Joan Swenson
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Zest up your garden with some basil
I am crazy about basil. Some years I have five or more varieties growing in the yard because it is a perfect summer herb.
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Growing new sweet peas is easier than you'd think
Caroline O. Reid, who claims not to have a green thumb, seems to have the perfect way of dealing with the sweet pea question: Should one replant sweet peas every year or let them go to seed and buy new seeds to plant in the fall?
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Joan Swenson: Growing Garden Fest, cactus speaker, tiny gardens ideas flourish
The first Garden Fest at Bakersfield College four years ago had just seven exhibitors and 100 people who checked out the demonstrations and gardening booths.
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Joan Swenson: Best you can do with nutgrass is manage it
Hugh Smith wrote to ask what to do about nutgrass, the wickedest weed in a Bakersfield yard.
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Joan Swenson: Get the tomato beds ready, but planting? That can wait
My husband is an attorney during the week. Come the weekend, he’s a citrus and tomato grower — his backyard specialties.
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Joan Swenson: You have two options with aphids — you can kill or just chill
I was prowling around my roses last weekend, enjoying the first tiny buds beginning to unfurl on my north-facing pink Simplicity roses in the front yard and checking on the progress of a couple of transplanted rose bushes in the backyard.
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Aphids: To kill or chill, it's up to you
I was prowling around my roses last weekend, enjoying the first tiny buds beginning to unfurl on my north-facing pink Simplicity roses in the front yard and checking on the progress of a couple of transplanted rose bushes in the backyard.
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Joan Swenson: With snails, it's kill or be killed — at least for your garden
Trimming my winter-browned beach spider lily leaves a couple of weekends ago, I was also picking and chucking snails.
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Joan Swenson: A little work in the garden can save at the store
In tough times, people grow their own vegetables.
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Joan Swenson: Camellia show blooms to life
A Bakersfield springtime tradition, the Kern County Camellia Society’s annual show, is this weekend at East Hills Mall.
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Joan Swenson: Strawberries love Bakersfield, so plant now
On a whim a couple of weekends ago, I bought 50 bare root strawberry plants. Fifty bare root strawberry plants come in two overstuffed little bags. When you bring home 50 strawberry plants, the challenge is where to put them.
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Joan Swenson: Showers bring smiles to flowers
I was sure that February weather would remain balmy — until true January weather arrived again and it was time for pouring rain on the valley floor and snow in the hills.
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Joan Swenson: Pre-emergent deadline here, and it's never too early (or late) for tomatoes
Sunday is your deadline to put down pre-emergent herbicide and get good results preventing the growth of spotted spurge and crabgrass, the weeds that are the bane of the summer garden. Feb. 15 is the last day for expected frost in the Southern San Joaquin Valley and the soil temperatures start climbing, if they already haven’t, thanks to some 80-plus degree days this month. Once the soil temperatures start rising, tiny crabgrass and spurge seedlings will begin their rapid growth.
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Joan Swenson: Roses are easy, but have to pick the right ones
I see the bare root roses at the nurseries in the winter and I tell myself, no, no, no. No room for more roses — I have plenty.
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Joan Swenson: Pre-emergent herbicide a magic elixir for gardeners
I pulled out my hand-cranked dry chemical applicator last weekend and did a rapid run around the back lawn and the side yard where we have fruit trees. In less than 30 minutes, I’d taken care of preventing a lot of irritating crabgrass and spotted spurge plants that were moments away from sprouting.
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Joan Swenson: Healthiest food in the world as far as your garden
Did you catch the recent health item about the 11 best foods you should be eating?
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Joan Swenson: Readers share success stories on tomatoes, poinsettias and trees
From the mail bag …
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Joan Swenson: So many fruit tree choices to fill open space
Sadly, just before New Year’s, we finally removed our old green Pluot that had succumbed to borer damage. Whole limbs were dead and the poor tree wept huge amounts of sap for the past couple of years. The fruit was of poor quality this year, so my husband at last stopped watering the tree and agreed that it should go.
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Joan Swenson: Roses respond to tough love, so get to pruning and lopping
It’s roses time — time to prune the roses you have in your yard and time to plant new bare root roses, too. Pruning will rejuvenate your roses and get them ready for peak spring bloom season, which is just around the corner in Bakersfield.
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Joan Swenson: Late start for sweet peas no big deal, and please toss those poinsettias
Even though I planted my sweet peas terribly late this fall — at the very end of October — they came up and are doing well, thanks to warm, sunny weeks in November. The recent rains have benefited the seedlings, too. My plants aren’t quite ready for their trellises, but if you planted promptly in September, your plants are probably eager for something to lean upon.
