Jessie Keith

Horticulturist
, Garden Writer, Photographer,
Kitchen Gardener, Botanist, Mother, Traveler
I do not yet know why plants come out of the land or float in streams, or creep on rocks or roll from the sea. I am entranced by the mystery of them, and absorbed by their variety and kinds. Everywhere they are visible yet everywhere occult. 
                                                                                  -Liberty Hyde Bailey

Recent Online Articles:

Extreme Midsummer Perennial Makeovers


Put Up Your Cukes

Healthy Foods for Healthy Kids--Growing Success

Hardy Pricklypear


Nurturing Regional Native Trees

Late Season Native Garden for Wildlife

Recent Blogs:

Great American Food Festival List (A Work in Progress)


Garden Pitfalls of Working Mommyhood


Turning Homegrown Tomatoes into Garden Fresh Salsa


Spring Vegetable Successes 2010


Grow Garlic Grow!

All Kinds of Cucumbers

Cosmos: Simple, Easy, Beautiful Summer Annuals


Three Super Hand Weeding Tools

Top Basils for Pesto

Tips for the Pregnant Gardener

Good Beans to Grow

2010 Vegetable Picks

Upcoming Magazine Articles:

The Fruits of Winter, The Green Scene Magazine

Best In Show! (New Bedding Annuals with Old-Fashioned Appeal), The Old House Journa
l; Available July 2010!

Perfect Bulb Pairings, The Green Scene


Dahlias, Dahlias, Dahlias!, The American Gardener



Dahlias wane in areas where summers are hot but pick up beautifully later in the season. Spectacular selections like the bicolored cactus dahlia, 'Jessica', just glow in fall.
Late Summer Fare


Three-lobed coneflower (Rudbeckia triloba) is an eastern North American native that produces clouds of little black-eyed Susan flowers in late summer. It's so easy and so beautiful.


The annelino-type pole bean, 'Stortino di Trento', produces lots of small, curved beans with reddish brown streaks and a meaty, delicious flavor.

Grow Beautiful Vegetables


Few acorn squash are as beautiful as 'Festival.' It's both delicious to eat and great for decorating. For fall harvest, I plant my winter squash in June.

Favorite Vegetable Seed Vendors:

Baker's Creek Heirloom Seeds

Fedco Seeds
(Cheap & Good!)

Franchi Sementi Italian Seeds

Johnny's Selected Seeds

Pinetree Garden Seeds
(Cheap & Good!)

Renee's Garden

Favorite Ornamental  Vendors:

Annie's Annuals

Beaver Creek Greenhouses

Forest Farm

Fairweather Gardens

Odyssey Bulbs

Select Seeds

Favorite Gardening Sites & Blogs:

Finegardening.com

Learn2grow.com

Mo Plants

The Dinner Garden

You Grow Girl

The Garlic Press

www.YourGardenShow.com

Gardeners Feeding the Hungry:

Help Feed the Hungry through Gardening! Support organizations like Plant a Row for the Hungry, The Dinner Garden, The Giving Garden and local community gardens that support area food banks. Volunteers and donations are always needed. The Delaware Center for Horticulture's Urban Farm is my favorite local philanthropic garden to support. It's run by the amazing gardening wonder woman, Ann Mattingly.


Ann Mattingly preparing to plant vegetable seeds for The Delaware Center for Horticulture's Urban Garden (image care of DCH).


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