Illinois Ave Urban Farm

08/21/2024

Attention Spokane and Inland Northwest gardeners! The Friends of Manito will hold their Fall Plant Sale THIS SATURDAY, Aug. 24, from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. Their sales are always spectacular, esp. since they do a great job of offering plants that will grow well in our hardiness zone. The plants have been lovingly tended by their dedicated volunteers. There will be Spokane County Master Gardeners on hand to answer your gardening questions as well. If you're new to these plant sales, they're held at Manito Park (on Spokane's South Hill) just east of the Gaiser Conservatory. You can find more details at https://www.thefriendsofmanito.org/plant-sales. All proceeds will benefit Spokane's beloved Manito Park. Hope to see you there!

08/07/2024

When it’s late summer, and hot, garden planning often doesn’t appeal. Yet there’s fall vegetables and flowers to plant, and great local, organic, and caring seed companies from whom to order. Some of our faves include Johnny's Selected Seeds, Territorial Seed Company, Filaree Garlic Farm, and Snake River Seed Cooperative.

07/10/2024

Beneficial garden insects! Yay! Got to love Susan Mulvihill!

Want to see something really cool? This is a Snakefly and it is an amazing beneficial insect. Yeah, I know, it's kinda creepy but I want you to be able to recognize the good insects you might come across. Snakefly adults (pictured here) and their larvae eat aphids, insect eggs and mites. These insects belong to the Raphidioptera order. I should also mention they are related to lacewings. They range from 1/2" to 1" in length. They are only found in western North America so if that applies to you, I hope you get to see some in your garden. Remember to thank them for their hard work! This one is pictured on a currant leaf and that rumply surface is courtesy of the aphids that were running rampant before the beneficial insects were able to get back on track after our late cold snap this past winter.

08/19/2022

Food for thought...

Compost Queens

07/08/2022

04/06/2022

GROWING POTATOES THIS YEAR?

Over 4,000 varieties of native potatoes grow in the Andean highlands of Peru, Boliva, and Ecuador.

Selected over centuries for their taste, texture, shape and color, these potato varieties are very
well adapted to the harsh conditions that prevail in the high Andes, at altitudes ranging from 3,500 to 4,200 meters. Farmers generally produce these native varieties with minimal or no use of agrochemicals.

Diversity is conserved on farms and in communities for subsistence use and as a highly valued heritage. Most of these varieties never see a market; they are traded among highland and lowland communities and given as gifts for weddings and other occasions. The varieties differ from community to community.

It is believed that wild tubers were first domesticated around 8,000 years ago by farmers who lived on the high plains and mountain slopes near Lake Titicaca, which borders modern-day Bolivia and Peru. The tubers grew well in the cold, harsh climate and quickly took root as a centerpiece around which life revolved.

Additional information: https://bit.ly/2VCDmzc
Photo: International Potato Center

03/20/2022

WHAT TO DO ON SPRING EQUINOX
Compost this poem.
Take out all the words that remind you of winter,
words that slip frozen into the heart,
bare limbs of words that stick into the sky and shake.
Prune out dead wood;
rough ragged never gonna fruit,
done is done!
Pay attention to what is here,
not what isn't.
Send your roots into another row or field or bed.
Mow. Rake up all the grass.
Layer, as if you're expecting hail or a deep frost;
the end of winter is always unpredictable.
Add manure, plenty of manure
and call in the flies, the dung beetles, the worms.
Soon, there will be heat. Steam.
The pile will soften, break down, give in, let go.
Compost winter into spring,
take off those old clothes you've been wearing,
the despair like a hat on your head,
dig into the pile,
into the heat and the heart of what matters.
Plant your garden and remember, each year,
everything will be different;
compost what you can.

Author - Amy Schutzer
Spring Art - Mary Azarian
Via The Heirloom Gardener - John Forti

03/08/2022

THE MYTH OF LANDSCAPE FABRIC

The Myth
Increased concern over indiscriminate use of herbicides has caused landscape professionals and consumers to look closely at non-chemical alternatives to w**d control. Mulches are increasing in popularity as w**d control strategies and have a number of additional benefits, including water retention and soil protection. Mulches may be organic, inorganic, or synthetic and often can bring an aesthetic quality in tandem with their principal role in plant health maintenance. Synthetic mulches, including
geotextiles, are of interest to many consumers and professionals because they are perceived as nonbiodegradable, permanent solutions to w**d control.

Initially developed for agricultural use, geotextiles have found their way into ornamental installations as landscape fabrics. These fabrics, a vast improvement over the impermeable black plastics still (unfortunately) used for w**d control, are woven in such a way that water and gas exchange can occur but light pe*******on is significantly reduced. Hence, they are effective in reducing w**d seed germination in areas where soil disturbance would otherwise induce germination of a horde of w**ds. Such fabrics have been so effective in reducing w**ds in vegetable and ornamental crop production that they have been applied to more permanent landscape installations.

The Reality
Like the perpetual dieter searching for a permanent weight loss pill, so we as landscape professionals and consumers continue to seek permanent w**d control solutions. Unfortunately, there is no such permanent fix. We must remain “ever vigilant” in our battle with w**ds and cannot rely on a product to do this passively. The fact is that w**d control fabrics are not permanent and will decompose, especially when exposed to sunlight. Such fabrics are effective in agricultural situations, in annual planting beds, or where the landscape is regularly disturbed and the fabrics can be replaced when needed. For permanent landscapes, however, they are not a long term solution and in fact can hinder landscape plant health.

Some of the documented drawbacks of these fabrics are listed below.
• Geotextiles degrade in the landscape in as little as one year if unprotected from sunlight.
• Any organic matter or soil on top of the fabrics will hasten their colonization by w**ds; this
precludes covering the fabric with anything but inorganic mulch like pebbles. It also requires
continual maintenance to keep the fabric free of debris.
• Weeds will eventually grow on top of and through these fabrics, making their removal difficult.
• Landscape plant roots can also colonize fabrics, and they are damaged when the fabrics are removed.
• The aesthetic quality of landscape fabrics is minimal; it becomes worse as the materials begin to degrade.

I must add my own anecdotal story here. When we moved into our current house a few years ago, I began attacking the horsetail and bindw**d that were emerging from our backyard ornamental bed. The odd thing was is that my shovel wouldn’t go deeper than about 6 inches. What I discovered was the previous owners had laid landscape fabric down and then covered it with 6 inches of topsoil. The fabric was completely covered with the roots and rhizomes of both bindw**d and horsetail. It was apparent that the owners hoped to cover up the problem long enough to sell the house (I guess it worked!). Up came the fabric, out came the roots and rhizomes, and down went the wood chips. Now, a year later, the bed is nearly 100% free of both of these w**ds thanks to the wood chips and being “ever vigilant”.

The Bottom Line
• Geotextiles are not effective w**d control solutions for permanent landscapes
• Landscape fabrics used in permanent landscape installations will eventually become a high maintenance issue in terms of appearance, w**d control, and landscape plant health
• Organic mulches are preferred alternatives for permanent landscape installations as they can be reapplied throughout the life of the landscape without damaging the existing plantings.

For more information, please visit Dr. Chalker-Scott’s web page at http://www.theinformedgardener.com/

https://bit.ly/3b9lcwN
via s3.wp.wsu.edu

09/20/2021

Arugula pesto is one of our family's newer faves, and it yields even better than kale.

Robert A. Sloma and Kathleen Callum miss their magnificent 21 year old son Jozef Callum Sloma greatly. Making frozen cubes in his silicone Moai molds is one of our "continuing bonds," as they would refer to it in grief counseling. This mold form was a gift to Joe from his beloved uncle Rich Sloma, a great find for an archeology and history family.

Robert A. Sloma has experimented with customizing the arugula pesto by adding a very strong blue or gorgonzola cheese and substituting pine nuts. Yum! Here's a recipe to use as a guide https://www.simplyrecipes.com/recipes/arugula_pesto/

Arugula pesto made with fresh arugula leaves, garlic, olive oil, walnuts, and Parmesan cheese.

06/14/2021

This is one of the more challenging pieces that I have ever written. Grieving is somewhat complicated when it is entangled with the loss of a beloved only child, an urban family farm lifeway, a “complex” “carbon” and “moral” calculation, existential crisis, hope for the future, and sense of community. Jozef gave us hope for our world’s sustainable future. Like all farmers, urban and rural, farmstand sales and celebrating food were deeply interwoven with our family’s lifeway and community. We miss you, Jozef Callum Sloma (1999-2021).

04/20/2021

Farm stand closed until further notice. Family member vehicle accident. Good thoughts and prayers.

04/18/2021

One of our own inspirations has been Rosalind Creasy, the author of Edible Landscaping, gorgeous cookbook series "Edible Asian Garden" and more, and a slew of other resources. Creasy helped kick off a movement (thanks to The Inland Empire Gardeners she spoke once in the valley) to turn our front yards into meals for our tables and aesthetic food for neighborhood beautification. One edible landscaper calls this "landscaping with intention." https://www.tenthacrefarm.com/see-how-easily-you-can-create-an-edible-landscape/

However, many of us struggle to recycle paved or gravel driveways and empty lots into productive and aesthetically pleasing urban food space. Here's a post from the Winterthur Museum, Garden & Library about tillage radishes that should inspire! p.s., Inland Northwest Community Gardens - INCG and Master Gardeners of Spokane County - WSU used tillage radishes on old packed parking lot gravel over at Chief Garry Community Garden - but perhaps next time we will have a grander parquet floor vision in mind?

03/11/2021

One of the reasons that I