An older woman made her way slowly through the aisles of the garden center’s outdoor display area, leaning heavily on a cane. As I turned, hands loaded with small pots, she was behind me. She smiled and asked whether I had seen any bee balm on the display of herbs I’d been scanning. We began to chat, and it turned out that she wanted to attract hummingbirds to the balcony of her apartment. Someone had told her that hummingbirds...
Do you feed the birds? Most of us gardeners do. Unless you are protecting a crop of blueberries or blackberries, you probably enjoy the energy and joy birds bring to the garden with their antics and songs. Birds also vacuum up thousands of flying, crawling, and burrowing insects. Even hummingbirds eat an enormous number of insects as they fly around from blossom to blossom seeking sweet nectar. Birds are an important part of a balanced garden community. We have...
A Black Swallowtail butterfly feeds on Verbena bonariensis . When planning your garden and buying plants, is your first consideration who, or what, might eat them? If you are planting fruit trees, tomato vines, or salad greens you’re likely planning to share the fruits of your labor and investment with family and friends. Some friends of mine garden in a community garden, where much of the produce raised is donated to our local FISH organization. But food crops aside, when...
The lady checking out in front of me at the garden center had two cute little pots of ‘polka dot plant,’ Hypoestes phyllostachya, and she had a single question for the clerk: “Will deer eat it?” For those of us living among free-roaming herds of deer, that is always the question! Do deer graze in your garden? It seems that ever-growing herds of deer continue moving into more and more areas across the United States. Even suburbs and small towns...