You've waited and here they are! My picks for the best autumn gardening products*.

4.  The Wearable Garden Stool – An eccentric addition to your gardening arsenal, the Wearable Garden Stool is a fun, efficient and useful way to garden without backache, and just in time for bulb-ing! Read more in my blog: But It's The Pelvic Stool Thrust.  From: CleanAirGardening.com -- For: $54.99** 

3.  The Living Wall – Although this vertical potter can be somewhat difficult to manage, the unique Living Wall is sure to be the talk of the town – or at least of your home. From: Gardeners.com -- For: $169 

2.  The Worm Factory Composter – Providing you with year-round compost and compost tea, The Worm Factory is a fun, environmentally friendly alternative to fertilizer, and a great place to dump your vacuum dust! For detailed info, read my blog: Open a Can of Worms. From: Uncle Jim's Worm Farm -- For: $69.95 

1.  Aerogarden – Topping our charts as the best Autumn Gardening Tool, the hydroponic Aerogarden is the most effective and easy way to create a bountiful garden indoors – without the mess of soil or even watering! And with the array of seed kits offered, the Aerogarden appeals to all chefs and herb aficionados. What could be better than that? From: Aerogarden -- For: $149.95

Have a product you want sampled for possible appearance here? Or, questions? tmiller@ogdenpubs.com
*All products personally sampled by Taylor Miller.
** All prices as of 10.22.08

In the first of my two part series, here are my picks for this year's best autumn gardening products*!

8.  Meyer Lemon Tree – Kicking off the charts at number eight, this dwarf lemon tree can be grown indoors year-round, and its benefits are fruitful.  From: MeyerLemonTree.com -- For: $49.95** 

7.  Culinary Herb Garden – A garden terrarium makes a great gift for friends, kids or even as projects for students. Easy to grow herbs spring up quickly and can be used in no time For more info, read my blog: Biodome! (sans Pauly Shore).  From: DiscoverThis.com -- For: $23.95 

6.  The Garden Ladder – Increasing your surface area for indoor potted plants, the wooden Garden Ladder is easy to install and makes for a beautiful addition to any home.  From: Gardeners.com -- For: $119.88

5. The Herb Savor – At number five, Prepara’s Herb Savor organizes your cuttings into a clean, space-saving container that keeps herbs fresh for weeks. From: Prepara.com -- For: $29.95

For the top four products ...  Click here. 

Questions/Suggestions/Comments? tmiller@ogdenpubs.com
*All products personally sampled by Taylor Miller
**All prices as of 10.22.08

Two months ago, I received a complete worm composting system from Uncle Jim’s Worm Farms. Having 4,000 worms arrive in a package frightened one of my unsuspecting coworkers, but so far, my experience with worm composting has been deliciously disturbing. 

This is the Worm Factory, which advertises itself as an incredibly-efficient, easy and odorless method for recycling kitchen waste into nutrient-rich compost.  Or growing fishing worms!

Politically named a “vermicomposter,” each factory comes with several bins to fill with bedding and food material, along with red wigglers (Eisenia fetida).  The composting system recreates the recycling process in nature at an advanced pace using thousands of worms and millions of bacteria.  

The Worm Factory is most certainly efficient – perhaps a little too efficient.  The worms are expected to double in numbers by month 3, so, soon, I should have nearly 8,000 worms that require half a pound a food (minus meat and dairy) a day. That’s a lot of wigglers!

After the digestion process, worms secret “worm castings” (poo-poos) that are rich in natural nitrogen, an important fertilizer for soil.  Unlike with sensitive artificial fertilizers, worm castings won’t burn your plants.

You can use the soil-like material left in the bins after composting is completed in potting mix or top soil, or collect “Compost Tea” – liquid fertilizer – at any time from a spigot on the front of the factory. 

The composter, if used correctly, as an earthy smell, so it can be used indoors.  Odors occur only when meat or dairy is placed in the composter (a big no-no) or if there is too much food, in which case any kind of fiber can be added such as dryer lint, tissue, wood chips, egg shells, shredded paper, vacuum dust or junk mail (all of which are composted!).

I should say, that to date, my composter is very clean, no red wigglers have crawled out, and no offensive odors have been noted. 

But I just can’t bring the worms into my kitchen – just like I just couldn’t eat green or purple ketchup (remember that?)  The vermicomposter has to be in a temperature between 60 and 80 degrees, so for me, they are safe and out of the way in my garage.

Vermicomposters can ultimately attract other types of bugs, some good and some bad (such fruit flies or fungus gnats [read: Your Fungus Gnats are Showing]), and should be avoided around cats who might use it as a litterbox.

Why?  Cats can be infected by a parasitic protozoa called Toxoplasma gondii, which can result in an infection called Toxoplasmosis.  This infection is one reason why pregnant women should STAY AWAY from cat litter. 

But, in a creepy way, the infection is really cool: T. gondii affects a rodent's natural fear of cats (surgically precise - ONLY its fear of cats), so they are less likely to flee when a cat is near.  When cats prey on the affected rodents, they become carriers, with a high instance of the protozoa in their urine.

The infection, along with the high level of ammonia can be toxic to both you and your worms.  In humans, active toxoplasmosis can cause neurological disorders, organ infections and even death.  Latent infections can cause anxiety issues, feelings of in-security or neuroticism, just what we need, huh?

Keep your cats away from the worms, and all will be right in the world.  Rodents aren't a problem if you don't try to compost meat or dairy.

If you have any questions about vermicomposting, leave a comment or send me an email.  I’ll be happy to provide you with specific and further information about this delightfully disgusting art of recycling.  

October is my favorite month.  I get REALLY excited about Halloween*.  I especially love reading Martha Stewart’s Halloween issue.  But, when cutting out construction paper bats and applying a perfectly manicured mansion to the top of a three-layer cake just becomes too laborious, I go out and look for my own terrifying trinkets, and I’d like to share with you a few of my finds!

1.  Use your Hosta -- By now, your Hosta flowers should be about spent, leaving their white, lonely sticks jutting into the air like skeleton fingers.  Normally you might just trim them down, but this year, recycle your plant.  Using both hands, gently pull each of the sticks from the plant.  They are very brittle, so pull from the base.  The long shoots (three of mine are over 6 feet!) make for a creepy vase arrangement, but one that could work year-round.

2.  Use your Day lily – Harvested the same way, Day Lily sticks are much less brittle, which makes them more accessible for other uses.  I took last year’s sticks and with a long piece of jute twine, tied them to a small broken tree branch to make an authentic and unique witch’s broom.  You could also trim and de-leaf your Spirea bushes for a smaller broom.  

The chandelier in my dining room is boring, so I hung some sticks from it tied with spent Morning Glory vines, to up the creep factor.  Day lily sticks also look great just in a vase, and cleaned Morning Glory vines could be draped eeriely almost anywhere.

3.  Use your old records -- These record bowls are great candy dishes (especially for candy corn), not to mention great conversational pieces.  Plus, they’re easy to make:  Find an old record or buy one cheap at a thrift shop.  Put a terracotta pot upside down on a cookie sheet, place the record on top, set the oven at 200 and watch it melt, it won’t take long.

4.  Use your artistic skills – Art projects are fun for the family or for parties.  To make this Hocus Pocus inspired spell-book, I took a hollowed-out book from a craft shop and covered it in a polymer clay called Bake-n-Bend, which doesn’t harden until baked.  I found a pair of mannequin eyes and hand-stitched the cover to look like human skin as described in the movie.

5.  Use your imagination. --  Find things in your garden you could use and be creative.  These are birdhouse gourds I grew two years ago that are just waiting to be painted and hung from the ceiling.    

If you find or come up with any fun ideas, drop a comment!  Or, if you want any help with some of mine, email me.

* My love for Halloween is best represented by this lady’s love of surprise parties.  From SNL. Ooooomiiiiiiigodddddddd