Search results for: 'gardens'

April may be the cruelest month, especially in the Northeast, but don’t let that stop you from jumping into garden mode. Working steadily now, you won’t have to be playing catch-up when the weather warms up for good. Step 1 If you haven’t already, do a thorough clean-up, gently raking away leaves and other debris to give your perennials some much-needed sun and fresh air. Eliminate any weeds that might be living under the surface, ready to pop up with the help of a few sunny days. This is also a gre...

Hay versus straw Hay is grown as food for livestock.  If you buy hay for your garden you will have seed heads that can sprout and create weeds. I learned this the hard way one year when I sprinkled hay over a newly seeded part of our lawn and large weeds emerged that were hard to pull out. Straw makes a great mulch and planting bed for your garden. It has no nutritional value for animals because it's made of the plant stalk with the seed head removed, leaving a hollow tube. (Think of a drinking 'straw'...

Pizza Toppings: Now is the time to think about your favorite toppings for pizza cooked outdoors in your new electric pizza oven or sprinkled on top of a no frills store-bought pizza. The most popular garden toppings are tomatoes, bell peppers and red onions. Have you thought of adding some thinly sliced zucchini, summer squash or even figs from your garden? Recently I read that pickles are a favorite pizza topping. My friend Michelle makes a topping of goat cheese with cut up figs and caramelized onion ...

Not all frosts are equal. You can find out more about expected frost and freeze dates at your local cooperative extension website or by searching 'frost dates' along with your town and state or zip code. You can match that information with the 10-day forecast on your phone's weather app. A light frost occurs when temperatures fall to between 29 and 32 degrees F. Some tender plants will die. A moderate freeze occurs when temperatures go from 25 to 28 degrees F. Temperatures that fall below 24 degree...

When is a shrub not a plant? When it’s in your hand as the ingredient in a thirst-quenching  beverage. In this context, think of a shrub as a pre-made drink mixer to which you can add tonic water, ginger beer or soda water for a non-alcoholic version, or gin, vodka, bourbon or prosecco for an alcoholic beverage. Today’s craft cocktails have taken the concept, which has its origins in colonial times, to a new level of popularity. Many shrubs get their distinction from herbs that are easily grown i...

Traditionally it was considered good form to tidy up the garden before winter by cutting back just about everything to a few inches of the ground. Many horticulturists and naturalists now recommend that you leave some plants for winter interest and wildlife sustainability. But which ones? Here are Ruth Clausen’s tips for putting your garden to bed this fall. Be choosy about what needs to go. Observe which plants are diseased or pest-ridden and get rid of those. Put diseased plant material in a tra...

Here are 7 tips to help you with your garden now, as summer is winding down.  I follow every one of these practices in my garden. #1: Watering Tips: Remember to give your plants enough water. The water needs to reach the roots or it will lead to shallow root systems. This will prevent plants from absorbing and storing enough water to support them. For annuals, lawns and perennials, most roots are 4 to 6 inches below the soil surface. For trees they can be down as far as 18 to 24 inches.  Running the sp...

Dominique Charles is a woman with a mission. A busy professional living in Washington, DC, she first began gardening in 2014, after her friend Lauren built her a starter garden as a gift. Despite having grown up in New Orleans, and spending summers helping her grandparents - Emmitt and Thelma Muse of Greensburg, Louisiana – with their farm, where her favorite activity was picking blackberries and snapping green beans, Dominique didn’t really believe that she had a green thumb. It wasn’t until sh...

Really tall plants are show stoppers in the garden, providing a single grace note against a contrasting background or softening a hardscape element behind it. The last time I visited the Beatrix Farrand Garden at Bellefield in Hyde Park, I took pictures of some impressive tall perennials, such as plume poppy, that grow in front of the walls inside the garden.  English walled gardens are famous for using tall plants as a backdrop in this way. [caption id="attachment_3746" align="alignright" width="206"] ...

[caption id="attachment_3724" align="alignright" width="150"] Monarch butterfly[/caption] Three of the most popular species of native milkweed are Asclepias syriaca (common milkweed), Asclepias tuberosa (butterfly weed) and Asclepias incarnata (swamp milkweed). There are more than 100 native species in all!  (These 3 species are shown in the photo below from left to right) [caption id="attachment_3735" align="alignleft" width="150"] Asclepias incarnata (swamp milkweed) in my garden.[/caption] Milk...