This is the month to pot up spring-flowering bulbs, if you want them to bloom indoors in winter instead. Keep in mind, however, that most bulbs need to be kept quite chilly for a period of three to four months to perform successfully. Read More
For those of us who enjoy germinating "difficult" seeds, the paper towel method is almost a necessity. You can, after all, tuck a whole stack of damp paper towels into a small cardboard box at the back of your refrigerator. Your family, however, wouldn't appreciate you stashing flats of seed-starting mix back there instead--for months at a time! Read More
The Maximilian sunflower (Helianthus maximiliani) used to be the last perennial, with the exception of monkshood, blooming in my garden in October. Admittedly, it can grow to 10 feet and holds most of its flowers very close to its stalk, for a decidedly gangly look. In my flowerbed, the lanky latecomer also tended to slouch against nearby plants or sprawl at somewhat drunken angles, since I never got around to staking it. Read More
Like the lady's slipper about which I wrote earlier, the greater fringed gentian (Gentianopsis crinita) is one of those wildflowers which should, theoretically, grow in my region. I say "should" because I've never seen one! With lovely blue to blue-violet petals edged with long fringes, this wildling frequently succumbs to people's urge to pick it, and has become endangered in many states. Read More
I hate to admit that I completely forgot about my dahlia tubers until early July of this summer. They were stored in the cold room in the basement and, by that time, the new shoots had pushed the taped lids of their cardboard boxes open. Usually, however, even dahlias that are planted right after the last spring frost here in Zone 5 don't have time to do much blooming before the first autumn frost. Read More
As luck would have it, the bug that does the most damage to my garden is also one of the hardest to kill. The four-lined plant bug (Poecilocapsus lineatus) is especially fond of members of the mint family, and shows up most heavily on my lemon balm and spearmint plants. Read More
This is probably the wrong year to talk about providing water for the birds here in Pennsylvania, since they can find plenty of it in puddles following our recent deluge! In more normal summers, however, our weather often begins to turn hot and dry in July. Read More
Although rehmannia or Chinese foxglove is virtually unknown to U.S. gardeners, it ranks among the top 50 in China-of medicinal herbs, that is! Rehmannia glutinosa, also known as "earth yellow," is the type used for that purpose. Its furry leaves and flowers remind me of gesneriads such as gloxinia. Read More
This is the time of year we all start harvesting or trading seeds for next year's garden. If you are as organizationally challenged as I am, the packets you accumulate could end up scattered all over your house before spring arrives. Read More
Although often considered southern belles, spring starflowers (Ipheion or Tristagma spp.) can shine as far north as zone 5. Since that is my own zone, I planted a few bulbs at the front of a flower bed last fall, covering them with an upside-down daisy tray (a flat with a webbed bottom) to prevent our chickens from scratching them up again. Read More
A cousin stopped by in mid-July to give me a very generous amount of Aztec liliy and Peruvian daffodil bulbs she hadn't gotten around to planting earlier in the summer, due to the death of her mother. Despite it being so late, I was highly optimistic about those bulbs, because I knew from previous experience that they bloom very rapidly. Read More
The plants from which we get flavorings and spices have to rank among the most exotic, since they are the types for which expeditions were once launched and new worlds explored. Columbus actually stumbled across the Americas by accident, when they got in his way as he was seeking a new spice route to the East Indies! It wasn't until after Cortez invaded Mexico, however, that Europe "discovered" vanilla and chocolate. Read More
Sparmannia africana, also known as cape stock rose, is one of those plants that bristles when touched. Actually, only the showy stamens of the flowers move, expanding when something brushes against them. But, if you grow the cape stock rose as a houseplant, it could cause your guests to jump back and squeal, "It's alive!" Read More
These three substances sound nasty and the latter two somewhat chemical. They are all natural, however--as well as inexpensive--and can do wonders for your seed germination rates. Read More
My nodding scadoxus (Scadoxus nutans) bloomed for the first time recently, looking like a somewhat bent orange shaving brush. The poor thing was quite pot bound at the time. However, in its homeland of Ethiopia, it grows on trees and rocks in mountain forests, so it probably isn't picky about how much soil it does or doesn't have. Read More
Being an insatiable flower fiend, I traded for salsify seeds because I liked photos I'd seen of the purple blooms. I was disappointed to discover that they don't appear until the plant's second year, making it officially a biennial, though you can harvest the roots after its first summer. Read More
Although we all welcome the arrival of spring, the new season can bring new sneezin' as well--and not just from allergies! Change stresses our bodies, making us more vulnerable to viruses, especially if we try to hurry our winter-sluggish bags of bones into sudden gardening activity. That's when the herbs called adaptogens reportedly come in handy. Read More
In Herbaceous Perennial Plants, Allan Armitage writes that "Roscoea belongs in the almost-impossible-to-grow-but-I-must-have-one' group of plants, such as Meconopsis." Roscoea comes, in fact, from the same part of the world that the blue poppy does-the Himalayas. Read More
Rock roses aren't actually roses, as is proved by the fact that they lack thorns and require very little water, pruning, or other care. And, being native to the Mediterranean, they actually prefer poor and gritty soils to good ones. Read More
Summer should be one of the best times of the year for taking garden photos. We've got more flowers to photograph during this season than at other times of year, after all, and plenty of daylight in which to do it. Read More
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