A Bouquet a Day Is the Beautiful Way
Flowers are a cherished garden crop. Gardeners snip blooms to brighten their homes and give gifts that warm hearts. For garden flowers to look like this, gardeners put in planning, work, and TLC. Members of the garden's Flower Power team select, start, plant, tend,...
What else is growing at the garden?
Our Mothership: the Vermont Community Garden Network
The Vermont Community Garden Network (VCGN) has been there for us since before we dug up the south lawn and invited the community to garden together here. Way back in the winter of 2014, I went looking for a community-garden template (my favorite way to work). I...
The Garden in Winter
The garden sleeps. We don't. The garden is blanketed in snow. Compostville is still and frozen. The tabletop leaning against the garden shed holds heavy snow. In the growing season, we spread and dry crops on the table's mesh surface. Garden managers Chris and Sheryl,...
Thanks to the Plants and the Planters
The Plants Now we turn toward the vast fields of Plant life. As far as the eye can see, the Plants grow, working many wonders. They sustain many life forms. With our minds gathered together, we give thanks and look forward to seeing Plant life for many generations to...
Sweet Dreams to the 2020 Garden
We're still enjoying some garden greens and herbs, but we've done our last big harvests and created a cozy winter bed for the garden. https://youtu.be/gkvq0G3Tris It's all about the leaves. The City of Montpelier gathers truckloads of bagged leaves from neighborhood...
Brussels Sprouts: The Last Big Garden Harvest
While there are still salad greens, kale, and herbs to harvest, and a few lovely daikon radishes in a box bed, this special seasonal treat was our last big harvesting hurrah. We dug out all the Brussels sprouts, popped the sprouts off the stalks, and separated them...
The Garden’s Ancient History
This essay by 485 Elm gardener and naturalist Ned Swanberg originally appeared is reprinted from the Bridge with the author's permission. ESSAY: Discovering Watershed Passages Through Time and Space MONTPELIER — From the bridge near my home, I could drop a “Pooh...
Garlic Planting Day
Gardeners plant hope. Every year, we planting garlic for harvesting the next season. On August 8, 2020, we harvested the garlic planted the previous fall. We separated the garlic into two piles: We laid out these beautiful heads into shares for gardeners to take home....
Compost Happens
Eventually, everything that was once an animal, vegetable, or mineral will break down—it will all compost. Without help, that could take months, years, decades. Here at the Garden at 485 Elm, we're making compost happen faster. What's the rush? With Vermont law...
A Frost-Ready Garden
In early September, we had several nights of frost, our first of the season. Covering the greens overnight helps them live on to continue feeding us. The chard to the left and kale to the right are frost hardier; they'll do just fine on their own. When the sun and...
Squash Harvest
Temperatures are nearing freezing at night. Squash and cucumbers are very cold sensitive and will rot if exposed to frost. So we eat! In this pandemic-era garden season, we have smaller and fewer work parties. We miss our gatherings, but a safe, viable garden season...
