Rose Gardening Tasks Early Spring

Rose - Photo: Pexels

When should you start preparing your rose garden for the onset of spring and summer?  Well, if you live in an area where you can start seeing the promise of spring in late March or early April, then you're an "early spring" rose, gardener. However, if you live where March and April still bring icy rain and snow, then just keep waiting out old man winter until your turn at spring arrives and then follow the tips in this article.

Early spring is a time of great activity in the rose garden as you prepare for the beautiful buds that will be sprouting almost any day. Here's a summary of what needs to be done in order to prepare your roses for the tough growing season that lies ahead.

If you covered your roses with dirt or mulch, your first step is to gently remove the protective materials so you can introduce your dormant bushes to the warming spring sun and rains that lie ahead.

Before beginning your spring pruning activities, cut back any dead and damaged canes that did not survive the winter. Be sure to clear away any debris and residue from around the bushes as well.

Prepare the soil to nurture your plants by adding some organic compounds. You can either buy pre-packaged organics from your favorite garden supplier, or you can mix up your own recipe using composted manure or mushroom compost, or any of the usual meal blends which can include alfalfa, cottonseed, fish or blood meal.  See below for some suggestions.

Work your soil with a spade or hoe if it has become too compacted during the winter or if you notice standing water after watering your plants. Roses require well-drained soil to thrive.

After soil preparation is done you can plant any new additions to your garden including container-grown roses.

Next, it is time to begin your fungicide spraying regiment either immediately or, if you prefer to wait, approximately 14 days after you complete your pruning.  Opinions on the best time differ. The choice is yours.

Remember to rotate through different fungicides during the year to prevent any fungi from becoming immune to any one product.

Don't use any pesticides unless you see evidence of damage, but remember to keep a sharp eye out for aphids which are as much a sign of spring as April showers are. Hit them with a blast of water to remove them, or apply insecticide in a mister to the affected areas.

Imagine how hungry you'd be if you just woke up from a long winter hibernation! Well, your Roses are hungry too. The best way to coax them from dormancy to budding is to feed them now and every other week through the remainder of the growing season. Water well after feeding!  Feed with a fertilizer balanced for Nitrogen (N), Phosphates (P2O5) and Potash (K2O). Nitrogen stimulates the growth of leaves and canes and increases the size of the bush. Phosphate stimulates the growth of roots, canes, and stems and speeds up flowering. Potash stimulates the production of top quality blooms and improves the drought and disease resistance of the plant. A well-balanced fertilizer with these elements is 10-10-10. 

Another popular spring fertilizer is Osmocote which is a controlled release fertilizer that releases nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium depending on soil temperature. The 18-6-12 (8 to 9-month term) formulation is recommended for this area. Osmocote is also available with trace elements added in a product with the name of Sierra 17-6-10 Plus Minors Controlled Release Fertilizer

There! Your rose garden is ready for spring, but remember your work is far from over. If spring is near then summer can't be far behind. Read our summer article at http://www.RoseGarden-How-To.com to learn how to prepare your roses for the coming summer heat.

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What Are Some Quick and Simple COOKING RECIPES?

Saffron Chicken  (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

When you’re strapped for time on any given day, making meals for the family that is easy to complete yet quick to prepare can really make all the difference. If you’re not the best cook or you’re new to prepping meals, it might come as a bit of a challenge. Below, are a few resources you can look to when trying to find something suitable for your family. 

Breakfast

Breakfast is a pretty simple meal time to start with. You can make something as simple as a cheese omelet and toast or something a bit more complex such as a breakfast burrito. Breakfast meals as long as they’re not too intricate can be very easy and quick to prepare. If you’re looking for great breakfast recipes you can easily find them online. One of the best locations to check for the easiest recipes is realsimple.com. They have breakfast recipes that you can check out and even allow the kids to get in the kitchen and help out. You’ll enjoy the ease of the instructions and the quality memories you will share with your little ones. 

Lunch

Unless you like cold cuts on the daily basis learning a few simple lunch recipes can really make a big difference. Again, lunch is fairly easy to prepare and there are tons of recipes out there. You can do something as basic as adding grilled chicken to a salad or a bit more complex such as a grilled chicken Panini. Whatever your pleasures are for lunch you can find a great deal of them by checking out spoonful.com which has great lunch recipes for those looking to try something new. 

Dinner

In most cases the most time consuming and complex recipes are for dinner. Finding ways to cut corners while still getting all the health benefits you need can sometimes seem impossible. Dinner requires a lot more prep, ingredients, and skill than typical breakfast or lunch might. However, there are great solutions to cutting down on dinner such as making great crockpot dishes. They can be slowly cooking all day so that you don’t have to lift a finger when you get home that night. You can find some great simple yet quick recipes for your crock pot by checking out cookinglight.com as they have over 100 different crock pot recipes for you to try out. 

Parties/Special Occasions

There are those times when cooking for a larger crowd can weigh you down. Hosting parties or for those special occasions, you don’t just want to cook what you would prepare on any given day. For those looking for quick and simple recipes to entertain their guests, they can find a lot of recipes by checking out delish.com and find great appetizer recipes that will keep your guests happy. 

Cooking does not have to be this long drawn out process if you don’t want it to. While there are times when making everything from scratch and allowing it consume a better part of your day is really soothing, chances are you just don’t have the time to do that on the daily basis. So hopefully these simple recipes for breakfast, lunch, and dinner will help out. 

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Pruning Your Trees

Weeping willow after pruning A photo in August 2006  (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

If you have just entered the tree growing world, you have no doubt heard the term “pruning” tossed around by the more veteran growers. Well, I have something to admit. For several years, I did not even know what pruning was. I heard the term a lot, but I never felt comfortable asking someone what exactly it was. Even though it would have benefited my gardening and tree growing, I was too prideful to ask. I’ve found that pride is the reason for the failure of many great endeavors; if I had just asked someone what pruning was, I wouldn’t have undergone a few of the disasters that occurred during my first years of gardening.

Pruning is the removal of dead or unneeded branches to encourage the growth of flowers. Usually, a tree will end up devoting energy to branches that don’t need it, while neglecting branches which are bearing more fruit. If you remove the branches that are taking all the nutrients, you will begin to see a flourish in the other ones. Pruning also keeps the tree in shape by keeping the branches even. This prevents it from becoming weighed down on one side. Having too many branches on one side could cause the tree to become permanently crooked.

Many gardeners don’t even think about pruning their trees until they start to bear fruit. This is a big mistake, and you should never neglect to care for a tree just because it hasn’t yet begun to produce. During the entire process of growth, you should prune the tree in a way that it is even and uniform. Then, when it does start to produce fruit, the results will be significantly greater. It is very easy to tell the difference between a tree that has been pruned regularly during its growth, and one that has been neglected. Generally, the shape of the tree is much more natural looking if it has been pruned.

The first thing to look for when you start pruning is any branches which are dead or diseased. These are quite easy to recognize. Usually, they don’t bear any fruit and might be misshapen or discolored. Don’t hesitate at all in chopping these guys off, as they are nothing but detrimental to the health of your tree. Sometimes a branch can be dead or diseased without making it too obvious. If this is the case, simply wait until the tree is flowering and it will become obvious by not growing anything.

The second type of branch to look for is the branch that is too close in range to all the other ones. If it grows at such a length and angle that the end is right next to all the other branches, they might end up crowding each other out. Take off the smaller of the two branches to allow the larger one to have the breathing room that it needs. This same rule applies to the weight balance of your tree. Sometimes, for reasons we will never understand, a tree will grow several branches on one side and weigh itself into being lopsided.

So hopefully I have provided you with a basic knowledge of pruning. There are more situations and types of branches that require pruning, but what I’ve outlined is the very basic parts. These can alter depending on how old your tree is. For example, for the first 3 years of a tree’s growth, it requires pruning that follows more “formative” guidelines. After the tree is well established, you will need to use “regulatory” pruning to keep it where you would like it to be. There are entire books written on how to prune trees depending on how old they are. There are far too many techniques for me to go over, so if you want to use these advanced techniques then you should go to your local library and check out a book.

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Make Homemade Pizza

Homemade Pizza - Photo: Wikimedia

Making pizza from scratch, at home, isn't really as hard as you might think---and once you learn just a few secrets about how to make a great pizza crust, you might never want to "order in" again!

First, there is the matter of a recipe for pizza dough. Most of them call for very similar ingredients, basically water, yeast, oil, and flour. Some have a little more oil, some use less oil and add an egg. Whichever recipe you use, making the pizza dough goes fairly quickly and doesn't need to rise for hours like bread dough.

Here's a tip: If you aren't familiar with working with recipes that call for yeast, you might not know that yeast has to "proof"---that is, activate. You do this by combining it with water (about 110*), and usually a little bit of sugar (1 teaspoon or less). After you combine the yeast, warm water, and sugar, you need to let this mixture "rest" for about 5 minutes. This allows the yeast to activate or "proof."

Don't just assume that you can run hot water from your tap and it will be "warm" enough, without being "too hot." A small cooking thermometer is handy to have. It might be easier to heat up water to 110* rather than run hot water and then try to cool it down (especially if your water heater is set at 120* or above). I put room temperature water in a Pyrex measuring cup and heat the water in the microwave. After a while, you'll know exactly what setting and how long it takes to heat up the water.

After the yeast has proofed, stir in the other ingredients, following the recipe. You'll probably have to knead the dough a bit to mix all of the flour in so that you have a smooth and dry mound of pizza dough. Be very careful about kneading the pizza dough---it is easy to knead in too much flour. As long as the dough isn't actually sticking to your fingers, it is OK.

Once the dough is ready, let it "rest" for about 5 minutes. That's right, just let it lay there. This gets the rising process started.

Hand form, or use a rolling pin to roll out the dough to the desired size.

After experimenting with the different types of pizza pans and stones that are available, I have concluded that the one-ply pans with holes in them are the best. This helps to bake a crust that is nicely done on the bottom without being burnt, and yet leaves the dough nice a "chewy" in the middle. Depending on your preference for pizza dough, you can experiment by first baking pizza on regular cookie sheets. After that, you can get inexpensive pizza pans at dollar stores or discount stores like Wal-Mart to continue to experiment until you find the pan you prefer.

Now you are ready to bake the pizza. Here's a tip: pre-bake just the pizza crust for about 6 minutes before you load on the sauce and toppings. This helps to cook the crust enough so that the sauce won't sink in too much, leaving a gooey crust.

After you've pre-baked the crust, remove it from the oven and load it with sauce and meat toppings (be sure that anything other than pepperoni is pre-cooked, such as sausage or ground beef). If you like onions and peppers, then here's another tip: pre-cook them so that the onions are almost transparent and the pepper is limp. Load on the onions and peppers. Sprinkle with oregano or any other spices that you desire.

Return to the oven and bake for about 13-15 minutes. This is long enough to heat the sauce and other toppings. 

Remove from the oven and add the cheese. (If you are like me and like Hawaiian pizza, add the pineapple now, too.) Return to the oven for about 3 minutes, or just long enough to melt the cheese without burning it.

Once the pizza is baked, I like to slide it onto a pizza stone that I've sprinkled with cornmeal. Then, I let the pizza cool for about 5 minutes. The cornmeal keeps the bottom of the crust from getting soggy, and sure adds a nice "zest" to the taste of it! Cut with a pizza cutter (or kitchen shears---which work great!).

Enjoy your favorite beverage!

Author: Jan Kovarik

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Secrets to Growing TOMATOES in Containers

Bush Tomatoes - Photo: Pixabay

Suffering from the limited gardening space? If you are into the hobby of home gardening and would like to grow tomatoes, then fear not! Because as long as you have sunlight, tomatoes can be grown anywhere. Growing tomatoes in containers is a practice not only constrained to people with limited gardening space. Plenty of home gardeners grow their vegetables in containers, even when there is free space in the backyard. There are many reasons for container gardening, but we grow tomatoes in containers mostly for convenience, control, and flexibility.

Growing tomatoes in containers are not too different from growing tomatoes in the outdoor soil. Like plants in the ground, it's best to raise young tomato plants carefully indoors until they're strong enough for transplant. Transplanting is similar for containers as for ground- bury as much of the plant stem as possible. Doing so will promote root formation along the portion of the stem that is buried, giving the plant excellent base foundations, a good thing regardless of where the tomato is grown.

With vegetables grown in containers, it's possible to control the exact state of your growing medium. Once you've found the secret recipe for all your prior garden success, you can reuse it over and over again for future success. You can choose to go completely soiless, or completely organic, or a mixture of some of both. Growing tomatoes in containers give this important benefit. The most basic recipe for a good container soil mixture to grow vegetables is 40% compost, 40% peat moss, and 20% perlite.

Although tomatoes grown in containers frees you from messing with garden dirt, container vegetables do require more maintenance in terms of watering and fertilizing.  Unlike traditional garden tomatoes, tomato plants in containers have limited root coverage, and their growth is limited by the amount of water and nutrients in the container. Container vegetable plants may need to be watered daily in the heat of the summer, and sometimes even twice a day to prevent the plants from wilting up. Of course, this depends on how big your growing container is (bigger is always better), and whether you mulch or not. Tomatoes are especially water thirsty plants, so the better you can satisfy their watering needs, the better results you will be rewarded with the come harvest.

Of course, you can mitigate all the disadvantages of container growing by simply installing automated drip irrigators for your containers. Though it sounds complicated, the setup is not expensive and actually quite easy to install. An automated drip irrigation system set up for a price range anywhere between $50-100, and you will save yourself a lot of hassles later. Depending on how many containers you have, this could be a worthy investment with great payoffs in the long run.

Applying mulching to containers may sound like an unnecessary chore associated with traditional gardening, but it's a great way to reduce water evaporation and keep weeds down (if you're using compost or garden soil). Pine bark mulch will work great, as will black plastic mulching. Mulching has the added benefit of keeping your tomato plants looking neat and organized.

When the first blossoms have set in on your plants, don't be afraid to use more fertilizers. Twice the amount of normal usage will work. Increasing fertilization during first blossom formation will kickstart fruit production and result in bigger yields. But whatever fertilization rate you use, try to keep it constant.

And don't forget to pick your tomato fruits as soon as they're ripe. It's not a good idea to leave tomatoes on the vines for too long, and for every tomato, you pick off, you'll encourage the production of a new fruit.

Growing tomatoes in containers is indeed a very flexible and productive gardening practice. Don't be afraid to get creative with your container gardens, as tomatoes are generally hardy plants.

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Kosher Food Popular With Health Conscious Of All Faiths

Kosher Food - Photo: Wikipedia

Until recently, it was close to impossible for the kosher or health conscious traveler to keep his religious or healthy meals while in transit. Now developments in the kosher food industry are making this challenge much easier. 

The health conscious and dieters are finding Kosher food is better for you and offers a very wide range of items and dishes, and this trend is spreading rapidly.

Keeping kosher means following dietary laws handed down through the centuries among the Jewish faithful. Kosher has its roots in the Old Testament. Kosher laws are generally more strict than U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) standards.

Religious inspectors also rule out sick or injured animals that would be normally be accepted in non-Kosher markets.

In our modern world where most animals are often treated roughly, keeping Kosher means eating a much healthier grade of meat.

Kosher tradition features a major group of foods known as Parve. Parve includes a huge variety of fruits, vegetables, and grains in their natural, unprocessed state. This is exactly what many people who are trying to eat a healthier, low-fat, high-fiber diet are looking for.

These days Kosher food is widely available and often can be ordered pre-packaged via the Internet or mail. This makes a perfect option for anyone who wants to try Kosher, eat Kosher occasionally, or needs a stash of good Kosher meals when traveling.

Options include a wide variety of vegetables and salads along with meat, chicken, and fish dinners. Also available are salt-free meals and veggie dinners for people with special dietary needs. You can choose from menu items with traditional Jewish names to items that might seem to come from your average neighborhood restaurant. The difference is that everything is prepared with very high Kosher standards for ingredients and preparation.

People everywhere are starting to view Kosher certification as a mark of a food's superior quality, cleanliness, and healthfulness.

Author: Miklos Margaretten

6 Steps for a Perfect Wok

Wok - Photo: Pixabay

A wok can last a lifetime with the proper care.  This includes occasionally seasoning it, as well as properly storing it.  Luckily, both are very easy to do and can be done in just a few minutes.  Follow this step-by-step guide that will teach you one of the steps of proper wok care - seasoning it.

It’s important that you do NOT follow these instructions for a wok with a non-stick coating.  

Following these instructions will damage the non-stick coating.

Seasoning a Wok

1. Rinse the wok in hot water and some heavy duty soap (e.g. kitchen cleaner or comet).
2. Place the wok on the stove over a high heat.
3. Heat the wok until the bottom of the wok becomes a dark bluish color (about twenty minutes).  Rotate the wok on its side and burn similarly until entire wok is dark bluish.
4. Cooldown wok until room temperature.
5. Fold a paper towel, and soak it with cooking oil (such as peanut or corn oil).
6. Spread the oil all over the inside of the wok.  Make sure to completely cover the interior of the wok with oil.  The wok will now be ready to use.

In the beginning, you will need to season the wok very frequently, after every use is best.  When the food begins to stick to the surface of the wok, it may be time to re-season your wok.  Eventually, a thin layer of oil will begin to permanently set into the wok.  After this happens, you will not really have to worry too much about seasoning it again.  From time to time the seasonings on the surface of the wok will be depleted, and it will be necessary to re-season the wok.

Both seasoning and storing your wok are important in keeping your wok in excellent shape.  If you happen to get a little rust on it, don’t worry about it too much.  Try to lightly brush it away, but, otherwise, just re-season the wok and continue using it.  Other than that, use your wok often to develop a tasty seasoning on it to enhance your flavors.

Author: Ala Luke

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