🍂 A Gentle Start: Planning as Stewardship By the time fall arrives, our hands are often weary from the hustle of summer harvests. The garden shows both triumphs and failures side by side—overflowing tomatoes and peppers, but also pest-eaten greens or bare spots where something didn’t quite take. This is where mapping comes in. Garden…
🪱A Gentle Start: Feeding the Soil, Feeding the Soul Fall gardening invites us to slow down, take stock, and prepare for the season ahead. Worm castings—nature’s slow, steady gift—remind us that transformation often happens quietly. Kitchen scraps and garden debris pass through the humble worm, becoming black, crumbly castings that feed the soil in ways…
🥬A Gentle Start: Planting in the Quiet Season There’s something special about planting when the rest of the world seems to be winding down. The air is cooler, the garden feels calmer, and yet—life is just beginning beneath the soil. October planting is an act of faith. We tuck seeds into cool earth, trusting that…
A Gentle Start: Letting Go to Make Room for the New The turning of the seasons often requires a letting go before new life can begin. Clearing summer beds isn’t just about tidying up spent plants—it’s a physical reminder that sometimes we must release what’s run its course to make space for what’s next. In…
🥬 Introduction: Protecting the Harvest Before It Begins Few pests are as persistent—and as destructive—as the humble cabbage worm. In Zone 9 gardens, where warm weather stretches well into fall, these tiny green caterpillars can strip a healthy kale plant to bare stems in a matter of days. If you’ve ever checked your broccoli patch…
Designing with Faith, Function, and Flexibility in Zone 9 🍂 Introduction: A Season of Intentionality Fall gardening invites us into a different rhythm. After the frenzy of spring planting and the heat of summer maintenance, fall offers space to step back, evaluate, and design a garden that reflects where we are now—and where we’re headed….
