While we are all getting cozy in our homes, drinking hot toddies and planning for the upcoming winter holidays, what are our annual, perennial and biennial plants doing? Looking out at the garden or container array, you might be tempted to say “dying”, and you would be right, but there is actually a lot more … Read more
I used to mope over the advance of fall, lamenting the loss of my beloved garden flowers, morosely plucking the last roses, and generally carrying on as if horticultural Armageddon was just around the corner. I felt as if the Grim Reaper had stepped away from the neighbors’ lavish Halloween display to walk hand in … Read more
Right now it is gray, drippy and chilly outside my window. Even though the last roses are still shivering on the bushes, I feel starved for color. Grabbing at emotional straws, I peer hopefully through the mist for the new growth on the scarlet willow or Salix alba var. vitellina ‘Britzensis’—but the little tree does … Read more
The rubber has hit the road in my garden. This past week, the weather people all forecasted the first serious cold snap of the late fall season. That meant that anything tender left outside was doomed. I wasn’t planning on this development, but clearly I forgot to notify Mother Nature of my plans. On the … Read more
A generation or more ago, fall was a time when you would clean up the garden, put out a few mums, and plant the spring flowering bulbs. In the midst of all that, there was ample time to lose yourself watching the little wrens flitting through the aster stalks in search of delectable seeds. The … Read more
