Did you Get Lost in the Garden?

This time of year can be very confusing.  Especially when the weather throws a few curve balls like extra warm temperatures!  It almost makes you think it will be fine to plant those tomatoes four weeks early.  I know why, everyone wants bragging rights about that first ripe tomato! I thought for today’s Friday Five post that I would mention…

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…

Last year I built two new wooden raised beds for my vegetable garden. After building them I needed a way to fill them up with soil. Since I already had a pile of wood chips in the front yard from a tree trimmer I thought why not use them? As the wood chips break down they nourish the soil and…

What does a gardener’s garage look like?  Before you put an image into your mind please realize that the photo I’m about to show you is extremely embarrassing.  My garage has never been a priority for me – the garden has been!  When you add three kids to the mix who never seem to be able to put something back…

Coming up on April 25, 2008 is Arbor Day. It’s a day to celebrate a unique feature of our planet the trees. The trees are so important to us. They serve as the planet’s lungs filtering the air we breathe, they provide us fruit and nuts to eat, paper to read and write with, drugs like aspirin and shade to…

…meal in my garden this year. Blood meal is one of those organic additives that contribute to the quality of your soil. It has a very important nutrient: Nitrogen. Nitrogen is responsible for growing the green leafy growth on your plants. Since blood meal is made form the dried blood of livestock it is an organic product and releases the…

It’s the invasion of the lady bugs! Or really the Asian lady beetle. They are coming! As I write there is one on the windowsill in front of me. These beetles are great in the garden, they eat pests like aphids but when they invade they home they can become a problem. They go everywhere and leave yellow stains behind….

It’s that time of year when the fall blooming plants begin to start their show including Sweet Autumn Clematis (Clematis terniflora). This non-native clematis grows prolifically through the summer and gladly will climb and overtake any structure it meets then will bloom in the fall. I picked up two of these on the discount racks and even though I know…

I won’t be posting a Seed Sowing Saturday post this weekend since it’s Easter weekend. I’ve included a dogwood picture and if you would like to read more about dogwoods I wrote post for the Tennessee Gardener online that you may enjoy.  Also for an update on the plants in my garden shed feel free to take a look at…

As you can see from the picture to the left that this tree has taken a beating. Last fall when the deer were out in force a buck decided to rut against several of my favorite trees. Coincidentally all the deer damaged trees were young trees that I had planted in the yard including two maples, a dogwood and one…

April is an amazing time of year to get in the garden. The weather is better, the soil is warming up, and the plants are coming alive from their winter rest. April is the time of year when gardeners need to be going full speed agead to prep their Zone 7 gardens before the heat of summer arrives. Here in…

I am a self-professed plant propagation nut and therefore I find plant propagation in all it’s forms very interesting. It was inevitable that I’d try my hand at hybridizing and what better place to start than daylilies? Daylilies have easy to find and manipulate reproductive parts (stamens and pistols). The stamen is the male part that contains the pollen and…

Trees serve as the backbone of the garden. Trees add structure and height, clean the air, filter water, prevent soil erosion, provide shade and can be a habitat for wildlife. If you have ever sat beneath a maple tree in the heat of summer and enjoyed the cool shade it provided you understand the value of that tree. To me…

Today please read my post about Getting Ready for Spring Gardening over at Complete Organizing Solutions. What kind of preparations are you making right now for spring gardening?

I planted the fall vegetable garden in my 4’x8′ raised bed a couple weeks ago and thought it was time for another progress report. The tomatoes are still growing, or at least the cherry tomatoes are. They seem to be enhanced with the genetic make-up of kudzu and have taken over the garden effectively blocking out the sun and moisture…

A line of storms came through last night dropping the temperature nearly 20 degrees in an hour. Strong rain and wind blew all over Tennessee. Here in our yard we received about an inch of rain throughout the day. Fortunately our damage was minimal. Probably the worst thing affected was our sleep. The neighbor’s fence gate blew open and their…

It is highly possible that post might not have happened. I’m glad it did since I’ve seen some great November colors in the blog posts listed below. Due to a computer bug and other issues this week it’s been very hard to get anything written. Whoever had the bright idea to create Trojan viruses on computers needs to be locked…

Since we were gone for a few days one of the first things I did was check the vegetable garden’s progress. Things are shaping up even if it is a bit unkempt. The tomatoes need tied off again. I’m using bamboo stakes and twine to tie off the plants as they grow. I could easily have used store bought tomato…