Did you Get Lost in the Garden?

The shovel, the rake, and the hoe.  Three tools no gardener should be without.  Ever.  They dig, they grade, and the chop the earth.  They cut roots and aid the gardener in tilling when the tiller is kaput.  While they take a little muscle to use they are capable of great deeds, such as Bermuda grass removal! Raised Bed Vegetable…

Blooms are still being produced all over the garden midway into September. It won’t be long until fall comes and the blooms begin to become much more scarce.Good Advice: Enjoy it while it lasts!’New York Celeste’ Aster and ‘Powis Castle’ ArtemisiaFront GardenNotes: The ‘Powis Castle’ Artemisia is from a cutting.Cinnamon Basil (Ocimum basilicum)Japanese Maple Garden off the patio. Blue Mistflower…

When you think about power tools do you think electric? Maybe it’s time you should! Recently Greenworks sent me their battery powered Greeworks Pro 80 Volt 18″ Chainsaw (Amazon Aff) to test. I had some doubts. Could a battery powered chainsaw actually cut through well enough to be a part of my arsenal of power tools? Would a charge last…

Despite recent events at the White House the security of my greenhouse shed just won’t ever be as good as that of the Secret service. Since it is also a shed and will be housing my lawnmowers, weedeater, various garden tools, hoses, and all the plants I hope to propagate I need something to keep people out. Tools don’t walk…

Since I’ve talked so much about the arbor itself I thought for this post I would highlight the garden that the arbor takes you too. If you look past the arbor you will find a quasi-Japanese shade garden nook. I say quasi because it’s a hybrid of Japanese and American plants.  The Japanese elements are the Japanese maple, a side…

Here is Part Six of The Home Garden’s series of posts on how to garden on a budget.I began planning this post with the intention of talking about the importance of planning a garden. After typing and typing I realized that this is a subject so large that it really needed to be broken down into smaller sections. One of…

Almost sounds like a Christmas song but White Nose is the name of a squirrel that frequents our yard and our back deck. He’s a pretty big little guy with a furry white nose, hence his name. He feels quite comfortable partaking of our bird buffet. I really don’t mind the squirrels visiting the bird feeders. The only bad thing…

By far my favorite plant from the vegetable garden is the tomato.  I don’t buy them from the stores if I can help it as there is very little flavor to be found in store bought tomatoes.  Fresh from the garden is how a tomato should be.  Today on a gray overcast winter day I’m looking back at the tomatoes…

Every now and then it’s fun to go back and look up the statistics from The Home Garden to see what people are looking for and eventually wind up here. Sometimes the search terms are funny but hopefully the results lead the searcher to great info. So here are ten search terms that showed up that all began with the…

As our gardening season draws to a close I thought I’d update you on the progress of some cuttings and how they look now. First up is an echinacea that was a propagation experiment. I took basal stem cuttings (which come from the crown of the root) in the spring. Once it rooted I planted it in our front sidewalk…

Last Friday I mentioned 5 Vegetable Garden Design Tips for the Friday Fives post.  Today we’ll look at some more vegetable garden design tips that relate to organization of a garden’s layout!  I’ll have to own up and admit it that the organization part of gardening is a skill where I am somewhat deficient though I am striving to do…

While the calendar says it is spring there are some other indicators of the season. I’ll name a few and you are welcome to add or comment on what you think some other signs of spring are!You know it’s spring when…the smell of grass clippings from a recent mowing wafts through your yard on the wind.the smell of onions wafts…

I’ve written before about propagating Husker’s Red Penstemon (Penstemon digitalis) but thanks to a garden club friend of mine I learned a new method to propagate them. She was talking to Rita Randolph of Randolph Greenhouses who passed on this little trick that I’m about to share with you. It is as easy as it gets! Here’s How to Propagate…

Here’s a just a short update with what’s going on with my garden shed.Bought three colors of paint (two gallons of the main paint and one each for trim and doors). I’ll let you know what the color scheme will be later but it will blend with our house. Bought glazing to fix and repair the old single pain windows.Cleaned…

If you every wondered exactly why the beautyberry is called a beautyberry I’ll give you two words: “Beauty” and “berry!” These beautiful purple clusters of purple berries are well worth the wait each year for the autumn display. I’ve added several new beautyberries from cuttings to my garden this year and can’t wait until their display matches the first one…

Yesterday would have been my father’s 68th birthday.  He was a Halloween baby born back in 1943 but since July 6th, 2011 we’ve been without my dad.  I think about him in some way everyday and I definitely don’t need anything to remind me of how much he helped me through life, but to honor my dad in a small…

Every year I write down my ideas for gardening projects.  It helps me to put down some thoughts and map out where my garden needs to go throughout the season.  I won’t be able to accomplish every project on the list but it does give me some direction.  At the end of the year I’ll go back and see how…

For 3 years now (it’s hard to believe it’s been that long!) I’ve been selling plants at a local farmers market while also helping to manage the market’s logistical operations and online presence (Social Media and Webpage). Over that time I’ve observed quite a few different merchants with a variety of products at a farmers market and what kind of…