In Search of Beets

I read with great delight Nancy McDonald's article "Flavorful Flower Beds" in the July/August issue of the magazine. As I have an edible garden that I change each year, I was particularly interested in what she had tried. I have grown many of the plants she wrote about but have had a hard time finding a source for one she mentioned, 'McGregor's Favourite' beets. I have seen them growing in display gardens and in the Boston Flower Show, and they are a wonderful foliage accent. Do you know of a source for this red-foliaged beet?

Ellen McFarland
Westwood, Massachusetts

Editor's Note: Nancy McDonald reports that she found seeds for 'McGregor's Favourite' beets at Chiltern Seeds. To order from Chiltern's, visit its Web site at www.edirectory.co.uk/chilternseeds/ or request a catalog by sending $5 in cash to: Chiltern Seeds, Bortree Stile, Ulverston, Cumbria, LA12 7PB, England. If you send a note with your catalog request stating that you learned about Chiltern's in The American Gardener, the company will include a voucher worth $5 off an order of more than £10 (about $16).

Soil Sifting

The discussion of soil sifters among the members of the Society (reported in the July/August "Gardeners Information Service" page) caught my attention. During most of the 40 years I have been gardening, I used a homemade A-frame sifter. It always seemed to me that I was doing a lot of excess work moving the soil from place to place. So finally I created a sifter that eliminates a lot of that extra soil movement.

I removed the metal safety grids from both ends of an old window fan and made a box frame using two-by-fours, with the four-inch width as the sides. I then attached the grids to one face of the box with three-quarter-inch galvanized netting staples. This made the sifter so rigid that no other support is necessary. Using my wheelbarrow, I can now move the sifter around the garden at will.

Greg Heirman
Northville, Michigan

Editor's Note: That's a great idea! If other readers have found creative ways to construct soil sifters, please share them with Members' Forum

Gardening for Seniors

I was pleased to read Rita Pelczar's article, "Maturity in the Garden," in the May/June issue. As a trained horticultural therapist, I contract to retirement and assisted living homes, working with the residents in gardening and related activities such as flower arranging and local garden tours. Most of the residents who participate in these activities had a garden of their own at one time and have many memories of those gardens.

Some residents who participate in no other activities at their facility participate in the gardening activities because they can always do something, such as filling pots with soil or using tools to loosen the soil in raised beds. These gardening and related activities-which are adapted to the physical abilities of the participants-provide residents with increased socialization opportunities and a feeling of accomplishment and ownership in their living environment. I am always thrilled to get gardening advice from these experienced gardeners.

I wanted to point out one correction to the box "Where to Look for Ideas." The Enid A. Haupt Glass Garden is at the Howard A. Rusk Institute of Rehabilitation Medicine, in the New York University Medical Center. The garden is a wonderful oasis in the midst of a busy hospital and city, and its horticultural therapy program is a model program.

Diane Burgess
Bloomin' Well
Renton, Washington