A Flurry of Spring Planting
Gardeners planted arugula, carrots, chard, kale, mustard greens, pac choi, snap and snow peas, and spinach in beds that had been covered in leaf mulch for the winter. They created narrow furrows, they mixed in compost, and dropped in the seeds. Finally, they watered...
What else is growing at the garden?
Early Herb Walk
Clinical herbalist and Vermont Center for Integrative Herbalism student Diana Baron led us in and around the garden to identify the plants just poking out of the earth as we begin the 2018 gardening season. We took this herb stroll on April 21, a week before our first...
Day In The Dirt!
Gardeners dug, shaped, and planted at the first work party of the Garden at 485 Elm. Our seventeen volunteers joined hundreds of others at 33 community and school gardens all over the state participating in Day In The Dirt. This was the sixth annual Day In The Dirt,...
Winter gardening for real
Mulching some of the beds was that one last chore we didn't get to before the snow flew. On January 10, an intrepid gardener went out on her own to complete it. We weren't even sure the garden gates would open with so much snow piled on each side. But Meredith found...
Tucking the Garden in for Winter
Most of our crops have been harvested. Just a few hardy greens and Brussels sprouts remain. We've tested and amended the soil and planted winter cover crops for nutrient replenishment. But we're not quite done. Nature doesn't tend to leave bare earth. We mimic that...
Planting Tomorrow’s Garlic
The garlic we planted in mid-November will be harvested in early autumn of the 2018 garden season. Gardeners here enjoy harvesting and eating most of the crops we plant during the season we planted them. Garlic is one of the crops we overwinter. In 2018, we'll be...
Compostville with Master Composters
If you haven't already heard, big changes are coming to Compostville. Once our trusty heavy equipment guy does some grading, leveling, and stump removal, the rebuild will get underway. But there's always plenty to do in Compostville. We had our first work party with...
Brussels sprouts from good to great
A light frost that would kill a tomato plant is only the beginning for Brussels sprouts. Brussels sprouts sweeten to deliciousness after a few hard frosts. We'll be harvesting Brussels sprouts here at the Garden at 485 Elm for as long as there are still buds on the...
Changes Coming in Compostville
The Garden at 485 Elm began composting food scraps and garden waste in 2014. In that first growing season, we cobbled together some pallets and threw everything in them. It wasn't hot composting, but we kept our food scraps and lawn waste to ourselves. Our first...
Fresh food at the end of October
Most of the work now is garden cleanup, but there's still plenty to harvest and eat. http://
Gardening in sweatshirts again
The afternoons are comfortable for garden work and there's still plenty to do. This season, our cucumbers flowered and grew delicious. In the late July heat, the leaves turned yellow. By mid-August, all were dead. A gardener speculated that the double boxes were...
