Garden Betty
For people who want to grow more food with less work. š± This is my weekly newsletter loved by 38,000+ subscribersāhere's what one of them had to say: "These are not the regular run-of-the-mill garden-based emails. You actually touch on more unusual tidbits that encourage me to keep growing and learning."
a simple way to defeat squash vine borers
Squash vine borers are probably one of the most disgusting pests you'll come across in a garden. It's not that the grubs themselves are grossābut the damage they do is surrounded by piles of moist orange frass inside and outside of the hollow stems they consume. Yes, all that orange stuff is poop (Frass, in case you've never heard this term, is a funny way to say insect poop.) Besides being unpleasant to come across, squash vine borers are highly destructive pests and can cause entire plants...
seeing lots of squash flowers but no squash? here's why
I saw this meme the other day and thought it was pretty accurate. š¤£ Monster-sized squash (in particular, zucchini) is usually the running joke all summer because they seem to double in size overnight before you realize they're there, hidden in the leaves. (Those sneaky things!) And the plants can be very prolificājust two plants can feed a family for months, especially if you harvest squash leaves and squash blossoms to eat, too. (Oh, you didn't know you could eat squash leaves? Then you need...
what to plant now for an epic fall harvest
This week I just sowed another round of seeds in my garden (arugula, fava beans, bush beans, and carrots) and tomorrow I'll be starting a few winter-hardy varieties of lettuce, spinach, and kale in my garage to transplant outside in a few weeks. When my garlic crop is harvested in another week or so, I'll sow watermelon radish and black Spanish radish in its place. (These two are winter radish types, so they take a little longer to mature and are meant to be harvested in fall.) This is all...
the key to helping your garden survive a heat wave āļø
One of the most repeated myths I've been hearing these last couple weeks is that watering in the middle of the day is bad for your plants, because water drops magnify the sun and cause sunburn on your leaves. No, they do not. (And this has been proven false by science.) Leaves get sunburn from simple overexposure to the sun, just like humans do. There are other reasons you shouldn't water during peak daylight hours, but leaf scorch isn't one of them. When temperatures start to climb, plants...
how to keep your plants from bolting too early
This time of year, when the days are long and warm, many gardeners start to feel some frustration. Because while it's generally a good period for warm-weather crops like tomatoes and squash, it also means the end of cool-weather crops like kale and cilantro. ... Or does it? I typically have entire beds full of bolted (flowering) vegetable crops right about now, but I also have beds where my kale, lettuce, bok choy, and other leafy greens are thriving (often straight through the middle of...
if you hate earwigs as much as I do, here's how to deal with them
Of all the garden pests you're likely to encounter outside, the one that probably elicits the most disgusted reactions is the one that's the least harmful to humans, even though it looks like it'll tunnel into your brain. You know what I'm talking about: earwigs. No, these guys don't crawl into your ears at night. Small but mighty-looking, earwigs have a pair of formidable pincers at the end of their abdomens that look like they can do some damage. And they canāto other pests like aphids and...
my new book is HERE! šŗšø
Just released!!! š About two years ago, my longtime book editor asked if I would write a book about Route 66, America's most recognizable roadway, to honor the Route 66 Centennial in 2026. šŗšø It would be very different from all my other cookbooks and on the surface, it didn't seem doable: I knew little about Route 66, none of the recipes would be my own, and was it all going to be diners, drive-ins, and dives? You could only have so many recipes for burgers and pies, after all. But the more I...
For people who want to grow more food with less work. š± This is my weekly newsletter loved by 38,000+ subscribersāhere's what one of them had to say: "These are not the regular run-of-the-mill garden-based emails. You actually touch on more unusual tidbits that encourage me to keep growing and learning."