This Bourbon Fruitcake is handmade in small batches in Vermont, filled with fruits and nuts and flavored with smooth bourbon. Here at Gardener’s Supply, we enjoy giving back to our Vermont community by doing business with local merchants. When searching for a traditional, handmade fruitcake to feature in our Holiday 2012 catalog, we didn’t have to look far for the perfect partner: Bien Fait Cakes, an artisanal bakery in Vermont̵…
…ck and eat, and our team members will be tending gardens and talking to passersby about gardening and fresh foods throughout the summer. Our team has 39 years of garden and horticultural experience, ranging in age from 16 to 21. We are excited to make use of our skills from past summers to benefit the community and provide education about healthy eating and gardening as well as food relief support in Minneapolis. Gardening for Good is under the…
Ellen Ecker Ogden’s design in progress, top, for the 2×8 Elevated Cedar Raised Bed, below, which features flowers. Ogden’s design, A Paint Box Garden of Edible Plants, features vegetables. If you’re a garden designer in Vermont, what do you do in the winter? If you’re creative, you design! Ellen Ecker Ogden, who created two designs for our Elevated Raised Beds, often uses rugs and carpets before refining the design w…
…s and in the environment. We donate 8% of our company profits to programs and organizations that are using gardening to improve the world. It’s a commitment we’ve adhered to since our first day of business back in 1983. One of our first big projects was founding the Intervale Center in 1985. What was once a landfill is now 350 acres of organic farms and national model for sustainability. To make good on our promise this year — among o…
A top-quality hose is a worthwhile investment. It ensures that you can get the job done efficiently and with ease. These sturdy hoses are made of rubber and have metal fittings. The hot weather this summer has meant lots of watering. I recently spent most of a day going to my landscape clients to make sure their gardens and new plantings were well-watered. Using timers, sprinklers, soakers and hundreds of feet of hose, I had four new garden…
When you’re deciding how to manage pests in your garden and landscape, keep this in mind: First, do no harm. The vast majority of garden visitors are either helpful or harmless. Learn to identify ladybug larvae, right. They are major aphid eaters. More Information Read Most Bugs are Good Bugs for more detail and photos of beneficial creatures. As you make your first visits to the garden this year, you’re sure to see a few bu…
I used to grow enough corn that we could eat it for dinner every night during August and still have enough to freeze for winter. Once you’ve been eating home-frozen corn for a few years, it’s difficult to be satisfied with store-bought. It takes seven or eight ears worth of sweet corn to fill a one-quart freezer bag. So to get 25 quarts of frozen corn (the minimum amount I try to freeze each summer) you need to start with…
…inks for variety; I tried both Cherries Jubilee from Renee’s and Cherry Rose Jewel from Botanical Interests. Frankly, I had a difficult time telling them apart when they bloomed! Last spring I started some plants in our 2-3/4″ 6-Pack Cowpots and Germinating Mix, then transplanted my seedlings into containers, raised beds and directly into the garden. You can see the results in my slideshow. Varieties I’ll Try in 2013 Crimson E…
…mal DNA. Many Americans are concerned about the negative effects of GMO use on the agricultural economy and small-scale and organic farming. Surveys show a wide majority of Americans support mandatory labeling. At least 21 countries and the European Union have established some form of mandatory labeling. Mandatory labeling will allow consumers to identify food products they want to avoid. So why not label? Well, here are some of the argu…
Volunteers plant potatoes on May 15. We planted 67 pounds of seed potatoes; our harvest goal is 500 pounds or more. At our Burlington campus, we’re trying something new this year: growing potatoes. Lots of potatoes. If all goes well, we will harvest more than 500 pounds of potatoes this fall and donate them to the local food shelf. We’re calling the project Company Farm because the farmers are employee-owners who work in the Burlin…