The best way to water a vegetable garden
Drip irrigation supplemented by occasional overhead watering is the best way to water a vegetable garden. The best? That’s right. That’s my claim. This method gives you all of the advantages of drip irrigation while compensating for its few disadvantages. Here's why,...
Where to buy an avocado tree
Looking to plant the common Hass variety of avocado in your yard? Looking for the less common Reed? Searching for where to buy a rarely grown avocado variety like Nabal, GEM, or Jan Boyce? Let me try to connect you with the grower or seller of the avocado variety of...
Caring for your Southern California garden during a heat wave
That last one was a scorcher! In Santa Ana, it set an all-time record at 114. In Riverside, it got up to 118. Ojai hit 110. In the shade of my front porch in Ramona, San Diego County, it reached 113. July 6-8, 2018 was a spell for history. It was so hot that it...
Custom signs for fruit trees
While I may know the names of all of the fruit trees in my yard, my wife and children don't, and friends and family who visit certainly don't. So I started drawing the names of my trees on pieces of wood that I then stuck into the ground with metal stakes. They looked...
Growing grapes on a chain link fence
Five summers ago, we moved into a house that is fronted by 250 feet of blank chain link fence. I saw a grape canvas. And I started planting. Now in 2018 I see that my vision had been a good one. We’ve got 13 vines growing and a few dozen feet of fence left...
Teaming with Microbes: a book review
A good book changes you. If you looked at my vegetable garden today and compared it to my vegetable garden a couple years ago, one difference you’d notice is the fullness of its beds. Nowadays, I aim to keep plants growing over every square inch of each bed at all...
How much and how often to water avocado trees in California
I’ve always wished there were a simple formula that could tell us how much and how often to water an avocado tree. Alas, the variables are too numerous: weather is ever-changing, different soils have different water-holding capacities, frequencies are partially...
Starting a vegetable garden in Southern California
The change I’d like to see in my corner of the world is that more people grow a little of their own food. It doesn’t require a lot of space, many tools, much physical effort or time or money. Here I've gathered the five most useful things that I wish I had known when...










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