Carrots, Conundrums & Conversations

What to do when the carrots won’t thrive?  Not earth shattering, but that’s a question that currently haunts me.  Don’t get me wrong.  I love a conundrum.  I’m a science teacher after all and spend my days encouraging children to ask questions and explore.   My garden, and the one I manage at Havens school, are both ongoing daily experiments – our recent crop of 13 foot tall heirloom corn attests to that.  But really, a gardener needs someone to talk to, to share the successes, lament the failures and most importantly to work through those burning questions.  There are the professionals of course, but the answer I got to my carrot question, “Get over it, you can’t grow carrots.”  from a local nursery wasn’t particularly supportive or satisfying.  


As a co-chair of Piedmont Connect, I head up the Garden and Landscape group, and people frequently ask me garden questions.  As more of an organizer than experienced gardener, I can’t answer many, but I enjoy the conversation and the best part of PiedmontConnect’s annual Green Garden Ramble is watching all those green thumbs, both novice and expert, wandering from garden to garden, heads together in rapt discussion.  Whenever we meet to discuss what members want, opportunities to build community, and well -- ‘Connect’, always surface.  


Personally I’ve found my own garden guru and friend in Bill Drum, local gardening expert and co-founder of the Harvest Festival.  Every time I run into him he has a juicy tidbit to share, and I trust he’s been mulling over my carrot question since I mentioned it.   All gardeners thrive on sharing, and he’s a community resource par excellence.  Although I subscribe to a few garden newsletters, I’ve been seeking something more local and personal – so rather selfishly proposed a blog to Mr. Drum.   He jumped on board – so here we are.  Bill’s our resident expert, I’m the experimentalist, and we invite all of you to join our conversation.  You can watch for us on Piedmont Patch under the title Edible Garden Connections  or subscribe right here -  and if you have any solutions to the carrot conundrum – you know where to find me.


Terry