It always amazes me how quickly the wooded area of our property is taken over by Ostrich ferns. May 8 May 14 May 31 (pay no attention to the path of inflourescence-looking stuff. I spread some DE the day before. Oh and yeah … all that stuff in the foreground is garlic mustard weed that must be pulled ASAP.) All …
The scene of the crime. And this isn’t even all of them! Do they offer plantaholic 12-step programs? I’m seriously thinking I may need to find one. Noticing that my “holding area” (formerly the pit of despair, but somewhat spruced up) is getting a little tight, I took a count of the plants I need to plant. And the total …
Our Master Gardeners Heirloom Plant and Herb Sale was held May 23 and I was in charge of door prizes and gift bags, which means that I got to call up companies during one of the worst recessions in a long time and ask them for donations. Many have said “No, not this year.” And I understand that. But a …
Garden art or a tree stuck in the ground upside down? You make the call! I’m a big fan of garden art, but not such a big fan of paying for it. Fortunately, I’m also a fan of driftwood, so I’m always on the lookout for interesting pieces. A couple years ago I found a driftwood tree (the whole thing) …
Remember how I said my Disneyland rose didn’t make it through the winter? I was truly convinced it was a goner. All of the wood was dead. Fortunately my procrastination habit has finally paid off! I didn’t pull it out of the ground. I’m not sure if it’s because I was dreading dealing with the thorns or I was hoping …
I love the most recent post from Michael Tortorello’s New York Times blog. I’ve been following Michael’s misadventures of a new gardener with his first vegetable garden with interest (and frankly, a little bit of jealousy. Is the NYT paying him for this? How come I didn’t think to pitch that idea?) He’s talking about using newspaper to block weeds, …
This is dicentra Gold Heart, and she has become a star in our garden. I picked it up at the hardware store two or three years ago and even though she’s not in a great spot for a bleeding heart (west exposure) she just keeps getting bigger and bigger (and is currently taking over a mini hosta growing underneath it). …
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According to my seed-starting spreadsheet, which I make every year to tell me when and how I’m supposed to be starting seeds, March 14 was the day to start my sweet peas. But I couldn’t wait any longer so I got all wild and crazy and planted them last weekend. (I’m a seed-starting rebel, I tell […]
A few years ago I grew ‘Dalmation Peach’ Foxglove (Digitalis purpurea) for the first time. It’s a gorgeous foxglove, carrying peach to pink flowers atop 2-1/2 foot tall stems. But its best feature is that it will bloom the first year, unlike most foxgloves, which are true biennials and don’t bloom until the second year. [&
UPDATE, April 2021: I’m sad to report that boxwood blight has been positively identified via plant samples I sent to the plant disease diagnostic lab in my garden. The five boxwoods in the first photo of this post are infected and will be removed. At this time I have not found signs of the fungus […]
This started as a post to share what I’m growing from seed this year. What it evolved into is a sordid tale of seed hoarding, a gardener so traumatized by a never-ending winter that she completely overestimated her ability to grow so many plants and, in the end, a way to justify it all. As […]
I’m always amazed at how my fanaticism for gardening has grown exponentially, but it’s most apparent in my seed starting efforts. When I first got serious about gardening I didn’t grow anything from seed. Who has time for that, I thought. And it seemed like it would be difficult and require all kinds of equipment. […]
I’ve just come off the first few presentations of a talk I’m doing on some of the best new plants you’ll find in garden centers this year and spending all that time looking at new plants has me seriously excited about some of them. There are so many new plants coming on the market this […]
Winter has arrived. Cue the griping. I know I complain about the weather somewhat frequently, but as I’ve explained before, that’s pretty much my birthright as born Midwesterner. Winter (and whatever spring we have) in Wisconsin can be so boring that we literally can’t think of anything else to talk about. So a lot of conversatio
I’ve asked the opinion of my dear readers many times and it’s always an illuminating exercise. It’s interesting to get a feel for a direction others think my garden should go, even if you only know it from photos and descriptions. But in the nearly 10 years this blog has been in existence, there has […]
A quick note: This post is a partnership with Lowe’s Home Improvement. But you know that all words and opinions are my own. I also apologize for the messy basement visible in this post. Imagine a vegetable garden full of orderly but abundant raised beds on a bed of charcoal-colored gravel. At its entrance is […]
There aren’t a lot of opportunities to add really special plants to established gardens. Special plants require very specific placement so they can be seen and appreciated, and surrounded by a cast of supporting characters that don’t threaten to try to upstage the star. When I finally decided in fall to attempt a rescue mission [&hellip
If you’ve gardened for any amount of time you’ve probably been told test your soil. In fact you’ve probably been told to test your soil multiple times. Sorry to break it to you, but I’m not going to give you a pass on this one. You really should send a soil sample to a soil […]
I read most of Lee Reich’s book The Ever Curious Gardener in an unlikely place: on a Florida beach with my toes in the sand. I think Lee would be the first to tell you his book is not your typical beach read but there I was, in between dips in a very warm gulf, […]
Despite ample time over the holidays to figure out what seeds I want to order, I’ve not gotten my act together on an official seed order yet. I know my must haves, which include Chelsea Prize cucumbers, and ‘Gigante’ Italian parsley among many others, but I haven’t gotten around to checking if I need to buy […]
No sooner had the Christmas dinner dishes been cleared than that little voice in my head started whispering, “It’s time to think about gardening again.” That little voice was obviously a little drunk, because it’s not like I ever really stopped thinking about gardening. But my semi-drunken intuition wasn’t completely w
