Easy Gardener Gifts
We all know that Christmas is on it’s way and the gift buying season has commenced! Fortunately gardeners are easy to please with presents! Just find them something they can use in the garden and they…
Float Testing Acorns for Viability
The majestic oak is one of Tennessee’s most beautiful native trees. It’s also an extremely useful tree for our local wildlife as it can host over 200 species of insects and animals. You can see why…
Using Grass Clippings to Start a New Garden
Recently we moved into a new home. With a new home comes many challenges. With respect to the garden we are dealing with a blank slate to cultivate. Starting new gardens is a fun and challenging…
Why I Like to Use Sand as a Rooting Medium for Plant Cuttings
I do a lot of cuttings and have experimented with quite a few mediums but over the years I’ve found that sand is one of the best options out there for a rooting medium. Sand is…
How to Keep Deer Out of the Garden
To say that deer have been a challenge over the years is somewhat of an understatement. Deer love to graze around my garden. In fact over the last couple months we’ve watched as a family of…
Everything You Need to Know About Growing Amazing Peppers
Whether you want to learn more about growing bell peppers, banana peppers, or hot spicy peppers there are a few things you need to know! Peppers are a popular vegetable among home gardeners, prized for all…
Advantages and Disadvantages of Growing a Vegetable Garden in Pots
Due to a lot of reasons I’ve chosen to pot up the vegetable garden this year. The top reason is we will need to move in the middle of the gardening season and I don’t want…
What Plants Should You Plant with Hostas?
I’m a huge hosta fan. I wouldn’t call myself a collector but I really enjoy how well hostas thrive with very little need for attention. Hostas certainly have a few issues but to me they are…
Raised Bed Gardening
Designing a Raised Bed Vegetable Garden: 11 Things to Think About
Tips and suggestions for starting a raised bed vegetable garden.

More Information on Growing in Raised Beds
Growing Gardens with Plant Propagation
How to Propagate Birch Trees Through Cuttings – Info on Rooting Birch Trees
Birch tree cutting from a cutting taken in summer Have you ever wanted to try propagating birch trees from cuttings? The river birch is definitely worth propagating for your garden for many reasons. First of…
Hydrangea Propagation (Natural Layering)
Hydrangeas are fantastic garden plants! The flowers are beautiful but even when not in bloom hydrangeas can be a well formed shrub in the garden. Yesterday while walking through the garden I found a hydrangea…
How to Propagate English Laurel Cuttings (Otto Luyken, Skip Laurel)
This weekend we ventured up to my wife’s parents house. I’m always looking for something plant or garden related to get into so I braved the 30 degree temperatures for a little while to see…
Some Good Plants to Propagate with Hardwood Cuttings
I thought I would take a moment to talk about hardwood cuttings. It is the beginning of winter and which is also a great time to go out and try to reproduce many of your…
Starting Japanese Maple Seeds
While the weather outside resembles that of the arctic I spent a few minutes starting Japanese maple seeds. I had two varieties of tree that I saved seed from this fall, ‘Sango Kaku’ and ‘Bloodgood’…
Viburnum and Spirea Cuttings
Last summer I took cuttings from one of my viburnums and a couple spireas. They have a good start this year and are beginning to put on new growth. The viburnum came from a softwood…
