If you're having trouble growing Love-in-a-Mist from seed, try sowing your seed directly in a patch in late summer and letting it overwinter. Learn from your plant volunteer teachers. 🌱

Penstemon appreciation thread! Is there anything better than bees jamming the front half of their bodies into these bell shaped flowers in the spring? 🌱 #nativeplants First up, Penstemon calycosus, Calico Beardtongue or Long Sepal Beardtongue

Happy Caturday, from Roast Beef, Feline Intern Gardener. He loves this spot next to Little Bluestem and Bush's Poppy Mallow. 🌱 #catsofbsky

Wind tossed Baptisia australis in the light of sunset a couple of days ago - including one with an odd white flower. I love an oddball. 🌱 #nativeplants

If you have chive blossoms, it's time to make infused vinegar. It's excellent in salad dressings and in composed salads like potato, bean, pasta, etc. 🌱

Do you think this sort of sign and certification encourages neighbors? Do you think they might be curious to learn more? 🌱 #nativeplants

Clematis rooguchi, Foamflower, Wild Red Columbine, and Love-in-a-Mist this week in the Philadelphia suburbs. 🌱 #gardening

Update from vegetable central. Life is extra busy this spring with lots of caretaking work. I'm still going to have a food garden, but it will be different this year. I won't grow as much and most crops will be directly sown. Potatoes, beets, peas, and alliums are all doing well. 🌱 #vegetablegarden

Wild False Blue Indigo is coming into full flower. Threadleaf Bluestar is in full flower. Golden Alexander is in peak bloom. 🌱 #nativeplants

Wild Red Columbine are magic. 🌱 #nativeplants

Roast Beef, Feline Intern Gardener, fell asleep this evening in his pot of catnip. 🌱 #catsofbsky

Every day is Earth Day.

I was away from home for a few days and arrived home to see Moss Phlox, Golden Ragwort, and American Pawpaw in full flower. The Golden Alexander is thinking about it. The Wild False Blue Indigo shot up about a foot in the past few days. Details in Alt Text. 🌱 #nativeplants

The Montmorency Cherry Tree is flowering for the first time this year. The Hairy Penstemon, Pearly Everlasting, Gray Goldenrod, Bush's Poppy Mallow, Little Bluestem, and Partridge Pea are growing, too. There's a Bluebird nest in the Bluebird box. 🌱 #nativeplants

Life has been full of stress this spring. I feel careworn and down. Noticing that the Spring Beauty (Claytonia virginica) I added to the lawn last summer is blooming put a smile on my face today. 🌱 #nativeplants

This weekend and always, NO LILIES FOR KITTIES. www.fda.gov/animal-veter...

The Onion is usually not the best with gardening articles, but in this case, they're doing excellent work. 🌱

It's that time of year again, garden friends. You may need to net your garlic and onions. 🌱 open.substack.com/pub/gardenin...

I'm sorry. I've entered the "shakes fist at sky" stage of winter and I need to rant on the Internet for a minute. We got a foot of snow in mid-January that has just almost completely melted in the past couple of days followed by extreme cold and more small snowfall here and there. 1/

The first 4 Wiri Wiri Peppers, C. frutescens, germinated today after 6 days on a heat mat. After each seed germinates, I remove the soil block from the heat mat. Crops like peppers need heat to germinate, not to grow. Keeping seedlings on heat results in leggy seedlings. 🌱 #vegetablegardening

As corn earworms develop resistance to corn engineered to be toxic to them, a new study shows adult moths that survive have wings that are longer and stiffer, which favors long-distance migration—potentially helping the pests spread resistance faster and undermining a key crop-protection strategy.

A goal for 2026 is to get my garden certified by organizations that support habitat gardening and offer signs if a garden is certified as habitat. Why? I want people who walk past my garden to ask questions about it, think about what it means and if they want to do it, too. 🌱 #nativeplants

The onions and shallots I sowed on 1/17 germinated 7 days later. This is the progress 12 days after sowing. Ambient temperature 62F/16C. 🌱

Here's a practical guide for planning your garden, with links to goal setting advice and seed starting advice. It's been difficult for me to stay focused on anything lately, reading about new horrors every day. I'm trying to remain hopeful and help people garden. open.substack.com/pub/gardenin...

100 onion and 150 shallot seeds sown today. Target transplant date first or second week in April under netting against Allium Leaf Miner Fly. Anticipated harvest first half of July. 🌱 #vegetablegardening #organicgardening

For a brief moment this week, Roast Beef consented to sit in the basket by my desk. He usually doesn't bother with me at all, but since his preferred human is away, perhaps he wanted some company. He's a weird, awkward, anxious Beef, but he's our Beef. #catsofbluesky #caturday

This is no surprise to anyone. 🌱

Winter Sowing: Prairie Smoke, Willowleaf Bluestar, Downy Woodmint, Purple Poppy Mallow, Orange Butterfly Milkweed, Rattlesnake Master, Gray Goldenrod 🌱 #nativeplants

Here's a 2025 Garden Photo Album. Happy New Year to everyone! 🌱 #nativeplants #invertefest #organic-gardening #bugsky

Merry Christmas from Roast Beef, Feline Intern Gardener, who is patiently waiting at the table for Christmas dinner to be served. #catsofbsky

I made several types of cookies for Christmas gifts, but these are my all time favorites. These are how PA Dutch people make sugar cookies in southeastern Pennsylvania. They are cake-like, buttery, vanilla, and tender. They're coated in sugar before baking, rather than iced.

Happy Solstice gardeners. I wrote an article about how I use the winter solstice to plan the garden year ahead. Tomorrow our days get longer! 🌱 open.substack.com/pub/gardenin...

Hey #nativeplant friends, does anyone have a seed resource for Willowleaf Bluestar, Amsonia tabernaemontana var. salicifolia?

59 left now. Much like many of you, I *also* can't wait to stop posting about this. The end is near! Help me get there! Order a 2026 Love Notes from Nature Calendar! SquidFacts.net

Looks like the coating to 3" of snow in the forecast was a bit of an understatement. At least it's fluffy.

😩

This year's harvest of home grown Aleppo Pepper flakes is three quarts! 🌱 The best tool for making chili flakes is the food mill. Much less dust and faster than the food processor. #vegetablegardening #organicgardening

I thawed out the frozen Wiri Wiri Peppers from this year's garden to make pepper sauce this weekend. It's really hot, as usual. Two bottles will last us a year. Two bottles will go to my Guyanese neighbor who introduced me to these peppers, and the rest I will gift to folks who give me leaves. 🌱

I processed the dehydrated paprika harvest today. Surprisingly nice yield considering the plants were heavily deer browsed this year. Homegrown paprika is flavorful and aromatic. It's nothing like the stuff from the supermarket. If you can grow any other sort of pepper plant, you can grow paprika! 🌱

I wrote an article about how I compost. I hope you find it useful. 🌱 open.substack.com/pub/gardenin...

I managed to plant my garlic last weekend. I grow about 40 heads of Music hardneck garlic each year. I plant it close in richly composted soil in a patch pattern. The patch is 12 sqft. I plant in mid-November. I cover with leaves to insulate the soil and net to keep the squirrels out. 🌱

I made my puree for winter baking today from four butternut squash, which yielded 9 cups of puree for the freezer and enough to make pumpkin baked oatmeal for breakfast. I freeze the puree in 2 cup and 1 cup quantities. A pie recipe takes 2 cups. My favorite pumpkin cookie recipes take 1 cup. 🌱

I finally got questioned by the cops today, but it wasn't because I was looking through trash bags in the neighborhood for leaves. It's because of this innocent looking cat. I was working on spreading compost today, dressed in dirty garden clothes, when this Beefy boy jumped the fence. 1/

Cool stuff. A freeze last night made a zinnia burst. The ice crystals look like snow. I've heard people call this phenomenon "frost flowers" but that's usually the more aesthetic instances. 🌱

If you're interested in learning about Winter Sowing in a hands on workshop environment, it's prime time for those in the US to look up your county extension office Master Gardener program and check your local libraries for Winter Sowing events in the next couple of months. #nativeplants

I harvested the last of the carrots and a large amount of Syrian Oregano, parsley, and cilantro in advance of the freeze that was forecast. The carrots always do very well for me in 30 gallon grow bags. Most are long and straight. These are a Nantes type. 🌱 #vegetablegardening #organicgardening

Do you spend the autumn evenings before morning trash pickup driving slowly and suspiciously through the night darkened streets of your neighborhood looking to rescue bags of leaves destined for the landfill or are you normal? 🌱

Started the once per year "dealing with the compost" process. I sift it and then fill up all of my raised beds. I got two beds filled today. 🌱 #vegetablegarden #organicgarden