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Master Gardeners Teach Youth, Adults and Create Beautiful, Sustainable Landscapes Soon the beauty of winter will be upon us, with frost on the trees and pristine snow-covered landscapes. It’s a time when many people prefer to stay indoors, enjoy a good book, a warm fire in the fireplace and a hot cup of cocoa, giving little thought to... Continue Reading →
If you’ve grown garlic before, you know that the cloves for planting are found readily in the spring. What many do not know is that fall planted garlic produces larger cloves than spring-planted ones. Using this opportunity to plant now means it’s not too late to reap the benefits of fall-planted garlic. In selecting a... Continue Reading →
Especially at this time of year, if you do much gardening and yard work, you’ll be carrying things. If it turns out to be a lot of things, then consider a garden cart, tote or wheelbarrow. The kind of work you’ll be doing, how often and how heavy the load is will help you choose.... Continue Reading →
For better or worse, another gardening season is over. This week, we could talk about reviewing your gardening year, selecting disease resistant cultivars, proper pruning, watering or mulching techniques, or keeping garden records of success or failures so next year’s growing season goes better. But sometimes, you just need a little commiseration to lighten your... Continue Reading →
Viruses represent some of the toughest diseases to manage in cucumber, squash, pumpkin, and melon plants. Often the disease doesn’t kill but does reduce the size and number of leaves, which in turn decreases fruit production. Cucumber mosaic, cucumber green mottle mosaic, watermelon mosaic, zucchini yellow mosaic, and squash mosaic are some of the viruses... Continue Reading →
Do you have beautiful herbs in your garden and want to preserve them for use this winter? August and September are the time to get started drying your herbs. Harvest herb stems for drying from stems that are in the bud stage, but have not yet flowered. This is the stage at which leaves contain the highest amount... Continue Reading →
Have you ever thought about saving seeds from your own vegetable garden to grow next year? It can certainly be done and isn’t as hard as you might think. However, before you get started there are a few important things to keep in mind when selecting plants from which to save seeds. Avoid Hybrid Plants Many, if... Continue Reading →
Due to extremely frequent spring rains, some vegetable gardeners may not have been able to plant all the vegetables they would have liked. You might think “vegetable gardens can only be planted in spring, right?” Wrong – you can go on planting vegetables throughout summer and even into August if you choose your crops and... Continue Reading →
As a long-lived perennial, it's not uncommon for asparagus plants to live for 12-15 years or longer. So it's worth your time to take care of your plants, keeping the crowns healthy and vigorous to ensure a bountiful harvest each year. Follow these steps to ensure the health of your asparagus and next year's crop. Time to... Continue Reading →
Gardeners enjoy the beauty and fragrance of flowers, but from a plant’s standpoint flowers have one very basic and essential function – to ensure the production of seeds and thus the next generation. For a plant to produce seeds its flowers must be pollinated, either through self-pollination or cross-pollination, and most plants have evolved to... Continue Reading →
Earlier this spring, we looked at three ornamental plants promoted this year by the National Garden Bureau – dahlia, snapdragon and hybrid sage, Salvia nemorosa. It’s getting warm enough now (at least most days!) that we can begin planting their final “Year of the…” feature – pumpkin. Pumpkins are a fun plant to grow, especially when gardening with... Continue Reading →
One of the most easily recognized insects in the home landscape is the white grub. Almost every gardener has seen white grub larvae in the soil, while installing new plants or tilling the vegetable garden. The term "white grub" actually encompasses the larval stage of several scarab beetles, the most common, and most damaging, being... Continue Reading →
