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Why is Vitamin D Making the News

One day I was writing my “Prairie Fare” column at my desk when the phone rang. The gentleman identified himself as a retired lawyer and mentioned the topic of a recent column I had written. He had read it in his local paper. I missed the part about him being a “retired” lawyer. What on earth had I written? Was I in trouble? Good news: He wanted to talk more about vitamin D. In a previous column, I had mentioned consuming adequate vitamin D as potentially related to immunity. To be honest, he was more well-versed in vitamin D research than I. He had been in a vitamin D ...

End of the Gardening Season

The gardening season is pretty much done for this year. It is time to put away all the cute yard ornaments, clean up and store tools, and do the last few garden maintenance items. A couple things you might not think of – make sure to have hoses drained before it freezes and have flower pots all cleaned out too. If you are not quite ready to give up on being outside, you could decorate your pots for autumn. To me though, the chill in the air says that it is time to do ‘inside’ things. I take a break from gardening for now, at least until the seed catalogs start arriving. Those ...

Putting your flower bed to bed

Frost came early this year for some and not so early for others. After a hard frost I cannot wait to get out there a yank all the dead plants out. By now, I am so tired of yard work and knowing I have about two weeks’ worth of work of clean up in the beds, I just dread fall! But wait, ...

Dakota Gardener: Growing garlic in North Dakota

Frost came early this year — much too early for most of us. After a hard frost, our natural tendency may be to put our gardens to bed. But wait a second. We still have a few things we can plant now, including garlic. A little effort now can lead to amazing flavors in your meals next ...

Prairie Fare: Enjoy apple season

“Mom, we forgot to bring the apple picker,” my older daughter said as we stood on tiptoe next to the tree on a sunny autumn day. An apple narrowly missed bouncing off my head as it dropped out of the tree. Yes, the apple picker would have come in handy. We were trying to reach plump ...

Are your houseplants back inside?

Hopefully, it is not too late to bring your houseplants in. That cold snap we had over Labor Day weekend really threw a curveball at us. Even though I was warned, there were a few plants that did not get brought in or at least set in the garage. Perhaps, I was in denial. My houseplants ...