Gardening Question of the Week - How Do You Keep Containers from Staining the Patio?

Here's another common complaint that really hasn't been solved yet. Paul wrote: "I am looking for some assistance with a container issue I am having. There are several...

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[Source: About.com Gardening]

Anacyclus 'Silver Kisses'

Anacyclus 'Silver Kisses' (Mount Atlas Daisy)

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Viola labradorica

Viola labradorica 'Labrador Violet'

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Mazus reptans 'Purple'

Mazus reptans 'Purple'

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Choose Healthy Plants

When selecting plants for your garden or home, check the overall health of the whole nursery as well as the plants you are choosing. Watching for signs of insects, disease, stress and abuse can pay off big in the long run.

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Lotus corniculatus 'Plenus'

Lotus corniculatus 'Plenus' (Double Bird's Foot Trefoil)

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Creeping Wire Vine

Muehlenbeckia axillaries (Creeping Wire Vine)

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Anacyclus 'SilverKisses'

Anacyclus 'SilverKisses' (Mount Atlas Daisy)

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New Zealand Brass Buttons

Leptinella squalida (New Zealand Brass Buttons)

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Three Rivers Stone and Stepables Sedum

I want to share a couple recent purchases I made for my garden, specifically, for a water feature I am building that I should be able to share in a week or 10 days.The first is this gorgeous rock called Three Rivers Stone. I was at the stone place and wanted some boulders 12-18 inches [...]

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[Source: Backyard Gardening Blog]

Trifolium repens Atropurpureum

Trifolium repens Atropurpureum (Bronze Dutch Clover)

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Herniaria glabra

Herniaria glabra (Rupturewort, Green Carpet)

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Sedum pachyclados

Sedum pachyclados 'White Diamond'

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Caterpillar Season

For gardeners east of the Rockies, its just about time for tent caterpillar nests to start appearing in the trees. As unsettling as it is to see a squirming...

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[Source: About.com Gardening]

Isotoma 'Blue Star Creeper'

Isotoma fluviatilis 'Blue Star Creeper' (Laurentia)

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Labrador Violet

Viola labradorica 'Labrador Violet'

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Golden Creeping Speedwell

Veronica repens 'Sunshine' (Golden Creeping Speedwell)

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Dividing Bearded Iris

To divide bearded iris rhizomes, look for natural places to make a split and make sure each piece will be a good size and have enough roots to take hold, as shown here.

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Pumonaria

Pulmonaria, or Lungwort, is far more charming than its name would imply. Blooming when few other perennials have even emerged after winter, Pulmoniaria offers distintive speckled and splashed foliage and small, but profuse and vivid flowers in blues, pinks, corals and whites. There is a Pulmonaria for almost any garden and they are profiled here.

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What is Mulch

Mulch is any type of material that is spread or laid over the surface of the soil as a covering. It is used to retain moisture in the soil, suppress weeds, keep the soil cool and make the garden bed look more attractive. Organic mulches also help improve the soils fertility, as they decompose. Here are the pros and cons of various mulch materials.

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Epsom Salts and Plants

Gardeners have been using Epsom salts as a plant fertilizer for generations. There is little research to prove conclusively that Epsom salts have any effect on plants, but many seasoned gardeners cite their own gardens as proof that Epson salts help certain plants grow stronger and produce better. If youd like to try experimenting on your own, here are some tips for using Epsom salts in your gardens.

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Roses from Cuttings

Ever wonder if you could root and grow branches from your favorite rose bush? With a little care, roses root very easily. You won't always get exactly what you started with, but it's fun trying. And here's how.

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Echinacea, Cone Flowers

Echinacea, Purple Cone Flower

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Top Cut Flowers

Repeat blooming annuals are favored for cutting gardens, but many perennial flowers do wonderfully well as cut flowers. What makes for a good cut flower is a stem that is long enough and sturdy enough to hold the flower in an arrangement and a flower that lasts and looks good for several days. That gives the gardener a wide choice for choosing flowers to grow in a cutting garden. The following lists offer suggestions for great cut flowers.

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Growing Up with Vines & Climbers

Vines are often overlooked by gardeners, because they need some type of structure to climb on. But vines are so multi-purpose and so eager to sprawl and bloom, you...

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How to Prepare a Flower Bed

How to Prepare a Flower Bed

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Long Producing VeggieGarden

You can have a long producing vegetable garden with minimal effort. Keep harvesting in your vegetable garden into the fall and maybe even winter months. A long producing vegetable garden is possible, if you heed some simple, but key gardening rules.

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Soil pH

Gardeners are often told that a key to growing great plants is to check the soil's pH. What is meant by soil pH and why should it matter so much in the garden? Here's why...

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#2 - Panicum 'Shenandoah'

Panicum virgatum 'Shenandoah' (Switch Grass)

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Filling in the Spaces with Plants You Can Walk On

Creeping plants, fillers, paving plants... What do you call those plants that seem to ooze between bricks and cracks and make themselves at home across the lawn. ...

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[Source: About.com Gardening]

Xeriscape Gardening

Xeriscaping doesnt mean deserts and cactus or even a drought plagued, barren landscape. Xeriscaping is a method of gardening that involves choosing plants that are appropriate to their site and creating a landscape that can be maintained with little supplemental watering. Here are the seven steps of xeriscaping, common sense guides to gardening in harmony with your site that can be applied to any type of garden design.

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Plant of the Week: Bamboo.

Bamboo. We see it in all the garden design magainzes. Bamboo looks so elegant and graceful, how harmful can it be? Can bamboo be safetly grown in...

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Growing Perennials from Seed

Growing Perennial Flowers from Seed

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Wheelbarrows and Garden Carts

Wheelbarrows and garden carts are absolutely indispensable garden tools. Without a wheelbarrow or garden cart many gardening chores would not be possible. While wheelbarrows and garden carts perform basically the same functions, they each have their pros and cons. Look through the following considerations, check off the features that appeal to you and make a decision of what would work best for you, in your garden.

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#1 - Peony 'Alma Hansen'

Peony 'Alma Hansen'

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Gardening Question of the Week - Do Epsom Salts Really Do Anything for Plants?

Gloria emailed me recently asking if Epsom salts really did any good for tomatoes and, if so, what other plants would benefit from adding a handful? Although gardeners have...

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[Source: About.com Gardening]

Dividing Perennial PlantsIs it Time?

Spring is a great time to divide your over-grown perennials. They're small and manageable and they're actively growing. So any damage from stress is quicly repaired. ...

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[Source: About.com Gardening]

#1 - Butterfly Bush (Buddleia)

Butterfly Bush (Buddleia)

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Harvesting Vegetables

There are no precise guidelines as to when to harvest your vegetables, but there are some rules of thumb to guide you. Most vegetables are harvested just before full maturity, for maximum flavor and the most pleasant texture. The following are vegetable harvesting criteria for judging whether your vegetables are ready for picking.

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My Monet Weigela

My Monet Weigela (Weigela florida 'Verweig')

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#8 - Liatris spicata 'Kobold'

Liatris spicata (Gay Feather, Dense Blazing Star) 'Kobold'

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Lamium (Deadnettle)

Lamium (Deadnettle)

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Espalied Fruit Trees

Small Space Gardening - Espalied Fruit Trees

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Narcissis (Daffodils)

Narcissis (Daffodils)

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It's Earth Day. Lets Talk Dirt.

In honor of Earth Day, lets talk dirt. Theres an old gardening adage that says that the brown stuff on the ground in your garden is called soil; when...

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[Source: About.com Gardening]

Borage

Borage is a freely seeding, easy growing annual plant with vivid blue flowers and leaves with the flavor of cucumbers. Borage is actually a somewhat gangly plant, but you barely notice it because the star-shaped flowers are so vibrant. Theyre a true blue, hanging in downward facing clusters. Even the fussy white buds are attractive. Both the flowers and the leaves are edible, with a cucumber-like flavor. Here are some tips for growing borage.

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Powdery Mildew

Powdery mildew is one of the most common and easily recognized plant diseases. Almost no type of plant is immune. As the name implies, powdery mildew looks like powdery splotches of white or gray, on the leaves and stems of plants. Although powdery mildew is unattractive, it is rarely fatal. However severe or repetitive infections will weaken the plant. There are several steps a gardener can take to prevent and control powdery mildew in the garden.

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Using Cornmeal as a Fungicide

Researchers at Texs A&M have discovered that cornmeal has powerful fungicidal properties and is effective on all kinds of landscape fungus problems, from turf grass to black spot on roses. Heres how to apply cornmeal to treat fungus problems in your garden.

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Growing Moss on Rocks and Stone

Everyone wants the look of a mature, weathered garden. A quick trick for getting that look in a rock garden is to cultivate moss on the rocks themselves. ...

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[Source: About.com Gardening]

Helleborus (Hellebores)

How to Grow Hellebores

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Carrot F1 'Purple Haze'

Carrot F1 'Purple Haze'

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Backyard Frog Pond

Backyard Frog Pond

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Petunia Varieties

Petunias have done a 180 in recent years. They are much more tolerant of rain and many don't need any deadheading at all. They mound, they trail and they bloom their hearts out. How do you know what type of petunia to buy? Here's a petunia 101 on which types of petunias are best for your garden, hanging baskets and groundcovers.

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Wildflower Gardening

Gardeners have been led to believe that you can simply scatter some seeds and wind up with a self-sowing meadow of bluebells and lacecaps. In truth, even a wild and natural garden look requires some planning and effort. The good news is that most of the effort in wildflower gardening is in getting the garden started.

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New Plants for 2008.

The plants showcased here are some of the new introductions for 2008 - flowers, vegeatbles, roses and shrubs. Every gardener has favorite plants they rely on and grow every year, but we all like to try something new once in awhile. Hundreds, if not thousands of new plant varieties are developed and each year. Some of them won’t stand the test of time, but many are too tempting to pass up. Take a look to see if any might look good in your garden.

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Butterfly Gardening

A true butterfly garden is not just designed to attract adult butterflies, but also to afford a place for them to hibernate and lay eggs and for the larva, or caterpillars, to feed. Different species of butterflies have different preferences in plants.

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Creeping Thyme (Elfin)

Thymus praecox 'Elfin' (Creeping Thyme)

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Red Raspberry Leaves - Better Than Berries

Sometimes I feel like there are more leaves in my compost pile than in my garden. When I finish pruning and look at the pile Im tossing away, I...

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Rose Bud Unfurling

Rose Bud Unfurling

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Cactus & Euphorbia

Euphorbia plants are good choices for dry areas. Their foliage looks good all season and the flowers are as succulent as the leaves.

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Achillea

Achillea often get taken for granted because they are such a dependable, low maintenance perennial plant. There are many varieties of Yarrow and there is sure to be one or two suited to growing in your garden.

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Container Gardening - Caladium

Container gardens allow gardeners to experiment with new plants.

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Better Gardening Through Science

I wrote a new article today, Better Gardening Through Science, check it out. It covers milky spore bacteria, mycorrhizal fungus, and water absorbing polymers. All essential tools for today’s modern gardener.

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[Source: Backyard Gardening Blog]

How to Tell the Difference Between a Butterfly and a Moth

Ever wonder how to tell the difference between a butterfly and a moth? I tend to call the beautifully colored ones butterflies and the drab ones moths, but...

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[Source: About.com Gardening]

Gardening Question of the Week - Is it True You Can Use Baking Soda to Get Rid of Powdery Mildew?

This weeks question is a general one that Ive been getting a lot lately and expect to hear even more of, as the season progresses. Its good to answer...

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[Source: About.com Gardening]

A Petunia By Any Other Name

With all the plant choices we have these days, its kind of surprising that petunias are still so popular. Or maybe not. Todays petunias are supercharged, after all....

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[Source: About.com Gardening]

Pole Tree Pruners

Sometimes there's a damaged branch, just out of reach. Or maybe you need to open the canopy or snip off crossing branches. It's frustrating when there's a branch you can't get to it. Ladders are fine, but pruning requires stability and balance. Some clever person came up with pole pruners. How brilliant to attach a long handle to a saw blade. Here's some advice and suggestions on what to look for in pole tree pruners.

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Cherry Blossom White. Creating Your Own Personal Cherry Blossom Festival.

Even if you missed the National Cherry Blossom Festival, you can have your own private festival each spring by planting a few choice specimen cherry trees. About's Landscaping...

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[Source: About.com Gardening]

Sedum spurium 'John Creech'

Sedum spurium 'John Creech'

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Peonies

Peonies are prennial stars of the spring garden. Grown in a mass planting, they can be a garden anchor. Peonies are beautiful, often fragrant, clump forming perennials with large cupped or ruffled showy flowers.

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Plant of the Week: Borage

Why is it so many stunning flowers have such coarse names? Borage sounds like something your mother has to force you to eat. In reality, borage is a...

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[Source: About.com Gardening]

Polygonatum

Solomons Seal (Polygonatum) is an elegant Native American woodland plant. The small, tubular white flowers of Polygonatum dangle underneath the leaves. But it's the plant form that makes Solomon's Seal such an interesting plant. Once established, Polygonatum slowly spreads out and creates a nodding blanket of foliage that turns a golden yellow in autumn. Here are some tips on getting Solomons Seal to grow in your garden.

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A Path Through the Chaos

When your plants start taking over and merge into a jumbled mass, create a path. Even the humblest wild, woodland garden can look impressive if you care out a path. Add an object at the end of the path and you've turned your garden into an irresistible stroll garden.

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Colors that Complement

Complementary colors, colors opposite each other on the color wheel, are a no-brainer combination. Think of red and green at Christmas. Blue and yellow are a favorite of gardeners. Blue flowers tend to wash out or get lost in a garden full of colors. The yellow makes blue flowers more vivid and the blue softens the harshness of yellow flowers.

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Heuchera (Coral Bells)

Heuchera (Coral Bells)

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Making Shrubs the Focus

Using shrubs in your garden borders becomes addictive. You can get just as much color and interest, with a fraction of the maintenance. This border has several groupings of perennials, but it's the shrubs that give the garden weight and age

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Direct the Eye with Shrubs

It's the pair of Blue Spruces that tell your eye where to settle. Cover the spruce trees and the plants look like a jumble. With the anchor of the spruce trees, your eye stops darting and slowly takes in the surrounding plants.

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Pastels Make Color Easy

Once solution to using color in the garden is to limit yourself to pastels. Pastels are always well behaved and work well with each other.

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Cooling the Heat in the Garden

You can still have bold, hot colors and avoid chaos if you choose 1 or 2 colors total. The red lilies are repeated down the border, creating impact and cohesion. And the orange-red of the flowers is complemented and softened by the gold of the evergreens.

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Lack of Structure

Cottage gardens can look messy without an underlying structure. The easiest way to fix that is to use shrubs for structure.

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Mulch for Contrast

The darker mulch under this corydalis not only complements the yellow flowers, it brings the shape and texture of the foliage into sharper focus. It's like the old gardeners trick of wetting the soil before a garden tour. The damp soil is darker and makes the greens look greener.

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Giving Your Garden an Edge

It sounds simple enough, but it's also easy to let edging slip. A sharp delineation between your garden and your lawn not only defines where the garden starts, it draws the eye there. The contract of dark soil and green leaves is one of the best color combinations you can come up with. This is a beautiful planting, but the distinction between garden and lawn is blurred. A clean edge would have given the border more impact.

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Edging Defines the Garden Beds

Edging defines the garden beds. Here's a very informal border that could easily look messy if it bled right into the lawn. The edge and slightly raised bed make it clear that this is an ornamental planting and not just some plants that went wild in the corner.

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Edging for Ease and Looks

Edges don't always have to be cuts in the soil. Sometimes it's easier to maintain if you use an edging material. This gardener solved 2 problems by using the rocks she dug out of the soil to create her edge.

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A Subtle Pallette

An option is to choose a color and vary its shades. These astilbe will stay in bloom for a long time. Even as the flowers fade, they will be in hues that still work together to create a frame for the clematis. The Impatiens in the back corner add an additional pink accent.

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Dark Mulch as a Contrast

Once again, the yellow seems to brighten when played against a dark mulch. You can see the shape and texture more clearly.

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Create Mystery with a Path

You can't tell from this part of the garden whether the path ends or leads on, but the white flowers of the hydrangea and the large, round shrub at center both tempt you to walk out and see. Without this path, this garden would blend in with the forest behind it.

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The Necessary Edge

These garden beds were cut into the middle of the lawn. Without edging, they would look like they were floating in the lawn. With edging, they look like destinations.

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Create Contrast with Mulch

We know we should mulch to suppress weeds and conserve water, but mulch also serves an esthetic purpose. If the color combination of dark soil and green leaves can make an impact with an edge, why not bring that impact throughout your garden? The darker the mulch, the more your plants will stand out. The shredded cedar mulch is a fine choice in general, for a mulch, but the pale rusty color doesn't do much to enhance the golden leaves of the hakonechloa grass.

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Too Much Color

Perhaps the easiest way to regain control of your garden is to limit the colors you use in it. This is a display garden, so the impact of all this color is intentional, but if this were someone's home border, exuberance quickly changes to over stimulation.

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Fusion Impatiens Series

Impatiens are the most reliable flowers for shady areas of the garden. Now there are more choices than ever in varieties of Impatiens. Simply Beautiful flowers has come out with the tropical looking Fusion Impatiens series, including a yellow Impatiens, as well as the trailing and cascading Fanfare Impatiens series.

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Why do tomatoes crack

A common tomato growing problem is fruit that cracks or splits open as the tomato ripens. How can you prevent future tomatoes from cracking and is the cracked fruit still edible?

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Combing All the Elements

This person divided her gardens into islands joined by a grass path that opens to a hidden seating area. Notice how nicely the edging defines the islands.

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Selling Some Ditch Lilies

I’ve previously blogged about ditch lilies here, and now I’ve got quite a few extras and am selling them on ebay for cheap. Ditch lilies, also called tiger lilies, or common orange daylilies, are a species form of daylily. Hemerocallis fulva. Each plant has pleasing lighter green grass like foliage and 3 foot high flower [...]

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[Source: Backyard Gardening Blog]

Front Yard Gardens

If there is one place that small space gardening should be more widely practiced, it is in front yards. We have surrendered the front of our homes to foundation plantings of overly pruned evergreens and uninspiring dots of geraniums. It is intimidating to experiment in full view of every passer-by, but the pay off is great and I think youll find most people, neighbors included, will be delighted.

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Plant of the Week: Solomons Seal (Polygonatum)

Polygonatum is an awkward name for such an elegant plant. Even Solomons Seal doesnt really do it justice. Polygonatum gracefully arches and nods in the shade garden. ...

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[Source: About.com Gardening]

Got Aphids? Two Homemade Sprays for Fighting Aphids

We have a new Organic Gardening Guide here at About. Colleen Vanderlinden is just getting her site revved up, but already she has some wonderful tips for all of...

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[Source: About.com Gardening]

#3 - Garden Phlox 'David'

Phlox 'David'

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Gardening Question of the Week: Advice for Growing Tomatoes in Hanging Planters

Bugglaydee wrote in: I'm a first time gardner and I'm using the topsy turvy. Anyone out there have any tips? I want to grow tomatoes and tatume squash.Ive...

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[Source: About.com Gardening]

Growing Phormium

Phormium is a spiky, sword-leafed evergreen perennial that is used as a garden focal point or specimen plant. Some are small enough to use in containers, others can reach several feet in diameter and 7+ feet tall. Phormium arent hardy in many areas, but can be brought indoors for the winter. Growing Phormium is easy, if you give the plants what they want.

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How to Garden Greener

Green gardening is a confusing term. Gardeners talk about their love of nature, but in reality what were doing is manipulating nature and short of growing a field of weeds, it will remain so. So the easiest way to garden greener is to work more cooperatively with nature. Here are 5 easy steps to make your garden greener.

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Perennial Lettuce?

It has been so nice getting out and gardening this past week now that weather has finally warmed up. You do not realize how much joy, or the sense of peace, it gives you until you get to flip that switch from being stuck inside to being able to go out. Anyways, in inspecting my [...]

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[Source: Backyard Gardening Blog]

Container Grown Peas

There never seems to be enough space in the vegetable garden. Thankfully breeders have begun to focus on varieties that have a more compact form - without sacrificing yield. In particular, there are a number of so called patio varieties being introduced that make it possible to grow things in containers that are not traditionally thought of as container plants. Peas n-a-Pot, from Burpees, stretches the concept of container vegetable gardening.

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Cutting Back Ornamental Grass

By using the simple technique of bundling ornamental grasses before cutting them back, spring cleaning ornamental grasses won't mean getting a mess of grass blades all over your garden. Here are 3 easy steps for cutting back ornamental grasses easily.

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Top Cut Flowers

Repeat blooming annuals are favored for cutting gardens, but many perennial flowers do wonderfully well as cut flowers. What makes for a good cut flower is a stem that is long enough and sturdy enough to hold the flower in an arrangement and a flower that lasts and looks good for several days. That gives the gardener a wide choice for choosing flowers to grow in a cutting garden. The following lists offer suggestions for great cut flowers.

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Using Wood Ash in the Garden

Is wood ash good for garden soil? Will it do more harm than good? That depends on your soil and, of course, on the wood that was burned. Here are some thoughts to consider before you put wood ash on your garden plants.

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Creeping Thyme (Elfin)

Thymus praecox 'Elfin' (Creeping Thyme)

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Fall Bloomers

Perennial gardens change with the seasons and the fall garden is one of the most colorful seasons in the garden. Many fall blooming perennial flowers display jewel tone blossoms that complement the fall foliage display of trees and shrubs. The choice of fall blooming perennial plants keeps growing.

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Companion Planting

Herbs work especially well as companion plants. They multitask by attracting beneficial insects and repelling pest insects and their fragrance and foliage make them good companions in both the vegetable garden and the ornamental border. The following list offers some suggestions for using herb plants to repel specific garden pests.

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Fall Perennial Pruning

It can be nice to leave some perennials standing for winter interest. But many perennial plants dont survive rough weather well. Many plants have recurrent problems with pests and diseases, which will over winter in their fallen foliage and surface in the spring. The following list of perennial flowers survive and thrive better if pruned or cut down in the fall.

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Consider A Cutting Garden

Cutting gardens or cut flower gardens are a great way to bring your garden indoors. Well planned cutting gardens can grow enough flowers to create bouquets for the entire growing season. Cutting gardens can include long flowering annuals, seasonal perennials and colorful foliage. Here are some plant ideas for your cutting garden.

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Garden Spring Cleaning

Spring is the busiest time of year in the garden. There are so many garden chores to be done before your plants start growing in earnest. When to start spring garden cleaning and which tasks to conquer first depend on when spring comes to your garden. But here is a check list of spring cleaning tasks to plan for in your garden clean-up.

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Dividing Perennial Plants

The idea of dividing perennials can scare new gardeners. Division of perennials is an easily mastered gardening technique that is good for the plants and your garden. Most perennial flowers will need to be divided to remain vigorous and continue blooming season after season.

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Five Easy Ways to Re-Work the Overgrown Garden

You can wait years for your garden to fill in and look lush and then in the next moment it looks overgrown. Theres no substitution for regular pruning and...

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[Source: About.com Gardening]

Growing Hardy Mums

Mums are grown in just about every fall garden. Too often mums are an impulse buy at the nursery, when already in bloom late in the season. Chrysanthemums can actually be hardy perennials in most gardening zones, if planted early enough to become established. Mums are easy growing plants that will bloom as other plants fade, if pinched during the growing season. There are many more varieties of mums than youve probably seen, all worth taking a look.

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Helleborus (Hellebores)

How to Grow Hellebores

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Leaf Clean-Up

Fall clean-up of leaves is not a chore most gardeners look forward to. One way or another, you are gong to have to collect the leaves from your lawn, raking or otherwise, and there really aren't that many options. Here's some advice and tips in choosing a leaf blower/vac, shredder or even a humble rake, to make quick work of the leaves in your yard.

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Nigella

Nigella earns its common name of Love-in-a-Mist with a tangle of ferny, fennel like foliage that form a mist around the flowers. I'm not sure why anyone would call Nigella Devil in the Bush. Nigella flowers start off as interesting puffs, open into rich toned, straw-flower like blossoms and change into equally attractive seed pods. Here are some tips for growing Nigella in your garden.

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#8 - Liatris spicata 'Kobold'

Liatris spicata (Gay Feather, Dense Blazing Star) 'Kobold'

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Personalize Your Garden with Painted Garden Rocks

I know a lot of you are still waiting for gardening season to start in earnest. Heres a way to get started on your garden design and overcome cabin...

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[Source: About.com Gardening]

Garden Photography Contest

Liz Masoner, About.coms Photography Guide, is looking for some great flower photos this week. Liz has frequent photo competitions on her site, but in honor of all the pollen...

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[Source: About.com Gardening]

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, [...]

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[Source: Backyard Gardening Blog]

Dealing with Rose Diseases

Despite a gardeners best efforts, roses can often become infected with fungus diseases. Luckily, few fungus problems will kill your rose bush and most can be handled with low toxicity and minimal effort. Here are the top four rose diseases and how to handle them.

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Photo of Unidentified Rose

Photo of Unidentified Rose

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Rose Garden in Pakistan

Rose Garden in Pakistan

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Growing Catmint (Nepeta)

Catmint (Nepeta) is extremely hardy, drought tolerant and virtually maintenance free. All this and nepeta repeat blooms sporadically throughout the summer. Such a wonderful garden plant should be more widely appreciated and used by gardeners. Take another look here, at the pleasure of growing nepeta and its usefulness in any garden design.

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Rose Bushes in Pakistan

Rose Bushes in Pakistani Garden

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#1 - Peony 'Alma Hansen'

Peony 'Alma Hansen'

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Photo of Climbing Rose 'Polka'

Photo of Climbing Rose 'Polka'

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#12 - Oriental Lily 'Maywood'

Pink Oriental Lily 'Maywood'

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On Your Mark. Get Set. Mow! Spring Lawn Care.

I like to finish my spring cleaning by the end of March, so I can devote more time to gardening the second the weather turns warm. (Never mind all...

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[Source: About.com Gardening]

Tulips as Cut Flowers

Tulips just don't seem to behave as cut flowers. They bend and bow and contort. How do you deal with tulips in a vase?

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[Source: About.com Gardening: Most Popular Articles]

Hydrangea Types

There are many new hydrangeas on the market that take the guess work out of when or if you need to prune your hydrangea. However many of us have old hydrangea shrubs in our yards that can cause a lot of frustration when they don't bloom. Bloom on an older hydrangea usually depends on when it was pruned. To know when to prune your old fashioned hydrangea, you'll need to know what type of hydrangea it is. Here's some help in identifying your hydrangea.

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Watering Transplanted Plants

No matter when you transplant plants or seedlings from your garden, water is a crucial element to the garden plants success. When you water transplanted plants and seedlings is also important.

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Growing Rhubarb

Is rhubarb a vegetable? A fruit? An ornamental plant? Its a very ornamental vegetable that is usually prepared and eaten much like a fruit. All that and its perennial in many areas. Rhubarb is a cool season crop that is grown for its fibrous leaf stalks, which are a wonderful sweet-tart treat. These tips should help you get your rhubarb started right and growing well.

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Harvesting Vegetables

There are no precise guidelines as to when to harvest your vegetables, but there are some rules of thumb to guide you. Most vegetables are harvested just before full maturity, for maximum flavor and the most pleasant texture. The following are vegetable harvesting criteria for judging whether your vegetables are ready for picking.

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Dicentra, Bleeding Heart

Bleeding Heart, Dicentra spectabilis

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Garden Design - Color

Color is arguably the most prominent factor in a garden design and often the first one considered. Good garden design involves knowing how to combine colors so that the final product has a cohesive and pleasing effect. Here are some tips to train your eye to see color and for combining color in the garden.

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Top 5 Ways to Garden Greener ...and Still Have a Green Garden

Green gardening is a confusing term. Gardeners talk about their love of nature, but in reality what were doing is manipulating nature and short of growing a field of...

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[Source: About.com Gardening]

Ornamental Grasses in Shade

Choosing variegated oranmental grasses and sedges for the shade garden design.

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Hydrangea Colors

Hydrangeas have a reputation for being chamaeleons, but not all hydrangeas change color. Generally you will need to grow Big Leaf Hydrangeas, Hydrangea macrophylla, to get the pink or blue color you are seeking. You neednt become a chemist, but you will need to understand why your hydrangeas change color. Here's why.

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Two-Tone Rose

Two-Tone Rose

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Plant of the Week: Nigella

Nigella is one of my all time favorite plants. I can still remember being absolutely riveted when I first saw it in a garden. I thought it looked...

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[Source: About.com Gardening]

Coreopsis, Tickseed

Coreopsis Grandiflora Photo

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Koreanspice Viburnum

Koreanspice Viburnum (Viburnum carlesii)

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Papaver nudicaule (Poppies)

Iceland Poppies

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What is a Perennial Plant

Perennial gardening is very popular because growing plants that live more than one garden season lets your garden design evolve. But perennials don't live forever and not every perennial flower will survive your winter.

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Garden Structure in B & W

A great way to see the bones and structure of your garden is to view it in black & white, without the distraction of colorful flowers and foliage.

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Gardening Question of the Week Whats a Good Evergreen for Full Shade?

Deanna6 has a problem a lot of you probably share. She wrote into the About Gardening Forum: "Help, I need suggestions for evergreen type shrubs in 100% shade...

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[Source: About.com Gardening]

Ways to Make Gardening Easier

Gardening easier means you can garden more. Use these smart gardening tips to make your gardening chores and maintenance less time and labor consuming and make your time in the garden more enjoyable.

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[Source: About.com Gardening: Most Popular Articles]

Poinsettias

Poinsettias are popular holiday decorations and gifts. Knowing how to keep Christmas poinsettia plants in bloom longer and how to force them to rebloom next Christmas, requires some special care.

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Why Doesnt My Hydrangea Bloom?

There are certain questions that bind us together as gardeners and Why doesnt my hydrangea bloom? is in the top 5. Generally when hydrangea fail to bloom it either...

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[Source: About.com Gardening]

Deutzia 'Chardonnay Pearls'

Deutzia 'Chardonnay Pearls'

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Sedum spurium 'John Creech'

Sedum spurium 'John Creech'

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Gardening Poll: Do You Label Your Plants?

I cant tell you how many times Ive looked at a plant poking through in the spring and wondered what Id planted there (or if it was just a...

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[Source: About.com Gardening]

Making Hypertufa

Hypertufa planters are a wonderful way to bring the look of stone into your garden, without the weight. Hypertufa is easy to make yourself at home. Although it can be messy, its also a lot of fun. Here are some basic recipes and some creative suggestions for hypertufa toughs and garden decorations.

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Scotch Moss

Sagina subulata Aurea (Scotch Moss)

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Cutting Back Ornamental Grass

If you don't cut back your ornamental grasses in the fall, they can provide winter interest well into the spring. But eventually you will have to cut back those ornamental grasses and it can be a messy proposition. Here's a quick and easy way to cut back your ornamental grasses without having them spill all over the garden.

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[Source: About.com Gardening: Most Popular Articles]

What To Do in the Garden in AprilA Regional Gardening Guide

If April is the cruelest month, its either because there is so much to do all at once or because the weather wont cooperate and let you do it. ...

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[Source: About.com Gardening]