TILL THE SOIL, SURF THE NET : GARDENERS GO ONLINE TO FIND INFORMATION THEY OFTEN CAN'T FIND ANYWHERE ELSE.Byline: Elizabeth M. Cosin Daily News Staff Writer Most gardeners who have sowed enough seeds and weathered enough seasons know that being born with a green thumb isn't the secret to having your own Garden of Eden Garden of Eden n. See Eden. Noun 1. Garden of Eden - a beautiful garden where Adam and Eve were placed at the Creation; when they disobeyed and ate the forbidden fruit from the tree of knowledge of good and evil they were . You can talk your plants through only so many rough spots. Comes a time, eventually, when even the most experienced gardeners run into problems they can't solve with know-how, a visit to the nursery or a quick perusal of their reference collection. ``The one thing I did recently, and I don't know Don't know (DK, DKed) "Don't know the trade." A Street expression used whenever one party lacks knowledge of a trade or receives conflicting instructions from the other party. how I did it, was look up a plant I couldn't find anywhere else,'' says Beverly Brune, president-elect of California Garden Clubs Inc. ``I grow epiphyllum (an orchidlike cactus that grows 6-inch flowers) and have them in hanging baskets. I was able to find pictures and colors and how to fertilize them and all that.'' Brune, a retiree and longtime member of garden clubs, keeps a wide variety of exotic plants around the pool of her Westlake Village home. A newcomer to computers, she has only recently discovered the value of the Internet in helping to track down details about plants, many of which are not native to her area. She is not alone. These days, answers to all sorts of gardening questions can be found with the newest gadget in the gardener's toolshed tool·shed n. A small building in which tools are kept. Noun 1. toolshed - a shed for storing tools toolhouse shed - an outbuilding with a single story; used for shelter or storage - and you don't have to get dirty to use it. Computers are fast becoming critical for gardeners who need information they aren't able to find elsewhere. Hundreds of sites are now within reach on the Internet, and garden and landscape CD-ROM CD-ROM: see compact disc. CD-ROM in full compact disc read-only memory Type of computer storage medium that is read optically (e.g., by a laser). titles are available to help with everything from plant definitions to garden designs. ``If you can get online, you can talk to other people in the Los Angeles Los Angeles (lôs ăn`jələs, lŏs, ăn`jəlēz'), city (1990 pop. 3,485,398), seat of Los Angeles co., S Calif.; inc. 1850. area and share problems or get answers,'' says Rachel Mabie, urban horticulture Urban and peri-urban horticulture (UPH) includes all horticultural crops grown for human consumption and ornamental use within and in the immediate surroundings of cities. Although crops have always been grown inside the city, the practice is expanding and gaining more attention. adviser for Common Ground, the gardening program of University of California's Cooperative Extension. ``If your hobby is cacti or succulents, you can go online and talk to someone in Arizona and get information. Or if you are into roses, you can hook Can´ hook` 1. A device consisting of a short rope with flat hooks at each end, for hoisting casks or barrels by the ends of the staves. up with people all over the world who grow roses. It's really a wonderful thing.'' Common Ground isn't yet teaching online techniques, but Mabie's staff is already trying out reference CD-ROMs to help answer public inquiries and hopes one day to have a page up on the World Wide Web. Brune chats often with members of her organization though e-mail and hopes someday to have the California Garden Clubs up on the Web. Membership director Virginia Bennetts of Danville, Calif., also dabbles online for gardening information and plans on presenting a preliminary proposal at the group's next statewide board meeting (scheduled for next month in Fresno) to investigate going online. America Online See AOL. features one of many online forums, or newsgroups This is a list of newsgroups that are significant for their popularity or their position in Usenet history. As of October 2002, there are about 100,000 Usenet newsgroups, of which approximately a fifth are active. , where gardening enthusiasts can share problems, solutions and ask questions about everything from container gardening to composting and pest control pest control n → control m de plagas pest control n → lutte f contre les nuisibles pest control pest n . More than 400 messages were posted this year on AOL's Southern California Southern California, also colloquially known as SoCal, is the southern portion of the U.S. state of California. Centered on the cities of Los Angeles and San Diego, Southern California is home to nearly 24 million people and is the nation's second most populated region, message board, with people asking for advice on starting up gardening businesses, choosing the right plants for Los Angeles' arid weather and dealing with ants, gophers and other garden pests. The Internet is loaded with all kinds of gardening information, and many commercial nurseries and farms maintain their own Web sites, so be prepared to get hit up to buy stuff. Whitney Farms out of Oregon has a monthly online newsletter called the Dirt, which features stories and information on organic gardening and growing exotic plants and vegetables. It even maintains a message board for gardeners to interact. Gardening.com is another site, offered by Books That Work of Palo Alto Palo Alto, city, California Palo Alto (păl`ō ăl`tō), city (1990 pop. 55,900), Santa Clara co., W Calif.; inc. 1894. Although primarily residential, Palo Alto has aerospace, electronics, and advanced research industries. , Calif., and is filled with all kinds of information on gardening. It includes a list of companies that have toll-free information numbers and a fairly detailed guide to virtual magazines, as well as a plant database to search for what will grow in a particular climate. Private Web sites like the Garden Gate, a noncommercial page run by Midwest gardening enthusiast Karen Fletcher, has one of the more useful sites, with a variety of information, including an easy-to-use guide to help green-thumbed Web surfers find what they are looking for Looking for In the context of general equities, this describing a buy interest in which a dealer is asked to offer stock, often involving a capital commitment. Antithesis of in touch with. . GardenNet is another resource page, with information for rose aficionados, cactus lovers and fuchsia fuchsia: see evening primrose. fuchsia Any of about 100 species of flowering shrubs and trees in the genus Fuchsia (family Onagraceae), native to tropical and subtropical regions of Central and South America and to New Zealand and Tahiti. fanatics. You can even view photographs of award-winning flowers on the Net and get a good look at what that hybrid fuchsia is supposed to look like. Some sites are virtual doorways to some of the world's most famous botanical gardens A botanical garden is a place where plants, especially ferns, conifers and flowering plants, are grown and displayed for the purposes of research, conservation, and education. , so you can check out what the experts are up to without paying air fare. A garden enthusiast from Pasadena who goes online as Gypsyjane says she likes to peruse pe·ruse tr.v. pe·rused, pe·rus·ing, pe·rus·es To read or examine, typically with great care. [Middle English perusen, to use up : Latin per-, per- AOL's Garden Spot, which features a variety of topics for gardeners to discuss. She has gotten mixed results from her Web searches, however. ``I searched the Web under `tomatoes' and found some stuff, though most of it dealt with real gardens, rather than container gardening, which is my special interest,'' she says, adding that she doesn't like sites with too many advertisements. Many online users say they like the idea of using their computers to share questions, problems and even give solutions. It's akin to having thousands of virtual neighbors. ``That's absolutely the best part about it,'' Bennetts says. ``There's always someone out there who can help you.'' But if the Internet is too daunting daunt tr.v. daunt·ed, daunt·ing, daunts To abate the courage of; discourage. See Synonyms at dismay. [Middle English daunten, from Old French danter, from Latin (or too expensive) for you, there are nearly 50 personal gardening CD-ROM titles on the shelves - more than twice as many as in 1995 - according to according to prep. 1. As stated or indicated by; on the authority of: according to historians. 2. In keeping with: according to instructions. 3. PC Data of Reston, Va. Sales have increased from about $6 million in 1994 to an estimated $13 million by the end of this year. Sierra On-Line's Land Designer 3D and Land Designer/Gardens, and Books That Work's 3D Landscape are the top three sellers among a group dominated by design titles. Microsoft Complete Gardening and Better Homes & Gardens' Gardening are among the top-selling database titles. You can test-drive a number of CD-ROMs online by navigating to their Web sites and downloading programs, but most often you'll only get a taste. If you want the whole shebang Noun 1. whole shebang - everything available; usually preceded by `the'; "we saw the whole shebang"; "a hotdog with the works"; "we took on the whole caboodle"; "for $10 you get the full treatment" , head to your computer store and prepare to pay anywhere from $8 to $70, with an average price of about $34. Cyberspace's garden guide For our mini-search of gardening sites on the Web, we plugged the term ``gardening'' into several of the major search engines, and it usually got us in the vicinity of home gardening pages. As with other types of Web sites, many pages have hyperlinks to other pages, giving surfers more than one way to find what they are looking for. Here's a very brief list of some of the sites we found. There are hundreds of others, so happy surfing. The Dirt Newsletter Organic gardening information from Whitney Farms, an organic farm in Independence, Ore. Also includes message boards and advice spots. http://www.whitneyfarm.com/dirt.htm The Garden Gate Great links to other gardening sites and some helpful information, including a good guide on how to search for what you need. (Note: site is often busy). http://www.prairienet.org/garden/homepage.html Gardening.com Informational site sponsored by Books That Work. Full of information on all facets of gardening. Easy to navigate and find. Many links. http://www.gardening.com The Swedish Fuchsia Society All kinds of information about fuchsias in both Swedish and English. Includes full-color photos and where to find fellow fuchsia fanatics. http://www.klippo.se/nilsson/home.html Rosebud's Page An interesting guide maintained by a garden and Internet enthusiast with a great list of links to a dozen or so gardening and rose pages. http://www.maxinet.com/grunge The Hampton Roads Center Library This Hampton, Va., public library has a growing list of links to a variety of good gardening spots. A good place to start a Web search. http://www.sailfish sailfish, common name for a marine game and food fish belonging to the family Istiophoridae and related to the swordfish and the marlin. It is named for its high, wide dorsal fin, colored deep blue with black spots. .exis.net/(squiggly squig·gle n. A small wiggly mark or scrawl. intr.v. squig·gled, squig·gling, squig·gles 1. To squirm and wriggle. 2. To make squiggles. line)cwt/gardn.html CAPTION(S): 4 Photos, Box Photo: (1--Cover--Color) How does your garden grow online? (2--Color) An Internet search can turn up personal home pages, such as the Garden Gate, maintained by Midwest gardening enthusiast Karen Fletcher. (3--Color) Ever wonder whether that weird-looking plant in your pot is supposed to look that way? Compare it to photos available on such Web pages as this collection of fuchsia hybrids, put online by the Swedish Fuchsia Society. (4--Color) Maintained by Whitney Farms of Independence, Ore., an online newsletter called the Dirt contains stories and information on organic gardening and growing exotic plants and vegetables. Box: (Color) Cyberspace's garden guide (See text) |
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