Monthly Archives: February 2011

After living 18 years in the same house, those small foundation shrubs that were never supposed to grow more than knee-high are up to my shoulders.  Finally, it’s time for action (or revenge) ! I purchased a new pair of … Continue reading →

Topping the list of plants to force indoors is Prunus mume, the flowering apricot. This ornamental tree will begin blooming naturally in the piedmont in February. A few stems placed in a vase of water along with some forsythia, fragrant honeysuckle and … Continue reading →

I have had a love affair with camellias for decades.  Though I didn’t grow up with camellias in our Winston-Salem, NC home landscape, I fell for sasanqua camellias while in college at NC State. There were mature specimens of  ’Jean … Continue reading →

Valentine’s Day is a target date for purchasing lawn fertilizer. A late winter application of slow-release nitrogen will give your tall fescue lawn a jump-start into spring. If you are pricing lawn fertilizers you will see that the more nitrogen … Continue reading →

My gardening friend, Jim Nottke, recently shared this book review about seed germination. Since the seed sowing season is upon us,I thought I would reprint his article. “Between 1993 and 1998, Professor Norman Deno of Penn State University self-published the … Continue reading →