Hartley Magazine

All the latest news, hints, tips and advice from our experts

Youngsters take pride in community garden

Eight youngsters at the International Flavors Community Garden plot on West 18th Street in Erie, Pennsylvania, have helped clear away their patch for the winter after a fruitful summer. The children worked on the garden through an Erie School District after-school program called Creating Healthy Active Members Planning to Succeed. Garden supplies were paid for […]

Holiday Books for Better Gardening – It’s curl-up-and-read time

Why is it that most garden books debut in February? I have to wait until then for Willy Galloway’s terrific vegetable book, Grow, Cook, Eat—A Food Lover’s Guide to Vegetable Gardening. Is February the month when publishers assume gardeners’ hearts turn to spring? This gardener’s heart is warmed by new books in deep winter, when […]

Four great tips for an alternate approach

Brent Heath of Brent and Becky’s Bulbs makes this claim with a certain pride: “It’s always safe to walk in our greenhouses.” Most owners of commercial establishments can’t say that. Routine chemical spraying or fumigation of indoor growing spaces means workers are forbidden to enter the area for specific times—from hours to days. But not […]

It’s time to bring in the bounty

It’s time to bring in the bounty we’ve grown outdoors and take stock of the season. In that spirit, I’m looking at the most successful new varieties I tried this season—the majority featuring compact, space-saving qualifications. One of the limiting factors in my gardening space is that I’m compelled to locate plants that deer eat […]

School teaches life skills including gardening

Green-fingered educators at the Fusion Academy are teaching their children core subjects like English alongside long-term life skills such as healthy living through gardening. The school set up an edible garden project to reinforce students' practical skills and help them develop appropriate eating habits. During the summer students planted vegetable patches, which included three raised […]

Heirlooms Survive the Taste of Time

Home gardeners and farmers look to the past and see their future at the National Heirloom Exposition. Heirloom vegetables —those open-pollinated varieties older than 50 years—have long been treasured by gardeners and farmers alike for their wide-ranging flavors, extended harvest times, and often odd-lot looks. This September, the niche horticultural pursuits of organic practices, seed […]

Supplemental Light and Your Greenhouse

As the air turns crisp and winter casts a shadow on these early fall days, who can ignore the fact that everyday becomes shorter too? Will there be enough light on winter’s shortest days for your indoor plants? Although the quantity of solar radiation the earth receives just outside the atmosphere is nearly constant,  the […]