http://www.urban-gardens.info Mon, 15 Jan 2007 19:27:24 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en At the moment I'm afraid I don't have time for an in-depth article on square foot gardening, maybe sometime soon though. In the mean time, you can get some of the details from the Square Foot Gardening Website. This post is to help me (and all you readers out there) ... http://www.urban-gardens.info/2007/square-foot-garden-spacing/ Unfortunately, in most urban areas it is pretty much inevitable that there will be some nasty little rodents of some kind lurking about. In my case, there seem to be plenty of squirrels and a few rats around, which I'm hoping won't be too much of a problem once ... http://www.urban-gardens.info/2007/keeping-rodents-away-from-your-vegetables/ I've recently been planning my own small garden, and have been developing a list of things to keep in mind as I go about my planning. Some of these items are common sense, and some of them didn't occur to me until I started really thinking about my design. ... http://www.urban-gardens.info/2006/tips-for-planning-a-small-garden/ Often when I'm picking out plants the instructions will say to prepare the soil with a 5-10-10 fertilizer or some other combination of numbers X-Y-Z.  These are easy enough to find in the stores, but what does it mean? These types of fertilizers are sometimes referred to as N-P-K fertilizers, where ... http://www.urban-gardens.info/2006/fertilizer-explained/ In a small garden it really helps to get the most out of your limited space by taking advantage of all the verticle space that is available.  Lots of great flowers and vegetables can be trained to grow vertically, as long as they are provided with the proper type of ... http://www.urban-gardens.info/2006/saving-space-with-climbing-plants/ Because my garden is so small, I try to pick plants that will look nice for as long a season as possible in the limited space that is available.  Given that, I've decided to try out the "Endless Summer Hydrangea", which is relatively new...or newly available at least.  The endless summer ... http://www.urban-gardens.info/2006/endless-summer-hydrangea/ Here's a great article about growing peonies by Leonard Perry that I found on the University of Vermont Website.  I think it provides a great summary of the information needed to grow peonies, so I've quoted the whole thing here: One of the most outstanding perennial flowers that is grown in ... http://www.urban-gardens.info/2006/growing-peonies/ I'm finally settled down in a house where I plan to stay for several years, so this coming spring I will be attempting to grow some asparagus for the first time.  A few quick facts about asparagus: Asparagus can be grown in most parts of the United States They take about 3 ... http://www.urban-gardens.info/2006/growing-asparagus/ Although I'm lucky enough to have at least a small patch of land at my current house, I spent the last couple years with a 100-square foot balcony as my only outdoor space.  Don't be discouraged by a lack of land though, just about anything that you can grow in ... http://www.urban-gardens.info/2006/no-land-needed/ The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) has developed a system of zones that help us to determine which plants are best-suited to which areas of the country (sorry, I only have a map for the US here).  As this system of zones is pretty central to my plant selection process ... http://www.urban-gardens.info/2006/usda-plant-hardiness-zones/