This week in your Massachusetts garden & landscape
Week of September 2, 2019
When baking bread, add rosemary to bread dough using 1 tablespoon for each loaf.
- If your harvest of green beans is abundant, here’s a recipe to try. In a large pan, cook 1 thinly sliced onion and ¾ cup diced bacon in 1 teaspoon butter until the bacon is crisp. Add ½ cup sugar, ½ cup vinegar, a dash of pepper and 1 ½ pounds of green beans. Cover and cook until just tender, about 5 minutes. Enjoy!
- Bearberry, a low-growing species of manzanita (Arctostaphylos spp.) is an excellent pollinator plant and a great groundcover. Attracting hummingbirds, bumble bees, honey bees, mason bees and other common bee species, bearberry blooms in the spring and thrives in full sun. It is hardy in zones 2-6.
- For a fall crop of raspberries that are hardy in zones 4-8, choose ‘Anne’, ‘Jaclyn’ or ‘Heritage’. They are all disease resistant as well.
- Cardinal flower (Lobelia cardinalis) is a wetland plant for moist-to-wet locations. It will grow in full sun to part shade; and when planted in masses, it makes an amazing show of beautiful red flowers in the summer. Growing up to 3’ tall, cardinal flower is hardy in zones 2-8.
- For a delicious curry mayonnaise, mix 1 ¼ cups of mayonnaise with 2 tablespoons curry powder and 1 tablespoon each of minced parsley, chives and green onions. Enjoy!
- For clematis with the most beautiful blue flowers, choose ‘Arabella’, Emilia Plater’, ‘General Sikorski’ or ‘Prince Charles’.
- Harvest carrots using a garden spade rather than by hand. Pulling them by hand often leaves you with a handful of leaves and no carrots. Place the spade approximately 4” away from the plants and push into the ground. You will be able to easily wedge the carrots out.
- After harvesting, allow garlic heads to dry in an airy place out of direct sunlight. The garlic will keep much better if the heads are left to dry for approximately 3-4 weeks after harvesting.
- Pinch off blossoms of watermelon and cantaloupe now. There is not enough time for them to ripen into mature fruit before the first fall frost. Removing these blossoms will speed up the ripening of the present melons.
