Unless you garden in a temperate or tropical zone you may be one of those unfortunates who simply can’t get enough of gardening. The calender may state exactly when spring, summer, autumn and winter begin but we know that don’t mean Jack! Spring time in the Carolinas, Texas and Kansas is quite a bit different than it is in Montana, Maine and Michigan. Only the Northerner can explain the horror of a blizzard dropping an incredible 8-12 inches of snow on the first day of spring. Good-bye, Crocus! We’ll see you when the snow melts.

The short growing season is the culprit and a sad business it is indeed, a nasty thorn in our sides, in fact. Because of it we northern gardeners will do just about anything to extend it. Therefore, we shall discuss the many ways the sufferers of the short growing season have discovered, invented and created to lengthen the way-too-short growing season.

Before you will start with composting, you need to select which compost bin to use. Your choice must be based on what kind of compost to make such as newspapers, grass clippings, food leftovers, or perhaps a mixture of all.

Your choice of a compost bin will also be dependent on where you are planning to compost, either indoor or outdoor and also on what purpose why you make a compost, is it only for a hobby or for any full sized garden? To support you with these factors, below are the five items to follow.

First, get a measuring tape and get the width, height and length of the place where you plan to make the compost bin. You've got to take into account the height particularly if you are going for an expandable style of tumbler.

Vermiculture or vermicomposting comes from the Latin term vermis, meaning worms. Vermicomposting employs earthworms to change organic waste material into high quality compost. Vermicomposting changes many types of different kitchen waste into a into a nutrient-rich fertilizer for your garden.

Vermicompost, or vermiculture, most often uses two species of worms, red wigglers or red earthworms, which are rarely found in soil and are adapted to the special conditions in rotting vegetation, compost and manure piles.

Some of the benefits of Vermicomposting include:

The colder weather is upon us and the question being asked is, "What should I do with my organic garden in the winter." "How do I keep my organic garden in shape during the winter months"? "Growing a Vegetable Garden in Winter?" Follow along to find out your winter organic gardening questions with the Friday's Organic Gardening Around The Web segment.

"There are two things that determine your success as an organic gardener - soil and weather. You can change soil; you cannot change weather.

How cold it gets in Winter and how hot it gets in Summer can help you predict whether a particular plant struggles or thrives in your garden... Weather Basics for Organic Gardeners.

Don't you just love that lovely soft blanket of white that undulates over your lawn and garden plots? Doesn't it just bring winter joy to your soul?

Okay, maybe not. Maybe you're one of the people who sees winter as a long season before the only real important season comes along. You call the good season "Growing Season."

In either case, there is plenty you can do for your garden now, in the winter conditions many of us find ourselves in, that will help your garden get a head start in the Spring.

COMPOST

Caring for your lawn in an organic manner can be much easier than you might think. And when you implement an organic care system for your lawn, you can not only keep your lawn healthy, you can also avoid spreading toxic chemicals that are often found in other lawn care mixes and sprays. There are just a few simple changes you’ll need to make in order to care for your lawn in a more earth friendly manner.

Many times you’ll see your neighbors watering their lawns in the morning and the evening. However, this is actually something that does not benefit your lawn in the least. If you water more infrequently, this will encourage the grass roots to dig deeper into the soil, helping the grass to better establish itself deeper than the roots of the weeds. This will give the grass more moisture from deeper soil, while the weeds will naturally die out due to a lack of water nearer the top of the soil.

I have never seen the sense in spending hundreds of dollars on composting equipment when the best techniques require a minimal investment . If we are as similar as I believe we are, you plainly don't have the assets to go about composting this way...

...But what if I could tell you there was an trouble-free, inexpensive, very valuable option at your disposal?

The method I use by design includes something you should be using in any practice you employ: straw bales.

If you have any straw bales handy, you can use them to make a very efficient compost bin. In case you don't have some bales laying around they are very inexpensive and a terrific resource that you should purchase anyway. Here is how I make the most of the straw to produce a simple compost bin.

Every Friday we will be adding a post to our Organic Gardening Tips blog called "Friday's Organic Gardening Around The Web." We will have a new topic each week for the Friday feature from various sources around the Internet.

We subscribed to many different organic gardening newsletters and gardening feeds, plus our daily web surfing provides us with plenty of gardening information that we feel will be helpful to others.

Row covers will be the feature subject in our first "Friday's Organic Gardening Around The Web."

Those of us who live in the warmer regions of our country have the advantage of creating fall vegetable gardens and that would include turnips, spinach, Chinese cabbage, chard, rutabagas, cauliflower, radishes, carrots, onions, cabbage, mustard, broccoli, lettuce, beets, kohlrabi, bush beans and snap beans.

That’s quite a variety of good food to be putting on your table during the winter and one of the secrets to planting a fall garden is to plan it in the spring when you are buying the seeds for your spring and summer plantings because you will indeed need the seeds and many times it is almost impossible to pick up seeds at your local garden supply store in the fall.

Employing worms in organic gardening is wonderful for aerating the soil, keeping the soil active and loose, and aiding with composting.

A good fertilizer or a good compost is worm castings, which is the feces from the worms, plus the worms themselves. It's really great stuff.

What we have done in lawns in the past, is when we have aerated, we have actually taken the worms physically and kind of thrown them out on the lawn getting them to go within the ground. We use products like Medina Soil Activator, molasses, and seaweed, this is what feeds them and keeps them going. That is not exactly what they all do but that is part of what the process does and they help keep the soil alive and loose by the worms being active.