Top three garden lists

Five Easy-to-Grow Spring Veggies

• Sugar or Snap Peas – Start from seed or buy six-packs from the nursery. Harvest in 60-70 days.
• Radishes – Start from seed. Harvest in 30 days.
• Lettuces – Use six-packs. Harvest in 45-80 days. Bolt easily, so get them in the ground now.
• Beets – From seed to harvest in 60 days.
• Swiss chard – From seed to harvest in 40-60 days. Six-packs are faster.

Five Colorful California Native Plants

 These water wise, habitat friendly plants can be installed now for late spring and summer blossoms.

• Blue Bedder – Penstemon heterophyllus “Margarita BOP” or “Blue Springs.” Blue flowers.
• Pink Yarrow – Achillea millefolium “ Island Pink.” Pink flowers.
• California Fuchsia – Epilobium spp. Many cultivars. Orangy-red flowers.
• Sea Side Daisy – Erigeron “Wayne Roderick” – hybrid for inland regions. Lavender flowers.
• Sulphur Buckwheat – Eriogonum umbellatum var. polyanthum “Shasta Sulphur.” Yellow flowers.

 My Five favorite Gardening Tools

• Felco Pruners F6 – F6 hand pruners are ideal for smaller hands. Great ergonomic design.
• Hori Hori Knife – A great combination knife-trowel tool for digging small holes, cutting weed roots, and transferring seedlings.
• Hula Hoe — A hoe with a stirrup shaped end and an oscillating blade. Great for decapitating weeds in gravel paths.
• Tub Trugs – A lightweight recycled rubber lugging tub for hauling bark, tools, weeds, etc.
• Atlas Nitril 370 gardening gloves — Comfortable. Inexpensive. Breathable.

— Karen Boness, Sun Gardening Editor