Author: Kerry Peetz
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Year-round gardening: A spring checklist for Colorado gardeners
April is just about here and with it comes Easter (April 20), Earth Day (April 22), Colorado Arbor Day (April 26) and National Parks Week (April 19-27). Every gardener is itching to get outside and dig in the soil. Sometimes we forget that gardening can be tricky in April living in the foothills of Pikes…
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Year-round gardening: It’s time to start working in the garden
“In March winter is holding back and spring is pulling forward. Something holds and something pulls inside of us too.” – Jean Hersey, American author What a deliciously cold winter we’ve had. Hopefully, March will bring us an equally delightful spring that provides rain, sunshine and perennials that have survived the winter temperatures. Here are…
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Year-Round Gardening: Work to be done as gardens come back to life
Typically, March is our snowiest month. But if you’ve lived here for awhile you will have heard our ever-popular cliche, “If you don’t like the weather now, stick around for an hour, it will change.” Local meteorologists do a pretty great job of predicting our weather about 97% of the time, that “3% curve ball…
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Year-round gardening: Indoor plants still benefit from outdoor conditions
For gardeners, this is a melancholy time. We miss the splash of color from flowers, the scent of fresh soil and the magic of slicing garden-grown vegetables. Alas, another growing season has passed. Let’s turn to houseplants. For hundreds of years, we have been brightening up our homes and offices by adding plants. Even though…
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Year-round gardening: Steps to prep your Colorado garden for a new year
Much of what Colorado gardeners do from now through February is getting the garden ready for next year. Here are some things to consider. Cleanup • Discard fallen, spoiled or mummified fruits to reduce insect and disease carryover. • Prune and remove dead, diseased or damaged branches from shrubs and trees. Winter is an excellent…
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Year-round gardening: October checklist for Colorado gardeners
“October, baptize me with leaves! Swaddle me in corduroy and nurse me with split pea soup. October, tuck tiny candy bars in my pockets and carve my smile into a thousand pumpkins. O autumn! O teakettle! O grace!” — author Rainbow Rowell By now, we have all experienced cool, crisp night air. Gardens are wowing…
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Year-round gardening: A September checklist for Colorado gardeners
“By all these lovely tokens, September days are here. With summer’s best of weather and autumn’s best of cheer.” — Helen Hunt Jackson In 1875, Helen Hunt married William Jackson of Colorado Springs and made Colorado her home. Surely, they had our shared experiences of September days being noticeably shorter, with cooler nights and pleasant…
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Year-round gardening: August to-do list for Colorado gardeners
As gardeners, we are entering a slower, more easygoing phase. There’s always something to do in the garden, but we don’t need to keep up the frenetic pace of planting-mulching-weeding that April and May demand. June’s blooms may have faded, but with proper pruning some may reappear in August. July’s heat is over, but there’s…
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Year-round gardening: Midsummer checklist for Colorado gardeners
”Everything good, everything magical happens between the months of June and August.” — Jenny Han July is usually Colorado’s hottest month. Many gardening activities will become maintaining, weeding, even harvesting. • Gardeners can still direct seed zinnias in early July. They prefer the ground warm before emerging. They are wonderful annuals with fresh blooms that…
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Year-round gardening: Tips for top tomatoes
“You say to-may-tow, I say to-maw-tow, you say po-tay-tow, I say po-taw-tow.” Aah, you can close your eyes and join Luis Armstrong and Ella Fitzgerald finishing the lyrics to that catchy Ira Gershwin tune. Tomato, however you pronounce it, is the No. 1 plant grown in North American gardens. Ask any gardener, and they will…