Down The Garden Path Podcast

By: Joanne Shaw
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  • Summary

  • On Down the Garden Path Podcast, landscape designer Joanne Shaw discusses down-to-earth tips and advice for your plants, gardens and landscapes. She believes it is important and possible to have great gardens that are low maintenance. On Down the Garden Path, she speaks with industry experts and garden authors to educate listeners on how to seasonally manage their gardens and landscapes.
    Joanne Shaw
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Episodes
  • November in the Garden

    November in the Garden
    Oct 29 2024

    In this encore presentation of Down the Garden Path, Joanne Shaw and Matthew Dressing provide some tips and tricks and do’s and don'ts for your November garden. Here are some of the topics covered in this episode:

    • Planting bulbs
    • Cleaning up your vegetable garden in time for winter
    • Why you should not cut back your perennials
    • Check out their Five Fall Lawn Care Tips for November lawn care
    • How to protect your trees, shrubs, and evergreens from animals and winter
    Have a topic you'd like Joanne to discuss?

    Email your questions and comments to downthegardenpathpodcast@hotmail.com, or connect with her here: down2earth.ca

    You can find Down the Garden Path on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube: @downthegardenpathpodcast.

    You can find Matthew Dressing at naturalaffinity.ca.

    Resources mentioned during the show

    Down the Garden Path: A Step-By-Step Guide to Your Ontario Garden

    Down the Garden Path: Five Fall Lawn Care Tips

    Down the Garden Path Podcast

    On Down The Garden Path, professional landscape designer Joanne Shaw discusses down-to-earth tips and advice for your plants, gardens and landscapes. As the owner of Down2Earth Landscape Design, Joanne Shaw has been designing beautiful gardens for homeowners east of Toronto for over a decade. She does her best to bring you interesting, relevant and useful topics to help you keep your garden as low maintenance as possible.

    In Down the Garden Path: A Step-By-Step Guide to Your Ontario Garden, Joanne and fellow landscape designer Matthew Dressing distill their horticultural and design expertise and their combined experiences in helping others create and maintain thriving gardens into one easy-to-read monthly reference guide.

    Get your copy today on Amazon.

    Don't forget to check out Down the Garden Path on your favourite podcast app and subscribe! You can now catch the podcast on YouTube.
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    41 mins
  • How to Build a Layered Bulb Planter

    How to Build a Layered Bulb Planter
    Oct 21 2024
    Fed up with critters stealing your bulbs or waiting for the foliage to die back after your bulbs finish flowering? In this episode of Down the Garden Path podcast, Joanne Shaw explains why creating a layered bulb planter may be the solution you’re looking for. How to build a layered bulb planter: Choose the container carefully. Size and drainage are important.You can choose a plastic one that you will then use as a liner inside a “prettier” pot, or you can plant it right into a decorative pot -- just make sure you can move it to the garage now and back out into the garden in the spring. Choose at least 3 types and or sizes of bulbs. Be sure to consider the bloom times.Do you want them to stagger out a few weeks to bloom, or do you want them to bloom at approximately the same time?This is not an exact science so there are no guarantees that bulbs will bloom when you want them to. Make sure the bottom layer of bulbs is tall enough to grow out of the pot. Start by adding at least 1 to 2 inches of potting soil at the bottom of the pot.You can sprinkle a bit of bulb fertilizer if you would like.Insert the bulbs approximately a couple of inches apart, close enough for the bulbs to support each other.Top with another 2 inches of potting soil and a handful of fertilizer, then add the second layer of bulbs. Repeat for the subsequent layers.Water the container thoroughly after planting: you should see that a bit of water has come out of the drainage hole.These pots can then be stored in an unheated garage, shed or sheltered area between garages for instance. Do not store in direct sunlight. The goal is to avoid the freeze and thaw that inevitably occurs in our winters. Throughout the winter, water the plants thoroughly but intermittently. Think about doing it when it rains or snows outside.You don’t want the soil too wet or the bulbs may rot.If there’s snow, you could even top them off with a shovel of it to keep them watered and cool. In the spring, take them out of storage and place them around the yard.You can also do this on a smaller scale to have some small bulb planters in the house for spring or maybe even an Easter centrepiece or gift.These would make great Christmas gifts for other gardeners or people in an apartment or condo. Resources Mentioned in the Show: Down the Garden Path: A Step-By-Step Guide to Your Ontario Garden Have a topic you'd like me to discuss? Please let me know what other topics you would like me to discuss. Email your questions and comments to downthegardenpathpodcast@hotmail.com, or connect with me on my website: down2earth.ca Find Down the Garden Path on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube: @downthegardenpathpodcast. Down the Garden Path Podcast On Down The Garden Path, professional landscape designer Joanne Shaw discusses down-to-earth tips and advice for your plants, gardens and landscapes. As the owner of Down2Earth Landscape Design, Joanne Shaw has been designing beautiful gardens for homeowners east of Toronto for over a decade. She does her best to bring you interesting, relevant and useful topics to help you keep your garden as low maintenance as possible. In Down the Garden Path: A Step-By-Step Guide to Your Ontario Garden, Joanne and fellow landscape designer Matthew Dressing distill their horticultural and design expertise and their combined experiences in helping others create and maintain thriving gardens into one easy-to-read monthly reference guide. Get your copy today on Amazon. Don't forget to check out Down the Garden Path on your favourite podcast app and subscribe! You can now catch the podcast on YouTube.
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    20 mins
  • Lasagna No-Till Gardening

    Lasagna No-Till Gardening
    Oct 15 2024
    This week on Down the Garden Path, Joanne Shaw explores the benefits and steps to creating a no-till lasagna garden. What is lasagna no-till gardening? Often called "lasagna" gardening because of the layering involved or no-till gardening because there is no need to dig up and disturb the existing organic matter. Reasons to consider a lasagna no-till garden: You want to create a new or expanded garden area in your yardYou’re considering planting a vegetable or herb garden next year When’s the best time? October/ November is the best time to do it and in the least back-breaking and simplest way. Joanne’s experience: Joanne did this with her garden in October 2016.Check out the Lasagna Gardening section of Joanne’s book, Down the Garden Path: A Step-By-Step Guide to Your Ontario Garden. You’ll find pictures of Joanne’s garden in 2016 and how she tackled creating a new garden area that she planted in the following June of 2017. Or listen to her talk about it on a previous show.Here are some of the basics and her recommendations eight years later. Joanne lives on a corner lot with no sidewalks: her garden is in the front yard, to the right of the front door from the walkway to the curb and wraps around the corner and ends at the driveway.In 2016, she had a garden in the centre of that space surrounded by approximately 3-4 feet of grass (it was actually barren, dry soil that was hard to water because of the slight slope).It received A LOT of sun. She didn’t have time to baby a garden and wasn’t going to baby her lawn.She liked the idea of having more garden and less lawn and was looking for a simple way to make this happen.Her research led her to lasagna gardening where you cover your lawn with layers of material to not only kill your lawn but create a “new” garden or new improved garden area to plant in the following spring.Starting a new garden by digging up an existing lawn or maybe an old one that you inherited that needs some major refreshing seems straightforward. But not only is it hard work, it is often hard for most people to dispose of the old sod, or poor garden material. The steps: That is the beauty of this method. It starts with cardboard! Lots of cardboard, more than you think you will need because you want to make sure the boxes overlap.Make sure you remove the packing tape and don’t use any coated cardboard that may be found at the grocery store/or restaurants.Cover the cardboard with a quality organic material like manure or mushroom compost, at least to 2-3 inches, making sure the cardboard is completely covered.Cover everything once again with an organic mulch, again 2 to 3 inches. Don’t worry if this seems high, as everything starts to break down it will “thin” out. Joanne’s favourite: composted pine mulch (no dyed mulches please).This is the perfect time of year to do this and as the fall rain and winter snow (hopefully) cover the new garden, it will help everything to break down, especially the cardboard.Once May or June arrives, you should be able to start planting. It is as easy as that!This is great for areas large or small, but also ideal for challenging boulevards, where the grass doesn’t grow well or you’re tired of cutting it. Resources Mentioned in the Show: Down the Garden Path: A Step-By-Step Guide to Your Ontario Garden Lasagna Gardening Have a topic you'd like Joanne to discuss? Email your questions and comments to downthegardenpathpodcast@hotmail.com, or connect with me on my website: down2earth.ca Find Down the Garden Path on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube: @downthegardenpathpodcast. Down the Garden Path Podcast On Down The Garden Path, professional landscape designer Joanne Shaw discusses down-to-earth tips and advice for your plants, gardens and landscapes. As the owner of Down2Earth Landscape Design, Joanne Shaw has been designing beautiful gardens for homeowners east of Toronto for over a decade. She does her best to bring you interesting, relevant and useful topics to help you keep your garden as low maintenance as possible. In Down the Garden Path: A Step-By-Step Guide to Your Ontario Garden, Joanne and fellow landscape designer Matthew Dressing distill their horticultural and design expertise and their combined experiences in helping others create and maintain thriving gardens into one easy-to-read monthly reference guide. Get your copy today on Amazon. Don't forget to check out Down the Garden Path on your favourite podcast app and subscribe! You can now catch the podcast on YouTube.
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    25 mins

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