Did you Get Lost in the Garden?

The Dandelion(Taraxacum officinale)You know this pretty little face don’t you? Staring up at you with it’s bright golden feathery petals gleaming in the sun. It is a pretty little flower in it’s own way. Almost…dandy. But its pretty exterior hides how fierce this weed really is. It spreads fast if not contained.This little flower from the Asteraceae family will spread…

Sometimes plants just want to fall open in the center. There’s an easy fix for this but it requires some spring stem tip pruning! Check out the video below for this very simple garden tip! How to Keep Plants from Falling Open in the Center

It won’t be long at all before we can go wild and plant everything we want in Middle TN. I’ve been holding back my tomatoes until all signs of frost are gone in the forecast and it looks like this weekend will be the weekend for tomato planting! Just so you know the best way to plant a tomato is…

One of the first plants I began planting here in our garden/landscape was the Japanese dappled willow ‘Hakuro Nishiki’ (Salix integra). It’s a beautiful shrub willow with dappled foliage that is said to grow from 10-12 feet tall. I planted it for several reasons. First of all I liked it! The dappled foliage gives three seasons of interest which in…

I’m amazed this year by the blooms I actually have in the garden. Maybe it was the warm snap, or maybe we’ll be lucky enough to have some great blooms each and every February. My feature plant today is one that comes every spring much to the chagrin of the lawn lover.  Tiny purple flowers bloom enmass across yards all…

Arbor with Moonflowers One thing I really like about garden structures: no matter how much rain, how hot, or how dry they always look good! Fortunately our arbor also has the added benefit of a nice annual vine plant (moonflower) wrapping around it. Here is the arbor from the side yard looking toward the front yard. The homemade stepping stones…

On Monday morning I was on WAKM AM radio show Spotlight on Spring Hill again to talk garden talk. Since here in Tennessee we just had a 2 week dry spell I thought some water conservation tips would be helpful to mention on the radio. Here’s a few tips I gave: Water in the Morning If watering is necessary, water…

This past Sunday was Mother’s Day. I discovered that one very good advantage to being a gardener is the continuous stock of ready to cut flowers for arrangements. It only took a few minutes to put together these two arrangements one for my wife and one for my mother. Each arrangement contains ‘Caradonna’ Salvia, Irises, Heuchera (Coral Bells), Catmint ‘Walker’s…

This past weekend was fantastic. The weather couldn’t have been more perfect for getting outdoors and getting things done. I was looking forward to Saturday and the perfect weather a week in advance and knew exactly what I was going to tackle. My plan: to work around the garden shed! I managed to accomplish one major task that needed done…

Last year we designed, built, and grew our first vegetable garden in our new home. The garden was made of two large beds that were subdivided into 3 smaller conjoined beds in an “L” shape. Unfortunately the vegetable garden layout we designed was built more around aesthetics than around function. Since then I’ve realized something: When designing vegetable gardens think…

This week we began a series of posts on edible landscaping.  Below you will find several articles to get started on creating a productive and beautiful edible landcape.  There are many more articles to come in this series so please check back or bookmark this post for updates! How to Begin a Plan Create a “To Grow” list, identify a…

Tonight we were able to make good use of our vegetables from the garden. Here’s a quick look at what my family had for dinner tonight!Now the chicken was the main course and it didn’t come from the garden but the squash did! I covered it in olive oil with a little salt and pepper then grilled the squash halves….

I wanted to say thank you to Barbara Wise for an excellent container gardening presentation this past weekend at the Spring Hill Garden Club Meeting! The slides and photos of the work you do were fantastic and the garden club appreciated seeing the ideas created by a expert in the field of container gardening. It was definitely a perfect start…

Beware gardeners for danger may lurk beneath a rock. Though a rock may be a home to many creatures there are few that rival the venomous Black Widow spider. This spider is one of only two spiders gardeners in Tennessee have to watch out for, the other is the brown recluse. The black widow loves to lurk underneath rocks and…

Summer is the peak time for tomatoes which makes it the perfect time for tantalizing tomato talk! I’m pretty excited about this particular tomato that my wife selected from the Baker’s Creek Catalog last winter. I’m talking about ‘Woodle Orange’! It’s a funny name and prior to reading it in the catalog I had never heard of it before. Because…

Today was another good work day in the vegetable garden. I managed to get all the mulch laid on the pathways and even added a few stepping stones in one section. I’ll add a few more every now and then and eventually I’ll have them around the whole garden. As I was working around the garden putting the mulch down…