Category: Container Gardens

Animal repellant products / Beneficial Insects / Container Gardens / Edible Plants / Garden Design / Gardening on the Wild Side: Working in Harmony with Nature / Herbs / Tender Perennials / Wildlife Gardening

 by Elizabeth McCoy

Designing With Lemon Scented Plants

  Picnics with citronella candles, lemon scented furniture polish and sweet tea with lemons all recall happy childhood memories.   Fragrance has a profound ability to create or shift a mood, to trigger memories and create new ones.  Just as cinnamon evokes the holidays; crisp, cool lemon is a summertime fragrance. Most lemon scented plants thrive in warm climates.  Lemon trees, Citrus limon, are hardy only to Zone 8.  Originally native to Asia, they spread throughout the ancient world wherever the...

Beneficial Insects / Container Gardens / Edible Plants / Garden Design / Gardening on the Wild Side: Working in Harmony with Nature / Larval Host Plants / Native Plants / Perennial Care / Poisonous Plants / Summer Color Plants / Wildlife Gardening

 by Elizabeth McCoy

Designing Plantings to Host Butterflies and Moths

  A friend was excited to buy milkweed plants at a WBG plant sale several years ago. They aren’t easy to find commercially, and few people raise them from seed.  When I saw her again a few weeks later, I inquired about how her plants were doing. “Oh, I must have done something wrong. They’re not looking so good.  Most of the leaves have disappeared,” she replied.     I quickly reassured her that it was unlikely she had done...

Container Gardens / Garden Design / Garden Maintenance / Gardening on the Wild Side: Working in Harmony with Nature / Heirloom plants / Native Plants / Perennial Care / Poisonous Plants / Summer Color Plants / Sustainable Gardening / Wildlife Gardening

 by Elizabeth McCoy

Top Plant Picks for Summer Color: Foliage (Part 2)

Colorful and enticing plants fill every table and rack at garden centers in May.  Even the most experienced gardener may feel a little overwhelmed with so many interesting choices. Annual or perennial?  How big will this get? Will deer and bunnies eat it?  How long will it last?  Sun or shade?  Will it grow in a pot?  Will it stand the heat?  How much care will it require?  And most importantly, will it go the distance and survive all season?...

Carbon Garden / Container Gardens / Crafting With Plants / Gardening on the Wild Side: Working in Harmony with Nature / Moss Gardening / Native Plants / Permaculture / Wildlife Gardening

 by Elizabeth McCoy

Cultivating Moss Part 1: Native Mosses in the Garden

How much do you know already about mosses?  They are so common; you will find them growing most anywhere.  Take the Moss Quiz, and you’ll find the answers at the end of Part 2 of this post. The Moss Quiz      1.  Which will kill moss the fastest?   A.  Letting it dry out     B.  Watering it        2.  Will moss make new roots if you transplant it?   A.  Yes       B. No        3.  Can I share my beer...

Container Gardens / Evergreen Perennials / Garden Design / Garden Maintenance / Gardening on the Wild Side: Working in Harmony with Nature / Moss Gardening / Native Plants / Perennial Care / Permaculture / Sustainable Gardening

 by Elizabeth McCoy

Cultivating Moss Part 2: Propagation Methods

Mosses are wild, native plants, and find spots to grow where conditions support them.  They reproduce sexually with tiny spores that blow on the wind.  They need consistent moisture to transform from a spore to a small plant, but they do it without any interference from the gardener.  One way to develop a moss garden is to provide favorable conditions and let the mosses colonize on their own terms.  This may take several years, even with consistent efforts to keep...

Container Gardens / Deer / Garden Design / Garden Maintenance / Gardening on the Wild Side: Working in Harmony with Nature / Heirloom plants / Perennial Care / Permaculture / Poisonous Plants / Propagation / Soil Conservation / Sustainable Gardening / Wildlife Gardening

 by Elizabeth McCoy

Hellebores: Winter Flowers for Pollinators

What blooms through the snow in your yard?  Many older homes in our neighborhood have established clumps of evergreen hellebores blooming from January through April or May.  Suddenly, there are delicate pink and white petals emerging in the depths of winter. I asked a new friend about them soon after we moved to Williamsburg, and she generously gave me trays full of seedling plants when she thinned hers that spring.  What a wonderful gift!  The plants she gave to me...

Bulb Gardening / Container Gardens / Garden Design / Garden Maintenance / Gardening on the Wild Side: Working in Harmony with Nature / Geophytes / Heirloom plants / Permaculture / Poisonous Plants / Sustainable Gardening / Wildlife Gardening

 by Elizabeth McCoy

For Love of Narcissus

Is it possible to fall in love with a genus of plant?  Absolutely.  Some flowers appeal to us so persistently that we respond to them in ways that don’t quite make sense.  Their pull on our imagination, our affections, and yes, our resources, defies reason. Across horticultural history you’ll find characters who left their home continents behind to collect favorite plants.  You’ll find those who quit their day jobs to breed and grow them full-time.  And you will find smitten...

Container Gardens / Crafting With Plants / Evergreen Shrubs / Fragrant Plants / Gardening on the Wild Side: Working in Harmony with Nature / Herbs / Holiday Plants / Ornamental Shrubs / Tender Perennials

 by Elizabeth McCoy

Tips for Growing Holiday Plants

  Did Santa bring you a potted plant for Christmas?  Or maybe a neighbor dropped by with a beautiful potted something to spread a bit of good cheer your way?  Or do you always linger at the rack of holiday plants and wonder which ones you might be able to keep alive for a few weeks this winter? December and January are a great time to shop for plants.  And this week, especially, after Christmas, you’ll find some good values...

Beneficial Insects / Birds / Bulb Gardening / Container Gardens / Flowering Shrubs / Garden Design / Gardening on the Wild Side: Working in Harmony with Nature / Herbs / Native Plants / Ornamental Shrubs / Permaculture / Sustainable Gardening / Wildlife Gardening

 by Elizabeth McCoy

Winter Flowers for Pollinators

  Did you notice bees and other insects feeding later than usual last year?  And did you notice how many were out feeding on warm days last winter?  Our roller coaster weather affects insects, birds and other animals.  They may be out and about on warmish days in months when we don’t expect to see them.  And, of course they are hungry! Increased activity translates into an increased need for calories.  Providing winter forage for pollinators and birds presents gardeners...

Birds / Carbon Garden / Container Gardens / Evergreen Perennials / Ferns / Garden Design / Garden Maintenance / Gardening on the Wild Side: Working in Harmony with Nature / Native Plants / Perennial Care / Permaculture / Propagation / Soil Conservation / Sustainable Gardening

 by Elizabeth McCoy

Unraveling the Mystery of Growing Ferns from Spores

Ferns have successfully propagated themselves in nature, with no human assistance, for millennia. So it shouldn’t be too complicated, right?