GARDENING

Inexpensive ideas to grow a garden in tight spaces

Friday at 3:00 p.m. on Houston Life, the team is celebrating Earth Day. Do you have a small backyard or side yard? We’ll show you how to garden in a tight space and on a budget! That’s Friday on KPRC 2.

If you want to get your green thumb this spring but don’t have a big area available at home, there’s a gardening technique from the ‘70s making a comeback, which can help your veggies grow even in a limited space.

We're finally getting a taste of winter here in Houston, and if you want to make sure your plants and gardens survive the season, there are some things you can do to help protect them.

It’s the best time to be growing greens in Houston, and we’re getting a lesson on the easiest ways to it at home.

Water-wise or xeriscape gardening is a method of gardening that involves choosing plants that are appropriate to the site and creating a landscape that can be maintained with little supplemental watering.Don’t be fooled into thinking we are talking about barren landscapes full of cactus, agaves, and other thorny plants. Water-wise gardening can be applied to any type of garden. There are seven principals to water-wise gardening. Mulch – Mulch will moderate the soil temperature, hold moisture, slow erosion and suppress the weeds that compete with your plants for water and nutrients. Water-wise gardening 1 of 5For more in-depth information on Water-wise Gardening, visit these websites:http://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/earthkind/http://urbanlandscapeguide.tamu.edu/waterwise.html

HOUSTON – If you want to grow tomatoes from your own garden, spring is a good time to get you started. Ashley Grubb, the founder of Mustard Seed Farm and Market, shared her very interesting secret recipe for growing big tomatoes. The right balance of nutrients, good soil, water, and sunshine are all you need,” said Grubb, who shared the key ingredients that help her tomatoes develop. If you’re wondering where you can get a dead fish to plant your tomatoes, Grubb suggests going to the seafood department in any grocery store or a bait shop. Fish in grocery store (Mustard Seed Farm & Market)For more details on the fertilizer ingredients, see Grubb’s interview in the video above.

HOUSTON – More than 500,000 Houstonians are living in “food deserts”-- parts of town where fresh, nutritious food are not immediately accessible. Thursday afternoon, Mattie Sterling took a virtual gardening class on Zoom, hosted by the Julia C. Hester House. The Hester House provided participants with fertilizer, soil and vegetable plants. A spokesperson for the Hester House said they’re trying to help neighbors be self-sufficient in areas that don’t have grocery stores. “You can just walk outdoors, pick it, clean it up and put it on.”The Hester House plans to have more of these classes.

I asked what was going on there, especially since she had green onions already growing in her garden. It turns out that my friend was right, and after a few days, the little green onions started to grow back. Here are a few photos of my green onion’s journey. They are starting to look like actual green onions. It was even more shocking when I found out that green onions weren’t the only thing you could regrow.

New Houston Botanic Garden is 132-acres of plants, hiking trails, water features and morePublished: September 15, 2020, 4:58 pmHouston Botanic Garden is a 132-acre plant museum with hiking trails, water features, and a family discovery center, and opens to the public this Friday. It’s located at the site of the old Glennbrook Golf Course, right across I-45 from Hobby Airport. Lauren Kelly got a sneak peek from President and General Counsel, Claudia Gee Vassar.

HOUSTON At-home gardening is a great activity for parents to do with their kids, and Urban Harvest now has Back-to-School Grow Kits to teach students, children, and adults how to grow seasonal herbs and vegetables from seeds and transplants. The Grow Kit includes a 5-gallon grow bag, soil from Farm Dirt, decorate your own plant labels, two seasonal plant starts Basil and Dino Kale, flower seeds, Microlife fertilizer and detailed instructions for the gardener to follow. Each kit is $20, and there is also an option to Buy One, Give One for $35, when supporters buy a grow kit, another kit will be donated to the students of Kashmere Gardens Elementary School. Keep in mind, the kits must be pre-ordered by Thursday at 5pm prior to the Saturday pick-up on the website. Click HERE for more information.

Learn to read your plantsPlants sometimes look wilted during the heat of the day, even if they are well-watered. Water early in the morning or late in the evening when temperatures are cooler this reduces evaporation and allows plants time to uptake water before the heat of the day. The combination of heat and humidity can cause plants to poach, sometimes leading to permanent tissue damage. Electrolytes are minerals that help our bodies cope with stress, and heat is a definite stress factor. For more information to managing summer heat in the garden, click here to follow Angelas blog.