After a long warm fall, the weather has finally cooled down. If you’ve been out visiting the last flowers in your garden you may have seen some of the last of the pollinators visiting them. Most likely they were bumble …
By now, most of us are concerned about the decline of bees and other pollinators. But there’s a myriad of bees that are not honeybees and many are great pollinators. They are native bees, or wild bees. There are some …
With summer gardens winding down and leaves starting to turn color and fall, many of us have a great supply of materials for a compost pile. Previously I discussed how composting is perfect for turning kitchen scraps into a soil …
Americans waste 30-40% of the food that we produce. And where the waste goes is an important question because where you put it can either help or harm the planet. There’s no in between. You might send it to the …
My previous article discussed the role of carbon dioxide (CO2) in our atmosphere and how it helps maintain a range of temperatures that enable life on earth. The amount of CO2 in our atmosphere now is at 414 parts per …
My heart goes out to those who have lost their homes and buildings in the Jones fire. And my gratitude goes out to the firefighters who worked in such extreme heat and conditions. I can’t imagine what it’s like to …
Those are fall webworms (Hyphantria cunea), native to North America from southern Canada down to northern Mexico. They are perfectly normal and a part of our ecosystems across the continent. They thrive in the warmest time of the year, starting …
Here’s a nice little native plant whose flowers attract butterflies and bees and it starts blooming in mid-summer. Coyote mint (Monardella villosa) is native to much of California, mostly in foothill areas north of Los Angeles up to southern Oregon …
There’s a tree around here that will soon be bearing seeds in colorful papery looking seed pods. It’s called the tree of heaven (Ailanthus altissima). But it should be called the tree of hell. It smells awful, really awful, and …
A flower I love to grow is bee balm (Monarda didyma). And my second most favorite variety of it is ‘Jacob Cline’, a brilliant red. Here in our area it blooms by the Fourth of July! And…it looks like a …