Gardening Blog Posts
September Garden Checklist
Instead of giving you an extensive to-do list for your September garden, I’d like to concentrate on one task, culling your perennials, whether self-propagating by seed or root.
August Gardening Checklist
It’s over 100 degrees in the afternoon and the plants are drooping their greenery as if to curl up and protect themselves from the brutal late summer heat.
Culling All Judgment
In the summer months, my perennial flowers are in full bloom, each competing with the other for pride of space! I take note of who’s pushing whom out of the way so that I can cull and transplant the obnoxious culprits to another more favorable spot in the garden in the early fall months.
French Marigolds, Voted the Best Partner Plant
What’s a partner plant and why are French marigolds the best choice for any garden? Companion or Partner Planting is a tried and true old-timey technique of intentionally cultivating plants together symbiotically to help each other.
Perennials, Flowers Forever
Perennials are the roller coaster of the amusement park, the thrillers and architectural giants of the cottage style garden. They are plants that live for three years or longer. Most go dormant, returning better than before each season. Perennials operate like loyalty customer schemes where the longer they are planted, the more they reward you with spectacular profits year after year.
May Garden Checklist
On those perfect, just right May days, we’re content to putter in the garden, because the actual work has already been done. The fruits of your labor are vying for attention as they show off their splendor! There are only a few maintenance chores and selective plantings to take care of this month.
Dry Creek Bed
Do you have a soggy boggy area in your yard after a heavy rainstorm? Make your own picturesque dry creek bed and solve the water drainage problem! It took us most of a Saturday, with a noon hamburger pit stop, to finish our project.
Weeds, Weeds, Go Away!
Talking about weeds isn’t the most engrossing topic of gardening conversation, but it is oh so necessary! For a pesticide free yard, it’s pretty straight forward: smother and knock out the germinating seeds when they first nestle into your lawn in the fall, or yank them up from the roots when they emerge in the spring.
Reduce Garden Fever; Tend a Houseplant
What?!?!?! Have we really just persevered through three consecutive days of twenty-degree weather in Texas? We beat our own low temperatures for March according to our local weatherman. So much for my snapdragons coming into their own and the columbine buds just getting ready to bloom. I sure do hope these next few days of warmer weather, sunshine spurts, and spring rains keep these favorite early spring flowers of mine alive, much less healthy. In these conditions, I can really see the benefits of mulching thoroughly over the winter!
Impatient Gardener
One of my sisters sent me a quote about the patience gardeners must have from a book she is reading. I chuckled in amusement because I’m definitely not patient this time of year. I can’t wait to plant all those seeds I ordered from exotic catalogues. I meticulously examine my garden each morning waiting to see which bulbs have multiplied or which perennials didn’t make it.