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In the Garden monthly column

          
September 4, 2009

August 6, 2009

                                                                                  
Although the 2009 gardening season is far from over, this year’s unusual weather patterns serve as a reminder that growing your own fresh food is rarely predictable. After an excellent March for maple sugaring, April brought abundant sunshine instead of showers. May was slow to warm up, leading to a long bloom time for flowering bulbs. June and July brought nearly daily precipitation, overcast skies, and average highs in the 70s rather than 80s.

On the plus side, early season crops fared well, with harvests of spinach, lettuce, and peas extending past mid July. Beets and carrots reveled in the moist soil, and broccoli loved the relatively constant temperatures. For local food foragers, service berries were plump, sweet, and free for the picking in late June and early July, followed by a bumper crop of blackcaps.

As I write on August 1, the cloud of Late Blight hangs over Vermont. By the time you read this missive, I expect that many local tomato plants will have succumbed to the fungal disease, which last appeared in area gardens at the end of August 1998. The potato crop is also in trouble if Late Blight spores inoculate the tubers in the ground.   

In 1998, seed potatoes infected with Late Blight spread the pathogen to tomatoes, rotting about 75% of the local crop. In 2009 the disease is said to have originated with infected tomato transplants grown out of state and sold in big box stores. Aided by heavy rainfall, cool weather, and billions of airborne spores, the epidemic has spread exponentially throughout the northeast. 

Despite disappointments, the harvest season will go on and challenge us to enjoy and celebrate alternative crops in place of old standbys. In this spirit, Friends of Burlington Gardens will host its third annual “Corn Roast and Veggie Ball at Ethan Allen Homestead on Sunday, August 23 from 4:30 to 8:30 p.m.

Up to 90 tickets are available for this event, which includes a vegetarian buffet, seasonal desserts, and a tour of the beautiful community gardens at the Winooski Valley Park District site. After a delectable dinner, Jenni Johnson and Friends will jazz up the night with live music and dancing under the stars.   

Advance tickets are $20 for adults and $10 for children when purchased by August 19, or $25 and $15 respectively on the day of the event. Please call the FBG office at 861-4769, visit www.burlingtongardens.org, or email info@burlingtongardens.org to reserve tickets. We hope to see you at this tasty and fun event to support community gardening!


The township of Hebron, New York lies just across the border from Pawlet and Rupert Vermont. With scattered farms, a general store, and 56 square miles of upland meadows, woodland ridges, and fertile bottomlands, Hebron is home to a population of 1800 residents dispersed among six hamlets and miles of picturesque back roads.

I grew up happily on a 140 acre farmstead midway between West Hebron and North Hebron. Like most rural residents, our family maintained a large garden. My dad enjoyed getting up early in the morning to hoe the 100 foot long rows of bush beans, sweet corn, potatoes, and tomatoes that spanned the gently sloping hillside below our house.

We tilled our garden in mid April and had everything planted by the end of May. The harvest peak came in late August, just in time for the Washington County Fair where I proudly brought my entries to compete for blue ribbons. By first frost in September, the bulk of our winter vegetable supply was canned, frozen, or stored in the cool cellar.

My father believed in planting most crops by seed. The only transplants he purchased were tomatoes, and typically just one variety, Jet Star. He staked the plants three feet apart, mulched the soil with lawn clippings to reduce disease, and pruned off suckers to yield more fruit. After a stint in the army during WWII, and a career as an agricultural teacher and school principal, it was easy to understand his orderly pattern for our garden.

Two miles down the road, Harold and Mabel Worthington tended a menagerie of farm animals at a rustic old homestead surrounded with implements from days gone by. The Worthington’s style of gardening was quite intriguing to me, as each year during June a full plot of vegetable plants would magically appear in their yard.

With Yankee resourcefulness, Harold and Mabel visited local garden centers at the tail end of the spring season, when vegetable plants were overflowing from their pots and heavily discounted. Gently transferred to the warm soil of their garden, the plants adapted quickly and went on to produce an abundant harvest.

If you thought about starting a garden this spring, but found yourself too busy, perhaps it’s not too late to use the Worthington’s approach. All you need is a shovel to turn over a small patch of lawn, a spirit of adventure, and the last plants from your local greenhouse.

Until next time, happy gardening to all!


My first time growing sweet potatoes was in the mid 1990s while working with the National Gardening Association. In preparing a demonstration for an indoor gardening workshop, I suspended an organic sweet potato in a jar of water, placed the container on a windowsill, and waited to see what would happen.

Within three weeks, small roots appeared from the suspended sweet potato, followed by the emergence of green buds. The shoots soon sprouted leaves and grew vertically. At four inches of height, I cut slips from the young vines and rooted them in water. After a few days, the cuttings were transplanted into pots of soil mix for additional propagation.

The parent sweet potato yielded a dozen or more slips, which were transplanted into our family’s community garden plot in early June. As summer turned to fall, the energy in the vines was stored as sugar and starch in the swollen roots. Just before the first frost, we set out with shovels to unearth the buried treasure. Imagine our children’s surprise to discover sweet potatoes ranging from thumb sized to nearly five pounds.

The sweet potatoes stored well, and we set aside a portion of the crop each year to start new plants. From 2004 through 2006, our extra cuttings were sold at the Friends of Burlington Gardens Spring Plant Sale. The sweet potatoes were a big hit, and to keep pace with demand we turned to a southern grower that could provide slips in bulk quantities.

For 2009, Red Wagon Plants and Friends of Burlington Gardens are partnering to present the Champlain Valley Sweet Potato Slip Sale on Saturday, June 6 and Sunday, June 7 from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. daily or while supplies last. The benefit sale will be held at the Red Wagon Plants greenhouse facility at 2408 Shelburne Falls Road in Hinesburg.

More than 1600 Beauregard sweet potato slips are available, with 100% of proceeds used to support garden-based education programs. Each slip can produce a fall harvest of up to six sweet potatoes with garnet colored skin and delicious orange flesh. The slips are potted, hardened off, and ready for transplanting in home, school, and community gardens. 

For driving directions to the Sweet Potato Slip Sale and more information about growing sweet potatoes in Vermont, please visit http://www.burlingtongardens.org/sweet_potato_sale.html

                                                        May 7, 2009 

During April vacation, Barb and I found ourselves with an empty nest for the first time in many years. With Alison in college, Jon on a senior high youth trip, and a busy gardening season ahead, we knew that this was our golden opportunity for a grand but affordable adventure.

For several weeks, we pondered whether to stay close to home or wander afield. We looked at flying to somewhere warm, but the expense of airfare and hotels was beyond our budget. Then out of the blue, my sister Nancy graciously invited us to stay in the one room coop apartment she uses for business trips to Washington D.C.

Checking with Amtrak, we learned that “The Vermonter” leaves Essex Junction at 9:00 a.m. and arrives at Union Station at 10:30 p.m. With the click of a mouse, we purchased tickets for our April 20th scenic journey across the Green Mountains, down the Connecticut River Valley, and on to New York City and points south. 

The Vermont portion of the trip took us past waterfalls, farm fields, quiet villages, and freshly tilled backyard gardens. In Springfield Massachusetts, the train picked up speed with a switch to electric rails. Arriving in Washington, we transferred to the Metro for the short ride to my sister’s neighborhood near Dupont Circle.

Over the next three days we enjoyed visiting the American Indian Museum, National Gallery of Art, U.S. Botanic Garden, and the Washington Zoo, all of which are free admission. We walked miles taking in the beauty of bursting flowers and trees clothed in spring green.                                                                                                 The Capitol building -- April 21, 2009                                                                                                      
On Earth Day, we attended the dedication of “The People’s Garden,” a sustainable landscape located in front of the USDA headquarters. Framed with sturdy timbers, the garden’s organic raised beds are constructed of local oak and locust trees felled by storms.

Following the ceremony, I had the opportunity to talk briefly with Deputy Secretary of Agriculture Kathleen Merrigan and share the work that Vermonters are doing to connect communities and schools through gardening.

Photo above:  Deputy USDA Secretary Kathleen Merrigan, speaks at the opening of The People’s Garden at USDA heaquarters in Washington, D.C.  Looking on are Brings Plenty, Chairman of the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe, and Dawn Charging, USDA Director of Native American Programs. -- April 22, 2009

For our final evening in Washington, Barb and I walked from the Metro Center station to the grounds of the White House.

Looking across the South Lawn, we were inspired to see the new vegetable garden planted by Michelle Obama and local school children—and hopeful for the example set by our nation’s leaders in growing fresh healthy food.  

Photo above:  The Obama's new vegetable garden on the South Lawn of the White House -- April 23, 2009

Looking out across the backyard, I often think about my neighbors, Ken and Christine Hebert. Like my parents, the Heberts are members of the “Greatest Generation” who came of age during the Depression Era, survived World War II, and gave birth to the baby boom of the 1950s.

When Ken and Christine were growing up, Burlington’s “New North End” was a patchwork of fields and woodlots. Scattered farm houses, mom and pop stores, and filling stations lined the narrow road heading north from downtown. Ken’s family lived just off North Avenue, next to where the Short Stop now stands, while Christine’s parents ran Charlie’s Boat House at the mouth of the Winooski River.

Ken returned from the army in 1947 and married Christine in 1949. During the next two years, they built a sturdy home on a parcel of land once owned by Ken’s parents. Ken dug the basement by hand, poured the footings, and block by block built the foundation and walls of the house. Christine remembers baking “a pie a day” to restock his energy supply.

The first of three Hebert children was soon on the way. It was time for Ken and Christine to settle in and feed a growing family. Ken cut down trees from a section of their yard and pulled out stumps with a pickup truck. His work created a large vegetable garden – a place to grow where Ken has found harmony and peace for nearly sixty years.                     

Ken’s garden flourishes because he replenishes the soil. His compost pile slowly turns kitchen trimmings into rich organic matter, while leaves are shredded and tilled back into the fertile ground. Ashes from the Hebert’s wood stove are spread on the plot to add minerals, and an occasional load of manure provides a boost of natural fertilizer.

Whether tending a home garden or a community plot, there is much to learn from Ken’s example of treading gently on the Earth. When Ken enriches the land in the fall, he does so in faith, anticipating that he will garden again the following spring. He plants, waters, and cultivates, and the garden yields its harvest of fresh affordable food. It’s not hard to see that Ken and Christine’s health and vigor are a testament to this simple power of sustainable living.


This spring marks the 23rd year that my wife Barb and I have community gardened in Burlington. Beginning as newlyweds, we’ve grown fresh food side-by-side with fellow gardeners of diverse ages, cultures, and backgrounds. The seasons of planting and weeding have come and gone, yet some of the moments remembered best are when we paused from our labors to appreciate the beauty of a garden sunset, a fleeting rainbow, or the life of a faithful friend.

On February 1, Frank Way of South Burlington died at the Starr Farm Nursing Center after a courageous battle with cancer. With his wife June at his side, Frank was an avid community gardener at Starr Farm during the 1990s. He and June raised bushels of cucumbers, potatoes, and Blue Hubbard squash, which they loved to share with others.

A lifelong Vermonter, Frank graduated from the UVM College of Agriculture and served in the U.S. Army during the Korean Conflict. He returned to Vermont after the war to work as a County 4-H Extension Agent. During the last thirty years of his career, Frank traveled throughout the state as a food service inspector with the Vermont Department of Health.

By request of Frank’s family, Friends of Burlington Gardens has established the Frank Watson Way Memorial Scholarship Fund to support the Community Teaching Garden at Ethan Allen Homestead. Thanks to the generosity of friends and neighbors, more than a thousand dollars has already been raised to provide scholarships for limited income participants in the 20-week educational program.

The Community Teaching Garden is open to anyone in the Burlington area who has a sincere desire and commitment to learn how to garden organically, and to share their new skills with others. To make a contribution to the scholarship fund, learn more about the teaching garden program, or download an application form, please visit www.burlingtongardens.org or call me at the Friends of Burlington Gardens office at 861-4769.


With Groundhog Day signaling winter’s midpoint, February is an ideal time to chase away cabin fever blues by planning ahead for spring and summer gardening. 

Across Vermont, community gardens provide fertile settings where self-sufficiency and interdependence thrive. In Burlington, more than 2,000 city residents enjoy the fresh affordable produce grown at eleven Burlington Area Community Garden sites.
  
Burlington Parks and Recreation automatically mails a registration form to each household that enrolled in the BACG program in 2008 and maintained their garden plot in good condition. Returning BACG gardeners are wise to register early, as each year a few gardeners overlook the deadline and learn that plots at their site are already filled.
  
Photo caption: Bart and Kate Westdijk grew fresh food and friendships as participants in the 2008 New Discovery Garden at Ethan Allen Homestead.

Choosing the appropriate size BACG garden plot helps to maximize yields and save work. A full plot is approximately 25 ft. x 25 ft. and can produce enough fresh vegetables to feed a household of four people. But if poorly cared for, a 625 square foot plot can easily become overcome by weeds and draw the ire of fellow gardeners.

For smaller households, half plots are offered at most BACG sites, while novice/family friendly plots are available at the New Discovery Garden, Starr Farm, Baird Park, Champlain, and Myrtle Street sites. The 2009 fee for a full plot is $55, half plots are $37, and novice/family friendly plots are $20. BACG scholarships covering a portion of the plot fee are available for limited income gardeners. 

BACG registration forms are available at the Parks and Recreation office at 645 Pine Street, on the web at www.enjoyburlington.com, or by calling BACG coordinator Lisa Coven at 863-0420. New gardeners are assigned to garden sites based on their registration date. With demand high, the nearly 400 BACG plots are expected to fill up by early April.

Whether gardening at home or in a community plot, the season can be extended by raising a diversity of vegetables from seeds and transplants. Gardeners are encouraged to follow instructions on seed packets and avoid crowding crops. Plants are more productive and disease resistant when they have room to spread out leafy foliage and absorb energy from the sun.

In preparation for Town Meeting Day, Friends of Burlington Gardens has surveyed Burlington’s four mayoral candidates on issues of potential interest to supporters of community, school, and neighborhood gardening. A link to the survey responses is posted on the FBG web site at www.burlingtongardens.org/welcome.htm.

Special thanks to Bob Kiss, Andy Montroll, Dan Smith, and Kurt Wright for their participation in the survey, and good luck to all the candidates!