Archive for green gardening
My Organic Garden – It was the Best of Times, It was the Worst of Times
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Swiss Chard
Greetings fellow organic gardening enthusiasts! I’m taking a break from the arbor/Sicilian zucchini drama this week to discuss other garden news like the uprising of the brussel sprouts. I didn’t think it was possible but they have somehow gotten even larger and leafier since I last mentioned it. The brussel sprouts have completely taken over the poor unsuspecting basil and I fear that we will need to mediate the upcoming turf wars. On the bright side, I have red tomatoes! Yes, slowly (and I do mean at a snail’s pace), the tomatoes are turning red. With the amount of sun and extremely hot weather we have had this summer in Southern Ontario it confounds me. I have no idea why they are taking so long – over the course of a week they barely turn from dark green to a slightly lighter dark green. At this rate my tomatoes should be red in or around November.
Also, I have planted the largest cherry tomatoes on record. I thought I was growing little cherry tomatoes as I do every year, but the labeling skills at the nursery left much to be desired and my cherry tomatoes are the size of plums. That’s right, plums. They are very sweet though and are the perfect topping to a pizza with a little tomato sauce, fresh basil (from the garden) and a smattering of mozzarella cheese so I’m not complaining. There is nothing like picking something out of your garden and then eating it right away. Unfortunately that’s not happening as much as I would like this season but I digress.
I was given an heirloom tomato plant, and was excited to see what became of it as the seeds were apparently very old. This plant has grown to an impressive four and half feet tall and it is leafy, full and I prune it lovingly. Do you know that all this tender love and care has yielded me? One tomato! That right, one tomato is all it has grown. Now that I have picked that one tomato, it has grown two flowers so there is still hope. Maybe it’ll decide to give me another tomato before frost comes.
Tags: Eco Friendly, eco friendly gardening, eco friendly living, eco-friendly lifestyle, eco-gardening, ecofriendly, green gardening, Green Living, greener lifestyle, organic gardening, planet forward, sustainable lifestyle, Sustainable Living, Sustainable Practice, sustainable practices, urban gardens, zucchini gardenCommunal Gardening Comes Alive with Sharing Backyards Toronto
Posted by: | CommentsAn innovative program in Toronto is giving new meaning to the old Guess Who lyric ‘share the land’. If you are one of those fortunate enough to have the land for a garden but are unable to commit the time and effort to such an endeavor, this program is for you. Sharing Backyards Toronto is bringing together urban gardeners in need of space with those that have the space but not the time for gardening.
“This program was created by the Lifecycles Project Society in Victoria, B.C which currently has 20 Sharing Backyards partners around North America. The local partner in Toronto is eco-gardening group Growing for Green. Want to grow fruit locally? Become a member of the Ben Nobleman Community Orchard – another Growing for Green project in Toronto.”
Though the idea is a great one, the project does bring up a multitude of questions as to how this works. According to their website “garden partners share the cost of gardening supplies and the abundance of the crops”. The site also lines up a list of questions that you need to ask yourself and your gardening partner before you enter into this arrangement. The organizers of the project point out that “there are no restrictions on how you might choose to share your space” and then they outline some issues that might arise. One expense would be if the garden needs additional soil and, if so, who should cover the cost or will that be a shared expense? If you answer these questions for yourself and have idea of what you want from a gardening partner, the vetting process will find you a like-minded garden buddy. The site allows you to look up other’s ads or post your own, think of it as the match.com of the garden world.
Tags: Ben Nobleman Community Orchard, eco-gardening, gardening spaces, green gardening, Growing for Green, Lifecycles Project Society, organic gardening, Sharing Backyards Toronto, Toronto gardensGreen Gazette (Issue 13) Green Racing, Concrete Mushrooms and an eco ghost
Posted by: | CommentsGood evening everyone and welcome back to the greenest bulletins around. The green gazette is our twice per week posting to highlight some of the more intriguing, inspiring or incredible pieces of eco news. Inventions, ideas and issues will be tackled as we seek the online newswire for stories or blogs that are worth a quick read. So let’s get started…
A lot of people get excited about auto racing, really excited (too excited?). I’m not one of them but as with all things sports related – to each his own. Seeing vehicles race round a track (you end where you begin…hmmm) at insane speeds draws huge crowds and even bigger revenues to 
the sport. By definition it’s an extreme waste of fuel, nothing is delivered anywhere, nobody is commuting and each vehicle has but the single occupant. So how can auto racing green up? Natural gas vehicles is an intriguing answer and Volkswagen are leading the way. A recent entry into a 24 hour race VW won the ‘alt-fuel’ class in the contest. These aren’t a poor relation to traditional racing either, the vehicle offers 220hp and 202 foot pounds of torque. Bio-CNG is made from renewable resources such as grass or refined biological waste. VW claims the fuel is CO2-neutral, generating only the amount of carbon dioxide already absorbed by the source feedstock. The energy produced from a ton of organic residues equates to 60 liters (about 15 gallons) of fuel oil, or 200 kilowatt-hours of electrical power. Using this production process the yield from one hectare (2.4 acres) of cultivated land allows a vehicle to cover a distance of 67,600 kilometers (about 42,000 miles). Amazing stats from an amazing vehicle and you still get to see a car go round and round and round. If you have to race then why not do so with the 80% reduction in CO2 emissions that this vehicle delivers?
Nothing is greener than gardening you’d tend to assume and of course if you can grow your own fruit or vegetables what better way to cut down on food transportation? Besides which, nothing tastes like a strawberry, onion or an orange from your own back garden. As a result I wanted to add a link to these seven great tips for eco-friendly garden. Worth a look and really easy to implement!
As I’ve warned you before, here comes a weird story. Albania hardly ever makes the news, the small nation on the Adriatic is perhaps most famous for being the most Southwestern extremity of the former Soviet Eastern Bloc. Despite bordering Greece and being less than 100 miles off 
the coast of Southern Italy Albania was governed from the USSR from 1946-1992. The landscape (due to a combination of history, location and paranoia) is littered with concrete pillboxes or bunkers. Small concrete domes throughout the land that could be used strategically in case of invasion, and when I say scattered that’s not accurate there are over 700,000 dotting the land. The goal is to transform them into eco-friendly hostels, they are already built and the environment is not damaged further (many are in beautiful scenic locations). You can learn more about the designers and their vision and even download a huge pdf of the proposal by visiting their website. Taking something as stark as this and trying to create something positive is rather bold and creative. If you have time I’ve also included a preview video of the documentary being made about the concept. Time for me to visit Albania, I went to the former Yugoslavia to the North and it looks equally beautiful.
Finally tonight a little ghost from England especially for Halloween. Kaspa is a glow in the dark EcoGlo-Ghost that will glow for an extended period of time after switching the internal light bulb off. It’s a sweet little design and the extended glow (perfect for a ghost friendly kid) is due to the product containing phosphor. The product is winning awards for innovation and design and I must confess I’d have loved one when I was a lad. Read and view more about Kaspa here and there’s also a video of the ‘glowing’ – erm….ghost.
Happy Halloween!!
Tags: Albania, alt fuel, auto racing, bio-cng, bunkers, CO2, co2 emissions, concrete bunkers, eco ghost, eco glow, eco hostels, emissions, fuel consumption, glow in the dark, green gardening, green gardening tips, halloween, kaspa, natural gas cars, natural gas racing car, phosphor, planet forward, Soviet eastern bloc, USSR, Volkswagen
