No one has to mulch their garden and there are plenty of reasons—read excuses—not to do so. Suppose you contract with a mulch merchant to dump a big load of the stuff in a corner of your driveway. The load always looks much bigger than you expected and suddenly you have a very visible reminder … Read more
I was the tallest person in my second grade class, but shortly afterwards everyone else passed me on the growth chart. I sprouted a bit after second grade, but arrived at adulthood as a relatively short person. Being short means that I don’t have to worry about low ceilings or overhangs, but I do have … Read more
Cleaning up an overgrown garden is a little like a soap opera, complete with births, deaths, ambitious characters, opportunists, odd match-ups and thuggish intruders. As a gardener, you act as director and editor, generally simplifying the plot line, cleaning up messy situations, and making the whole more coherent. I did this recently with a garden … Read more
Lately I have been fascinated by plants with ugly names—a few weeks ago it was streptocarpus, better and more euphoniously known as Cape primrose. Right now, as my snapdragons prepare to bloom, it is their plant family, known as the “figwort” family, or Scrophulariaceae. Gardeners have long celebrated members of this family, which includes summer … Read more
Right now, in mid-July, the roses are taking a mid-season rest, while the daisies—coneflowers, coreopsis and Shastas—take center stage. I love them all, but at this moment I am absolutely infatuated with the streptocarpus plants that are currently strutting their flowery stuff on my covered front porch. The name “streptocarpus” is awful, invoking virulent sore … Read more
