Heptacodium miconioidesis a small tree or large shrub that provides year long interest, especially in late summer and fall when it appears to flower twice; once in white and then again in red. The white flowers form in bunches of 7 which gives the plant its common name of seven sons plant. After flowering, it forms small fruits and red calyx that are as large as and showier than the flowers.
Colchicum autumnale, commonly called the fall crocus has one of the most unusual life cycles of any plant in my garden. It flowers with no leaves and it’s seeds are stored underground for part of the year. In a given gardening season it flowers first, then rests, and then makes leaves. This is one mixed up plant that has developed a very unique and interesting life cycle.
When should you move the corms – they are not bulbs? When can you collect the seed? Important information like this becomes clear once you understand how Colchicum autumnale grows – their life cycle.
If you spend time understanding the science behind Roundup and glyphosate, its active ingredient, you soon realize that this is a safe chemical compared to many other chemicals, even ones liberally used in the home. Why is it then that so many people fear Roundup?
Probably the biggest reason is great promotion by the anti-Roundup and anti-Monsanto crowd. That is one powerful force that brings one misleading article after another to the attention of a lot of people.
I think that another reason for this fear is our inability to understand very small and very large numbers. A recent research study found glyphosate in natural water systems, and I have seen it posted by several people as proof of a real problem that needs to be feared. If these people simply understood small numbers, they would not fear the report or Roundup.
Origanum ‘Kent Beauty’ is a wonderful little plant for the rock garden. It is not a show stopper, nor does it have big flashy flowers, but it does have a very unique look that gets people talking. It requires almost no care and has few pests.
I am seeing the term soil factory used more often, usually in discussions about Bokashi or Vermicomposting. I’ll restrict this blog to discussions about Bokashi, but most of the comments also apply to Vermicomposting.
It is claimed that Bokashi ferment, the material remaining after the fermentation process, can be used to make soil, which can then be used for house plants or in the garden. This would be quite a feat if true. It takes nature millions of years to make soil, and now Bokashi enthusiasts can do it in a couple of weeks.
Collecting seed is an easy and cheap way to propagate and share plants. It allows you to make more of your own plants or add new types of plants to your garden. You can collect from both gardens and the wild, and it is a great pastime when you are traveling.
In this post I will describe different types of seed and help you determine when they are ready to collect.
Almost every gardener grows spring bulbs like tulips, daffodils, hyacinths and crocus. Millions of new bulbs are sold every year and yet people do not agree on the best time to plant them. Some want to plant early, as soon as they arrive in shops. Others say that you should wait until the ground gets an early frost. Some wait until the ground is fully frozen, but that is usually because they forgot to plant earlier.
A couple of years ago I was in a large nursery that specialized in spring bulbs. It was early September in a zone 5 climate and a manager told me not to plant the bulbs for a couple of months until we had a light frost. I looked him in the eye and asked about the bulbs I had planted in prior years – they were already in the ground. Do they need to be dug up so I could re-plant them after frost? He did not have an answer.
Lets have a look at the science and figure out when you should plant spring bulbs.
A seed exchange is a great way to get free or low cost seed. It is also a way to get seed that you can’t buy anywhere else. For years now I have been using these services to expand my collection of plants and I just love them. One of the most enjoyable experiences in gardening is seeing a new species of plant flower for the first time.
So where are these great seed exchanges, you ask? This post provides a list of them.
Senna hebecarpa is rarely grown in gardens but it deserves to be used more frequently. It is a perennial that can grow to 180 cm (six feet) and has unusual compound leaves. Both of these features make it look more like a shrub.
Common names include American senna, wild senna and the northern wild senna. It is a North American legume, that hosts nitrogen fixing bacteria in it’s root nodules.
Jiffy peat pellets, also called Jiffy pellets and Jiffy-7, are a convenient way to start seeds. Just add water to the small pellets and they expand, ready for us. Place a seed in the top and in no time you will have happy seedlings.
This all sounds like a good idea, but how well do plants grow? Are the pellets bio-degradable in the garden?
Compost tea is reported to be great for growing plants, and some companies even call it a compost tea fertilizer. What is the NPK value of this magic potion?
I started this post about a year ago, and at that time, there were many products on the market, but I could not find one that provided the compost tea NPK value. I checked again today and was surprised that the number of compost tea products available is down significantly. Maybe it was too expensive to ship all that water around the country? Maybe it did not work, and people stopped buying the product?
Interestingly, the number of commercial DIY kits for making your tea is up significantly. When you click on Google Images for ‘bottles of tea,’ you are taken to pages selling kits. Even with kits, the same question needs to be asked. What is the NPK value of the tea these kits produce? Very few of the manufacturers I looked at provided such information, but many did say their compost ingredients were the best. Easy to say if you don’t give any data.
Even if you are not interested in compost tea, the following discussion will show you how companies are misleading consumers.
People speculate that blossom end rot in tomatoes and peppers is caused by a lack of calcium in the soil. Many now suggest that dropping a TUMS (common brand of antacid) into the soil below each tomato or pepper will prevent this problem.
Will TUMS cure blossom end rot (BER)?
This is a very good example of a myth that can be debunked very easily, knowing nothing about BER.
