Pink Berkeley Tie-Dye

Posted by maipen on Feb 1, 2012 in Uncategorized | 1 comment

Ahhh, it feels good to get your hand in the soil and in the greenhouse preparing for a spring crop. We’ve had a very mild winter so far and need rain but I am fast at work getting seedlings started in the greenhouse. It also feels good to begin preparing for another season of grafting tomatoes.  Last year, my first attempt at grafting went pretty well but my post surgical care left something to be desired for sure.  This year I will try to maintain a more consistent temperature and humidity for the week after the grafting process.

This season I will save the heirloom root plants to preserve at least those plants after taking the tops and grafting them to the root stock.  So wish me luck and stay tuned for photos and video of the mad scientist and grafter.

Wormfest 2011! A live music festival in the Berkeley hills!

Posted by maipen on Sep 12, 2011 in Blog | 0 comments

For my birthday this year, my wife got me a Worm Farm.  Yes, a worm farm, and I will soon be pouring black gold in the form of Worm Compost tea to dilute and use to fertilize my greenhouse habit. Our friends and neighbors who live around the corner have a backyard garden to match ours and are equally passionate about home vegetable gardening.  They invited to share or exchange veggies since they had a lot of one thing and I had a lot of another thing.  So I bit and the next week I was treated to the largest leaves of Kale I have ever seen.  Little did I know that they were being fed Worm Tea, a likely reason why they plants were so large.

We were treated to a viewing of their worm farm, and although I fish, I must admit I was a first a little squeamish when I saw the hundreds of worms feasting on rotten kitchen scraps. My wife was paying attention though, and a few weeks later ordered a worm bin after talking to our neighbor over the phone about the worm composting.  It turns out her husband is also a musician so we planned a musical worm party. She wanted to supply me with the worms for my new box and give me some tips about caring for the few thousand worms. . . .

I just checked on the little buggers (no pun intended) and they are doing fine, munching on a rotten apple and some old squash.  They seemed to be doing fine but I gave them a fine misting of water to soothe their little bodies for the next few days.

The Greenhouse Effect

Posted by maipen on Jul 19, 2011 in Blog, Featured, Portfolio | 0 comments

Hi and welcome to the Greenhouse Effect, where the positive effects of greenhouse gardening are explored. Follow along on the journey of discovery and listen in on Charlie’s greenhouse podcasts otherwise known as GreenCast’s or GreenPods. These enlightening and sometimes hilarious writings are all caused by the greenhouse effect, that is the effect that this small greenhouse has had on Charlie and his community in the hills of North Berkeley. 

The Sound of Silence

Posted by maipen on Jul 17, 2011 in Blog, Featured | 0 comments

What does silence sound like?  You might think that silence has no sound but I found otherwise because of “The Greenhouse Effect.” The first couple of months of greenhouse ownership taught me a lot about sitting still, listening and actually hearing the sounds of silence. These silent sounds are sometimes the drip, drip, drip of rain on the roof of the greenhouse, or the faint sound of a train off in the distance or the sounds of your inner thoughts as you sit and listen.

My father and I spent a weekend doing just that, listening for the sounds of silence with a stay at Green Gulch near Muir Beach in Marin. We compiled a number of our thoughts into koans (zen stories that sometimes ask questions and other times make a statement) and wrote them down over the two days.  It was time well spent with my pops for sure.Below are a few results of our silent spoken words.

Macro Moments

Posted by maipen on Jul 15, 2011 in Featured, Portfolio | 1 comment

When we decided to get the greenhouse, I knew then that I would need a macro lens to take photos of plants at various stages of development. I did in fact get a lens that summer and often will rush into the house and smile, going over to my wife like a little kid, “Honey, looks like a macro-moment.  The seedlings are breaking the ground…”  She smiles her wonderful smile and genuinely say’s something like “Oh that’s fabulous.”

It’s only when I come in with fourteen views of a seedling breaking the ground on my digital camera saying, “Wow, do you want to see these great shots?” that her eyes begin to fog over viewing the small thumbnails on my digital camera.  She is a good sport though and most of the time will humor me and smile.

Charlie Costello, the creator of ZebraGreens among other things can usually be seen at his home called MariLark out in the garden or in the greenhouse these days. He’s the Zebra and his wife Liz is the Giraffe.  Stay tuned for more about that in another blog post.