Plum Yew – a Shade Evergreen You Should Grow
Shade is the gardener’s perpetual problem – just what can I grow in those inevitable shady spots that are found in every garden. Beneath trees or in the shade of buildings, it is…
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Native American Holly Trees
Winter is the time when evergreen trees are most noticeable in our gardens, and few stand out more than holly does. These handsome trees and bushes, with their rich-green leathery leaves, bring structure…
Classic Trees for a Japanese Garden
The Japanese style of garden is enjoying huge popularity in the West. Perhaps it’s the huge interest in mindfulness and Zen, the desire for simplicity, or maybe the realization that it is the…
Winter Landscaping Tips
You invest love, energy and money into your garden, so why enjoy it for only part of the year? Winter is a season too, and despite the cold and rain or snow there…
Holly – the Perfect Tree for Christmas
While the perfect Christmas Tree might be a Spruce or Fir, the perfect tree to have growing in your yard at Christmas is a Holly Tree. This classic tree for Christmas is perhaps…
Pick the Right Persimmon
Persimmon fruits have become hot items in the produce department in the last few years. these exotic-looking bright orange fruits, which look a little like a beefsteak tomato, are available in late fall…
Nuts About Pecans? – Then Grow Your Own
These days it seems everyone is talking about – and eating – nuts. The peanut – not a nut at all, but a type of bean – is of course central to American…
Growing Grapes at Home
So you want to grow some grape vines? Perhaps you are interested in making wine, or perhaps you want to enjoy top-quality grapes for the table, picked right from your garden. Perhaps you…
Protect Your Evergreens the Way the Pros Do
Protecting newly-planted trees – especially evergreens – in their first winter is a real issue for gardeners who live in cold parts of the country. Every fall and winter it comes up and…
Black-Leaf Crape Myrtles – A New Look For An Old Favorite
Crape myrtles have been favorites with southern gardeners for a very long time. Their resistance to heat and drought, combined with vibrant flowers produced over a long period, have made sure of that….
An Easy Approach to Planning Your Garden
The layout of your garden is as important as how you decorate inside, but it often doesn’t get the same attention, or budget. Yet the garden is often the main focus of life…
Growing Peaches in Your Garden
Peaches are such luscious fruits, and so delicious to eat, that it seems hard to believe they are also among the easiest of fruit trees to grow, and ideal for smaller gardens, since…
Crab Apples – the Best Flowering Tree for Cold Climates
Spring and flowering trees go together – it wouldn’t be spring without them. But the classic flowering trees like cherry trees and magnolias are hard to grow in colder climates, below zone 5…
Grow Muscadine Grapes – the Best Grapes You Will Ever Taste
If you live outside the South, the chances are your grape-eating experience is limited to the green, seedless grapes sold in supermarkets. If that is so, then you have been missing out on…
Pick Figs from Your Own Garden
Figs hold a special place among the many kinds of fruits we eat. They have a unique quality that goes well with savory foods, especially ham and soft cheeses, or added to salads….
How to Grow Berry Bushes – What Ones Should I Grow?
Fresh fruit is one of the great pleasures of life, and home-grown is always superior in just about every way. But growing fruits like peaches, pears, and even apples is not easy, and…
5 Steps to Better Soil for Fall Planting
Now that fall is beginning, this is prime planting season for trees and shrubs. Planted now, rather than in spring, they will establish roots over winter – even in the coldest areas –…
Look Up When You Plant – Trees and Utility Lines
With fall advancing, we are into peak tree-planting season, and all across the country gardeners and home owners are choosing shade trees, ornamental trees, or planning to plant trees to screen their property…
Cherry Laurel – the Top-Pick Easy Evergreen Shrub
It doesn’t matter how much or how little you garden, or how complex or simple your garden is, evergreens are going to be an essential part of it. They provide structure as screens…
Fall – The Ideal Planting Season
Somehow, over recent years, the gardening year got turned around. Today everyone rushes into their garden at the first sign of spring, and immediately starts planning and planting for the best garden ever….
Are You Growing These Fall Blooming Plants? You Should Be!
We tend to think of garden flowers as something that happens in spring and summer and having blooms at those times is relatively easy. Too many gardens though, are finished by Labor Day,…
Plan Ahead for Winter Interest in the Garden
While we enjoy the last balmy days of summer, it is hard to think of the winter to come, but it will come, and our once-green gardens will be a lot barer when…
Summer Tree Problems – What Counts, and What Doesn’t
There is a cycle to the growth of a garden through the seasons. After the silent wait of winter, spring arrives full of promise. The fresh, new growth of trees and shrubs is…
Time to Plan for Fall Color
Summer is at its height, but the smart gardener is always thinking ahead. Fall will be with us all too soon, and if you want to continue the garden fun and beauty into…