United States

While we may be accustomed to seeing trees standing all by themselves in yards across neighborhoods, it’s actually better tree care to grow other plants and flowers around trees. But how many of us actually consider how to landscape trees when we create our yard design? Not many at all! Most people don’t even know […]

Temperatures are falling, colors are changing, holidays are passing, and winter is approaching. Before you hunker down and settle in for the season, you should consider how to keep safe trees. While nature has built in some organic winterizing processes, there are also steps you can take to winterize trees to protect them from pests […]

About Those USDA Climate Zones   The familiar United States Department of Agriculture Plant Hardiness Zone Map is based on the average annual minimum temperature for each zone. Needless to say, some years a zone will get a minimum temperature lower or higher than the average. Nevertheless, the average minimum temperature is a fairly good indicator […]

Of the more than 115 chemical elements in the periodic table, only 16 are sure to benefit plant life. These are essential nutrients. (There might be others that we don’t know about, but surely they must be needed in very small quantities and are probably never lacking.) Carbon (C), oxygen (O) and hydrogen (H) are […]

IT’S SPRING! Among our favorite early spring blooming trees are: Japanese magnolia (like the Ann or Jane), eastern redbud, flowering dogwood(white and pink), Taiwan cherry, and wild plum. The Japanese magnolias are among the first bloomers of spring flowering trees. Three important types of early blooming Japanese magnolias are: The star magnolias (Magnolia stellata) and […]

We prune our young trees and shrubs to control their size, shape and scale within our landscape. Proper pruning also stimulates flowering and fruit bearing and helps to keep shrubs and trees healthy and vigorous, thus reducing the likelihood of future problems. Plants that produce fruit such as growing bananas need pruning to encourage growth […]

Botanical names (aka scientific or Latin names) for plant species are italicized or underlined. Botanical names are standard throughout the world, unlike common names which can be different in different languages and even in different parts of the same country. A botanical species name has two parts — 1. The Genus: which is always in […]

In our previous post “Flowers: Sex, Pollinators and Pollinizers“, we focused our topic on asexual reproduction in plants — primarily those that need a pollinator or pollinizer to boost the reproduction cycle. Asexual reproduction, as we discussed, works best in environments that do not change. But as you may know, our surrounding environment rarely ever […]

An invasive species, as defined in an Executive Order signed by President Clinton in 1999, is an “alien species whose introduction does, or is likely to, cause economic or environmental harm, or harm to human health” Some kinds of plants, due to being transplanted away from their natural home, consequently become invasive in their new home. […]

Getting your best crop, whether vegetable, fruit, ornamental or lawn, often requires adding lime or fertilizer to your soil. But you need to know how much. If you are starting a new garden, it’s a good idea to have the soil tested. If your plants don’t seem to be doing as well as you think […]

With its glossy dark green leaves, fragrant pink-tinged blossoms, and bright orange-yellow lemons, the Meyer lemon deserves a place in your life! Long an obscure specialty of fruit collectors and farmers’ markets in the citrus belt, the Meyer lemon has recently gone mainstream thanks to Martha Stewart and her Meyer lemon recipes. Today, Meyer lemons […]

Spring brings those beautiful flowers we all love so much. However, ever wonder just how it all happens? What happens behind the scenes of certain plants or trees for them to flower or fruit? Sexual reproduction is an essential part of nature – even for trees and plants Many plants are capable of reproducing from stolons, rhizomes, offsets, […]