1 minute. Carefully pour in wine and bring to a simmer, loosening any bits from the bottom. Add tomatoes along with herb sprigs and a bit more salt and pepper to taste. In a small bowl, mix cornstarch and water, then stir into the vegetables. Cook until simmering again.

Heat oven to 350 F. Nestle chicken pieces into the vegetables and place uncovered on middle rack in oven. Bake about 30 minutes, until chicken is cooked through and sauce is slightly thickened. Discard herb sprigs. Serve over mashed potatoes.

Notes

Per serving: 402 calories, 22 grams fat (6 grams saturated fat), 83 milligrams cholesterol, 185 milligrams sodium, 23 grams total carbohydrates, 3 grams fiber, 24 grams protein.

Tags

entrees

recipe

gardening

Yard to table

sbradford — Mon, 03 Jun 2024 17:34:17 +0000

Yard to table

June 1, 2024

Margie Wuebker

Co-op People

Jerry Banks has a green thumb — something to which his family could always attest. Now, so can the residents and staff at Woodland Country Manor in Somerville.

Gardening has been a part of Banks’ life as far back as he can remember, but ever since he retired from AK Steel in Middletown, he’s had lots more time to spend on the enjoyable activity. The result has been a cornucopia of vegetables and fruit for the dinner table, and Woodland’s residents have been the beneficiaries.

Banks and his wife, Kathy, residents of Somerville and members of Oxford-based Butler Rural Electric Cooperative, always had a home garden but expanded their gardening activities when her parents (Homer and Phoebe Polser) moved to the retirement community not far from the “homeplace.”

“They used to tend a 1½- to 2-acre garden,” Banks says. “He was not one to sit around without getting some dirt on his hands, so Kathy and I thought a garden would help with the transition.”

Banks eyed the inner courtyard at Woodland as an ideal garden site for residents, and the management agreed.

He initially procured fill dirt from an area pig farm, ensuring a fertile place for plants and seeds to take root. At first, residents watched from their windows as he carefully worked the soil and then started planting. They soon came outside for a closer look. Many shared their memories of days gone by when they had their own backyard gardens.

The circular garden is bordered by wide concrete sidewalks and umbrella tables with comfortable lawn chairs. Vegetables like peas, lettuce, kale, and radishes go in early in the season since they tolerate cool temperatures, and other fare, such as green beans, cucumbers, spinach, squash, pumpkins, peppers, tomatoes, and potatoes, fill out the space as temperatures get progressively warmer through the spring and summer. Brightly colored zinnias and statuesque sunflowers border the neat rows.

“People often ask me about secret ingredients to promote healthy growth,” he says, with a mischievous air. “There is nothing like cow manure to enrich the soil. Also, I am a real fanatic about weeds — get them out before they have a chance to take over. Hot, dry summer days bring a need for frequent watering and periodic doses of Miracle-Gro.”

Banks does not keep track of the time he donates for Woodland’s garden, because he considers the response of residents more than enough compensation. Although he purchases all the seeds, plants, and other supplies, the bountiful harvest stays on-site with head cook Karen White planning menus around whatever happens to be in season. Impromptu “snapping parties” take place when the garden yields buckets of green beans. Residents enjoy the activity, knowing their handiwork will make a tasty addition to their dinner plates.

“The garden gives our residents so much joy,” Woodland owner/administrator Lori Auer says. “They enjoy watching everything grow — especially the tomatoes, because they will tell you there is nothing like a homegrown tomato.”

Banks chuckles when he recalls how residents come out with wheelchairs, canes, and walkers to supervise his work and offer words of advice. Gatherings quickly turn into parties with cold lemonade and snacks. One resident even brings his harmonica to provide music.

“I have been blessed in my life,” Banks says. “This is something I can do to give back and so I’ll continue doing it as long as I’m able.”

Tags

Butler Rural Electric Cooperative

gardening

vegetables

flowers

A matter of taste

sbradford — Wed, 01 May 2024 18:20:02 +0000

A matter of taste

May 1, 2024

Chase Smoak

Features

Tired of losing tomatoes to unwanted garden pests? Worried you’ll need to sacrifice excellent taste for improved yield? Take a deep breath and relax: This year, you can have your tomato and eat it, too. With the help of a few new varieties and field-proven tactics, you’ll be on your way to growing the best tomato crop yet.

If you want to grow delicious, homegrown tomatoes this year, simply focus your attention on these three stages of gardening: planning, preparing, and protecting.

Stage 1: Plan

Planning for a successful tomato harvest starts with choosing the right varieties to grow in your garden.

Many gardeners claim that if you want great flavor, you’ll need to plant heirloom varieties. People selected these landrace tomato plants long ago for traits such as shape, size, and taste, so the claim has a basis. In pursuit of a better-tasting tomato, however, significant factors like resistance to insects and disease resistance were overlooked.

If you’ve grown heirlooms, you know how challenging the process can be. This bittersweet truth has left many gardeners wondering if old-timey taste is a thing of the past. Well, there’s good news. Consumer demand for resilient, flavorful tomatoes has not fallen on deaf ears. Plant breeders have come up with several improved tomato varieties — but with so many options available, how do you make the best choice?

A nonprofit organization called All-America Selections (AAS) may have the answer. The group tests new varieties before they hit the market, and their trial notes will tell you everything you need to know.

How does it work? Professional horticulturists across the country volunteer to grow test plots of new tomato varieties and compare notes on disease resistance, yields, and taste alongside established varieties.

“Our judges rate taste and texture first, then everything else second,” says Diane Blazek, executive director of All-America Selections and the National Garden Bureau. “You can have the most prolific, cute, unique new tomato, but if it doesn’t taste good, nobody wants it.”

Stage 2: Prepare

Proper site selection and planting techniques are vital to tomato gardening success.

Your tomato garden needs access to full sun (6 to 8 hours a day) and should have good drainage. Tomato plants hate wet feet and often succumb to root rot when left in waterlogged soils. They do, however, need regular watering throughout the growing season, so select a spot with easy access to water. Irrigating deeply but infrequently strengthens plants and encourages deep, healthy root systems for hot summer days.

Avoid using a place where tomatoes, potatoes, peppers, eggplant, and other solanaceous crops have been grown within the past three years. Many pests overwinter in the soil adjacent to plants and will terrorize unsuspecting gardeners.

Once you’ve selected the right spot, make sure to test your soil and amend the ground as indicated. Your local extension agent can help you arrange a test and interpret the results. Tomatoes are nutrient hogs that require a good supply of nutrients from start to finish, so you’ll likely need to fertilize before and during the growing cycle.

Adequate moisture is necessary for nutrient uptake. Drip irrigation works well and doesn’t soak leaves, which often leads to disease issues.

And don’t forget to deal with weeds. They are an often-overlooked source of tomato pests. After clearing the site of any weeds, spread mulch 3 to 4 inches deep and keep it a palm-width away from the bases of tomato stems.

Tomatoes should be planted after the last frost, according to The Ohio State University’s College of Food, Agricultural, and Environmental Sciences. In central Ohio, the ideal planting time is around May 20. In the southern part of the state, it’s one to two weeks earlier, and to the north, it’s a week later.

Stage 3: Protect

Like the rising of the sun, pests — insects and diseases — are to be expected in every garden. The good news: They can be controlled or even avoided using integrated pest management (IPM), a commonsense approach to gardening that treads lightly on the environment and minimizes use of garden chemicals.

Monitor and identify. Get to know your garden and what lives in it. Talk to your local extension agent for a precise understanding of the insects and diseases to watch out for. Remember that beneficial insects like praying mantis and lady beetles naturally keep damaging insects in check. Don’t resort to pesticides at the first sign of something that flies or crawls.

Make an evaluation. If you do spot harmful pests or damage on tomatoes, evaluate whether real damage is being done to the landscape. They may be annoying, but small pest populations can often be tolerated. Set thresholds to guide your treatment decisions. For example, you may decide there’s little benefit to treating a pest problem if there is less than 10% damage to the plant.

Choose a wise treatment. If treatment is necessary, use the least toxic measure first. Cultural methods such as proper watering, plant spacing, and fertilization can help prevent or reduce the number of pests. Mechanical means are another option that requires the physical removal of pests and can be useful for small populations. For example, hornworms are easily removable by hand-picking, and aphids are often washed away by a good squirt from a water hose.

If these approaches fail, reach out to your local extension agent for advice on pesticides and follow all label directions. Pesticide labels are the law, and many chemicals may be unethical or even illegal to use on fruit-bearing plants. Err on the side of caution.

Heirlooms for Ohio

Here are a few AAS winning tomato varieties to consider growing this season. To find seed suppliers and garden centers that carry these and other AAS-recommended varieties, visit www.all-americaselections.org/buy-winners.

Purple Zebra. If you want a tomato that looks just as good as it tastes, search no more. According to AAS, Purple Zebra is a national winner with fruit that is “firm in texture, complex in flavor and has a taste more sweet than acidic.” This variety has high resistance to tomato mosaic virus, verticillium wilt, fusarium wilt, and late blight. Start seeds indoors 4 to 6 weeks before the last frost for best results. In the garden, space transplants no less than 2 feet apart or, if using containers, select 5-gallon pots with drainage. This variety produces 150 to 200 green-striped, purple tomatoes and requires staking. Most gardeners can begin harvesting tomatoes 80 to 85 days after transplant.

Celano. Another national winner, Celano, is an early-producing, high-yielding grape-type tomato for your patio or garden. According to AAS trial notes, Celano developed fruit much earlier and produced much longer than comparable varieties. Deep-red, oblong tomatoes typically weigh a little over half an ounce and taste sweet. As for disease resistance, this variety has superior tolerance to late blight. Transplants should be spaced at least 2 feet apart in the garden and will benefit from staking.

Early Resilience. Another national winner, Early Resilience, is a fantastic selection for canning enthusiasts. Each plant will produce roughly 25 tomatoes with good-quality flesh and excellent flavor. This variety displays high resistance to blossom-end rot and numerous diseases. From transplant, gardeners can expect to harvest tomatoes after 70 to 115 days. For best results, space each plant at least 2 feet apart. Staking may help but is not required.

Tags

gardening

vegetables

Masters of the landscape

sbradford — Mon, 24 Apr 2023 18:10:49 +0000

Masters of the landscape

May 1, 2023

Margaret Buranen

Co-op People

Jackie Driscoll paints her landscape with a palette of colors from native plants.

Driscoll, a member of Lorain-Medina Rural Electric Cooperative, is a master gardener volunteer (MGV). She’s turned 8 acres of a former crop field into a stunning pollinator garden, and from spring through fall, bees, birds, and butterflies swoop down to enjoy and benefit from spiderwort, false foxglove, golden Alexandria, asters, coneflowers, sunflowers, ironweed, and more types of native flowering plants (or “forbs”). The prairie also has half a dozen species of native grasses.

Driscoll also has a kitchen garden of herbs and several flower gardens around her house. She tucks a few vegetables here and there into the flower gardens.

Driscoll has been gardening since she was a child. Her mother, who kept gardening until she died at 88, planted the joy of gardening seed in her daughter, and it still flourishes.

Jackie and her husband, Brian, lived in a Cleveland suburb while their children were growing up. Their property was small, but Driscoll kept adding plants to it. “My husband finally said, ‘You have to leave some grass,’” she recalls.

In 2010, the Driscolls bought rural land outside Rochester Township near Wellington — and suddenly they had plenty of room for Jackie’s gardens. A few years later, with their five children now young adults, she had extra time on her hands.

“I was looking for something to do, to become involved with, once the kids were grown,” she says.

The Master Gardener Volunteer program seemed a good choice. Medina County’s training sessions worked best with Driscoll’s schedule, and in 2016 she began weekly classes there.

“I love taking [gardening] classes. I really do,” Driscoll says. “Master Gardeners has been a great fit for me because there’s always a class or conference I can go to and learn something more.”

Toward the end of the master gardening training, each student gave a presentation to the class. Driscoll and another student teamed up to tell their classmates about the native plant prairies they had planted at their homes.

“That’s a lot of what master gardeners do: give presentations to educate the community,” Driscoll says.

Driscoll particularly enjoys sharing her gardening knowledge with kids. At the Medina Parks Department’s Earth Day celebration, the master gardeners had a big demonstration table. “We talked about good bugs and bad bugs in your garden and how to use integrated pest management [instead of insecticides],” she says.

Driscoll has also answered the master gardeners’ hotline. This free service allows community members to call or email with gardening questions, to which the volunteer on duty provides research-based answers.

She also enjoys the social aspect of the program — learning and volunteering with like-minded people. “I’ve met so many nice people through Master Gardeners,” she says.

Driscoll is one of 53 Master Gardener Volunteers in Medina County. The group’s coordinator is Ashley Kulhanek, Extension Educator, Agriculture and Natural Resources, at Ohio State University. “We focus on education and outreach, not [providing] free garden labor,” Kulhanek says. “We do not just grow gardens. We grow gardeners.”

Earning the MGV certification requires 50 hours of class training and 50 hours of volunteer time. Kulhanek says the volunteers are encouraged to work on whatever type of gardening interests them most. “If you want to be outdoors and enjoy plants and nature, you can find your fit in the MGV program,” she adds.

For more information about the Master Gardener Volunteer program, contact your county extension agent or click here.

Ohio’s wider MGV program is directed by Pam Bennett, extension educator, horticulture, at Ohio State. According to Bennett, Ohio has more than 3,500 MGVs in 64 counties.

In 2020 Driscoll took out some aggressive native grasses to create an entirely forb field. “It should be full of glorious bloom this summer,” she says. “The old adage is that the first year [native] plants sleep [because all of their energy goes into developing deep root systems]. The second year they creep, and the third year they leap.”

For anyone thinking about becoming an MGV, Driscoll says, “If they enjoy learning and sharing their knowledge it’s a great program. You can choose an area of interest — we have several groups — and find like-minded people. It’s made me a better steward of the land we’re on. Our intentions were always good, but now we have the knowledge [to garden well and responsibly].”

Tags

Lorain-Medina Rural Electric Cooperative

co-op member

gardening

horticulture

Rain gardens

sbradford — Wed, 29 Mar 2023 14:54:17 +0000

Rain gardens

April 1, 2023

Randy Edwards

Features

In April of 2020, we were just beginning to wrap our heads around the notion that the coronavirus pandemic would not simply disappear after the weather turned warm. We began to accept that, for a while at least, our days would mostly be spent within the walls of our home and the boundaries of our neighborhoods. Schools were shuttered, office workers were learning to Zoom, and spring travel plans shifted to staycations.

Suddenly, everyone was developing a hobby: baking sourdough bread, knitting sweaters, learning to speak French, or playing the piano. Animal shelters were overrun with requests for dogs.

My family dug a hole in the ground and let it fill with water.

If that seems like a modest aspiration, understand that I’ve coveted a rain garden for many years. Designed to temporarily capture and slow the flow of water off your property, rain gardens are a practical and beautiful landscape feature that is becoming popular, especially for those looking to lighten their footprint on the Earth.

It’s a given that in a rainy environment like Ohio’s, we can’t let water simply pool wherever it wants. Because most of our homes have subterranean foundations, we need to keep rainwater away from the house if we want to keep our basements dry and protect our foundations. So, in keeping with building codes, homebuilders install drainage tile and sump pumps to keep the water routed toward a stormwater collection system, which could be a storm sewer in an urban area or a drainage ditch out in the country.

This approach works (usually), but the long-term effects of our collective rush to drain can be hard on rivers and creeks and the aquatic critters that live therein. Storm water management systems can cause rivers to be “flashy” — meaning the water rises and falls quickly, scouring that river-bottom habitat, causing erosion, and leading to flooding downstream. Storm drainage systems also carry sediment and trash from city streets, grease and oil from cars, and fertilizers and pesticides from yards and fields.

Rain gardens are shallow depressions in the ground that collect rainwater and allow it to slowly percolate into the soil instead of rushing off into the street. These features filter stormwater and prevent flooding as well as providing habitat for birds and butterflies and natural beauty that lasts throughout the year.

After a consultation with our local soil and water conservation district, we staked out a section of yard on the side of the house near two downspouts and began to dig. This led to plenty of curious questions from passing neighbors out walking (6 feet apart at the time, of course). Spurious speculation about our efforts included a small swimming pool, a large bird bath, even one suggestion of a hole to bury a body. We smiled grimly at their jokes and kept digging, by hand, until one more-helpful neighbor let us know that Home Depot rents excavating equipment and offered his truck to help fetch an earth-mover.

This was a game-changer, and in one day we had the rough outlines of the garden in place. After several bags of soil amendments and placement of carefully selected plantings, we routed the water from the downspouts into the rain garden.

Early on, I’ll admit, it looked like a muddy hole in the ground with a few scrawny shrubs. But later in the season, and especially by the next season, we were delighted by how lovely it looked, with wetland vegetation like buttonbush and queen of the prairie jostling for sunlight with black-eyed Susans and swamp milkweed.

There are many resources available to help homeowners plan, build, and maintain a rain garden. The Central Ohio Rain Garden Initiative has a complete building guide and a list of suitable native plants. The Toledo-Lucas County Rain Garden Initiative also has a step-by-step guide. But first check in with your local soil and water conservation district, as some offer classes and advice. Because rain gardens help relieve stress on municipal storm drainage systems, some communities even have cost-share programs that reimburse homeowners for plants, mulch, compost, and other rain garden materials.

A final thought: We surrounded our garden with solar-powered lights, both to add nocturnal beauty and to keep our guests from toppling into the garden while leaving one of our backyard parties. It’s kind of hard to miss, with its shrubbery and tall grasses, but your family and friends will thank you.

A few things to keep in mind

Consider the size but be flexible. There’s a formula for measuring how large your rain garden needs to be, based on the size of your roof and other factors. We didn’t have quite enough room, but our smaller rain garden captures the water from most rain events. In serious downpours, the garden overflows into a swale and into the storm sewer. If you want, you can add a downstream drain and route the overflow directly into the storm sewer.
Be realistic about what you can do by hand. In my neighborhood, at least, it doesn’t take long to get past the topsoil and into clay, which doesn’t come up easily. The rented excavator cost a bit but was worth every cent.
Follow the directions to test the drainage. Dig a hole, fill it with water, and see how much it drains in 24 hours. That’s how deep you want your rain garden to be, and that’s important because the water needs to disappear within 24 hours of the rain event. Otherwise, you’re making a place for mosquitos to breed, and nobody wants that.
Accept that your neighbors may look at you strangely at first, but will be impressed when the plants begin to grow and blossom.

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Future farm

sbradford — Thu, 30 Jun 2022 17:51:58 +0000

Future farm

July 1, 2022

Patty Yoder

Features

A stroll through this Ohio farm leads you past a lovely formal garden, a koi pond, and two fountains before you reach the medicinal, culinary, and potager gardens. A bit later, your tour also takes you by robotic systems and a bioreactor — a high-tech composting tower built for Project Martian, a creative exploration for growing zero-dirt food on Mars.

This is not your typical farm.

“We’ve combined 18th-century farming traditions with 21st-century technology,” says Jim Bruner, co-owner of the urban farm near downtown Columbus. “Our mission here is to grow, maintain, sustain, and explain.”

Ten years ago, the property was an abandoned 1868 Italianate house and two adjacent overgrown lots. After much planning, digging, and planting, Mezzacello now produces high-quality, nutritious food and serves as a learning lab where Bruner and local students test ideas. The name Mezzacello (“little Monticello”) pays homage to another lifelong innovator: Thomas Jefferson, and his agricultural experiments at his iconic Virginia estate.

In the summer, students attend weeklong camps at Mezzacello to learn about biotechnology, bioengineering, biochemistry, and renewable energy. For many campers, it’s the first time they connect the dots between growing and eating healthy food.

“A lot of kids think eating is the same thing as nutrition,” Bruner says. “At camp, they start to understand the idea of ‘garbage in, garbage out,’ which is true for what they eat and how they feel as well as what they feed other living things.”

Health is one of the reasons Bruner, who is originally from California, became an urban farmer. He’s also naturally drawn to anything involving innovation, systems, and design thinking. By day, he works at the PAST Foundation, a nonprofit that helps bring real-world science and applied STEM into the classroom. He’s also former president, executive director, and board chair of Ohio Invention Convention and an enthusiastic cheerleader for ideas — from his latest experiment at Mezzacello to a student inventor’s biodegradable golf tee or insulin plunger.

While Bruner and his husband, Rick Riley, cover most of the farm’s expenses, the Ohio Farm Bureau, Scotts Miracle-Gro Foundation, and the Columbus Foundation help fund their projects.

Currently, Bruner and Hamid Ahmed, a Mezzacello intern, are building a biodome prototype. Ahmed is exploring ways to end global hunger as part of his Medical Pathways project at Metro Early College High School.

“It hurts to know that so many families do not have enough food,” Ahmed says. “The biodome is so people don’t have to depend on an outside source to survive.”

When finished, the structure will contain complex systems for growing hydroponic gardens and raising chickens. If their biodome proves cost-effective, sturdy, and easy to use, it could feed people worldwide.

Building and problem-solving are fun challenges for a bright high school student, but Ahmed is also developing a critical new skill: perseverance. Setbacks are part of any massive undertaking, and a great mentor can make a world of difference.

“It does get frustrating, believe me. I am not the most patient guy, but Jim is one of the best teachers I’ve ever had. He’s helped me understand that I have to be patient,” Ahmed says. “I have a goal that I want to get to, and I know that if I keep pushing through, the right angle will come to me — and it will be worth it.”

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Ladybugs

aspecht — Fri, 26 Jun 2020 15:47:00 +0000

Ladybugs

April 1, 2020

Craig Springer

In The Garden

In 1975, the Ohio General Assembly chose the ladybug as the official state insect, citing attributes shared with the great people of the Buckeye State.

“The ladybug is symbolic of the people of Ohio,” reads the legislature’s proclamation. “She is proud and friendly, bringing delight to millions of children when she alights on their hand or arm to display her multi-colored wings, and she is extremely industrious and hardy, able to live under the most adverse conditions and yet retain her beauty and charm, while at the same time being of inestimable value to nature.”

The legislative body overlooked this: Ladybugs also are implacable, plundering predators — though that’s not a bad thing.

This orange-and-black or red-and-black speck of an insect (which is technically a beetle rather than a bug) is the size of a pencil eraser, and it brings a welcomed utility to orchardists and farmers alike. Ladybugs, as cute and dainty as they may be, are voracious predators of other bugs, including some destructive ones that are too small for the human eye to see.

Ladybugs live two years and survive the winter in their adult form, hiding en masse beneath the frostline under rocks and downed timber. As winter turns to spring, the warmth that comes with extra daylight stirs them to reproduce. Adults lay clusters of about 50 eggs at a time, strategically placed near colonies of aphids and mealy bugs or other tiny pests that tend to destroy agricultural crops and greenhouse plants.

The ladybug eggs incubate in less than five days. When they hatch, the larvae, which look like tiny, spiny crocodiles, are born into that smorgasbord and immediately go about their business of eating all those destructive neighbors. In less than two weeks, they change from that rather scary-looking form into the familiar Volkswagen-shaped beetle.

Despite the cuteness, the adults are also efficient eating machines. They’re equipped with razor-sharp jaws that slice and squeeze their insect food. A single adult can consume upward of a thousand aphids in a single day.

Their bright colors don’t provide camouflage in vegetation — quite the opposite. Their striking colors convey a message in nature that they are toxic. When agitated or picked up by a bird, ladybugs emit toxins that repulse would-be predators.

In folklore, they have long been held as a harbinger of summer, hence another name for the little bugs: St. Barnaby’s bees. On the pre-Gregorian calendar, June 11, St. Barnaby’s Day, marked the beginning of summer and the date ladybugs were expected to make their first appearance of the season. Depending on the weather, though, they may start emerging from their winter naps as early as April.

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gardening

insects

How to give your yard four-season interest

hgraffice — Fri, 26 Jun 2020 15:02:31 +0000

How to give your yard four-season interest

March 27, 2016

George Weigel

In The Garden

Sometimes it’s not easy making a yard look good even in one season, much less all four. Yet high on many a landscaping wish list lately is the goal of creating a yard that changes with the seasons and looks good in all of them.

The job is a little easier in spring to early summer when the majority of plants bloom and in moderate climates where seasonal differences aren’t as harsh. It gets much harder where seasons bring major changes, and it’s hardest of all in cold-winter climates where the landscape can be buried under snow for months at a time.

Still, it’s possible to milk the most out of any landscape anywhere with good planning. The heart of that is picking a diverse selection of plants that has something different going on at different times of the year.

Too often that doesn’t happen, however, because gardening tends to be viewed as a “spring thing.” The result is that everyone shows up at the garden center as the weather warms in spring and ends up buying the same plants that happen to be peaking then.

A crepe myrtle, for example, that will bloom beautifully by late summer but that looks like a bare set of moose antlers at purchase time, has little chance next to an azalea that’s blooming in full glory. Buy your plants at the same time year after year, and it’s no wonder that many yards end up as one-season wonders.

If you’d like to start spreading out your interest this season, here are 10 ways to do it:

1) Add more variety — Plant more plants and different kinds of them. You’ll get multi-season change and interest just by dumb luck. Even when planting a particular species, choose several different varieties of it to capitalize on their differences.

2) Evaluate your seasonal weaknesses — Do homework into what plants are in prime form at what times. Then think about what each part of your yard looks like in each season and seek out plants that will add interest to those boring gaps. Make notes during the course of the season to help identify the down times most in need of help.

3) Move beyond two-week wonders — Many of our favorite landscape plants happen to be one-dimensional plants that peak only for a few weeks out of the whole year. They tend to be ones that have the good marketing sense to bloom when the most people are shopping, such as azaleas, rhododendrons, lilacs, peonies, and forsythia.

If your yard is heavy with short-term performers, it’s time to…

4) Look for harder workers — plants that do more than one thing in one season — One example is oakleaf hydrangea, a U.S. native shrub that blooms white in late spring, gets burgundy foliage in fall, and then shows off peeling bark when the leaves drop for winter. Viburnums are shrubs that flower fragrantly in spring, turn yellow or red in fall, then develop berry-sized fruits of red, gold, blue, or black from fall into early winter. Some even hold their leaves in winter. And native ninebarks are shrubs that flower pinkish-white in late spring, then get BB-sized clusters of red seed heads in early summer, then turn blood red in fall, then display peeling stems when bare over winter. Leaning toward plants with multi-season interest is especially helpful in smaller yards where limited space limits the number of different plants that can be used.

5) Pay attention to leaf color, especially in plants that hold their foliage over winter — Blooms are fleeting, but colorful leaves and needles add interest much longer — some of them all year long.

6) Don’t plant-shop only in spring — You’ll tend to buy only what’s looking good then — or on sale. Shop in different seasons. Make it a point to go to the garden center whenever your yard is looking particularly barren.

7) Visit public gardens — They’re great for getting ideas and seeing what’s doing what at any given time. Take advantage of public gardens near you because the plants doing well there are likely to do well in the same climate and soils as your yard. Visit these in different seasons, too. Public gardens are especially helpful because plants are usually labeled.

8) Pay attention to what other people have planted — If you see plants nearby doing something interesting at a time when your yard is snoozing, find out what those plants are and add them to your list. Odds are your neighbors will be flattered that you noticed how nice their plants were looking.

9) Don’t overlook the “hardscaping” — These are the paver walks, the stone walls, the arbors, the fences, the benches, and the other non-plant features of the landscape. Not only do they add structure or “bones” to the look during the growing season, but they’re at their best in winter when many to most plants are offstage.

10) Add dedicated seasonal gardens — In addition to mixing plants with multi-season interest throughout the yard, consider planning whole gardens that peak in a particular season. Load each of those gardens with plants at their best in each assigned season — for example, a summer garden filled with annual flowers and summer bulbs, and a fall garden highlighted with plants that get late-season berries and turn leaf color.

Four good books to help you with your four-season homework:

• Continuous Bloom: A Month-by-Month Guide to Nonstop Color in the Perennial Garden by Pam Duthie (Chicago Review Press, $49.95, 2000).

• Time-Tested Plants: Thirty Years in a Four-Season Landscape by Pamela Harper (Timber Press, $39.94, 2005). No longer available from the publisher. Available at www.amazon.com.

• The Nonstop Color Garden by Nellie Neal (Cool Springs Press, $24.99 paperback, 2014).

• The Nonstop Garden by Stephanie Cohen and Jennifer Benner (Timber Press, $19.95 paperback, 2014).

George Weigel is a Pennsylvania-based horticulturist, garden consultant, author, and newspaper garden columnist. His website is http://georgeweigel.net.

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gardening