Accessible Gardening: Practical Matters for Physically Challenged Gardeners #15, 1 by Amargia

Amargia wrote:
Carrie, here is an easy garden project you should still have time for. It is a way to get celery early and easily . You can root celery you buy from the grocery store. Next time you buy a bunch of celery,, carefully remove the remains of the outer stalks. You should find a tiny stalk a couple of inches tall at the center of the bunch. (The height at which most cooks cut celery off leaves the tiny central stalk untouched.) Dampen the white bottom so rooting hormone will stick. Brush on the rooting hormone and plant in fertile soil. What will grow usually never reaches the size of the bunch you started with, but you can cut tender and delicious stalks off the growing plant as you need them in the kitchen. I would rank celery as the #1 hardest vegetable to grow so some foolproof “cheat celery” lessens the trauma of failures. This may be old news to you. but it was a new one to me. I’ve rooted grocery store carrots, avacadoes, Irish and sweet potatoes, but celery was a new one on me.

Vickie, can I send you a book to read? I think Jim Wilson’s Container Gardening is the best book I’ve come across on the subject. I think it has a place in our resource list, but you are our container growing expert. Most of our containers have a soil capacity of 20 gallons or more. I don’t think that counts as true container gardening. It falls somewhere between containers and earth boxes.

Had to tie up my banana pepper in semi-shade, but I will still grow peppers in similar conditions in future because it has been so productive. (Jim)