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On Saturdays, the Writer's Group would like to say thanks by presenting a "You Supply The Caption" photo. A gardening related photo will be presented, and you the Readers will provide humorous captions. The wit available on Dave's is some of the best around, so please join in the fun! This feature is not a "for compensation" article - just our way of saying Thanks for reading. Hope you enjoy...now let's hear some funny stuff!
Recently I described the more popular border-type bellflowers. In this article, I will intoduce you to uncommon yet equally desirable border bellflowers that are well worth trying to find!
I love Chinese food! Not the typical suburban fried “chicken balls” in psychedelic orange sauce but authentic, regional cuisines I learned about while living in Toronto’s original “china town”. We had a hard time finding a restaurant that served my familiar favorites when we moved to Atlanta, so I began growing vegetables I needed to make the food I loved. Soon I learned that many of these vegetables grow well in cool weather and are frost tolerant.
Nigella is one of my favorite biennials. Most people call it Love-in-a-Mist, but others refer to it as “Devil in the Bush.” I cannot imagine why this comely flower would be called such an uncomely name. For me, the first appellation is much more fitting. In spring its misty loveliness graces gardens throughout the country and beyond.
Tulips! In the Netherlands, they're everybody's favorite flower, the definitive harbinger of Spring. The speculative bubble of Tulip Mania may have burst centuries ago, but Tulipa mania is alive and well in the hearts of gardeners everywhere! With bulbs going on sale now, this is a great time to join in the excitement.
"Oh! You want to be careful with those pine needles," a garden visitor once warned me, as he spied the mulch in my salvia bed. "It'll bring your soil pH down to where it's too acid for those salvias."
I must be a creature of habit. I take my houseplants outside the first week in May, and I bring them back inside the middle of October. I have repeated this activity for at least the last fifteen years. The problem is, I really don't like houseplants.
The air is crisp, the sky is blue and you are surrounded by more brilliant colors than you could have imagined. Is it worth the trip? You bet it is. Buy a huge memory card for that camera and plan to stay at least a week. You'll need plenty of time to soak it all in before you head back home.
Senecio is one of the largest genera of flowering plants there are with thousands of species found all over the world. Though most are not, some are succulent plants with excellent drought tolerance and great plants for growing in pots and the landscape in a variety of different climates. It is this much smaller group of Senecios that will be discussed in this article.
I began to grow native honeysuckles several years ago after falling in love with the Asiatic varieties but disliking their invasive habits in our American soil. I have found them to be drought tolerant and easy plants to grow. Casual gardeners frequently ask what they are - isn’t it nice to know that such an interesting plant can be native to our habitat?
Lilies are the most versatile of bulbs. You can choose from a variety of sizes and blooming times, and a rainbow of colors. The smaller, early-blooming hybrids are bright and cheerful, while the taller varieties are majestically beautiful and often intensely fragrant. Lily bulbs are harvested by growers late in the season, so if you've ordered them ahead of time, be prepared to plant your lilies correctly as soon as they arrive.
The genus Campanula, commonly known as bellflowers, comprised nearly 300 species. many of these are well-known perennials for the border. This article will introduce you to the most common border bellflowers.
"You Supply The Caption" photo is a fun opportunity for Readers. A gardening related photo will be presented, and you, the Readers, will provide humorous captions. The wit available on Dave's Garden is some of the best around, so please join in the fun! This feature is not a "for compensation" article - just a way of saying Thanks for reading. Hope you enjoy...now let's hear some funny stuff!
Water gardens don't have to be large in-ground koi ponds. Many of us don't have the room or money to dig up our yard and build a pond. Maybe your health keeps you from being outside as much as you like. Or you want to bring the joy of water gardens into your house for constant enjoyment. Here is a basic overview of fancy goldfish and indoor water-gardens.
We all know gardeners who pounce on every faded flower, deadheading to keep their garden looking as fresh and colorful as possible. Other gardeners, less dedicated or more distracted, claim the spent flowers add “texture” to their gardens. And some gardeners know the value of allowing seeds to ripen for later collection. To them, those dried stems have a special beauty and excitement after the flowers fade. Seed collecting can be an obsessive hobby, and one that’s not necessarily limited to your own garden…
Sweet olive (Osmanthus fragrans, Zones 8-10) is one of the horticultural treasures that Southerners enjoy in their gardens. We have only to step outside in late winter or early spring when the sweet olive blooms to detect its heady scent wafting on the air. For those of us who enjoy fragrance in the garden and live in regions with mild winters, the sweet olive is a “must have” plant.
The Pomegranate, Punica granatum, is one of the oldest fruits known. It is also one of the healthiest foods on earth. These little ruby red seeds called arils are bursting with flavor, vitamin C, antioxidants and fiber. Don't be intimidated by their gorgeous outer husks. A deep bowl or sink of water makes quick work of separating membrane from aril as these glossy little gems rise to the top. They rise to the top in cooking too!
Many enjoy fall vegetable gardening when lettuces, cooking greens, stir fry vegetables, and root crops thrive. But, when freezing rains or snow threaten whatever is left in the garden, most confine their garden dreams to catalogs and thoughts early spring. Here is an overview of gardening in the fall and winter seasons.
One of the few trees that did not live in my childhood environment in southeast Kentucky was the bald cypress. Now isn’t that a strange name for such a lovely tree? This is the story of a tiny seedling that I knew nothing about, one that was guaranteed not to grow here in the flatlands of western Kentucky.
Too often I see Geraniums treated as annuals. Allowed to die in the fall and then mulched or thrown in the trash. This is not necessary, a few simple steps and your geraniums can last for years.
As a gardener you have most likely been told time and time again, the key to good planting is good soil. There's no getting around that really. Most plants require a healthy, nutrient-rich soil. While there are many ways to achieve this, I will share with you a fun, inexpensive way to improve your soil.
Gardeners enjoy bringing the beauty of the summer garden indoors. During the fall it is no different. A table centerpiece is a nice way to add a touch of fall to the home. Centerpieces need not be high priced creations bought at the florist. It is possible to create an easy and relatively inexpensive fall centerpiece. Adding apples or other garden bounty will make it an edible display.
Here we come once again, vine lovers! The three preceding articles introduced climbers which are found on Reunion Island although all are exotic or indigenous, the endemic ones are very few and often not very showy therefore we will stay with species from various parts of the world.
Autumn means different things to different people, but everyone has a list of fall gardening chores. In New England winter comes on faster every year, somehow, and I feel less prepared every year. Maybe it's as I learn more, the list of things I feel I absolutely have to do gets longer. Here, I humbly offer the wimpy chilly person's guide to fall gardening chores.
Enkianthus may not be familiar to many gardeners but this small group of Asian deciduous shrubs provide garden value from spring through fall. Be it from their exquisite, delicate, bell-like flowers or from their brilliant fall foliage, this shrub is sure to please.
"You Supply The Caption" photo is a fun opportunity for Readers. A gardening related photo will be presented, and you, the Readers, will provide humorous captions. The wit available on Dave's Garden is some of the best around, so please join in the fun! This feature is not a "for compensation" article - just a way of saying Thanks for reading. Hope you enjoy...now let's hear some funny stuff!
I came home from work early the other day and, driving through the neighborhood, I found myself waiting behind a school bus. The kids jumped off the bottom step one by one, hitting the asphalt with the flourish of gymnasts. As I waited, I couldn’t help but recall being that age and how I would pretend to be a kid from Sleepy Hollow rushing home before the Headless Horseman could overtake me.
Bottle, kettle, apple, swan; the descriptive names of hardshell gourds tell you this is a fun crop. And, unlike colorful thin shelled gourds which brighten fall displays and soon wither away, hardshell gourds will dry to a permanent and very craftable wooden form. I'd like to give you the basics on growing the best hardshell gourds for crafting fun.
The feeling comes quickly, the knot in your stomach, the pain crawling up from your neck into your head. Tension and stress! You could take a pill, but a better solution is to go play in your garden. Try this when you feel like you've been sitting in a patch of prickly pear cactus.
Among all the lists of unlikely edible flowering plants that appear from time to time in garden articles and books, I’d never seen one that includes the canna.
Integrated Pest Management what an intimidating term; that was my thought when I first heard it during my Master Gardener class some ten years ago. Since that time I’ve come to discover that IPM is a very basic approach to controlling pests and diseases in the yard and garden.
I got used to classify my plants in “good” and “difficult”. I don't call them “bad” if they are difficult to be grown indoors and always try to learn more so I don't lose them. But this time I won't write about the “bad” plants. On the contrary, I'll tell you about the best plant I have, a plant which became like an old friend to me, the Hibiscus.
Some trees will stop erosion, and will give us much needed shade. The white pine was one of those trees, but I don't think my dad knew that 100 white pine trees was about 50 too many.
The beauty we enjoy in our gardens and indeed, in the entire natural world, seems so awe-inspiring at times that it brings us to speechlessness. But what if you learned that, instead of "evolutionary" origins, we should be looking for "iterationary" origins of the world and all in it? In this article I will introduce you to the fascinating and wonderful world of fractal geometry as it relates to the natural realm . . .
“The artist is a receptacle for the emotions that come from all over the place: from the sky, from the earth, from a scrap of paper, from a passing shape, from a spider's web".......Pablo Picasso
