Connecticut Garden Journal

One way to get a gardening fix in the middle of winter is to grow mushrooms. Gourmet mushrooms are hard to find in the wild and often very expensive in grocery stores. An easy way to have gourmet mushrooms is to grow them indoors with mushroom kits purchased online. Growers have expanded the varieties available. There are now oyster mushrooms, lion's mane, wine cap and shiitake mushrooms you can grow in the comfort of your home while the winter rages outdoors.

Probably the easiest mushroom kits to try indoors are the lion's mane and oyster mushrooms. Kits feature blue, pink, or golden varieties of oyster mushrooms. Once you’ve received the mushroom box with inoculated spawn inside, place it in a humid, cool room and mist the medium in the plastic bag to keep it moist, but not wet. Within a few weeks, mushrooms magically appear. Harvest when they're fully formed. If you keep the kit moist you should get another flush of growth within 2 months.

Shiitake mushrooms grow a little differently. Make slits in the clear plastic bag holding the medium and mist inside the bag to keep it moist, but not wet. Place it in a warm room with indirect light. After a few weeks the shiitake mushrooms will start forming. Harvest when the cap is domed by gently twisting and pulling the mushrooms. After the first harvest, soak the medium in water overnight. Let it dry out for another night, then place it back in the plastic bag to rest for 2 weeks. It should start sprouting mushrooms for a second round, soon after that.

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One of my favorite winter activities is perusing print catalogs and websites for new varieties to try this coming year. I have my favorites, but I'm always on the lookout for something new. So, after looking at a few of my favorite companies I have my 2024 list of new vegetables to grow. Here we go!

From Johnny's Seeds in Maine comes two new tomato varieties. 'Harvest Moon' is a hybrid, beefsteak-type with yellow skin and flesh and a stunning bright red interior. It grows on a compact indeterminate plant so doesn't grow too large. 'Magic Bullet' is an open pollinated, grape-shaped, snacking tomato with colorful green, yellow, pink and indigo fruits!

High Mowing in Vermont features 'Honeynut' butternut squash. This open pollinated variety produces 1 pound, sweet tasting fruits that are perfect for individual servings. The plant is also powdery mildew resistant. They also have 'Turkish Delight' hybrid eggplant. It has jet black skin on an elongated shape that sets fruits without pollination.

From California comes Renee's Garden's 'Bronze Torch' grape tomato. The red fruits have golden streaks and are 2- to-3 inches long, tasty, and last long after harvest. Here's a turnip that you might like. 'Pastel Duo' baby turnips are white and pink turnips that don't need peeling. Harvest when they're walnut size for a mild flavor and use in salads or sautées.

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Happy New Year. January is time to go through all my old seeds, see what I need to replace and try some new varieties. This year let's keep our seed purchases local. There are vegetable and flower seed houses based in Connecticut offering a nice variety of seed to purchase.

NE Seed in East Hartford has been around since 1987, but the family goes back many generations. They offer a wide variety of veggie seeds, including a nice selection of heirloom and hybrid tomatoes, and organic seed. They're geared towards larger sized growers and sell seed on line by the half ounce.

John Scheepers Kitchen Garden Seeds in Bantam also offers a wide variety of veggies and flowers and are more geared to the small scale, home gardener. I particularly like their salad greens with many unusual selections such as dandelion greens and mache. They sell seed packets on-line.

Chas Hart Seed has been selling seed wholesale since 1892 in Wethersfield. You mostly see their seeds on seed racks around the state. But they also offer seeds on-line in their catalog and sell seed by the quarter ounce. If you're looking for lots of classic varieties, this company is the place to go.

Finally, Select Seeds in Union, Connecticut is all about flowers. They offer annual and perennial organic seeds and themed seed collections such as for pollinators, edible gardens, fragrance and containers. They sell seed in packets online and in stores.

Although not all the seed offered in these catalogs is grown and sourced in New England, but purchasing seed from these companies supports the local economy.

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After the holidays, many gardeners wonder what to do with the holiday plants they purchased or received. Many of those plants can have a second life indoors and outdoors. Let's go through the list.

Poinsettias aren't hardy outdoors during our winters, but they do hold their bract colors throughout spring. The best use for poinsettias is as a houseplant this winter to add a little color indoors and then pair them with spring annual flowers, such as violas, pansies; and perennials, such as heuchera and bleeding heart, outdoors in the garden. As long as it doesn't frost, you can create a colorful spring scape using your poinsettias. Once summer comes and they start growing new green leaves, it's time to compost them. Check out Connecticut Gardener Magazine for more ideas on using poinsettias.

For holiday cactus, find a bright, cool, room indoors for them to grow. In spring, hang holiday cactus plants in small trees, such as crabapples, as they would grow in Nature to give them a taste of the humidity and light.

Amaryllis are perennial bulbs and are easy to bring back again for a repeat bloom next year. Remove the flower stalks, once spent, and leave the leaves growing your amaryllis in a sunny window. In early summer move the potted amaryllis outdoors to a part shade location with other low growing perennials. The green leaves provide a perfect backdrop to more colorful annuals and perennials. Come fall, move it into a dark, cool room, stop watering, remove the leaves and let it stay dormant for a few months before it starts growing again.

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With the holidays upon us, many gardeners have free time from their jobs and gardening outdoors. It's a good time of year to see how ecologically oriented your yard is.

Ecological or regenerative gardening focuses on the whole yard, including the soil, to create a habitat that's good for birds, wildlife and humans. The first step is to realize there's life happening in your garden even in the dead of winter. Winter birds, chipmunks and mice are searching for seeds to eat. Insects are settled into their winter homes in leaf layers and in erect, pithy, plant stems. As long as the soil is thawed, microbes are breaking down organic matter creating food.

With this in mind, there are some simple things to do to encourage all this activity. Leave leaves in the yard and garden for creatures to overwinter and to protect plant roots. Any amount of leaves over a 1-foot-thick layer should be removed and composted into leaf mold. Plant native flowers, trees and shrubs that produce an abundance of seeds, berries and fruits for wildlife. (It’s easy to research native plant nurseries). Make sure there are places to nest, overwinter and hide such as brush piles and dense evergreen shrubs and trees. Consider creating a water feature. This will help animals in winter as long as it stays thawed and create habitat for salamanders, frogs and other water lovers adding diversity to your yard.

An ecologically oriented landscape may not look as neat and tidy as we're used to, but it's good to garden in tune with Nature.

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Many gardeners have already selected and decorated their holiday tree for the season. But if you're still planning on getting a tree, consider this alternative; a living holiday tree.

Living holiday trees are ones you'll plant in your yard once the holidays are over. It's a great tradition where you can grow a forest of holiday trees over time. Garden centers offer lots of options for a containerized, living holiday tree in pots, including smaller sized trees for tabletops. Here are some options.

Blue spruce has bright blue, sharp needles on stiff branches that are great for hanging ornaments. If the needles are too sharp for you, try the softer, but green needled, Serbian and Norway spruce trees. Dwarf Alberta spruce has beautiful green needles, but they're tightly pruned. They're fine for wrapping lights and tinsel on the tree but harder to hang ornaments. For fragrance nothing beats a balsam fir tree. You can even find juniper shrubs and white pine trees in small sizes for your home.

Once you have your tree, leave it outdoors. One week before bringing it in, move the tree to a protected, unheated shed or garage. Once you bring it inside, place it in a bucket to catch water, and place it in a bright, cool room for only one week. If you leave it indoors too long, the tree might break dormancy.

After the holidays, plant it outdoors in a full sun location where it will have room to grow for years. Keep it watered and protected from drying winds this winter with anti-desiccant sprays or wraps of burlap.

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The USDA plant hardiness zone map splits the country into 11 zones, with a and b half zones, based on average winter minimum temperatures over the past 30 years. Although not the last word on plant hardiness and survival, the map has been a touchstone for gardeners to compare plants and determine which are best for their area.

The USDA Hardiness zone map was last updated in 2012 and now they have a new 2023 version. As you might expect with global warming, the hardiness zones have shifted. In 2012 there was a significant area of Northwest Connecticut in zone 5 (winter minimum temperatures between minus 10 and 20). That area is gone. Most of Connecticut is firmly established in hardiness zone 6 (winter minimums of zero to minus 10) with a large area along the Long Island Sound in hardiness zone 7. In general across the country, there has been a one half zone shift towards warmer winters.

While the winter minimum temperatures might be warming, that doesn't mean we won't get winter cold snaps that will plunge the temperatures well below those minimums. The zones are based on averages, not isolated events. Plants can be killed if the temperatures in winter dip too low for a period of time, regardless of what the map says.

So, the recommendation is to grow plants well established in our hardiness zone and, if you're testing marginally hardy plants based on the map, plant them in micro climate areas such as near the house, garage, or the shelter of other trees and shrubs where they are protected from the cold.

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I was poking around my basement the other day and found my amaryllis bulbs. I stored them down there a few months ago to go dormant. Now it's time to move them into a sunny, cool room.

Amaryllis bulbs are native to the southern hemisphere. They normally bloom in spring and early summer in those climes, which means winter here. While the classic amaryllis has either a large sized, red or white flower, there are many variations in nature and for us to grow.

'Beautiful Emotion' is a salmon colored dwarf variety. 'Bright Nymph' is a red and white, double flowered selection and I recently purchased 'Sumatra' for its spider-like, red flowers.

Whatever variety you choose, bring them home and pot them in a container one size larger than the bulb. Amaryllis like to be root bound. Grow them in a sunny window in a warm room. Rotate the pot periodically so the flower stalk doesn't lean. Use wooden chop sticks to keep tall varieties from flopping over. For bulbs already potted up, place the plastic container in a larger decorative container. Just make sure the drainage holes are open. Keep the soil moist, but let it dry out a bit between waterings.

The bigger the amaryllis bulb, the more flower stalks and flowers you'll get. It's not unusual to have 3 flower stalks with 4 to 6 flowers on each stalk. Cut back the stalks once they finish flowering and grow the plant indoors until spring when it can be moved outdoors. Water and fertilize regularly remembering to give the bulb a rest next fall to stimulate flowering.

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I hope everyone is having a good Thanksgiving break. This time of year it's nice to do some indoor craft and gardening projects. One of my favorites is decorating with indoor succulents.

Succulent plants have become very popular for their low maintenance and interesting shaped and colored leaves. They don't require much water, especially in winter, but do need a brightly lit room to grow well and not get leggy.

There are many ways to decorate with succulents. You can pot up a single, dramatic succulent such as an aloe vera or jade plant as a centerpiece for the holidays.

Another method is to purchase many small succulents in 1 or 2 inch diameter pots and group them together in a shallow decorative container. The advantage of these small plants is they're easy to work with, less expensive and fun to mix and match for their colors and shapes. Use an 8 or 10 inch diameter container and plant small versions of different types of cactus, echeverias, milk trees, sedums and hens and chicks. You can even plant some cascading succulents such as string of pearls for the edge. Some gardeners love containers with all the same types of succulent, while others like to mix and match different colored and shaped plants.

Plant in cactus mix potting soil in a container with a drainage hole. Water well at first, then let the pot dry out completely between waterings. Decorate the planting with rocks, pebbles and even moss. Pack the plants together. Even though they will eventually need replanting as they grow, these indoor succulent containers will look great for the holidays.

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After the cold weather that ended our growing season, it's predictably warmed up again. This temperature fluctuation is our new norm, so we should be ready to act when we have a window of opportunity. That's why I'm building some new, raised beds this week.

Raised bed gardening is a great way to maximize your veggie and flower yields, contain gardens in a small space and define the garden so kids and pets don't run through it. While you can use lots of different materials to make raised beds including, stone, brick, cinder block, metal and composite wood, I like using rough cut spruce or hemlock. They hold up for a good 10 years in my garden and are much cheaper than cedar.

Build the beds at least 10 inches tall and no more than 4 feet wide. You'll avoid walking on the soil and compressing it and have a high enough bed to get good soil water drainage and plant growth. I like using metal, raised bed, corners. These corners come with 1 or 2 inch diameter slots and at different heights. Simply cut the wood to length, slide the boards into the slots and screw them tight. When the wood eventually rots, just replace individual boards without having to redo the whole bed. I also line the bottom with ¼ inch mesh hardware cloth to prevent mice and voles from tunneling into the bed.

Build the beds now but don't fill them with soil yet. That's better done in spring. And don't just think of veggies when planting. I've seen some beautiful perennial and annual flower raised beds, too.

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