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...
Ivy: Hero or Villain? English ivy, celebrated in hymns and carols, rich in history and tradition, may be among the most hated of ‘imported’ plants for some American gardeners. Native plant enthusiasts may call ivy a ‘noxious weed.’ And now, thanks to a new state law, HB 1941, which will go into effect in Virginia in January of 2027, horticultural retailers will be required to label ivy as an invasive plant and suggest alternatives whenever it is sold directly...
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...
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...
Let’s celebrate some of our more unusual and lesser-known native wildflowers in 2025. The Virginia Native Plant Society has chosen the Mayapple, Podophyllum peltatum, as its 2025 Wildflower of the Year. The Perennial Plant Association has also chosen a native wildflower, indigenous to Virginia, as its pick for 2025. Perennial Plant of the Year for 2025 The 2025 Perennial Plant of the Year is clustered mountain mint, Pycnanthemum muticum, a native wildflower in the mint, or Lamiaceae family. It...
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...
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...
Broadleaf Evergreen Trees & Shrubs Buxus microphylla, Littleleaf Boxwood Buxus sempervirens, Common Boxwood Ilex opaca, American Holly Ilex vomitoria, Yaupon holly Ilex aquifolium, English Holly Ilex cornuta, Chinese Holly Myrica cerifera, Southern Wax Myrtle Myrica pensylvanica, Bayberry Osmanthus heterophyllus, Holly Tea-olive Pyracantha coccinea, Scarlet Firethorn Quercus virginiana, Live Oak Broadleaf Evergreen Trees & Shrubs with Showy Flowers Camellia japonica, Japanese Camellia Camellia sasanqua, Sasanqua Camellia Kalmia latifolia, Mountain Laurel Magnolia grandiflora, Southern Magnolia Rhododendron spp. Azaleas and...
Deciduous Shade Trees Quercus spp., Oak Acer spp., Maple Betula spp., Birch Corylus americana, American Hazelnut Fagus grandifolia, American Beach Juglans nigra, Black Walnut Platanus occidentalis, American Sycamore Liquidambar styraciflua, American Sweetgum Carya illinoinensis, Pecan Carya spp., Hickory Salix spp., Willows Flowering Deciduous Trees Aesculus pavia, Scarlet Buckeye Amelanchier laevis, Allegheny Serviceberry Cercis canadensis, Redbud Cornus spp. Other Dogwood species Cornus florida, Flowering Dogwood Lagerstroemia indica, Crape Myrtle Liriodendron tulipifera, Tulip Poplar Magnolia virginiana, Sweetbay Magnolia Magnolia spp....
Our once shady front yard was left a bright expanse of coarse wood chips and mangled leaves after the arborists pulled out their heavy equipment and left, that hot summer afternoon almost a dozen years ago. A freak summer thunderstorm had harbored a waterspout or small tornado when it blew in from College Creek a few days before. Our first clue that something was wrong had been seeing the underside of a muddy root ball rising 8 feet or...