Hi, its Justin at the Red Bird Mission Grow Appalachia site. Well I don’t know about you all but the weather so far has been ideal around here for growing a garden. We’ve had just enough rain to keep everything from drying out and plenty of sun for everything to grow.

  

It has also been ideal for bugs and deer. We have been battling both. The bugs are the worst this year. We have been consistently spraying and dusting. It has worked but if you miss a day they devour your crop. We have fenced our gardens to keep the deer out and none have broke in yet.

Our farmers market started in June and the vendors have been bringing some excellent looking produce. Lets just hope we can keep up with the demand.

We had a visitor from Washington, DC come down and wanted to do a blog on gardens in the Appalachia. He is a Writer for thehoe.org. He has roots from Harlan County KY, thats what got him interested in this area. I took him around to visit some of our Grow Appalachia members.

      thehoe.org/2017/07/07/garden-azimuth-appalachia/

TheHoe.org, devoted to the essential endeavor of garden cultivation, is directed by John A. Bray of Diversified Expression, LLC. Bray, a Washington, D.C. native, is a veteran newspaper and magazine reporter and editor.

Bray worked for four years as an editor at Taunton’s Kitchen Garden Magazine, traveling extensively in search of exceptional home gardens. His writing has appeared in a wide range of publications, including The New York Times and The Saturday Evening Post. Bray spent an academic year as a Knight-Wallace Journalism Fellow at the University of Michigan and was a Knight Center for Specialized Journalism Fellow at the University of Maryland.