Gardeners can find seeds, soil mixes and other gardening items at local hardware stores, big box stores and nurseries, which are still open but have restricted hours due to the coronavirus threat.
“Support your local businesses by buying your seeds there,” said Pam Wolfe of Round Lake, a master gardener and former horticultural worker at a local greenhouse. “My husband bought seeds for me at the local Ace Hardware store.”
Local nurseries, including Hawthorn Gardens in Hawthorn Woods as well as Country Bumpkin in Mundelein, will deliver orders curbside at the stores.
Kim Isaacson, horticulture program coordinator for University of Illinois Extension/Lake County in Grayslake, said Hawthorn Gardens will help beginning gardeners choose what to purchase.
“You can order what you need online — for example two packages of spinach, two packages of leaf lettuce and soilless mix — and then have them bring it to your car when you arrive,” Isaacson said.
While supplies last, Pasquesi Home and Gardens in Lake Bluff has an online take-out menu. Patrons can order lettuce bowls, various herbs and cool season vegetables like lettuces and arugula online, then pick them up at the store.
Online seed companies also sell vegetable gardening supplies. Isaacson and Wolfe suggested Seeds of Change, Harris Seeds and the Territorial Seed Company.
Isaacson said the on-site master gardener program at the University of Illinois Extension has been suspended until at least May 31. That includes all the programs featuring master gardeners at local libraries and other venues, she said.
Gardeners with questions can contact master gardeners via email at uiemg-lake@illinois.edu. More information can be found online at https://web.extension.illinois.edu/veggies and https://web.extension.illinois.edu/herbs.
Cindy Julian, a board member of Central Gardeners of Lake County, suggested searching libraries online for information on raising vegetables. Some libraries make it easy to read gardening books via a home computer.
