Claire’s – Opened & Stocked with Organics

Botanical Interests Organic Seeds

      The temperature may be in the teens outside, but it is warm and welcoming inside Claire’s Garden Center in Patterson (ten minutes south of Pawling, on Haviland Hollow Road off of Route 22).   They are open for gardeners who wants to purchase supplies—because it is the closest we can get to actually working in the garden.  I was able to find almost everything on my shopping list on their well-stocked shelves.  There is an extensive supply of organic: seeds, amendments, and pest controls.  They even carry many of the hard to locate ingredients Steve Solomon recommends for the “complete organic fertilizer mix” in his book, Gardening When it Counts: gypsum, rock phosphate, bonemeal, green sand, and kelpmeal.

     Now, I sit by the fire, inputting the information from the back of my new seed packages onto my spreadsheet that will guide me throughout the season, as I wait for the ice and snow to melt.