Did you Get Lost in the Garden?

If you read my title you may have noticed an unusual looking word. The study of blotany is not something restricted to any one area. Many regions around the world have studied this craft.You may never have heard of Blotany but it bears some resemblance to other words you may be familiar with. Blotany looks very similar to the word…

If you want a drought tolerant hardy perennial that looks great check out a ‘Moonbeam’ coreopsis. ‘Moonbeam’ is one of the threadleaf varieties and is more drought tolerant because of those narrow needle-like leaves. The smaller surface area means that the leaves lose less water through transpiration than other varieties of coreopsis. It still has the massive profusion of blooms…

There are probably a million things I could think of that need done around the yard and in our various gardens but here are a few that are bouncing around in my head at the moment. I’ve been distracted with the deer the last couple days and several things that need done haven’t been tackled yet.Dave’s Fall Garden To-Do ListBuild…

I mostly use raised beds for my vegetables but the truth is almost any plant can do great in a raised bed. Herbs, flowers, and ornamentals can all thrive in raised beds.  What makes a raised bed an awesome growing method is the soil that it uses.  You can mix the perfect soil mixture for any plant you want to…

The organic weedkiller winner is… as selected by the random number generator at Random.org… which came up with the number… (I’m drawing this out a little)… (just for fun)… (are we having fun yet?)….   3… which means that…. Meemsnyc from the blog: Gardening in the Boroughs of NYC is the winner! Congrats and email me your mailing address ASAP…

I haven’t made it out into the garden much lately other than to gather the occasional item for the kitchen but I did manage to grab the camera and head into the yard this afternoon for a few minutes. Here’s a little of what I found! This is a ‘Golden Globe’ arborvitae.  It has a nice rounded habit with golden…

In the spring time one ground cover really stands out due to its prolific flowering. Creeping phlox or Phlox subulata really punches out the color for a couple weeks in spring then fades into a nice lush and green carpet of foliage. You can use it on slopes, around mailboxes or as a low growing front border plant. It has…

This post is about two of my favorite vegetable garden plants: tomatoes and sugar snap peas! Both are delicious right from the garden and I have both growing in my home and garden! The snap peas are about 6 inches tall at this point. The pea growth has been slowed some by the cool temperatures.  Even though sugar snap peas…

The holiday season is in full swing and the good news is that gardeners are very easy to shop for! Whether your gardener likes gardening with vegetables, herbs, or ornamental plants there is something for everyone. Today here are some Christmas gift ideas for gardeners to help you find just the right thing! (Disclaimer: The links in this post are…

New to our garden this year ‘Powis Castle’ artemisia is proving to be a powerful perennial plant for foliage! I’ve always enjoyed artemisias for the silver foliage and really liked the ‘Silver Mound’ artemisia that we put in the front sidewalk garden so once I found this cultivar at a local nursery I thought I would give it a try….

I successfully rooted a Florida dogwood (Cornus florida) from a cutting! This is a tree that’s been tricky in the past for me to propagate, and I finally had some success I think is worth sharing. In this post, I’ll walk you through exactly what worked, step-by-step instructions for how to root flowering dogwood cuttings yourself, and some tips and…

Grape vines area great edible plant to add to the garden. Grape vines can be used in many ways and have the attributes of an ornamental plant with high value as an edible plant. As an edible plant grapes can be used to make wine, juice, and their leaves are edible making them an interesting choice for wrapping food inside…

Today I went tomato harvesting in our vegetable garden. We had quite a crop! They ranged from the little Sweet 100’s to some very large 16 ounce tomatoes. This wasn’t our first large harvest. We’ve had a steady diet of the red wonder fruits throughout this summer. We’ve eaten them sliced on turkey sandwiches with a generous helping of mayo,…

Every year I notice these little green insects, aphids.  Well, sometimes they aren’t green, I’ve seen them in orange and yellow and they come in red, brown, and black too.  Whatever fashion sense these insects display one thing is for sure: you don’t really want aphids on your plants!  Aphids are a soft-bodied insect that love to suck on the…

As yesterday we saw more and more fall color from the south in Virginia and Tennessee today brings us more proof that fall is here in the Southern U.S.. SC Gardener has fall foliage that is well worth a look! One post entitled Fall Color Isn’t Just for Trees: Shrubs With Fall Leaf Color gives us a look at the…

Spring is saying “hello I’m coming” this weekend which means time to get into the garden and get a few things done before she arrives! Wet weather is expected on Sunday evening so Saturday is the day. I’ll be skipping the Nashville Lawn and Garden Show this year to work on my own edible landscape AKA the vegetable garden. (I’d…

I could have named this post several different things like: How to Destroy Your Mower in 5 Minutes, or Roasting Marshmallows Over an Open Mower, or even How To Turn Your Lawn Mower into a Bomb in Three Easy Steps. Fortunately each of those creative titles are inaccurate. The first title is wrong since I think my mower is still…