Did you Get Lost in the Garden?

Denise from Southern California has another great Fall Color Project post for us!  You might think that her region may not have much fall color to offer, but if you look you’ll find it!  Just take a glance at the muhlenbergia in full bloom, the ginko trees, or the sweetgum and you’ll see the fall color that comes to Southern California….

One of the projects I’ve been cultivating this year is my self-sowing garden. Part of the motivation for this garden is due to its location. Nearby is a gas utility line and I didn’t want to plant anything here that I would feel bad about removing should the need arise, but I still wanted plants that looked great. Nearly every…

One of the keys to attracting pollinators is to plant what they like. That means providing plants that give the pollinators food and shelter for all stages of development. Monarch butterflies one pollinator that can benefit from planting milkweed but there are many other insects and creatures that can benefit from the perennial. Also please keep in mind that milkweed…

This year with the advent of the virus many people found themselves with time to spend in their gardens. Which means that a lot of new gardeners have started gardening for the very first time. As a beginner gardener it can be overwhelming and there can be a ton of questions. What plants to grow? Where to find seeds? What…

Today I started another segment of my Front Garden remodel. If you recall from my previous posts on this particular garden I wasn’t pleased with the builder’s special hollies and the crabapple I had there. The crabapple was free tree from Arbor Day that I planted in a completely wrong spot. I do that sometimes I get a plant going…

Pours, and pours, and pours, and pours, and pours to a total of 6 inches of rain within 48 hours. And there is more to come! I have never seen this much rain in such a short period of time since we moved to this house.  During one period within 45 minutes we received more than 2 inches of rain….

Healthy potato plants About a month before the last frost date is the best planting time for potatoes in my zone 7b garden. That starts the planting season for potatoes here in Tennessee in Mid March. If you need a better guide than that think of St. Patrick’s Day and plan around it within a few days. Potatoes are not…

My last garden shed post was way back in June and I’m definitely overdue to share some more progress. This one has much more to do with gardening than building a shed so go take a look at the first part of two posts! The Gardens Around The Shed

I’m definitely no expert in roses.  Recently I saw this rose blooming at my mother-in-law’s home and was curious as to it’s identity. The insides of the bloom are a creamy yellow color while the outside of the petals are a kind of red-peach color. The rose has a cluster of four flowers which make it most likely a type…

If you are like me you’ve been scanning the forecast trying to plan out every possible moment you can be outside in the garden! Around here Saturday is supposed to be pretty nice with scattered clouds and no rain coming in until late. And I can’t forget to mention the big 70 that has appeared in the temperature predictions! Since…

Cilantro is one of our family’s favorite herbs to grow. We use it in cooking various dishes and always include it in our guacamole. In the garden it tends to be very short lived in the heat of the summer. Cilantro is very heat sensitive and will produce flowers very fast when the temperatures get warm. Why does Cilantro bolt?…

The people at EcoSMART have offered to give away a bundle package containing an eco friendly pesticide and several other of their environmentally friendly products. Included in the bundle is an organic weed killer, a fungicide, garden insect killer and an insect repellent. All you need to do to enter the drawing for the is to post in the comments…

One of my goals this “offseason” (as if there ever really is!) is to maintain a constant supply of fresh basil from November to April. I could do this by simply planting a sequential crop of basil seeds every couple months. This will work but I have an easier way! Basil is one of those nifty plants that grows roots…

Yesterday during a reprieve from the rain we went out to examine the state of the garden. The past two weeks I’ve been mostly concentrating on the greenhouse project and I felt it was time to see what I’ve been missing. The celosia I planted from seed this year did really well. It’s a virtually no maintenance annual unless you…

It’s been a long time.  Last year, or last mowing season, I had the misfortune of blowing up my mower.  Well I nearly blew up my mower. It was close, very close.  While mowing one fine spring day last May the blades ran over a nylon cord and got caught.  I did what any responsible power tool user does in…

As gardeners we deal with all kinds of issue that can make gardening frustrating and difficult.  One of those issues is pests.  Pests come in many forms from thousands of kinds of insects to birds and animals.  No method of pest control is 100% effective all the time so gardeners need be creative problem solvers in the garden.  The best…

Compost bins are essential in the garden. They take the waste materials from the yard, garden, kitchen, or farm and turn it into usable soil. Good compost is worth its weight in gold to gardeners which is exactly why it is nicknamed “gardener’s gold.” One of the easiest ways to make a lot of compost is to set up a…

I was inspecting the Birdbath Garden the other day when a persistent buzzing sound became noticeable. I looked around a little closer and found this little bee happily buzzing among the stalks of the salvia. No wonder I like these plants! They are magnets for these happy little pollinators. This bee buzzed from stalk to stalk sampling all it had…