Heirloom seeds and garden stories from the shore of Saginaw Bay, Zone 6a Michigan.
This is a small raised-bed garden in Bay City, Michigan, tended by someone who gets up before dawn most mornings to check the seedlings before the day begins. The freighters move through the bay channel year-round, slower in winter, more of them in summer, and the garden follows the same unhurried rhythm. Cherokee Purples and shishito peppers, seeds saved in paper envelopes, bread baked from the kitchen that smells like the garden when the basil is still warm from the sun.
What’s Growing
It is high summer on the bay. The tomatoes are climbing their stakes, the first snow peas and broccolini have already come through the kitchen, and the leafcutter bees are out working the beds. The freighters are frequent now, and the garden asks for water, patience, and not much else.
Latest from the Garden
- The Leafcutter Bees Have Arrived: A Gentle Summer Workforce for the GardenChris Izworski sets out this year’s leafcutter bees at Freighter View Farms on Saginaw Bay. How these gentle, low-maintenance solitary pollinators arrive, settle in, and help a Zone 6a garden thrive.
- First Snow Peas of the Season: A Cool Spring and the Sweetness It Left BehindChris Izworski cuts the season’s first snow peas at Freighter View Farms on Saginaw Bay. How a slow, cool Zone 6a spring held their sweetness into a late June harvest.
- First Broccolini of the Season: An Early April Transplant and June’s Quiet RewardChris Izworski cuts the season’s first broccolini at Freighter View Farms on Saginaw Bay. How an early April transplant in Zone 6a became June’s quiet reward.
- The Chive Blossoms, and the Jar of Pink They BecameFor about two weeks every spring the chives stop being an herb and start being a fireworks display. The clumps that spent all winter as nothing, then all of April as a fistful of green… Read more: The Chive Blossoms, and the Jar of Pink They Became
- The Garden Is In, and the Season TurnsThe bay was a flat sheet of silver this morning, the kind of early June water that has finally let go of its winter temper and decided to behave. I carried my coffee out past… Read more: The Garden Is In, and the Season Turns
Browse the Garden
Seed Saving
The fermentation method, drying on ceramic plates, shelling beans at the kitchen table while the bay freezes.
Heirloom Tomatoes
Twenty varieties tested in Zone 6a raised beds. The five that earn a permanent place. The one that tastes like nothing else.
Zone 6a Planning
Month by month from onions in February to garlic in October. What to start when, and why the timing matters more than almost anything.
Flowers and Pollinators
Zinnias at every edge, cosmos in the gaps, marigolds that do real work.
Best of the Garden
The posts that have lasted, the ones worth reading first.
Freighter View Farms | Chris Izworski 