Savvy Gardening

Make salsa verde with your bumper crop of tomatillos

Several years ago, I discovered how easy it is to grow tomatillos. It’s almost too easy (as long as you have more than one plant)! That first growing season, I had such an abundance of the husk-covered fruits, I couldn’t keep up with the harvest. I happened to discover a timely salsa verde recipe in a magazine and I’ve been making it ever since. I’ve adapted the recipe over the years to tweak the flavor. If I want it to be tangier, I leave the honey out. For extra spice, I’ll play with the amount of hot peppers I add. This recipe is so easy to make, there is barely any prep involved.

Any extra salsa that can’t be eaten right away is frozen. It’s exciting to pull it out to thaw over the winter months. Salsa verde is delicious on tacos, burrito bowls, and enchiladas, or spooned over chicken and fish.
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Rudbeckias: Powerhouse plants!

Written by Jessica Walliser

Rudbeckias are some of the most robust and attractive plants around. They are no-fuss plants that require little more than average soil and full sun. The pollen and nectar of these plants support many different pollinators and beneficial insects (yay!!). North America hosts many native species of Rudbeckia and I seem to love them all. In my own garden, I grow no less than six different types of Rudbeckias. Here are five of my favorites:
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5 Mini melons for small gardens and containers

Written by Jessica Walliser

Melons do not mind their manners – at least as far as their growth habits are concerned. A single rambling vine a of standard melon variety can cover up to 100 square feet of garden space, and many gardeners don’t have that kind of room to spare. It’s sad to think that delicious and nutritious homegrown melons are taken off the menus of many gardeners because of space restrictions. This is specially true knowing that it doesn’t have to be this way. Bush-type mini melons for small gardens are the perfect choice, taking up little room yet producing much like their full-sized brethren.

Grafted tomatoes

Written by Niki Jabbour

For the past few years, I’ve been hearing more and more about grafted tomatoes. Last year was the first time they were offered at garden centres in my region, but I took a pass. It seemed like there was a lot of hype surrounding them, and my penny-pinching self didn’t want to pay $12.99 for a single tomato seedling. This year, grafted tomatoes are back, with even more glitzy advertising, and so I threw in the trowel and added an ‘Indigo Rose’ grafted tomato to my garden.
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Lost ladybugs

Written by Jessica Walliser

Over 30 years ago, three native ladybug species, the 9-spotted, the 2-spotted, and the transverse ladybug, were very common across Eastern North America. But, starting in the late 1980s, their numbers began to decline. In fact, the 9-spotted ladybug, New York’s state insect, hadn’t been spotted in the state in well over 20 years! One of the most common ladybug species in the Northeastern U.S. had seemingly vanished, only to be found in sparse populations in parts of the Mid-West.
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Harvesting garlic scapes? Blend them into this garlic scape pesto recipe

Written by Tara Nolan

In late spring, when the delightfully loopy garlic scapes appear between the leaves of my fall-planted garlic, I know it’s almost garlic scape pesto season. This bonus, flavorful harvest can be used in a variety of ways, but blending the scapes into pesto is my favorite way to preserve them.
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