Metropolitan Gardening

Check out the Skillshare class, "Urban Gardening: Tips and Tricks for effective city growing." Help spread the word: http://skl.sh/Kusc6e Here's the details: Watch the video introduction: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=273O4VKNERE The challenges of gardening in the city require a grab bag of tips and tricks to manage the urban landscape. Join Dimitri Gatanas and Bryan Ogden as they provide a series of hands on workshops and focused leaning experiances located in the heart of Harlem at the Urban Garden Center.

  A lec Baxt discusses soil amendments for growing vegetables in the rooftop environment. Particularly we explore his experimental use of "Bio-Char" which may be a ground breaking idea for mixing with roof light to potentially create a nutritious and fertile growing medium. Alec is the Founding Farmer of Farming up.org in Brooklyn, NYC There is another longer video of this interview forthcoming that delves deeper into the details of the subject.

T here's nothing like planting a spring vegetable window box - here's four easy steps. 1) This is the secret : Choose seedlings for immediate reinforcement. Planting from seeds is awesome - but it takes a few weeks - buying new plants from a nursery or local garden center gets them a good solid start and feels great right from the get go. They have had a head start in a green house in optimum conditions. Urban window sills are full of dangers to young seeds finding a solid germination. So for an instant garden try this to make your hard work easy. 2)  Measure the space in your window box - then pick a planting container to fit it. Getting a planter box that is too big for your window will create frustration and a return trip.Make sure your containers have holes in the bottom . If you are above the first floor make sure no one can get water on them from below - if so make sure you have a drainage plate under your planter and be careful when you water not to "pee on you...