Did you Get Lost in the Garden?

During a break in the rain on Monday I was able to take these shots. The blue of the sky is just starting to peak through the dark rain clouds. It reminded me of one of my favorite newer U2 songs, Window in the Skies (from U218 The Singles). My oldest daughter’s favorite part is when they sing “Oh, Oh,…

I’ve finally gotten around to one of the chores I’ve been meaning to do for two years! Amazing how that works isn’t it? You intend to do a project in the garden then you get distracted with other projects and it becomes to late to accomplish. Today I finally mulched the west side of the planting bed outside of the…

The tomatoes are doing great! They have a strong healthy start in our seed starting area. I planted them a week and a half  ago and many of the seedlings are now getting their true leaves.  As the roots start to emerge from the peat pellets I’ll transplant them deeply into individual pots.  Deep planting is the best way to…

The leaves are still fresh on my ‘Forest Pansy’ Redbud but you can already see why I picked it as a focal point for our arbor project. My idea was to place the beautiful purple foliage of the redbud where you can view it through the arbor. That can’t be done from all perspectives but as the tree grows larger…

Not to be confused with any other Dave’s top ten list. This is a list of the top ten chores that I need to to in my yard and garden from now until the middle of fall. They aren’t in any particular order and I will accomplish them in a similar fashion!1. Clean up the garden beds. Each bed has…

The title of this post says it all. If I can move a rock I’ll put it somewhere! Thanks to a garden club friend (Evelyn) I found out about a man named Barry who was clearing part of his property so that his wife could have horses. Unfortunately for Barry, and very fortunately for me and several other rock collectors,…

Last week I walked outside my front door on my way to get the morning newspaper the same as usual. Sometimes I’ll go out the back door to walk around the garden to the front yard and other days I come out the front door. There is little rhyme or reason to it, just however I feel like going. But…

Recently I was given the opportunity to check out Nancy Ondra’s latest book called Five-Plant Gardens. Nancy Ondra writes the blog Hayefield and has written several other books including The Perennial Care Manual.  She is definitely what I consider and expert on perennial plants! This latest book isn’t about the care of the plants it’s about how to go about…

Every gardener has an enemy, a nemesis, an evil villain that lurks in the garden that the garden would love to eradicate. I’ve had an invader this year that has been more aggressive than ever before – Bermuda grass. Once it gets a foothold in the garden it is extremely hard to hold back, let alone eliminate.  Recently I attempted…

When pruning shrubs and trees there are certain characteristics you need to look for to determine where to cut, how to cut, when to cut, or even what to cut. It’s like a good mystery movie with the who, what, when, and where! One very important thing to watch out for is crossed branches (this would be a who). Crossed…

This weekend was a busy one and not even really in the garden. The garden chores that need attention are significant but sometimes I actually have to get out of the garden to do other things! Hard to believe but it’s true! This weekend had me shopping for materials on Friday night until 9:00 at the local home improvement store…

Last year I told you about the Japanese maples that grew naturally from underneath a tree at my parent’s house. I over wintered young trees in my garden shed (see the April Video update) and have been taking care of them here in our garden. The other day I transferred the Japanese maple seedlings from the shed because it was…

It’s been a good while since I had a couple hours to “maintain” the vegetable garden. Ideally I would take 20 minutes each day to weed, search the garden for problems, weed, prune, weed, and tie up tomatoes. Yes you may have noticed quite a few weeds, let’s just say so did I! Today I did a little bit of…

The weather this weekend was perfect. You can’t say that much here in July but it was just plain perfect. I hope you got to enjoy it as much as I did! I hope you enjoy a looking at a few pictures from the weekend! Salvia ‘Black and Blue’ and Zinnias Moonflower vine climbing the front porch.’Silver Mound’ Artemisia

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…

Over the next several days (until the voting begins on the Better Homes and Gardens 48 Hour Blog Challenge) I’ll be giving small previews of my Arbor project. It’s ready to go and I’m very pleased with the result. Here’s a first look at one aspect of the arbor: Solar Lights: Solar lights are one of those garden details that…

Today was one of those days when everyone decided to have a great idea at once, post about fall colors! Unfortunately I’ve been working all day on the greenhouse and have just now been able to update the project. Better late than never right?We’ll start today’s flurry of fall foliage posts in the order they were received!The first stop today…

Fall is the perfect time to start preparing tree and shrub seeds that need a period of cold weather before they’ll sprout. When seed starting tree and shrub seeds I use two techniques that help to trigger better germination rates. The first technique is simply soaking the seeds. The second process is called stratification and mimics the natural cycle seeds…