Recycle your household waste into useful items for the organic garden. Organic gardeners spend a lot of time and ingenuity thinking of new items to add to the compost bin. However, even if that wicker chair did eventually break down into something resembling organic matter, we must concede that many of our discards weren’t meant to become…
Organic gardeners can experiment with winter sowing methods to start seeds of hardy vegetables, flowers, and cover crops outdoors; no greenhouse is required. Traditionally, there has been a time in the winter months when the gardener must appraise the success of the past season while the garden lies fallow. The duration of this fallow period…
Great changes take place within a compost pile so that it becomes greater than the sum of its parts – there are more usable nitrates than in the original material. “Good micro-organisms in the finished compost protect and nurture plants Composting can be anaerobic or aerobic and be made as a batch or continuously. Anaerobic…
The best care for flowers, vegetables or a lush green lawn begins with preparing the soil by digging in lots of organic matter down deep where plant roots wander. Whether starting a new organic vegetable garden, or renovating an old flower bed, proper soil preparation will pave the way to long-term soil fertility and healthy…
Easy to grow coleus with its bright colored foliage is making a comeback in the shady garden, and as an indoor plant for home and office. Brightly colored Coleus (Solenostemon) plants were brought to England in the mid-1800s by botanist and explorer Karl Blume, who had found them growing wild on the tropical island of…
Annual plants grow and flower quickly and these annuals are perfect additions to a nose-pleasing fragrance garden. Which scents will you add to your garden? Scented Geranium (Pelargonium spp.) Zones 9-11. Scented geraniums are actually Pelargoniums and should not be confused with hardy garden Geraniums. They do, however, have a great place in the fragrance garden…
Whether your shade garden is well-drained and somewhat dry, or moist and somewhat boggy, there are flowering plants for your full shade landscape plot. These five flowering plants are able to provide gardeners with lots of color even in full shade garden beds. 1. Foamflower (Tiarella cordifolia) for Moist Shade Gardens Foamflowers have attractive flower…
To draw more butterflies to the yard, plant a garden of their favorite flowers. Here are a few suggestions. Sunny mornings or balmy evenings on the porch aren’t complete without a few butterflies to watch. The fragile, colorful visitors make garden chores more pleasant, too. Children, in particular, find butterflies fascinating. To draw more of…
Invasive plants may be alien or native, but all have the ability to become superabundant at the expense of neighboring plants. The effects of invasive plants on neighboring plants vary, but each has the ability to become established and abundant at the expense of native species. These plants grow around, on top of, or below…
Birds disperse the seeds of invasive plants that often crowd or even kill native plants. Yet, these berries are often essential, providing birds with needed nutrients. Hikers walking along the edges of woodlands in late fall and early winter are often amazed by large masses of red berries on shrubs and trees. These berries serve…
Learn some guidelines for using evergreens in the garden to provide winter interest. Look at the types of evergreens available, and variety of uses for your landscape. In the winter, evergreen plants move from the background elements we build the rest of our gardens around, to the primary players that are hugely important. A winter…
See the best of the new perennial plants available to home gardeners. New colors, healthier plants and interesting flower forms can all be found. This new year finds gardeners with many new plant choices to use in their gardens, containers and flower borders this year. Here are some of the best and most unique new…
See the best of the new annual plants available to home gardeners. New colors, healthier plants and interesting flower forms can all be found. Annual plants add quick color, long-lasting flowers and great accents to garden beds, borders and containers. Here are some of the best new annuals of the new year. 1. Ginger ‘Tahitian…
Whether gas, corded or cordless (battery), the grass trimmer’s string feed system is critical. Here’s how to choose the best for your purposes. Grass trimmers are used for precision cutting of grass that has been missed by mowers. Instead of steel blades, nylon string is used to cut the grass. This is safer and…
The charming Japanese Painted Fern is a hardy and colorful addition to any shade garden design. It is easy to see why the Japanese Painted Fern variety “Pictum” was chosen Perennial of the Year in 2004. Rising in a graceful arch, its lacy silvery-green fronds unfurl from a blood red stem to display a soft…
Heart-shaped pink and white flowers delicately dangling from graceful arching stems of lacey foliage make Bleeding Hearts a favorite flower in the spring garden. The distinctive heart-shaped flowers of Dicentra spectabilis have inspired a romantic tale of love and loss. Carefully separating the flower blossom, the ears of a pink rabbit, a pair of delicate pink slippers…
A sustainable collection of flowering plants begins with lamb’s ear. Stachys, Geranium, Nepeta, Salvia and Monarda are sun loving perennials for a summer garden. Stachys is the soft wooly lamb’s ear plant gardeners like brushing their hands against. However, the Stachys called common betony is a lamb’s ear too, but with larger stiff green leaves and tall flower…
Plant a special garden filled with colorful, sun-loving flowers. These easy-go-grow favorites will keep it looking good all season long. Plants have different light requirements, and to ignore them is folly. Choosing flowers for a sunny garden will be a rewarding experience as long as the plants’ light requirements are compatible with the light available…
Perennial flowers once tall can now be found in shorter varieties fitting a petite garden. These small plants will bloom spring through summer in a sunny border garden. This perennial idea will fit in a petite garden because it uses shorter more compact plants. Planted together in full sun, this bloom sequence runs spring through…
These half hardy herbaceous plants give a stunning garden display and are easy to grow, but at risk from winter frost. However, overwintering dahlia tubers is quite easy. Dahlias are one of the most popular and versatile of ornamental flowering plants. They have a long history as garden plants; today there are over 50,000 different dahlia…
Divide tubers and root cuttings to increase dahlia plants and provide masses of cut flowers from late summer through to the first frost. There are two schools of thought on dahlia tubers: Leave them in the ground through the winter, or dig them and store them. For Tubers that Have Wintered Over in the Garden…
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