Vibrant Fall Foliage Are you drawn to bright scarlet leaves in autumn? You have probably admired sumac shrubs growing along the roadsides even if you didn’t know their name. Sumac’s huge, compound leaves can grow to two feet long, made up of as many as 31 leaflets arranged along its colorful central stem. They are deep green and glossy through much of the year, until they turn golden, orange, scarlet, or even deep purple from September until the leaves finally...
Planting Reliable Shrubs in Tough Conditions Home builders and contract landscapers rely on tried-and-true shrubs that they expect to out-live their warranty. That doesn’t mean that they are planting the most beautiful shrubs in new neighborhoods, or even the most appropriate ones for the site. They certainly don’t try to replace the sorts of native shrubs that might have grown on the site before it was razed for construction. But they choose reliable shrubs that they expect prospective buyers...
The Living Fence Gardening is the art of domesticating the wild, of creating living geometry within our landscapes. Order, symmetry, lines, and boundaries please the eye and soothe the spirit. We are inclined to organize and define our spaces by dividing them up into smaller pieces we can manage, to protect them within walls and behind gates. We contain what is ours, setting aside sacred space, our own ‘paradise,’ from the wider world. We exclude the unwanted wildness living...