Planting Ideas

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Train Clematis up a Post

File this under “other things you can do with fencing other than actual fencing.” Like my trick for saving shrubs from the ravages of rabbits I like to use fencing to form little cages, trellises really, around posts.
Posts, poles, supports, columns, whatever you want to call them, we all have them, we all need them. […]

Grow your own food to save money

Food prices are growing like pole beans, and many people are planting more edibles in their garden, or taking up gardening for the first time, in an effort to save money. So, I thought a blog post on the subject would be both timely and useful.
Oil & Ethanol
First, why are food prices going up? Two […]

Use Black Mulch to Brighten Up Shady Areas

Mulch comes in many colors, people have long been using the ever present red mulch, and in fact I would venture it probably rivals plain mulch in volume. There are also golden mulches, that look like very fresh wood. Then there are more subdued brown mulches that look like slightly older wood.
The main advertised benefit […]

Naturalizing Crocus in the Lawn

Finally Flowers. Michigan had an abysmally cold February and March and all the bulbs and other plants were delayed, I heard that even one state to the South things were on schedule, but up here this is the latest start I remember in recent time.
But finally, things are waking up, and up first of course, […]

Gardening Catalogue Deluge; What to Plant?

Apparently all the nurseries have a conspiracy to bury us gardeners in catalogues starting the week after Christmas. I don’t get why, but apparently we all must start thinking about what we want to plant as soon as we’re done taking down our Christmas tree. In the past week and a half I have gotten […]

Edible Ornamentals

When planning your garden design do not forget that you can use vegetables in your ornamental beds.
Yes, I said it, vegetables in your ornamental beds. For some reason people see an ornamental bed as featuring eye-pleasing designs with organic layouts and nice flowers. Whereas a vegetable garden needs to have straight orderly rows like a […]

Butterfly Bush

I’ve blogged about butterfly bushes, or Buddleia, before, but I felt the need to do so again today.
You see, I went outside and noticed no less than 10 large monarch butterflies on one of my bushes. I tried my best to get a picture of them all but it wasn’t working well, the best […]

My New Tanyosho Pine

I went to Rome in June, read all about it here. I fell in love with the beautiful stone pines that dotted the landscape. They are a very graceful pine with no understory branches and an upside down pyramid flat-top upperstory. Unfortunately they are not hardy where I live in Michigan.
Well, a few […]

A Border of Happy Returns Daylilies

My back garden is looking great again this year and I attribute much of it to my row of “Happy Returns” daylilies. Remember, a daylily is so named because each bloom lasts only for 1 day, and yet each day this row is covered by atleast a hundred blooms, and such blooming power will last […]

Barberry, a great shrub for the landscape

There is something to be said about barberries. They do not have beautiful flowers. Their scent can be bad. Their foliage, though nice, is beat by other plants. And yet I find myself thinking of them as one of the best bushes for the landscape.
The reasons? Sheer growability. Japanese Barberry (Berberis thunbergii) are hardy […]

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