Category: Native Trees

Help Wanted / Invasive Plants / Native Plants / Native Trees / Nuisance Plants / Ornamental Shrubs / Soil Conservation / Summer Color Plants / Tree Identification / Trees / Vegetable Gardening / Watering

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Master Gardeners’ Homeowner Outreach Programs 2026

Transform Your Garden with Expert Advice from Certified Master Gardeners Do you dream of a flourishing garden but aren’t sure where to start? Or perhaps you’ve encountered some gardening issues that require expert intervention. The James City County Williamsburg Master Gardener Association has just what you need! We offer free, environmentally sound, research-based recommendations for your home’s trees, lawn, landscape, and water-saving practices.  Our teams of 2-3 certified Extension Master Gardeners are ready to visit your home, discuss your gardening...

Birds / Carbon Garden / Conservation / Deer Resistant Plants / Edible Plants / Flowering Shrubs / Food Forest / Foraging / Garden Design / Garden Maintenance / Gardening on the Wild Side: Working in Harmony with Nature / Healing Garden / Hedge / Hedgerow / Larval Host Plants / Native Trees / Permaculture / Poisonous Plants / Soil Conservation / Wildlife Gardening / Williamsburg Botanical Garden

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The Many Uses of Sumac

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...

Community Gardening / Conservation / Edible Plants / Evergreen Perennials / Evergreen Shrubs / Flowering Shrubs / Food Forest / Fragrant Plants / Garden Design / Garden Maintenance / Gardening on the Wild Side: Working in Harmony with Nature / Healing Garden / Heirloom plants / Herbs / Native Trees / Permaculture / Sanctuary Garden / Sustainable Gardening / Therapeutic Gardening / Wildlife Gardening

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Making a Healing Garden

“The art of healing comes from nature, not from the physician.” Paracelsus Creating Sanctuary Sometimes we all need a place to get away from the noise of our daily lives to find some peace.  We want a place to relax, to heal, to reconnect with the natural world, and to dream of a better future for ourselves and our loved ones.  Our outdoor spaces can provide us with peace, healing, sanctuary, sustenance, and inspiration when we design them with these...

Conservation / Ferns / Flowering Shrubs / Garden Design / Gardening on the Wild Side: Working in Harmony with Nature / Native Trees / Soil Conservation / Spring Flowering Trees / Sustainable Gardening / Wildlife Gardening

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Our Planetary Garden

  A New View of our Earth American soldiers and scientists working at White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico took the first images of Earth from space in late October of 1946 when they attached a 35-millimeter movie camera to a confiscated German V-2 missile they were testing.  The missile reached an altitude of 65 miles, just above the limit of ‘outer space,’ before crashing back to earth with the film protected in a steel container. Subsequent missile tests...

Birds / Conservation / Garden Design / Gardening on the Wild Side: Working in Harmony with Nature / Heirloom plants / Native Trees / Spring Flowering Trees / Tree Care / Wildlife Gardening

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Flowering Dogwood

  Dogwood trees explode into a profusion of flowers each spring.  They grow wild along the forest edge, in clearings and along highways throughout Virginia, transforming from grey woody skeletons into graceful clouds of pink or white flowers as winter melts into spring each April.   The State Tree of Virginia Flowering dogwood trees are cultivated in neighborhoods, around schools, in old church yards, and in private and public gardens, wherever they can shelter in the afternoon shade of taller...

Young tree in hand

JCCW Master Gardener Association / Native Plants / Native Trees / Planting Trees / Trees

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James City County Tree Seedling Giveaway

A Public Service Announcement James City County is launching a new initiative to provide residents with free tree seedlings. The seedlings are all native species and will be available in various sizes according to their mature height (small, medium, or large). If you want a few tree seedlings for your property, please sign up using the link below. They may be out of the small trees but have medium and large trees available.  They will go quickly, so if you...

Food Forest / Foraging / Garden Maintenance / Gardening on the Wild Side: Working in Harmony with Nature / Larval Host Plants / Native Trees / Ornamental Shrubs / Planting Trees / Spring Flowering Trees / Trees / Wildlife Gardening

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Burst Into Spring with Eastern Redbud

  A Beacon of Spring A blooming redbud tree grabs my attention like no other spring flowering tree.  It just suddenly lights up like a neon beacon glowing brightly in the edge of the wintery forest; transforming from non-descript to gorgeous in the space of a day. Unlike other spring blooming trees which show visibly swelling buds for weeks, while they wait for winter’s cold to pass; clusters of redbud blossoms simply break directly out of its bark, anywhere and...

Birds / Conservation / Gardening on the Wild Side: Working in Harmony with Nature / Jamestown Island / Native Plants / Native Trees / Resource Protection / Shoreline Erosion / Trees in Winter / Winter

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Bald Cypress at Glebe Gut

  This photo, used for our late January 2025 webpage header, was taken along the National Colonial Parkway at Glebe Gut.  It features a bald cypress tree and other native vegetation. Glebe Gut is a narrow, tidal channel that flows under the Colonial Parkway, between College Creek and Mill Creek, near Jamestown Island.  The waterway itself forms the western boundary of a 100-acre tract of land known as the Glebe Land, set aside after 1619 for the use and support...

Citizen Science / Conservation / Evergreen Shrubs / Garden Maintenance / Master Gardener Home Visits / Native Trees / Pruning Clinic / Sustainable Gardening / Tree Care / Trees / Trees in Winter

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The Annual Pruning Clinic

The 2026 Pruning Home Visits Application Request window is OPEN through mid-March, 2026.  APPLY NOW to get personalized pruning instructions from our Extension Master Gardeners.  Click below to apply.   Woody plants remain healthier, more productive, and more beautiful with strategic, well-timed pruning.  Pruning young plants guides their growth into a strong and balanced structure.  Pruning older plants opens them up to sunlight and airflow, limiting the opportunities for disease to infect them.  Proper pruning can also rejuvenate them with...

Citizen Science / Conservation / Evergreen Shrubs / Evergreen trees / Flowering Shrubs / Garden Maintenance / Gardening on the Wild Side: Working in Harmony with Nature / Master Gardener Home Visits / Native Trees / Permaculture / Tree Care / Trees in Winter / Wildlife Gardening

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Pruning: Dos and Don’ts

  Pruning woody shrubs is both art and science.  Selecting which branches to leave and which to remove allows a gardener to train a woody plant into a pleasing, balanced shape that fits the available space.  Some gardeners use pruning techniques to create neatly trimmed topiary, elegant hedges, or espaliered fruit trees.  Gardeners may also prune roots and branches and remove leaves and buds to train trees to live as bonsai in shallow containers.  Woody plants are extremely adaptable and...