Composting with Worms
Have you heard about composting with worms? Vermicomposting? Worm farming? It is a wonderful eco-friendly way to create nutrient-rich vermicompost. Plus, worm tea for your soil.
Gardening
Gardening & Habitat
The Gardening category explores practical ways to grow and care for plants in Midwest gardens and backyard spaces. You’ll find tips on planting flowers, growing fruits and vegetables, improving soil, managing garden pests, and supporting pollinators.
This category also includes container gardening ideas, composting guidance, and simple ways to create wildlife-friendly habitat in your yard. Whether you’re planting seasonal blooms, tending a vegetable patch, or maintaining a small patio garden, these posts offer clear, useful advice.
Gardening connects us to the land. With thoughtful planning and care, even small spaces can support healthy plants and local wildlife.
Straw Bale Garden
I am wholeheartedly committed to growing all the fresh produce that I can this growing season. This led me on a hunt to locate ways to achieve my goal. A straw bale garden is my solution.
Sharpening Your Garden Shovel
Sharpening Your Garden Shovel
Spending 5 minutes of time per year sharpening your garden shovel can eliminate your backbreaking work by digging deeper and dividing painless.
Bird Seed Suet Filled Egg Shell Recipe
Bird Seed Suet Filled Egg Shell Recipe
Want to make a healthy treat for the birds this winter? Try this bird seed suet filled egg shell recipe and add whatever ingredients you think your backyard feathered friends will like.
Blanching Garden Vegetables for Freezing
Blanching Garden Vegetables for Freezing
Spending a few days during the growing season blanching garden vegetables for freezing will yield you months of the healthy add-on to your meals during the offseason.
Storing Dahlias Over Winter
Storing Dahlias Over Winter
Many types of dahlias do not survive the snowy cold winters here. We have to lift them out of the dirt or purchase new ones come spring. I wrote up a quick guide to digging up and storing dahlias over winter.
Outdoor Decorating for Halloween
Decorating Your Yard for Halloween
Decorating your yard for Halloween ? We all have that neighbor. You know. The one neighbor that when they do something, they go all out. This is the house in our neighborhood! It may spark some ideas for you, too.
Homemade Birdseed Ornaments Make Your Own
Homemade Birdseed Ornaments Make Your Own
Follow the recipe for these birdseed ornaments and the next day you have a sweet treat for your birds. The ornaments would make wonderful holiday gifts for friends and family as well as wedding favors for your guests.
Planting Horseradish Root
Planting Horseradish Root
In this article I will go over basic planting horseradish root. I’ll tell you where to obtain horseradish root, when and where to plant, and basic care for your root.
Quikrete Walkway Patio
Quikrete Walkways & Patios
Easy do-it-yourself project on how to make a Quikcrete walkway or patio, it takes some time and effort but the results look professional. The materials needed are minimal and allow you to take your time and create a visually appealing outdoor space.
Raised Garden Bed Out of Dresser
Raised Garden Bed Out of Dresser
Raised Garden Bed Out of Dresser. Here is taking recycling to extremes one might think. I think it is a creative way to recycle and make use of something that would just end up in the landfill. For those of you without a lot of space or who love vertical gardening, this might just work for you.
Cucumber Beetles How to Get Rid of Them
Cucumber Beetles
This article focuses on cucumber beetles and how to get rid of them in your garden. Pictures of two types and how to prevent them from coming back.
No Sprout Bird Seed
No Sprout Bird Seed
Show of hands. How many of you have weed sprouts under your bird feeders right now? I used to! Until I learned this no sprout bird seed secret.
How to Start and Care for a Rhubarb Plant
How to Start and Care for a Rhubarb Plant
I received a question via e-mail from a fellow gardener asking general questions about starting & maintaining Rhubarb
plants. Someone knows I grow mammoth rhubarb plants :). I answered his questions back via e-mail and decided to share the information on the site too.
Change the Color of Hydrangeas
Change The Color of Hydrangeas How to change the color of hydrangeas. Yes, for the most part, you can change the color of hydrangeas, with the exception of white hydrangeas. White Hydrangeas You can’t change the color of white hydrangeas. The only variation with white hydrangeas comes with the plant’s age. It will sometimes take … Read more
Tulip Care After Blooming
Tulip Care After Blooming
In the spring, your garden is singing with color and it all looks so beautiful but soon the colors fade and start to look messy. Your tulips start losing their leaves and the stems start to dry up. Read on for tulip care after blooming.
Terra Cotta Clay Pot Garden Person
Terra Cotta Clay Pot Garden Person
How to Build a Terra Cotta Clay Pot Garden Person. This is a creative way to spruce up your garden and use chipped or repurposed terra cotta pots. There is no “wrong” way to build a terra cotta clay pot garden person.
Tomatoes Have Dark Spots on Bottom
Tomatoes Have Dark Spots on Bottom
You can’t wait to pick your first red ripe tomatoes of the season. As the tomato grows larger you notice your tomatoes have dark spots on bottom.
It quickly turns from a water soaked patch to a dark colored lesion. Some of your tomatoes have a small patch, some larger, what the heck is it?
Introduction to Water Gardening
An Introduction to Water Gardening
Water seems to have a soothing, magically calming effect on the body. It is beautiful, sparkling, and gentle. Water gardens can add interest to an otherwise bland backyard. They can include waterfalls, ponds and fountains.
Common Lawn Pests
Common Lawn Pests Disease and common lawn pests can be prevented or cured by following a few basic steps. Be sure to set your low mower height to 1-1/2 inches, have a sharp blade, have the proper fertilizing, drainage, and water. Even following each and everything above still can bring on unwanted insect attacks. So … Read more