Gardening Tips by Bob Beyfuss

Mid-summer gardening
August marks the middle of our gardening season as well as mid-summer and this year I feel like we have already experienced a legitimate summer! July was one of the warmest on record in our region and most vegetable gardens are at peak production. This is actually a good time to plant some seeds for fall season harvests of lettuce, spinach, beets, radishes and assorted other salad greens.

Thirty-Four Species of Birds
I know this is supposed to be a gardening column but I seem to get more e-mail responses to my columns about birds than my usual “tips.” Actually my tips are often reminders of chores I tell you to do but often fail to do myself! This week I will revisit our feathered friends.

I just returned from my annual driving trip to Florida and I am happy to see that all the snow has finally melted around my property. When I left in late March there was still more than a foot of the white stuff in my woods. Ironically, temperatures in Albany were actually warmer than Florida for almost a week.

Sequence of Bloom

It is nice to be able to produce wonderful compost in your own backyard at little to no cost. Fall is the ideal time to create a compost pile but keep in mind that the compost may not be ready to use until next fall. Those of you who started a compost pile last fall may be applying it to your garden beds right now. Here is how you can get started this week!