If you enjoy gardening, you might yearn to do what you love and make it into your job. But there’s a lot to know if you want to be a farmer. Whether you want to supplement your income by selling what you grow, you’re dreaming of quitting your day job or you’re already a farmer, you can get help at Cornell University’s website for beginning farmers. Online courses for aspiring, new and experienced farmers are being offered. The courses fill…...
Tag: Vegetables
Free class at Lockwood’s covers what you should do in garden in October
Don’t prune in autumn. That’s one of the important bits of advice gardening expert Sally Cunningham will share during a free class on “Yard and Garden Care in October (for a Better Spring!)” at 10:30 a.m. Saturday, October 12, at Lockwood’s Greenhouses, 4484 Clark Street, Hamburg. While the class is free, seating is limited, so please call 649-4684 to make a reservation. Whether you maintain a yard or grow vegetables and flowers, the jobs you do now will make a…...
Heirloom vegetables connect us with previous generations; learn more at fair
by Connie Oswald Stofko Starting in 1910, Jim Tammaro’s great-grandmother grew lovely flowers, a dianthus called ‘maiden pinks’, in the garden of her Rochester home. In 1960, his aunt took some of the plants to her home. In the 1980s, when his aunt died at the age of 93, the plants were turned over to Tammaro. Now Tammaro carries on the legacy, growing the maiden pinks outside the front door of his Williamsville home. Growing these plants that have a…...
Celery update: I’ve harvested some & it’s tasty
by Connie Oswald Stofko Remember my experiment with celery stumps? Well, I harvested some stalks and they taste delicious. I got the idea from posts on Pinterest. When you’ve finished off a bunch of celery, instead of throwing the stump on the compost pile, you root it. Set it in just enough water to cover that ridge at the base of the celery where the roots come out– See the photo at left. I first tried rooting celery this winter,…...
Cornell & apple industry group introduce two new varieties of apples
Cornell University, in partnership with the New York Apple Growers, a new industry group, has developed two new apple varieties of apples, SnapDragon and RubyFrost, that will be available this fall at a few farmers markets. The apples were developed by Cornell University breeder and Horticulture Professor Susan Brown. They are being grown by 140 apple farmers throughout New York State. The two varieties have been a decade in the making, and how they’ve gone to market is a first…...
Watch local cooking challenge & learn to cook with native plants
Sumac, a native plant, is pretty this time of year with its large red, cone-shaped flowers. You can see these small trees in parks or in the wild, and they make a great landscape plant. But did you know sumac is edible? There are quite a few native plants you might want to start growing for food– If you know how to cook with them. In this article we’ll tell you about two events where you can get ideas on…...
Sept. 13 is deadline to enter veggies, flowers in Genesee Country Village fair
You can enter plants, flowers, heirloom vegetables and fruits in the Agricultural Fair to be held 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, Oct. 5 and 6 at the Genesee Country Village and Museum, 1410 Flint Hill Road, Mumford. The competitions include one for largest pumpkin. Prior registration is required. Entry forms must be received by Friday, Sept. 13. Find the entry form and rules here. Entrants will receive one day free admission to the fair. The competitions are…...
Gardener goes old school with organic gardening in Buffalo
“We’re from New York City,” said Shawn King. “It’s all concrete there. When we got here and saw all this land, we just started planting.” She and her husband, Lew-Jean, have lived for 27 years at 166 Lasalle Ave., Buffalo. I visited them on July 13 during the Samuel P. Capen Garden Walk. “We’ve always had a garden,” Shawn said. “The love of gardening was instilled in me by my grandmother.” In the front yard, a neat arrangement of flowers…...
Pesticide-free yard in Parkside is kid-friendly & pretty, too
You may be used to seeing small yellow signs warning you to keep your children and pets off a neighbor’s lawn because it had recently been sprayed with a pesticide. A different kind of yellow sign is displayed in the front yard at 82 West Humboldt, Buffalo: “Pesticide Free. This area safe for children, pets and other living things.” “To me, it’s worth avoiding pesticides,” Dan Cadzow said. “You track it inside on your shoes and the kids play on…...
Questions on another voodoo plant and lettuce woes
Can you help readers with these two gardening questions? Gardening question #1: What’s the name of this stinky plant? I saw your post about the stinky plant. I think I have one, but it does not look like a lily. I was told mine is a voodoo plant. Last year, it gave me a beautiful umbrella effect. This year, it is odd and has a red flower in the middle. Today I found a ton of flies on it, and…...