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Flowering Wisdom
Last year, I planted sage. This year, the sage is blooming, and to great visual effect. Each individual sage flower isn’t even a half an inch long. Taken all together, in a large stand, the color can...
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Congress Cutting Gardens, Keeping Wasteful Military Spending High
The next time you visit the National Mall in Washington D.C., you can expect a bit less from the U.S. Botanic Garden. The House of Representatives has voted to approve an amendment that reduces the...
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If You Mow Your Lawn
People who mow their lawns to be neat and tidy and short miss the pleasure of bronze colored seed heads.
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Propagating in August
Two garden activities await me this morning. The first looks forward – I’ll be trying to propagate lavender cuttings, which are supposed to do well when started towards the end of summer as well as in...
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Better Homes and Garden Porn
I offer as reason to toss aside the magazine Better Homes and Gardens the photograph you see here. From the magazine’s web site comes this photograph of a flower bed in vibrant hues of green with...
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Vegetable Gardening 2012 Continues as Vegetable Gardening 2013 Begins
In the automobile industry, the end of a calendar summer is the beginning of the next model year. So it goes with vegetables, but in carbon-neutral fashion. Garden fashion magazines depict the...
View ArticleLittle plant disaster: a touch-me-this discovery
Dad: Why did you take so long coming up the hill? Son: Oh, I was just looking at those pink plants by the road. Dad: Did you like the flowers? Son: They were OK, but I really like the seed pods. Do you...
View ArticleHow I Know Autumn is Coming
I hear the sound of acorns falling. I feel acorns underfoot beneath the oak tree. The blueberries and blackberries are gone. The second round of snap peas has sprouted. The lily stalks look like they...
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Autumn Chives
Chives are a powerful asset in any garden. Their leaves can be eaten, adding a fresh onion-like flavor to a meal when lightly cooked. They grow in tight bunches and seed freely, filling in spaces...
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Reclaimed for the Sun
When I moved up to Maine 3 years ago, the place I moved into had a deck of pressure-treated wood shoved into a south-and-east facing corner. It wasn’t connected to the steps, so you had to walk to it....
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Vegetables at the Brink of Autumn
My August plan to chance a second batch of snap peas has borne fruit: Even though the plants are shorter than their summertime parents, they’ve got some delicious pods. And what does a hot pepper taste...
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Autumn Growths
At the same time that an unusually long growing season is bringing me a second, smaller batch of flowering onions, consistent rains have stimulated other fruiting bodies in my garden as well....
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October Bounty
A full week into October here in mid-Maine, and still I’m harvesting a bounty from good earth. A few peppers that are supposed to be hot came out sweet in the chill, but hundred of sweet peapods are...
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Putting the Pumpkins to Bed
One of my favorite ways to watch the seasons turn is to put the family’s jack o’lanterns at the edge of the woods right off the side of the house. Every few days as we walk to the bus stop or over to...
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8 Landscaping Ideas To Fix A Boring Backyard
Felicia Feaster at HGTV says of the garden seen below that, “This backyard benefits from the subtle use of various textures on its terraces that ups the excitement level.” This is subtle? I’m counting...
View ArticleOne Bumblebee
Where I live in central Maine it’s been an unusual year. We’ve had a slow start due to cold, but even so I haven’t seen more than one bumblebee in my garden. Just one bumblebee, and no honeybees at...
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Dangerous EarthGro Pottting Soil From Scotts
I am in the process of creating a new vegetable garden this summer, on a piece of land that gets good sun, but where the soil is poor. Generations ago, people had created a driveway for horse-drawn...
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