Did you Get Lost in the Garden?

Finally I braved the harsh August summer elements and trekked out to the garden shed to lay the brick floor down. I didn’t get finished but I did manage to get some important work done like leveling the crushed gravel underneath where the bricks will go. I took a board and a level and made sure that the gravel was…

Asiatic lilies are a plant that in the right conditions can develop roots from leaf cuttings. Not all plants work this way but some lilies develop bulbils from the leaf area. This technique below uses that trait to help stimulate root growth from the ends of the leaves. How to Propagate Asiatic Lilies from Leaves I took six leaves from…

After my post yesterday about the Snowy Owl Visit to Spring Hill, TN, Pete sent me a few of his pictures of the owl. He was able to get much closer to the bird than I could and his pictures are fantastic! He prefaced the pictures with a story that I’ll share with you in this post. I am a…

Spring is hitting us full force right now in mid April. Flowers are blooming everywhere! The mailbox garden is covered in spring time flowers and in just about every other garden is a spot of color to talk about. This post is plant and garden photo heavy so be prepared! April Blooms in the Mailbox Garden We’ll start the garden…

The complete and total elimination of garden weeds is every gardener’s dream!  And to do so organically or naturally just makes it all the more thrilling! While I’ll share with you some methods for eliminating weeds naturally for The Friday Fives, please keep in mind that the battle with weeds is perpetual struggle between gardener and nature.  Weed seeds can…

This time of year the native honeysuckle growing on my arbor is one of the showiest flowers around. Tons of flowers are covering the controllable version of lonicera. The native honeysuckle goes by the name of Lonicera sempervirens and not Lonicera japonica. I have the exotic foreigner too but it came with the garden! And it’s been ignoring my eviction…

Happy Thanksgiving! I hope you and your family have a fantastic Thanksgiving filled with fun, family, and of course food!

Over this weekend our travels found us at one of the local big box stores looking for shelving hardware for our downstairs closet (another project but not one that will make it to the garden blog).  While there I went through the seed kiosks looking for the plants that made my master list for seed purchases.  Now you’re probably wondering…

Saving seeds and cuttings in the fall is one additional way you can save a few bucks for the next gardening season. In the fall, plants produce their final batch of seeds and the thrifty gardener can take advantage of this! Seeds in general aren’t very expensive. You can find all sorts of mail order seed places and find a…

I couldn’t stand it anymore. I’ve been thinking about this for a while now and I just couldn’t take it anymore. It was just too much. The pressure of leaving has been building since the Garden Blogger Fall Color Project and each day it built a little more, another layer added to the top. I took all I could before…

Another unforeseen issue has arisen in my garden: blister beetles!  These voracious beetles are systematically devouring the foliage of our plants.  So far they’ve taken turns tasting our tomatoes, tomatillos, and even a clematis.  I’m not heartbroken over the clematis as it’s a sweet autumn clematis that grows like a weed – it will come back.  But I do want…

This week I put together another project in the vegetable garden. It was a little one that was another step toward designing my vegetable garden as a parterre style garden layout.  The idea for this project was to create something that was both edible and ornamental! I decided that working in the vegetable garden was the way to go.  Vegetables…

The other day I wrote a post about protecting your plants from a freeze. I followed what I preached and came through with no frost damage on my covered plants. I think Tennessee is now officially in the clear! I came away with these interesting shots. A new kind of pot garden?

Cucumber Plant – Deer Damage I was startled the other day when the eventual invader leaped out from behind my shed and scampered off into the woods. I jumped because I thought the deer had gone. I thought that they had picked up and moved on after the neighbors behind us moved in with their dog.  I wish I was…

While we are eating, and playing, and celebrating the holiday let us always remember why we celebrate, our freedom! Happy Independence Day!

I think it’s important for anyone interested in gardening to visit the local garden shows every now and then. Nashville’s Lawn and Garden Show was this past weekend and I stopped up to pay a visit. Overall it was a nice show but I have to say I wasn’t as impressed with it as I was last year. The display…

There are few fall performers more majestic than the beautyberry.  My beautyberry is Callicarpa dichtoma ‘Early Amethyst’ and is a native of Asia.  It’s a beautiful shrub with tiny white flowers in the summer that become loaded with clusters of purple berries in the fall.  When I say loaded, I mean loaded! The berries last throughout the fall and typically…

In the world of plants there are few that are easier to root than a willow. Whether you have a weeping willow, contorted willow, or dappled willow they all root very easily. Rooting a dappled willow is extremely simple and can be done in a glass or vase of water. Rooting a Willow Tree To root a willow in most…