About the Journal
About Iris Bramble
I have been gardening for twenty years across two coasts and four climate zones, and mostly I keep notes so I do not make the same mistakes twice. This journal is those notes, lightly tidied up for anyone who wants to read over my shoulder.
How I got here
I started gardening in 2006 on a north-facing apartment patio in Boston, in about nine square feet of container space, which I promptly killed most of in the first summer. Since then I have gardened in zones 6a, 7a, 5b, and now 8b here in Portland, Oregon. Each move taught me that almost nothing transfers between zones without adjustment, and that most gardening writing is written for someone else's climate.
I am not a horticulturist. I do not have a degree in plant science. What I have is two decades of a heavy notebook and a tendency to write down everything that went wrong, including the things I was certain I would remember but did not.
What I write about
- Vegetables. Tomatoes, peppers, brassicas, beans, the standbys that earn their dirt. Seed-starting, succession planting, and what actually ripens before first frost in zone 8b.
- Perennials. Drought-tolerant picks, pollinator plants, native-adjacent choices for the Pacific Northwest, and the ones that surprised me by thriving on neglect.
- Soil and compost. Raised-bed mixes I have iterated on for years, compost setups for small yards, the amendments worth buying and the ones that are mostly marketing.
- Pests and problems. Aphids, slugs, powdery mildew, verticillium wilt, the full parade. Written from experience, not fear.
- Small spaces. Patios, balconies, 4x8 raised beds, the entire category of gardens that do not look like magazine gardens but still feed people.
How I write
Every entry is written from my own garden, in my own hands, with my own failures included. I occasionally use AI for the same reasons any writer uses a reference book or a search engine, to check a spelling of a cultivar name or a nitrogen ratio. Nothing goes up until I have read it back out loud and confirmed I would stand behind every number, every variety, every recommendation.
When something changes, I update the entry instead of letting it drift. Zone maps have shifted, cultivars get discontinued, my own opinions evolve after a few more seasons. The date at the top is the original post date. Any revisions get a note at the bottom.
How this stays free
Display advertising, mostly through Google. No sponsored plant roundups. No paid-to-recommend seed catalogs. If I mention Johnny's Selected Seeds or FoxFarm Ocean Forest, it is because those are what is on my own shelves, and the bag or packet in question has the dirt of my garden on it.
Write to me
Email hello@gsearch.io. Corrections, questions about my zone, stories from your own garden, or photos of something I said wouldn't work. I read everything. See the contact page for the rest.
The Pot & Plot Journal · Portland, Oregon · Keeping garden notes since April 2026.