Support diversity by growing and buying
a wide variety of fruits and vegetables !

In the last century 30,000 vegetable varieties have become extinct, and one more is lost every six hours.
In the U.S., 93% of our food product diversity has
been lost since 1900.

The ability to grow one’s own food is becoming more
important today with worldwide food safety issues.
Growing your own fruit and vegetables and buying locally grown organic food can provide healthy, nutritious food for you and your family, while supporting the local ecosystem.

"Locavore" is the Word of the Year!

According to the New Oxford American Dictionary
* * Do you know where your food comes from? * *
* Do you know how your food is grown?
What can you do?

 Summer is already here!

Read about our history

Read the story about ...

Sacramento's new 2007 front yard landscape ordinance!

Plant Notes - for vegetable planting and growing
information specific to the Sacramento region.

JOIN THE BILLION TREE CAMPAIGN:
PLANT FOR THE PLANET
The United Nations
Environment Programme
(UNEP) worldwide tree planting campaign.  Make a pledge to plant one tree or many.  
For more information

MULCH helps to maintain balanced soil temperatures, increase water infiltration and retention, prevent soil compaction, control erosion, reduce weeds, improve soil texture and provide a source
of organic matter for the "soil food web" which includes the "Microherd."

* Remember: plants in stress send out signals that attract insects & disease.
* It is also important to leave areas of bare dirt (without inches of mulch) in your yard for ground-nesting native bees.

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Site update: July 14, 2008

Time to get all your summer vegetables and fruit starters and seeds into the ground. Seedling starters can be purchased for a jump start, but varieties are more limited than with seed. It is always time to check for slug and snail trails, as they love new tender growth. Stale beer in saucers can keep them in check during this vulnerable time. Copper tape creates a barrier that they don't like to cross. Right now during the warm afternoons, new plantings appreciate a little shade until they settle into their new homes. A shade cloth suspended between stakes provides a barrier that gives protection from the warmer afternoon hours is helpful (zucchini and eggplant like this a lot).

It is always harvest time! Tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, beans, potatoes, leeks, corn, onions, and chard are just a few now being harvested. Juicy raspberries and blackberries, and other berry varieties are ripening, as well as many varieties of fruit trees; plums, nectarines, apricots, peaches, and figs.

Nonprofit group wants farms near urban homes

No-dig crops help reduce water

Rain gardens capture storm water, clean it up

Banking on Gardening

Bike tour finds gardens blossoming in city lots

We're in love with our lawns

Exhibit gives the dirt on lawns

Consumer tips for choosing healthy food

Permaculture: beyond the garden

'Doomsday' seed vault opens in arctic

A Rose Is [Not] a Rose

In a forest's breath, deciphering climate clues

Why we will all be gardeners

Prairie Revival

Sterile soil, dirty hands

At park, a new garden sets example

Prof's new book focuses on critical role of native plants

Organic food is healthier: study

Disappearing Honeybee and Native Bee articles

Is Dirt the New Prozac?

Don't Think 'Yard,' Think 'Habitat'

Why Grow Your Own Food?

- more garden books

The Art of Simple Food - Alice Waters
Animal, Vegetable, Miracle - A Year of Food Life
by Barbara Kingsolver, Steven L. Hopp & Camille Kingsolver

Comfrey is in bloom now! This medicinal herb is an excellent agent for trapping and preventing
leaching of some of the soluble nutritional elements in soil, notably potassium.

Join Us -The Great Sunflower Project
A community science project with the goal of increasing our understanding of where bees are doing poorly and how the pollination of our garden and wild plants are being affected.
We're hoping you will join us by planting sunflowers in your garden. Community, demonstration, and school gardens are
invited to participate.

You'll be sent some free native sunflower (Helianthus annuus)
seed and twice a month, we'd like you to time how long it
takes for 5 bees to visit one flower on that sunflower.  This information will give an index of pollination that can be
compared across the United States. Once we know where
bees are in trouble, we can start developing a plan to help
them. For details & to register: www.greatsunflower.org

Sacramento Garden Notes - Robert Hamm - July 19-20

Effie Yeaw Nature Center Calendar of Events for July

What's Blooming in the Cemetery Garden Tour - July 19, 10am

Elderberry Farms Nursery - call for volunteers, work days

Fruit Tasting- Capital Nursery - Sat Jul 26 & Sun Jul 27