Personal Stories


Travel Journal – Central Appalachia Wetlands and Carnivorous Plants

by Kristen Smeal, ABG Co President While traveling to visit family in Central Appalachia this Summer, I visited two sphagnum (peat) moss bogs; the Cranesville Swamp Preserve and Black Moshannon State Park. These two regions are similar in that they are at higher elevation in a basin-shaped landscape, which traps […]

Cranesville Swamp

Guerilla gardening with neighbors

Guerilla Gardening with Neighbors

Alameda Sun, Thursday, May 12, 2022 by Ann Naffziger, Alameda Backyard Growers About 10 years ago, my next-door neighbor and I were commiserating that we didn’t have enough sunny space in our yards to grow as many tomatoes, peppers, and eggplant as we could eat. Privately, I was intensely jealous […]


Farewell Interview with Jeff Bridge of Ploughshares Nursery

by Jeff Bridge, answering questions from ABG Board Member, Marla Koss Alameda Backyard Growers and so many of us as individuals have grown to love and depend on Ploughshares Nursery and its stalwart manager Jeff Bridge. In early October Jeff left Ploughshares to join a wholesale nursery in Petaluma. At […]

Jeff Bridge

gardens of hope

Alameda Gardens of Hope

  On the one-year anniversary of our reality being impacted by the pandemic, we want to hear your stories. When shelter-in-place was ordered last March, many people turned to gardening for solace and hope.  Did you start a garden for the first time since last March? Or, did you change […]


Happy New Year Gardening

Happy New Gardening Year! January 19 at 7:00 pm on Zoom Meeting Details: Thinking about starting a garden for the first time or just want to see some friendly faces? Please join Alameda Backyard Growers for Happy New Gardening Year. In this hour-long Zoom meeting we will talk about how […]

planting cover crops

Exotic Fruit Ice Cream in the Daintree

This fruit turns into this I just got back from a trip to Australia and one of the highlights was visiting a national park where the rainforest meets the Great Barrier Reef called the Daintree. On our way to the Daintree, a fabulous tip from the tourist information representative had […]