My daughters often accuse me of being a pessimist, which may be a natural inclination or a learned trait from my early career as a journalist. Whatever. I can barely contain my joy at the storm damage we incurred this Saturday. While many of our friends and neighbors lost big trees or faced hours (more than 24 in a few…
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One of the most repeated mantras in gardening is “right plant, right place.” Like other garden sayings, there is a lot of truth in the advice to choose plants that fit the conditions of a landscape rather than try to adjust the location’s soil, sunlight or micro-climate to fit a desired plant. Three years ago, I gave up on growing…
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Sorry for the National Enquirer imitation, but I was pretty taken aback Wednesday evening when I discovered these tan blobs on the mulch in one of my gardens. It’s slime mold and it looked like the world’s largest bird poop, sort of. Other sources compare it to dog vomit. I didn’t know what it was at first, but after taking…
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Walking around the ponds near our house this spring, I’ve noticed this has been a great year for milkweed (Asclepias) with stands of it everywhere and many of the plants now in beautiful bloom. This plant gets its name partly because it spreads like a you-know-what, but in the case of this plant all that spread is to the benefit…
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Cranesbills, also called hardy geranium, are noted for their wild look—at least some of them are. They can get very scraggly and leggy, after the first flush of bloom. I usually cut back my ‘Johnson Blue’ cranesbill in early July to keep it contained and encourage more blooms. But I don’t think I will have to cut back the plant…
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