Napa Master Gardener Column

More than twenty thousand years ago, a major ice age spread across the northern latitudes of North America, Europe, and Asia and all the earthworms died. For millennia, these regions had no earthworms.

If you're a gardener in Napa Valley, you know that winter is not the off season it is elsewhere. In our climate, we can always plant something. When I walk into a nursery at this time of year, I feel like the proverbial kid in the candy store.

A few weeks ago, some friends were over for dinner, and I was throwing food scraps into my miniature compost bin that fits under my kitchen sink (free from the City of Napa). One gentleman told me he didn't compost. It's easy, I said. The UC Master Gardeners have workshops on it all the time.

When I was still living at home with my parents, I remember my mother loving the succulent known as hens and chicks (Sempervivum spp.). They were often planted along highways. To be honest, I was not impressed with them. But today, I am very impressed.

Sometimes I think I should write a book called Gardening for Geezers. For those of us of a certain age, the idea of creeping about on all fours, even equipped with kneepads, is not a felicitous prospect. Some of us even need canes or wheelchairs.