I have often written about the “four season garden” and how good plant choices can help you to achieve this elusive goal; a garden that is interesting and beautiful year-round. Evergreens play a major role in such a landscape, particularly in the winter, with their shape, texture and colour. Conifers with weeping forms are among […]
POTTED BULBS BRING HOPE FOR SPRING Spring has certainly taken its time in arriving this year hasn’t it? My raised beds in the vegetable garden were still too wet to work organic matter into as of mid-month, but on the positive side the soil under the lawn is no longer frozen! There’s no sign of […]
Although I loved Popeye and the cast of characters as a kid, my nose would wrinkle immediately at the sight of spinach on my plate, especially when it came out of a can. Mom tried the “look what it does for Popeye” argument, but to no avail. Move forward forty years and the situation, and […]
When the Spanish first saw zinnias growing in Mexico they found the flower so unattractive that they called it mal de ojos, or “sickness of the eye.” Five centuries later the zinnia, thanks to changes and improvements in flower colours and shape, plant size and disease resistance, is a popular annual found in flower beds […]
MUCH TO ANTICIPATE IN THE GARDEN It’s a sure sign that spring is imminent, ‘Turf’s Up’ is back on the pages of your local daily newspaper. Are you as tired of winter as I am? At what point in the last two months did you say “OK, that’s enough of this season!” The vernal equinox, […]
The universe unfolded as it should this week, as my Mom got her peas planted on her traditional date, the last day of February. Failure to adhere to this ritual might not knock the planet off its axis, but it would be earth-shaking in my parents’ household none the less. Planting peas in February […]
