A cross between coneflowers and gloriosa daisies, a new variety of a little-known native plant, and the smallest native Joe Pye flower yet top the list of interesting new perennials debuting in the 2024 growing season. Growers, local garden centers, and other plant experts picked the following 14 choices for my annual January […]
A super-cold-hardy dusty miller, a double-award-winning purple-blooming agapanthus, and a whole new type of succulent are among a slew of interesting new annual flowers debuting in the 2024 growing season. Growers, local garden centers, and other plant experts picked those and more for my four-part, best-new-plants series that I compile each January – […]
A lot of winter is still staring us in the face, but for gardeners, it’s a time to dream about the many plants already awakening in greenhouses. Some of these plants will be new to the market in 2024 – improvements or new twists that haven’t been grown in home gardens yet. […]
The National Gardening Association’s 2023 National Gardening Survey found that an estimated 80 percent of American households are taking part in some sort of lawn or gardening activity. That’s a five-year high and comes despite markedly higher prices in plants and gardening supplies. What form will that interest take in 2024? Here’s […]
The 2023 gardening season took us down a lot of roads… too much and too little rain, the sudden appearance/disappearance of spotted lanternflies, more bans of invasive plants, and gardening in a smoky haze, to name a few. I thought I’d close out the year by highlighting some of what I wrote about […]
The world’s biggest and longest running indoor flower show, the Philadelphia Flower Show, is set to bloom next March 2-10, and the 2024 theme will be “United by Flowers.” Show officials say visitors can expect a “massive, immersive, and flower-filled entrance garden,” plus large-scale floral creations and gardens designed by florists and garden […]
Now that another gardening season is in the bag, it’s a good time to look back and see what lessons we can draw from it. The 2023 gardening year was another one that brought us lots of twists and turns, not the least of which was more erratic weather and feast-or-famine rainfall. […]
Most of the gardening questions I get this time of year begin with the words, “Is it too late to…” or “Can I still…” Mid-fall is a confusing, kinda-over/kinda-not time in the garden. It’s a time when frost usually has killed the summer vegetables and annuals and slowed the growth of everything […]
Are you one of those gardeners who already has buzzed everything to the ground and packed away the trowels for the season? Not so fast. As the sage philosopher Yogi Berra once pointed out, “It ain’t over till it’s over.” And in the garden, it ain’t over until it’s really cold […]
I planted a small meadow on a bank in my back yard for two main reasons: 1.) I was looking for a low-care, low-cost way to cover a tough site that’s not easy to work. 2.) I liked the idea of adding diversity to encourage pollinators and beneficial insects. That’s why I […]