Sustainable Gardening Newsletter, September ’09

A new section about Urban Gardening!
Visit and in a comment suggest more good links, great programs, awesome stories
about school and community gardens, CSAs, park renovations, farmers'
markets, backyard-sharing and container/rooftop/balcony gardening.
Renee Shepherd joins the website as its newest contributor. I asked her: How do veg-gardeners go wrong? Her answer? Veg-Gardening: What Works, What Doesn't.

What almost everyone needs to do right now but probably won’t? Overseed the lawn. Without it, lawns fade away, and homeowners are discouraged – or they hire ChemLawn to force that lawn to green-up, fast!
AND it's time to feed your lawn, the second thing that most people should do but don't. Scroll down to "Fall" here.
And what do you know? It's also the best time to start a new lawn.

At the state's urging, towns along the Passaic River in New Jersey are lining up to limit the use of landscape fertilizers.
Casey Trees (a terrific nonprofit here in DC) shows how trees can be cared for by bicycle. They call it the Water-by-Cycle Initiative.

Got a sprinkler? Is it as efficient as it could be? Billy Goodnick to the rescue.
Vote for America's Favorite Flower – and note that rudbeckia's in the lead. Its competition? 3 Petunias, a penta and a vinca!
Is rubber mulch safe? According to Linda Chalker-Scott, not so much.

Sustainable Gardening for Florida, or Anywhere
is a shout-out to Ginny Stibolt for a great review of her new book, but
explores what the heck sustainability IS. Ginny's got answers we don't
often see.
Does Cash for Grass make Sense (or Cents)? is a guest post by Tom Hawkins suggesting an alternative to paying people to rip out the lawn – Buffalograss.

GardenRant edition. The whole newsletter, with off-topic sidebar, is available here.

Posted by Susan Harris on September 12, 2009 at 4:23 am, in the category What's Happening.

Comments are off for this post

Benjamin says:

September 12, 2009 at 5:48 pm

I was gardening this evening and the neighbor yelled to her husband “should we mow their yard too?” Not with that polluting machine. I yelled back (in my smarmy mind) “Put some landscaping out so property values go up.” All they have is grass. And they mow / blow religiously as a couple. It’s cute, really. Anyway, I ain’t mowing until the funnel spiders leave and it’s time for fall fertilzing–damn, that’s next week!
Michelle D. says:

September 13, 2009 at 8:45 pm

Hi Susan,
Nice links with some valuable info.

In regards to the cost to install a sod lawn in my area the price for professional installation , which includes soil prep , the sod and the laying of the sod is in the $ 3.25 per square foot range.
A tad bit higher than the amount that was mentioned on the Sustainable Blog.

Just incase someone from the California area was reading and was interested in a realistic cost estimate bid.

Michelle D.