Yard and Garden Planning Reader Questions
Readers ask questions about dividing and deadheading perennials as well as overwintering coleus and fish in a water garden. Home » Plants & Animals » Garden Planning » Yard and Garden Planning Reader Questions From time to time, I [... more]
Suite101 |
An Easy Way to Measure Sunlight
A simple, handy tool can help you determine the amount of sunlight in any location in your yard. The Sunlight Calculator meter measures the duration and intensity of sunlight falling in a location over a 12-hour period. The results are indicated ... [... more]
National Gardening Association |
Unique Forms, Unusual Flowers
What other plants from a $2 packet of seeds could cover the whole side of a house? Or cloak a summer porch in cooling shade? Hide an eyesore of a garage or rusty chain-link fence? Dress up an arbor? Soften the corner of a house? Create a ... [... more]
National Gardening Association |
Agastache 'Blue Fortune'
Plants that combine beauty with edibility are in vogue, and a new selection in the mint family fits this bill. Agastache 'Blue Fortune' has anise-scented leaves (hence its common name of anise hyssop) and purplish blue flower spikes that are ... [... more]
National Gardening Association |
As the Garden Turns
I once saw a play in which Katharine Hepburn played a crusty old lady set in her ways. Her foil was a young hippie girl. In the end, they forged an understanding, but that only happens in plays, which is why I didn't plant a clump of larkspur ... [... more]
National Gardening Association |
All-American Daylilies
A good daylily variety will bloom continuously for 3 to 4 weeks. By choosing varieties carefully, you can have daylilies flowering for the entire perennial season, 3 months in the North to 10 months in the South. It's an astonishing performance, ... [... more]
National Gardening Association |
Backyard Dreams
When you start thinking about your yard as place to live in, not just to garden in, a shift in priorities occurs. Where you once saw places for flower beds, shrub borders, and a vegetable garden, you now see the need for places where human ... [... more]
National Gardening Association |
Description
Several exciting new ornamental grasses have come into our gardens the last few years, but none with the beauty, versatility, and reliability of feather reed grass, also known as Calamagrostis acutiflora 'Karl Foerster'. This tall and narrow ... [... more]
National Gardening Association |
A Recycler's Garden
Champagne bottles, artfully combined with other throw-aways and planted with yarrow, aloe, and geum (among others), makes a simple and cheap retaining wall. Few gardeners consider empty champagne bottles landscaping materials, but Jana Olsen, a ... [... more]
National Gardening Association |
A Gardener's Guide to Frost
It's late fall. The sky is blue, and the sun is bright. Then your local weather forecaster ruins everything with these chilling words: "Possible frost tonight." Once the initial panic subsides, reason sets in. Frost is a local event, and it's .. [... more]
National Gardening Association |
Garden Grinders
Shredding reduces the size of your compost pile and speeds decomposition. I used to think that a chipper-shredder didn't make sense for anyone with less than a half-acre garden. But now that so many communities have banned or restricted disposal ... [... more]
National Gardening Association |
Avoiding and Solving Common Bulb Problems
Check bulbs before buying or planting: Make sure they're firm and free of corky lesions, mold, and soft spots. Plant in well-drained soil. Provide at least half a day of sun. Full sun is best in cool climates, but midday and afternoon shade are ... [... more]
National Gardening Association |
