Friday, May 3, 2013
Let's grow some knowledge. Whether you dig gardens because it's your business or just because you dig gardening, share your tips by blogging on Patch.
Spring has sprung and gardening season is approaching full swing. If you have a green thumb and can distinguish an annual from a perennial, we invite you to blog on Patch. Blogging is a great way for you to share your gardening expertise with thousands of Patch readers in Northern Virginia and DC. You can post as often as you'd like, even if you have to squeeze posts in between planting, weeding and scraping that dirt from beneath your nails. You can also post photos of your prize-winning peonies or your famous tomato plants, and write about garden tours, how to grow those prize-winning roses, and how to start your own home vegetable garden. Interested? To start your own blog, go to the homepage and click "Start a Blog" to submit your …
Monday, December 31, 2012
Keeping a garden journal is a great way to see what works for your garden.
On the morning of January 1, 2013, I will brew a cup of coffee, open my garden journal and record the temperature, the color of the morning sky, and what plants (if any) are blooming in my winter garden. This year Hana Jiman Sasanqua camellias, coneflowers (Echinacea), feverfew and hardy salvia are still blooming in our relatively balmy temperatures. I have been keeping a garden journal for the past ten years. I began my first journal in January, when my garden was reduced to its “bones”, and I could view it without the distractions of flowers and shrubs in bloom. This clear view allowed me to see what changes I might make and make plans for spring planting. A garden journal is a useful tool. On a practical basis, it helps with …
Tuesday, December 18, 2012
How to decorate with found objects.
In these last days of the year, as darkness falls earlier and earlier, we try to lighten our spirits by festooning our homes with sparkling lights and evergreen boughs. We gardeners scour our gardens for natural decorations, and trade with our gardening friends for those special beauties not found in our own yards. I am lucky to live on a wooded lot replete with rhododendron, mahonia, juniper, eastern white pines and a magnificent magnolia. I have a number of large rosemary bushes and two lavender bushes that can easily yield up some fragrant boughs. I trade cut branches of these evergreens with my even luckier gardening friends whose lots have evergreen hollies bursting with berries and deciduous hollies like winterberry holly whose fat …
Tuesday, December 4, 2012
Give the Gift of Winter Blooms
Although the cold weather has not yet arrived in our area, it soon will. When the bleak mid-winter weather begins to get us down, there are blooms to lift our spirits. The amaryllis is one of these blooms. Cultivate an amaryllis now and you will be uplifted by its extravagantly large flowers in the dark days of February. The most commonly encountered bloom is fiery red in color, but amaryllis (spelled the same whether singular or plural) also come in white, candy stripes and even lavender. Amaryllis bulbs have just arrived in all the garden centers and big box stores such as Home Depot, Lowes and Walmart. As a general rule, amaryllis bulbs will flower in seven to ten weeks from the time they are potted. Amaryllis that are purchased already…
Tuesday, November 20, 2012
Container gardening in fall and winter.
Garden leaves have been raked (mostly) and incorporated into the compost bins. Spring blooming bulbs have been planted. It is time for the gardener to transform outdoor containers into winter gardens. If you live in the Northern Virginia area, your garden is most likely dominated by the shade of lovely oaks, tulip poplars and other large deciduous trees. Gardeners in our area can maximize available sunshine by incorporating large containers planted with annuals and perennial bloomers into garden beds or hardscaped areas like patios and driveways. But what does the gardener do with these large urns and pots when summer is over? Colorful blooms and foliage can continue to delight the gardener even in the winter if cold hardy plants are used…
Tuesday, November 6, 2012
Assessing Post-Sandy Tree and Shrub Damage
The Northern Virginia area escaped relatively unscathed through Hurricane Sandy’s onslaught. The forecasts of heavy winds, storm surge and flooding were lessened by Sandy’s eventual track, and we were spared the kind of damage that devastated our neighbors to the northeast. Some large trees did succumb to the sixty-mile-an-hour wind gusts and saturated ground, but most of the debris seems to consist of large tree limbs, small branches and leaves…lots of leaves. While we pick up and bag this debris from our yards, gardeners should assess whether any hidden damage was done to those trees and large shrubs left standing after the storm. Trees and shrubs adapt to the normal stresses of wind flow as they sway in reaction to this pressure; the …
Tuesday, October 23, 2012
It's not as spooky as it sounds…
When we gardeners refer to the good “bones” of our gardens, we are not talking about this month’s All Hallows Eve decorations, a new composting element, or the occasional remains of a vole or field mouse we might find. The “bones” of a garden are the elements that are permanent and that provide its structure: trees, shrubs, arbors, walls, trellises, walkways, and statuary or other sculptural elements. They represent the garden as it appears when the growing season ends, when the color and texture provided by blooming plant material is muted by snow and bare earth. The garden’s bones are the single most important design element of a garden — a garden with “good bones” looks right throughout the growing season and in the heart of winter. A …
Tuesday, October 9, 2012
Fall is the time to plant for spring beauty in your garden.
My mailbox has been blooming[1] with bulb catalogues for the past few weeks. Lovely color photos of daffodils, tulips, scilla and grape hyacinths are spread out like a bouquet across every horizontal surface of my kitchen. Like many of my other gardening friends, I have been busy cutting back perennials and otherwise getting the garden ready for its winter rest, but I have seized a few minutes each day to peruse the bulb catalogues for spring bloom ideas. It seems counterintuitive as we diligently work to put our gardens to bed, but autumn is the time to choose and plant spring blooming bulbs. Spring blooming bulbs need to be planted several weeks before the ground freezes in order to become well established. They must not be planted …
Tuesday, September 25, 2012
Compost is black gold for your garden.
It is the perfect time of year to talk about composting. Leaves have begun to fall, and gardeners are cleaning up and cutting back spent flowers and other plant material in the garden. Composting this material is the ultimate step in sustainable gardening — returning nature’s bounty to our garden soil. I have been an enthusiastic composter for the past 10 years and have watched as my gardens thrive and my carbon footprint shrinks. Compost is produced when organic matter such as garden, lawn and other organic waste is broken down by bacteria and fungi. Compost incorporated into your garden soil can reduce erosion and water runoff. Plant roots penetrate compost-rich soil more easily and hold the soil in place. Water then flows down into the …
Tuesday, September 11, 2012
That leaves September chores for the gardener.
Summer’s end finds this gardener hard at work preparing the garden for fall …taking inventory of what worked and what fizzled; cutting back any plant that has finished blooming or is diseased; and preparing the beds to receive new perennials. I am taking advantage of the cooler September weather to divide overgrown spring and summer blooming perennials such as black-eyed susans, daylilies, peonies, Asiatic lilies, moss pinks and yarrow. Dividing these overgrown perennials will result in healthier plants and provide me with free plant material to fill in bare areas in my garden beds. Dividing and replanting the divisions of black-eyed Susans, peonies and moss pinks is relatively easy; you simply cut into the crown of the plant with a shovel…
Carol Lewis
10:31 am on Monday, May 20, 2013
Whoever is doing this, please stop! These are ads and don't belong in a Patch commentary space. It's annoying. more ›