gardening

“Dear PoP,

Hells yes you should envy my awesome tomatoes. In the earthbox below are Audrey III and Audrey IV; the pic was taken a couple of weeks ago. Each is over 6 feet tall and vining out of control! One is an heirloom variety called “Matt’s Wild Cherry” and the other is a Juliet tomato. Off to the right in the photo is a Golden patio “dwarf”. It collapsed under the weight of its tomatoes this past weekend. I have tied it back up; if it dies, there will be fried green tomatoes! The other photo is a handful of cherry tomatoes picked just this morning. So good.”

Awesome! If anyone else has a great garden, vegetable or flower or simply a prized tomato, shoot me a photo in an email.

I admit it. I have some serious tomato envy after passing dozens of scenes like this, this weekend.

I say we have an informal contest: if anyone is growing tomatoes out there and you have an especially good looking one – send me a photo!

Speaking of urban farming here are a couple of unusual shots from New Hampshire Ave, NW near the Petworth metro. I love encountering fruit trees. I have noticed too many this year but the one below is apricot, I think. Have you guys spotted any fruit trees around town? What’s the most unusual crop you’ve seen grown in the city?

We’re often reminded to water newly planted trees (especially if they’re in front of our house) but what about the new grass in the medians? How do these get watered when there is little rain? The medians on New Hampshire from Grant Circle to south of Georgia Ave are looking in pretty rough shape. In hindsight is grass a bad idea for these medians?

I’m starting to these hanging vegetable (I think mostly tomatos?) holders on porches all over town. There was a huge article in the New York Times about Growing Vegetables Upside Down. Any converts here?

In addition to urban beekeeping, Michael, also runs GreenDCRealty, an occasional PoP advertiser. All photos by Fritz Hubig

So what’s all the buzz about urban beekeeping these days you might be wondering and what causes someone to raise some 150,000 bees in the backyard of their DC home. Well its a tough question to answer but as most beekeepers myself included will tell you, we simply find the ability and act of being a hobby apiculturist as a way to reconnect with nature in a way that doesn’t always present itself via our daily lives in an urban setting. That being said opening a conversation at a Saturday evening house party in Columbia Heights with, “so as I was extracting honey today” tends to raise a few eyebrows and a pause in conversation as the first reply tends to be, “so what’s happening to all the bees?”

Honey bees are not an entirely new comer to my life as it has pretty much been an on and off again relationship over the past 17 years. Having spent 4 years of undergraduate studies within farming and beekeeping tends to leave one with only a few job prospects out there and even fewer in a city like DC. So somewhere around 4 years ago with my backyard garden at my home in the Woodridge neighborhood of NE DC not looking so hot I decided it was time for some divine intervention from Mother Nature and that I would set up my urban bee plot once again. I had been on the down-low all these years as it was a bit confusing as to what DC’s bee keeping policy really was. That all changed though when bees made their way to the White House, then the Fairmont Hotel got in the action and in March of this year DC Parks and Rec through Kelly Melstead and Tony Burnham the Districts resident beekeeper offered up an introductory course in beekeeping which has led to a whole new buzz so to speak as more trained hobbyists begin tending to bees across the District.

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