This is Offbeat Home's archive of Plants & Gardening posts.

These posts cover vegetables, flower gardens, houseplants, and the trails and tribulations associated with them.

Most Recent Posts About Plants & Gardening

I do not care what you say; the BEST snack food in the world is edamame. Green, healthy, savory, salty — steamed soybeans have the popability of potato chips, and it's so easy to drop a ton of money on frozen packs of them at the grocery.

I broke free of the frozen food aisle a couple years ago when I planted my first rows of soybeans. Last year, I broke 20 pounds of pods come harvest time — I'm hooked. Here is what I love about the amazingly snackable bean.

Great idea of the day: fill a foyer with plants Get inspired »

I'm gonna give y'all some city vegetable gardening tips that might help you save some cash and beef up your summer dinner menu at the same time. You see what I did there? Food pun!
Let's look at some truths.

We moved into our homestead back in 2006 when it was just a blank canvas of lawn, with a couple old rose bushes here and there. After six years of major landscape changes, it’s about time I got around to making a decent planting plan of the homestead. Using AutoCAD and Illustrator, I came up with a pretty rad (and full-color!) homesteading map.

I'm using my big windows to power a hydroponic garden I hacked together with plastic bottles and a few supplies from Amazon. It is automated, and takes care of the hard stuff for me.

Yo, hopeful gardeners! Check in! How's everything looking with your starter seedlings?

If you haven't already, it's a good time to look at your babies and see who's past the germination deadline without showing any green. Some of my seeds have a very long germination time (10-14 days) but once two weeks is up and I haven't seen any proto-leaves, those little things are quickly replaced with new seeds.

This year I'm planting a bigger variety of plants than I ever have before. I've started most of them already (all that I had toilet paper rolls for!) because I have a feeling we're in for a warm spring. I don't think I'm going to have to worry about frost as late as I have in years past — so I'm kind of starting all my stuff at once. If I'm wrong, well…then I'll just start again. I've been late in planting seeds in the past, and everything turned out all right, so if I end up starting something late because I THOUGHT it was already covered, it's not the end of the world.

I've been saving up my toilet paper rolls ALL WINTER. Last week, I proudly harvested them from the bathroom cupboard, sliced them all in half, and used them to start my garden.

I just refuse to buy those little peat pots and seed starter plugs. They cost so darn much and don't have any advantage to a bag of starting soil and one of these reuse-ier solutions!

The traps and tricks carnivorous plants use to snag insects and small vertebrates are fascinating examples of adaptation. These five plants are a great addition to your cabinet of curiosities — if you can keep them alive! Luckily, I've got a little info on a simpler carnivorous plant, should you want to give it a go.