Plant Profiles

Even Pansies Get the Blues   One of the great things about our climate zone is that we get to enjoy cold-hardy flowers like pansies most of the winter. Sometimes, though, a pansy-bed [...]

Daffodils are a favorite flower of mine. Their cheerful yellow flowers are the signature plant of early spring. While they are not native to our country they have naturalized well. Daffodils are [...]

“Pyracantha”: The word conjures an image in my mind of the thorny monster that engulfed my front walk nearly every year for fifteen years despite annual and sometimes semi-annual [...]

One of our showiest native terrestrial orchids is the Pink Lady Slipper, Cypripedium acaule. The genus name comes from Latin meaning ‘Venus’s slipper’. Other common names include Pink Moccasin [...]

# Common Name Scientific Name Type Blooms Environ Comments My Best Varieties 1 Tea Olive or Sweet Olive Osmanthus fragrans Evergreen Shrub to 10’+ Spring & Fall Fabulous Sun to Part [...]

Winter is often hard on houseplants, but if you know how to treat them right, you can keep them as healthy and happy as they were in summer! Light is scarce in winter and this really hurts [...]

The lazy, hazy days of summer may be gone and with them the growing season for many fruits and herbs will close. There are ways, however, to prolong the joys of summer. The fruits of our labor in [...]

Fall is an opportune time to plant groundcovers. In fact, groundcovers may be planted as long as the ground isn’t frozen. Although multiple varieties of delightful groundcovers abound, looking [...]

“We have the receipt of fern-seed, we walk invisible.” Shakespeare’s King Henry IV. As you know ferns do not flower therefore they do not make seeds. How they reproduced was a mystery until the [...]

Leyland Cypress is a fast growing columnar evergreen tree most often used for screening. Once established, it can grow three to four feet in a year. Its ultimate height is 60 – 70 feet with a [...]