The 2026 edition · 37 entries

The almanac

Every entry in the 2026 edition, newest first. New entries land through the season; follow along on Facebook to catch them daily.

Planting & timing

12 entries

Common nighthawks with white wing bars flying over rooftops and a garden fence at dusk.

Aug 25, 2026

The Nighthawks Leave Before Summer Does

A bird that spent all summer over your garden without an introduction is slipping south to Argentina this week, and the half hour after sunset is your last good chance to watch a season leave in person.

A potted garden chrysanthemum crowned with tight green buds on porch steps at dusk.

Aug 24, 2026

Your Mums Are Measuring the Night

Chrysanthemums do not bloom by thermometer. A pigment in their leaves counts the dark hours each night, and the buds on your porch pot are the paperwork of a season that has not visibly arrived.

Raised garden bed with young fall seedlings in golden light

Aug 1, 2026

The fall sowing window is open: what to plant in August

The second season is the quiet gardener's secret. Here is what goes in the ground now.

Wicker basket of late-summer harvest on garden soil

Jul 14, 2026

Seeds or seedlings: which to buy, crop by crop

Some crops resent the move and some don't care. Knowing which is which saves a season.

Hands separating garlic cloves over a garden bed with cloves pressed into dark soil

Jul 7, 2026

Garlic is the easiest crop you're not growing yet

One October afternoon, eight months of neglect, and a July harvest that stores until spring.

Frost crystals edging kale leaves at sunrise

Jun 16, 2026

Frost dates: the two numbers that run your whole garden

Every packet says 'after all danger of frost.' Here is what that actually means, and how to find yours.

Bumblebee on a zinnia at the edge of a vegetable garden

Jun 9, 2026

The case for wasting a row on flowers

Five square feet of the right blooms buys pollination, pest control, and cut flowers. The vegetables profit.

Vegetable seedlings in trays under a warm grow light on a wooden shelf

Jun 5, 2026

Seed starting under lights, without the gadget aisle

A shelf, a shop light, and a timer grow better transplants than a sunny window ever will.

Wooden raised beds beside an in-ground vegetable plot in morning light

May 22, 2026

Raised beds or in-ground: an honest comparison

One costs money and one costs patience. The right answer depends on your soil, your back, and your water bill.

Hands holding an open seed packet over a garden bed with seeds in palm

May 15, 2026

How to read a seed packet like it owes you answers

Every packet is a tiny instruction manual written in code. Here is the decoder.

Tray of seedlings on a porch step in dappled morning shade

Apr 23, 2026

Hardening off: the week that decides the season

Indoor seedlings have never met wind or true sun. The week you introduce them decides everything after.

Four small garden beds each planted with a different crop family

Apr 13, 2026

Crop rotation for gardens smaller than a farm

The four-year rotation was written for fields. Here is the version that works in four beds, and when to ignore it.

Garden myths

17 entries

Backlit goldenrod plumes with a honeybee, and a green ragweed plant standing behind them at a sunlit field edge.

Aug 25, 2026

The Goldenrod Is Innocent

Every August the showiest flower in the ditch gets blamed for allergy season, while the real culprit blooms green and invisible ten feet away. The case falls apart the moment you look at how pollen actually travels.

An American crow perched on a weathered fence post beside ripening sweet corn at golden hour.

Aug 24, 2026

The Scarecrow Never Worked, but the Crow Does

A century of stomach records says the black bird in the corn is mostly eating your pests, billing you a few ears for the service, and memorizing your face while she works.

A common snapping turtle resting at the sunlit edge of a pond at golden hour.

Aug 18, 2026

The Monster in the Pond Is Its Janitor

Snapping turtles almost never bite in the water, barely eat live fish, and clean a pond faster than anything else on the payroll. The scariest thing in the pond deserves a pardon.

Two barn swallows skimming low over a lawn at dusk as storm clouds build.

Aug 18, 2026

Why Swallows Fly Low Before Rain

The old rhyme about low-flying swallows is one of the few weather proverbs physics grades out almost perfectly. The birds are not reading the sky. They are following their groceries.

Weathered farmhouse back door standing ajar with rain clouds gathering beyond the roofline

Aug 17, 2026

The house that hears rain coming: sticking doors, tested honestly

When the back door starts fighting you, the old-timers moved the picnic indoors. The physics behind the sign, which rooms lie, and how to run the test tonight.

Wheel bug with its cog-shaped crest perched on a rose cane in warm evening light

Aug 17, 2026

The wheel bug: a full hearing for the scariest insect in the garden

Half a gear wheel, a folded beak, and a reputation for menace. The strangest-looking insect in North America is also one of the most useful things on your roses.

Small flock of goldfinches gathered on tall sunflowers and thistles in warm evening light

Aug 9, 2026

A charm, a knot, a sparkle: the secret names of garden visitors

English keeps a hidden name for every gathering in your garden, and most of them are five hundred years old. Here is the full roll call.

Garden spider on a dewy orb web at dawn with a toad resting below among the plants

Aug 5, 2026

The wrongly accused: a defense of the garden's scariest workers

The spider, the toad, the mole, the snake, and the giant wasp. Every one of them is on your side, and this is their day in court.

Crushed eggshells scattered around the base of a young tomato plant

Jul 24, 2026

Eggshells in the garden: what they actually do (and don't)

Half the internet swears by them, half calls them a myth. The truth is quieter than both camps.

Seed packets and a trowel on weathered wood

Jul 21, 2026

Coffee grounds in the garden: what they do and don't do

Beloved, free, and mostly misunderstood. A fair trial for the kitchen's favorite amendment.

Water droplets on green squash leaves in bright midday sun

Jul 17, 2026

Watering in the midday sun does not burn leaves

The lens-effect warning has been repeated for a century. Physicists finally tested it.

Glass jar of epsom salt with a wooden spoon beside a tomato plant

Jul 3, 2026

Epsom salt is not the cure-all your feed store says it is

Magnesium helps exactly one problem, and it is probably not the one your tomatoes have.

Fingers pinching a small side shoot on a staked tomato plant

Jun 23, 2026

Do you really have to prune tomato suckers?

Gardening's most confident advice, tested: what pruning actually buys you, and when it buys nothing.

Garden at dusk under a red evening sky with swallows flying low

May 26, 2026

Old weather signs, put on trial

Crickets, pine cones, red skies, and cows lying down. Which folk forecasts hold up, and which are barn-door decoration.

Tomatoes, basil, and marigolds interplanted in a garden bed at golden hour

May 8, 2026

Companion planting: the honest version

Tomatoes do not love basil. But some garden pairings really do pay, and the reasons are better than the folklore.

Zucchini leaves with powdery mildew beside a spray bottle of milky liquid

May 1, 2026

The milk spray: a kitchen remedy that actually works

Most folk sprays fail the almanac's trials. This one, strangely, passes, with rules.

Hand cradling the season's first ripening tomato on the vine at sunset

Apr 20, 2026

The first tomato of summer, and everything wrong with it

Black bottoms, cracked shoulders, no fruit at all. The season's first tomatoes arrive with complaints, and most fix themselves.

Watering & care

8 entries

Galvanized watering can watering young plants in morning light

Jul 28, 2026

Morning or evening: when watering actually matters

The oldest argument at the garden fence, settled by what the water is doing at 7 a.m.

Hands spreading golden straw mulch around young pepper plants

Jun 26, 2026

Mulch is the closest thing gardening has to a cheat code

Less watering, fewer weeds, better soil, and the only real skill is not overdoing it.

Soaker hose watering the base of tomato plants in a raised bed

May 29, 2026

Water deep or water often: only one grows roots

The daily sprinkle feels diligent and builds a garden that cannot survive a weekend away.

Lettuce bed at evening with a copper tape barrier and a sunken beer trap

May 19, 2026

Slugs: what actually stops them

Eggshells fail, copper mostly works, and the beer trap is undefeated. A field guide to the nightly war.

Trowel of dark soil beside a settled jar test and a soil test kit on a bench

May 12, 2026

The soil test: ten dollars of answers under every garden

Most struggling gardens are guessing at a question the soil will answer for the price of lunch.

Sack of granular fertilizer with a scoop beside young vegetable rows

May 5, 2026

What the three numbers on the fertilizer bag mean

N-P-K is the whole alphabet of plant feeding. Learn three letters and the fertilizer aisle stops shouting.

Hand squeezing a ball of dark spring soil over a freshly turned bed

Apr 16, 2026

When is the soil ready? The squeeze that answers it

The calendar says plant and the ground says wait. One handful of soil settles the argument.

Freshly transplanted tomato seedling being watered gently at its base

Apr 9, 2026

Transplant shock: first aid for the droopy and the sulking

Every moved plant sulks. Most recover alone, some need help, and two folk remedies make everything worse.

Kitchen garden

6 entries

Wooden crate of homegrown raspberries, cherry tomatoes, basil, snap peas and lettuce

Jul 10, 2026

The crops that pay: what to grow when groceries are expensive

Ranked by the only math that matters at the checkout: what a bed of it would have cost at the store.

Green onion and lettuce ends regrowing in glasses of water on a sunny windowsill

Jun 30, 2026

Five groceries that regrow on a windowsill (and three that won't)

The honest version of the scrap-garden trend: what actually works, what's a science fair, and what's a lie.

Garden trug with zucchini, tomato, beans and cantaloupe picked at peak ripeness

Jun 19, 2026

Picked too early, left too long: reading harvest signals

The garden tells you when. A crop-by-crop guide to the tells, and why the store trained you wrong.

Terracotta pots of cherry tomatoes, peppers and trailing herbs on a patio

Jun 12, 2026

The honest guide to growing food in pots

A patio can feed you more than you'd think, if you skip the crops that hate containers and fix the one thing that kills the rest.

Wooden compost bin layered with kitchen scraps and dry leaves, garden fork alongside

Jun 2, 2026

Compost without the chemistry exam

Browns, greens, water, and patience. Everything else in the compost aisle is optional.

Fingers pinching the growing tip of a bushy basil plant

Apr 27, 2026

Pinch, prune, or leave it alone: a nervous gardener's guide

Two fingernails and one rule of thumb replace most of the pruning shelf. The hard part is knowing when to stop.