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Welcome to our library of articles, where you can search and browse over 2,000 articles written by our own team of garden writers. Interested in becoming a Dave's Garden writer? Submit an article to apply.
You see that east facing window each and everyday and you just know there is a reason it lives there with that perfect sun, perfect shade, and just the right spot for a house plant – but what do you add there? African Violets are the simple and easy answer! With a few simple steps you can grow this wonderful and almost ever blooming plant.
I am definitely not a morbid person, but over the years I have always added a black plant to every garden, just for accent. This year I decided to see if I could find enough black blooming plants to create a more formal garden that was all black, using silver as the accent. This is what I came up with.....
Have you ever wondered how people get the time for such lush and "gardenisque" aquariums? Ever thought you didn't have the time or expertise to create and keep one yourself? Well, I'm about to show you how anyone can have a lush aquarium that will basically take care of itself (in time).
They arrive with no baggage, often stowed away on freighters, hidden in packing material or commercial cargo. These visitors never pass through Customs, and seldom register where they decide to establish a family. The first signs of their existence stirs curiosity, then study and, finally, a battle plan. Insect terrorists have again invaded our agricultural balance.
Home gardeners can easily turn to more organic means of sustaining their gardens with all the current interest in going “green”. Most garden centers, feed stores, nurseries and hardware stores are carrying more organic elements that make organic fertilizing easy. All it takes is a few ingredients to have a complete fertilizer that also contains oodles of “micro nutrients” not normally available in chemical fertilizers – plus the benefit of improved soil composition and microbial life.
The members of the Araucaceae are beautiful and majestic trees and many just happen to grow well where I live in California. The following is an introduction to some of the more common species and a little cultivational information.
Watching the moonlight silvering the palm fronds….a gentle wafting breeze …. The fragrance of honeysuckle and plumeria……a mockingbird singing…..that is romance for me.
A return to the world of mycorrhizal relationships. Again we explore life beneath the soil, as we take a look at vital connections between plants & fungi.
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!
Do you LOVE salsa? Me too! While at the grocery store picking out the ingredients for salsa, it dawned on me that I could grow almost all of them in the back yard! Let's plan a salsa garden! It can be in the garden or on the patio in pots. We will have the freshest salsa in town, and it will be exactly how we like it, a little spicy to fire breathing dragon!
Dave’s Garden has grown, and grown, and grown… and every year newcomers to our site come across a reference to a “Roundup” and wonder what it is, if it isn’t the weed-killer. In a nutshell, a DG Roundup is a gathering of gardeners for the express purposes of swapping plants, meeting fellow gardeners and breaking bread together.
High relative humidity and warm temperatures mean the air is pregnant with moisture and ripe for delivery. A lowering in air pressure and air temperature, and "water breaks"; read on to see how . . .
"Each April, Paducah, Kentucky hosts the American Quilters Society show and contest. Quilters come from all over the United States, and many foreign countries come to participate. . . " Melody Rose
For years I tried and failed to grow plants in the garden. The whole reason, I was to find out, was simple pitfalls and the wrong or hard to grow plants in the garden. This is a list of simple garden perennials that you can grow in the garden and ones that will reward you year after year.
It is the oldest sweet; it is one of the purest foods; it is mentioned in the Sumarian and Babylon cuneiform writings; the ancient Egyptians used it; Plato and Aristotle wrote of it; and it will not spoil. It is referred to as the golden nectar of the gods and it has been used to treat maladies for thousands of years.
My birdseed bill last winter was right around $100. Add the cost of thistle for the summer Goldfinches, and I'm spending almost $150 a year to enjoy the wildlife in my gardens. I started looking around my yard to see what the critters eat when the feeder is empty, and I discovered a treasure trove of goodies. This spring, I'll spend some of that seed money to add even more to the winter smorgasbord! Something that will last longer than a day or two, and give me enjoyment all summer long.
Aeoniums are one of the most ornamental of all the succulents. Even those that don't appreciate succulents seem to like these plants. Perhaps it is the fact they look like large, colorful, rubbery flowers that these popular plants have such an appeal. And luckily many are easy plants to grow as well. The following article is an introduction, along with some of my own experiences, to these amazing plants.
While most of the Jewels featured here so far have been truly regal, this one is a little closer to the "common folk" in that although it looks metallic, the metal is not a noble metal or gem. Nonetheless, it is quite special, yet a bit easier to grow than most of the others I've discussed. Read on to learn more . . .
There are several different flowers known as "marigolds" that belong to distinct genera: Bidens tripartita, Caltha palustris, and Calendula officinalis, and the genus Tagetes. These are the hardy annual flowers in hues of yellow, gold, orange and mahogany, sometimes red or white. These marigolds are indigenous to the American Southwest to Mexico, and to South America, but they were spread throughout the world by early colonists.
April is always a busy month on the farm. Some years, it’s complicated by a lot of April showers, both rain and snow, but this year it was for the most part, warm and dry.
Unless you live in the tropics, you need a greenhouse. The problem of course, is the cost as permanent greenhouses sell for thousands of dollars. There is a way out though, that allows gardeners on even the tightest budget to enjoy a little piece of tropicana. All you need to do is spend a little, bend your back & apply some imagination.
We all have them, some more than others. Some we rarely see, some that we can expect every year. Some are very poisonous, some are helpful. No matter what type of gardener you are sooner of later they will show up and you will need to deal with them, WEEDS.
If I followed my every plant purchasing impulse, I would have to get a real job. Admittedly I am mesmerized by low-price tags. But I think I also feel a bit self-righteous in saving the dogeared victims of too many days on a table. Clearance shopping for perennials, bulbs, shrubs and tropicals is a great strategy for the gardener who wants to invest a little more time in shopping and caring for new plants, and a lot less money.
My main reason for gardening is the tranquility and relaxation I gain in return and I've been doing this "therapy" for many years. Having my hands in the cool earth, sweating out the impurities that have invaded my body, hoeing my demons away and too many other labor intensive tasks to mention have helped my body and spirit in so many ways. So imagine my surprise at finding out how much enjoyment and calm I receive from playing with the little 10$ desk zen garden given to me as a gift. Nothing heavy to tote, no hot sun, zero garden bugs and the ease of going no further than my computer desk to seek an outlet for everyday stresses. And so began my journey into the world of the famous Japenese Zen Gardens. I hope to give you some insight of the philosophy behind these landscapes, show you amazing pictures of several large and small gardens and finally to walk you through making your very own . All you must do is choose which one that best suits your wants and needs.
California poppies are easy to grow. They are drought-tolerant and can grow in poor soil. They self-sow and refuse to be pampered. This is no high-maintenance Hollywood beauty, but she does have quite a wardrobe for playing whatever garden role you like. You don't like the orange dress? How about white, or yellow, or rose? Do you prefer the satiny sheath of four petals or the frilly tutu of eight? She's here to please.
Friends see the lush green plantings at our house and exclaim, “Oh, you have such a green thumb! What’s your secret?” I say, “I water them,” and they look at me in disbelief. But watering – not watering enough, or watering so much that plant roots get soggy – may be the biggest issue for those who think their thumbs are black. Fortunately, it’s often an easy problem to solve. Polymer moisture crystals are one of the best watering aids I’ve found.
Welcome to the first article ever on this wonderful and ever growing group filled with people who, for the life of themselves, cannot stop the plant bug that already is growing in their soul. Come on in and introduce yourself and let me tell you how to know if you need the services of Gardeners Anonymous.
There is nothing more beautiful on an early spring morning than to come upon the lovely trillium, stretching her arms and raising her lovely face to catch a glimpse of the morning sun. But with all that beauty, it is the one thing that spoiled Aunt Bett's wedding day.
The Shasta Daisy is one of the backbones of a perennial border, with long lasting 3 inch wide sparkling white blooms and yellow centers on sturdy stems that grow up to 40” tall, flowering in June through September. The flowers make wonderful cut flowers, and in the landscape they attract bees and butterflies.
If you have bulbs blooming in your yard or garden this spring, perhaps you have experienced the same dilemma I’ve faced in recent years: I’d love to pick some for a bouquet, but then I feel like I’m diminishing the beautiful show. I admit that this feeling may sound a bit fussy, but I’m a senior citizen now, and old garden duffers like me are allowed a bit of eccentricity now and then!
This is the story of a wild flower I found last summer. At first I thought it was a weed, but with some care it turned out to be an attractive & hardy addition to my garden.
Every tropical plants enthusiast nowadays knows about passionflowers, those wonderful climbers which are native (for 98%) to the New World and which have been grown by amateurs for decades both in Europe and the USA, mostly the hardy ones (P. caerulea and P. incarnata). The rest of the 650 species recorded today are to be found from Mexican deserts to the Andean high mountains and the Amazonian lowlands, plus the odd ones in Australia and South-Eastern Asia. So this is a pretty vast subject and we will restrict here to passionflowers hybridization, a peculiar aspect of this fascinating subject.
We each have our own secret addictions. This is my confession: I am addicted to blue pots. Plastic, clay, terra cotta, stoneware, even the styrofoam ones look pretty good to me.
When palms are described in terms of their hardiness, almost always it is reference to their cold hardiness. This is how a palm gets a USDA number of let's say 8a, 9b or 11 etc. However there are severe limitations to this hardiness designation that pertain to the cultivation of palms (this is probably the case with many other plant species as well, but I am most familiar with palms). These other forms of hardiness can be completely overlooked if one is reading texts and referring simply to a palm's USDA hardiness rating. And serious miscalculations concerning the likelihood of a certain species ability to survive one's marginal climate can lead to disappointment and loss of potentially costly plants. The following article is a discussion of some of these other important hardiness parameters.
If you thought that the Little Queen or her royal relatives were finicky, you haven't experienced this plant. Alocasia villeneuvii has been in collections longer than many of the others, but rarely do you see an adult specimen. Read on to find out why. . .
Osteospermums are lovely daisy-like plants that originate in South Africa. They were virtually unknown as a landscape plant 25 years ago, but are becoming more popular as people discover these cheerful flowers. They brighten up borders and containers wherever they are grown
Folly: Architecture. a whimsical or extravagant structure built to serve as a conversation piece, lend interest to a view, commemorate a person or event, etc.: found esp. in England in the 18th century.
Boxwood has a use in almost any garden. It can be sheared into neat geometic shapes for a formal garden setting, or left to grow into it's natural shape for a more casual look. As far as height, you will find anything from 2' to 15'. There are cultivars with variegated foliage for a different look. It is as well suited for a hedge as it is for a specimen planting. Come with me as I take a closer look at this very popular shrub.
