Featured Articles

  • Traveling Plants | Letter from the Editor

    It was June and I was stuck in Denver. Well, not stuck, but delayed at the airport trying to get home and mindlessly scrolling through all the photos I’d taken…

  • 6 Great Plants for the Cottage Garden Look

    Incorporating the cottage garden style into your garden can be accomplished largely by using many of the plants that are hallmarks of the design. Here are some options to get…

  • 6 Great Plants for a New Perennial Design

    Incorporating the New Perennial style into your garden can be accomplished largely by using many of the plants that are hallmarks of the design. Here are some options to get…

  • Creating Winter Interest

    In gardening, we talk mostly about spring, summer, and to a lesser degree, fall. But that ignores a quarter of the calendar year. It’s not easy to design a garden…

  • 5 Tips to Help Your Garden Now

    Winning Tip: Plant tables I take over our patio every year to harden off seedlings, and I am always picking up clearance plants, many of which wait in my driveway…

  • Got Your Soil Test Back? Here Are 3 Things You Need to Know

    Though immensely valuable, a soil test is not a crystal ball. A little knowledge goes a long way in making the most out of your test results. See 5 tips…

  • 5 Tips To Improve Your Garden Soil

    5 Tips to Improve Your Garden Soil

    If you garden, you know soil is important. You have undoubtedly witnessed that as gardens grow more bountiful, the ground beneath them becomes proportionately darker, richer, and looser. You have…

  • 3 Autumn Favorites to Anchor Your Garden Design

    I am addicted to acquiring new plants, perhaps more than most people. If you tell me all the glorious details of a recent introduction, I will buy it by the…

  • 3 Steadfast Summer Bloomers

    3 Steadfast Summer Bloomers

    I am addicted to acquiring new plants, perhaps more than most people. If you tell me all the glorious details of a recent introduction, I will buy it by the…

  • 5 Spring Beauties to Start the Gardening Season Off Right

    I am addicted to acquiring new plants, perhaps more than most people. If you tell me all the glorious details of a recent introduction, I will buy it by the…

  • Bloody Mary Rodgersia

    Reliable Performers for the Mid-Atlantic

    We all want the newest, jazziest plants available, but a garden is not complete without a backbone of infallible plants that provide interest whether your new investments flourish or fail.…

  • Reliable Performers for the Midwest

    We all want the newest, jazziest plants available, but a garden is not complete without a backbone of infallible plants that provide interest whether your new investments flourish or fail.…

  • Reliable Performers for the Northeast

    We all want the newest, jazziest plants available, but a garden is not complete without a backbone of infallible plants that provide interest whether your new investments flourish or fail.…

  • Reliable Performers for the Northwest

    We all want the newest, jazziest plants available, but a garden is not complete without a backbone of infallible plants that provide interest whether your new investments flourish or fail.…

  • Dark Towers Penstemon

    Reliable Performers for the South

    We all want the newest, jazziest plants available, but a garden is not complete without a backbone of infallible plants that provide interest whether your new investments flourish or fail.…

  • Reliable Performers for the Southern Plains

    We all want the newest, jazziest plants available, but a garden is not complete without a backbone of infallible plants that provide interest whether your new investments flourish or fail.…

  • PANCHITO-MANZANITA

    Reliable Performers for the Southwest

    We all want the newest, jazziest plants available, but a garden is not complete without a backbone of infallible plants that provide interest whether your new investments flourish or fail.…

  • 7 Easy Fruit Trees to Grow Right in Your Own Backyard

    The main problem with many of the dwarf fruit trees available is that the fruit they produce rarely matches up to that of their full-size counterparts. Research continues, though, with…

  • How to Prune Dwarf Fruit Trees

    Given the challenges of true dwarfing rootstocks (toppling and high moisture needs), many gardeners may choose a variety with a semi-dwarfing rootstock instead. That can be a good move. Semi-dwarfing…

  • Native alternative to common garden plants

    Native Alternatives to Common Garden Plants

    The relatively adaptable and easygoing North American native plants in Great Natives From the Western United States—That Anyone Can Grow are excellent alternatives to commonly grown nonnative plants. These picks…

  • Great Native Plants From the Western United States—That Anyone Can Grow

    People on the coasts tend to think of much of the interior Western United States as all canyons and cowboys. The West has plenty of both, but so much more:…

  • How to Grow Dwarf Fruit Trees

    Growing your own orchard fruits in the backyard is extremely rewarding and gives you an empowering sense of resiliency. It reduces your carbon footprint (that luscious peach you’re biting into…

    Houseplants

  • Winter Bulbs Will Get You Through

    When you hear “bulbs,” you usually think spring, right? But you can enjoy the magic of bulbs a whole lot sooner. Smack dab in the middle of blustery winter, when…

  • growing bulbs indoors

    Growing Bulbs Indoors? Here’s What You Need to Know

    Here’s the lowdown for keeping your winter bulbs thriving and pumping out the perks in midwinter. Light As much sun as you can muster is optimal. An unobstructed southfacing window…

    Edible Gardening

  • Reliable Performers for Your Region

    As garden curator Irvin Etienne discusses in his article on reliable performers, we all want the newest, jazziest plants available, but a garden is not complete without a backbone of…

    Articles

  • Grow This Hydrangea for Its Foliage—and Its Ability to Climb

    A lively argument (at least at a gathering of solid horticulturists) could be had over crowning the “Queen of Vines,” although that sobriquet has generally been reserved for Her Majesty…

  • Earth-Friendly Containers

    The dirty secret of gardening is that there is an aspect of the hobby that is terrible for the environment—namely, the plastic pots that dominate the nursery industry. It’s a…

  • Biodegradable Pots: What You Need to Know

    How fast do alternative plant containers break down, and do they inhibit root growth? These are common questions when talking about biocontainers. Decomposition of an ecofriendly container depends on many…

  • Shade Plants With Shiny Foliage

    Silver foliage is a useful tool in garden design, as it provides subtle variety that easily pairs with almost all other foliage and flower colors. Unlike attention-getting chartreuse hostas or…

  • 3 Ways To Use Silver to Brighten Your Shade Garden

    In the shade, where foliage often trumps blossoms, it is important to take into account the size, shape, color, and texture of leaves and how they relate to each other.…

  • blending garden styles

    Mixing the Cottage-Garden Style With the New Perennial Approach

    The term “cottage garden” conjures up images of a garden that’s bursting at the seams in summer—of herbs, self-seeding annuals, and flowering shrubs mingling together; of vigorous climbing roses scrambling…

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