Winter Care of Houseplants

If you grow your own fresh air, you appreciate the liveliness houseplants bring to the indoors during the long winter months. On days when I’m feeling blue, nothing lifts my spirits like taking care of my houseplants. Removing dead leaves, looking for any insect pests that I missed when bringing them indoors last fall, pinching…

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Blooming Lilacs in October!

It is not unusual for some plants to blossom out of season.  Magnolia, crabapple, lilac, and forsythia are notably spring-blooming plants, but stressful growing conditions can instigate a type of dormancy that pushes flowering to later in the season. Lilacs are a great example this year. To better understand why this happens, it is helpful…

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Seed Saving Tips and Tricks

This article originally appeared on The Garden Professors blog in September 2020. As summer winds down and the summer crops and flowers start to slow down many gardeners start thinking about saving seeds. Who doesn’t love saving seeds from that favorite tomato or beautiful coneflower?  Not only do you have some for next year, but…

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Seven Sons in Fall

In the fall, there are just simply fewer landscape plants that offer great appeal. Sure, goldenrod, asters, plumbago, turtlehead, sedums and mums should be a part of just about any landscape, but the ratio of spring and summer bloomers is probably about 3:1 or even more. For that reason, let’s highlight one more fall appealing plant – the Seven Sons tree/flower/shrub.

Fertilizer Time!

It’s the first of September…that means for cool season lawns such as tall fescue, Kentucky bluegrass and perennial ryegrass, it’s time to fertilize. After a long summer of heat, drought and pests, it’s time.

Euonymous, Anyone?

In this case, you might want the shrub or vine, euonymous, but not the common euonymous scale insects that often infest them. In fact, in some landscapes, the scale infestations are so common that budding horticulturists and entomologists often think that the symptoms and signs are a natural occurrence, as in “they’re supposed to be there”.

Patio Planter Care in Mid-Summer

In mid-summer, especially when a hot, dry week is predicted, (like this upcoming week), patio planters and houseplants need a little TLC. Four actions are involved: