Ken Druse

WHO AMONG US doesn’t have at least one Urgent Garden Question? This month on my public radio show and podcast, Ken Druse and I answered a diverse list:

Yes, plants die, even in the care of experienced gardeners (and others just need to be gotten rid of). Plants we’ve known, but no longer grow for one reason or the other, is the subject today of a conversation with my friend, Ken Druse.Ken needs no introduction except to say he’s the author and photographer of 20 garden books, including most recently “The Scentual Garden,” about S-C-E-N-T. He joined me via Skype to talk about all the plants we’ve loved before (including Phlomis russeliana, above; photo from Wikipedia). Plus: Tell us in comments at the bo

My longtime friend Ken, an award-winning garden photographer and author of many books, including “The New Shade Garden” and “Making More Plants,” produced his own “Real Dirt” podcast for 10 years, all available on KenDruse dot com.Read along as you listen to the May 15, 2107 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below. You can subscribe to all future editions on iTunes or Stitcher (and browse my archive of podcasts here).The May show is a doubleheader; this transcript is the “overtime” segment, starting at about 24 minutes into the audio file, and Part 1’s transcript is at this other link, including how to work around wet spring so

LAST FALL, a month apart, the earth lost two of it great plantswomen. They were from opposite coasts, and one—Californian Ruth Bancroft, at 109 years old—was twice the age of the other, New Englander Elizabeth Farnsworth, 54. Both were individuals of great focus and optimism and energy whom I enormously admired, and will not forget.

This month on our Q&A segment we crammed in as many as we could by taking a shortcut, and instead of having live callers, we gathered more questions than ever and I just shouted them out. Call it our Lightning Round.Important note: Got a question for a future show? Ask it in the comments or contact form on A Way to Garden dot com or KenDruse dot com, or on Facebook dot com/A Way to Garden and we’ll scoop them up as we plan for next time.Read along as you listen to the June 12, 2107 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below. You can subscribe to all future editions on

I’ve rounded up some of the best to tackle in the monthly Q&A segment with help from my friend Ken Druse. Ken, an award-winning garden photographer and author of more books than I can count, including “The New Shade Garden” and “Making More Plants,” produced his own “Real Dirt” podcast for 10 years, all available on KenDruse dot com (and still available on iTunes, too).Read along as you listen to the March 6, 2107 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below. You can subscribe to all future editions on iTunes or Stitcher (and browse my archive of podcasts here).Part 2 of the transcript of this month’s doubleheader is at this link (incl

Helping me answer, as he does each month, is my friend and longtime garden writer and photographer, Ken Druse of Ken Druse dot com, author of “The New Shade Garden” and “Making More Plants” and many other favorite garden books.Read along as you listen to the Nov. 13, 2017 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below. You can subscribe to all future editions on iTunes or Stitcher (and browse my archive of podcasts here). If you have a question for a future show, post it in comments on this website, or on Ken’s website, or use our contact forms to email us, or ask us at Facebook.com/awaytogarden.the november q&a with ken druseQ. We’re at mid-November. How much frost have you had, and what zone ar

Read along as you listen to the July 2, 2018 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below. You can subscribe to all future editions on iTunes or Stitcher (and browse my archive of podcasts here).You can also browse all the past Q&A’s with Ken Druse at this link, or visit him at his website.urgent garden questions, with ken druseQ. Hello, Ken.A. I was going to complain.Q. Oh. [Laughter.]

I’ve rounded up some of the best to tackle in the monthly Q&A segment with help from my friend Ken Druse. Ken, an award-winning garden photographer and author of more books than I can count, including “The New Shade Garden” and “Making More Plants,” produced his own “Real Dirt” podcast for 10 years, all available on KenDruse dot com (and still available on iTunes, too).Read along as you listen to the March 6, 2107 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below. You can subscribe to all future editions on iTunes or Stitcher (and browse my archive of podcasts here). This is the second segment of the March Q&A program—find the first

What do you want (need?) to know about seeds?Do you experience failure with some particular crop, like spindly seedlings or poor germination, or need help with a better lighting set-up or watering method or something technical like that? What’s the craziest thing you ever grew—or wanted to grow but didn’t dare? Your biggest win—or to

THANKS TO YOUR BOUNTIFUL supply of Urgent Garden Questions, my friend Ken Druse and I are being kept busy. In our latest Q&A edition of my podcast, we’ll tackle how to plant groundcovers under established trees, and the gentle care required. Our other topics include what to do with that gift plant like a Primula, after you enjoy it for a week or two as a centerpiece, and how to use “pea brush” to “brush up” floppy plantings.

Brie Arthur, a Michigan native who studied horticulture and landscape design at Purdue, is now based in North Carolina, where she has worked as a plant propagator and grower at top nurseries like Plant Delights and Camellia Forest.In recent years Brie has transitioned to a garden-communicator role–writing, lecturing and also working as a correspondent for the popular public television program “Growing a Greener World.” Oh, and lest I forget: She is totally mad about tomatoes, growing 100-plus varieties a season…and besides a 101 in foodscaping, I got some tomato recommendations from Brie, too.Read along as you listen to the May 29, 2107 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below. You can subscribe to all future edi

We’d love to hear what aliens of any description you are battling, whether weeds, insects, you name it—perhaps for subjects for future shows. Be sure to add a comment at the end of the story to let us know, and please say where you located. Any questions you have of any nature are also always welcome here as a comment or via the contact form, or on Facebook—not just ones related to invasive species, of course. You can also find Ken directly at his website.For answers to other questions, you can browse the archive of all our monthly segments.Read along as you listen to the podcast version of the August 14, 2017 edition of the show using the player below, and don’t forget: Keep the questions coming.august urgent garden question q&a with ken drusewhy do tomatoes crack?Q. So many questions have been coming in, because of course it’s that time of the garden season really no ma

Ken is a longtime garden author and photographer, with many books to his credit including “The New Shade Garden” and “Natural Companions” and “Making More Plants.” He can be found at KenDruse dot com.Read along as you listen to the Oct. 29, 2018 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below. You can subscribe to all future editions on iTunes or Stitcher (and browse my archive of podcasts here).the october q&a with ken druseQ. Uh-oh. I can hear in y

1. Developing a signature garden style, even in a small space, with designer Susan Morrison2. Overwintering tender plants, plus issues with hydrangeas (a reader and listener Q&A session), with Ken Druse3. Vegetable and mushroom soup ideas, with Alexandra Stafford of Alexandra Cooks dot com4. Cattle-panel DIY ideas (creating tomato cages and more garden organizing tools with wire fencing), with Joe Lamp’l5. Asian jumping worms, and research around these terrifying invasive species, with B

Because you keep asking your questions in comments here on the website, in emails, on Facebook, and now at @awaytogarden, on Instagram, too, my friend and fellow garden writer Ken Druse keeps coming back to help me answer them.Read along as you listen to the May 20, 2018 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below. You can subscribe to all future editions on iTunes or Stitcher (and browse my archive of podcasts here).the may urgent garden questions

I had to shut up and turn the mic over to Ken, an award-winning garden author and photographer of more books than I can count or apparently write myself. And he began (jokingly) like this:Ken: “Hello and welcome to ‘A Way to Garden. I’m your visiting host, Ken Druse. I’m the author of, as someone said, soon to be 20 books on gardening, and our guest, our special guest today is someone who is familiar to all listeners to the radio show and the podcast and visitors to Margaret

Read along as you listen to the August 19, 2019 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below. You can subscribe to all future editions on iTunes or Spotify or Stitcher (and browse my archive of podcasts here).And for those of you listening from near the Capital Region of New York State, Ken will join me at the New York State Writers Institute’s second annual Book Festival on Saturday, September 14th, 2019, and we’re going to have information about how you can join this wonderful, big, free day-long book festival and meet us.the latest q&a with ken druseMargaret Roach: New York State Writers Institute’s se

It’s seed-catalog season, when we gardeners in many regions may not be able to grow much outdoors, but can dream big. Ken, author of “Making More Plants: The Science, Art, and Joy of Propagation,” joined me on the radio show and podcast to help us all get ready for a successful season of growing from seed.This show and story is part of my annual Seed Series, and we’ll be giving away a copy of Ken’s book (see the comments box at the bottom of the page).Read along as you listen to the Jan. 21, 2019 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below. You can subscribe to all future editions on iTunes or Stitcher (and browse my archive of podcasts h

Those were among readers’ and listeners’ Urgent Garden Questions this summer. Ken Druse, longtime friend and author of such beloved garden books as “The New Shade Garden” and “Making More Plants” and “Natural Companions,” helped me answer them.When Ken Druse and I taped the July 2018 Urgent Garden Question show in earlier July, my most urgent question was: Will it ever rain again? Be careful what you wish for, because it started shortly after and hasn’t really stopped, with something close to 4 inches falling in about two weeks.Read along as you listen to the July 30, 2018 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below

Ken Druse, author of nearly 20 beautiful and inspirational garden books, including “The New Shade Garden” and “Making More Plants,” helped me tackle the subject of garden design from the ground up, and which must-have elements even established gardens need to find room for. Things like views from indoors, and lots of well-placed outdoor faucets (like the one with accompanying hose reel, above, at his house) and electrical outlets, among other essentials.Read along as you listen to the May 27, 2019 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below. You can subscribe to all future editions on iTunes or Spotify or Stitcher (and browse my archive of podcasts here).garden design ideas, a q&a with ken druseMargaret: Ken, hello. How are you?Ken: I’m excited, Margaret. [Laughter.]Margaret: Good. Because of this question from Kyle that we

My longtime friend and fellow garden writer Ken of Ken Druse dot com is author of many books including “The New Shade Garden,” and “Making More Plants,” and “Natural Companions.” We tackled subjects ranging from propagating coleus from cuttings, to repotting a jade plant—and repotting in general—and even why a jade might be blooming now, after many years of ownership with no blooms. Ken shared ideas about some of his favorite unusual houseplants, too (that’s one of his Thai hybrid euphorbias, above), including several that bloom in the offseason.Read along as you listen to the Dec. 17, 2018 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below. You can subscribe to all future editions on iTunes or Stitcher (and browse my archive of podcasts here).year-end q&a with ken druse

“Hey, let’s make it another edition of our Desert Island Plants series on the radio show and podcast,” we decided. And so favorite natives of spring are the topic this week.Talking about our most-loved spring native woodland perennials—from blue cohosh (just emerging one April, above) and merrybells, to various trilliums and Virginia bluebells and more—is a perfect fit for Ken Druse. His books “The Natural Shade Garden” in 1992 and “The New Shade

And how I was finally trying to get them back into shape for the rest of the season (yes, there are still months to go even up North here!) by pinching things. And just for fun, how I’ve been rooting some of the pinched off bits in little jars of water. So all that’s to say, Ken and I got to talking about a little midsummer rejuvenation and also some of the less-obvious positive effects that can yield.I don’t need to introduce my friend Ken Druse, author of 20 garden books, including one on propagation called “Making More Plants.” The photo up top, from Ken, is a jumble of coleus and sweet-potato vine–two candidates among many for pinching back and propagating–maybe even to m

The first installment appeared April 20, 2020. On March 31, 2021, the paper ran a Q&A with me to kick off Year 2 of the series.The topics I’ve covered so far:Where to begin your spring cleanup in a chaotic season. Bed-prep using cardboard, newsprint and sometimes plastic sheeting. Shopping in your own garden for “free” plants. How to make a late-start flower garden of “annuals,” including many to direct-sow. Pruning Q&A with Jeff Jabco of Swarthmore’s Sco

In most of the country this spring 2020, we’re not out shopping at garden centers, browsing for new adoptees the way we usually would be. But maybe you, like Ken Druse and I, are ready to do some shopping in your own garden, looking for divisions of favorite things that would work elsewhere, or simply keeping that bee balm from overrunning everything else that shares the same bed with it. We discussed dividing plants—the how, the when, the why, and how even certain shrubs (not just herbaceous perennials) can be divided. Ken even made a step-by-step video for us of the process.Plus: Comment in the box at the bottom of the page to enter to win a copy of Ken’s “Making  More Plants” book.Read along as you listen to the April 13, 2020 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below. You can subscribe to all future editions

TACKLING CANADA THISTLE, and the ethics of herbicide use. Reblooming amaryllis. Moss in the lawn or garden beds. Pesky squirrels. Propagating philodendron, and fragrant violets. Those are among the questions that have been asked lately, and my friend Ken Druse of KenDruse.com helped me answer them in the latest edition of our Urgent Garden Question shows.

My annual Seed Series continues, and with help from Ken, author of “Making More Plants: The Science, Art, and Joy of Propagation,” I also tackled growing primulas from seed, spinach failures, direct-sowing some perennials and biennials, and Ken’s adventures sowing citrus seed and more. (That’s Daucus carota ‘Dara,’ above, that Ken grew recently.)When we reached out in December to get your Urgent Seed Questions, we got so many that we taped two shows—and even at that, some will be tackled in future episodes with guest experts. As we did in Part 1, when we covered seed-starting basics, we’re giving away a copy of Ken’s book “Making

My regular alter ego, Ken Druse, needs no introduction, but he is of course the author of not a small number of gardening books himself, 20 at last count, including some I know changed the way I look at plants. He’s back today to take a stroll through our mutual garden bookshelves.Plus: We’ll have a giveaway of a couple of favorites; enter to win in the comments box at the bottom of the page. Note that we checked that all of these books are available–often used–with a little Google searching for those that are out of print. With the ones I’ve given Amazon links for, there are used copies in all prices and conditions available, so dig deep. Read alon

Longtime friend and fellow garden writer Ken was just back from a garden-filled lecture trip across the nation, with stops at Minnesota Landscape Arboretum and in Northern California when we spoke. That’s an exceptional private garden in Piedmont, above, that he visited.Read along as you listen to the July 15, 2019 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below. You can subscribe to all future editions on iTunes or Spotify or Stitcher (and browse my archive of podcasts here).q&a with ken druse: ken’s recent garden travelsMargaret Roach: Hi, Ken.

Figuring out which plants are native locally is one key first step, and at the bottom of the transcript is a list of some places to help you start in that search, no matter where you garden (including how to find your state’s list, and then your county’s from there). Up top, those are native Trillium erectum and Geranium maculatum in a shady bed at Ken’s.Speaking of native plants, we also tackled a listener question about pruning Magnolia grandiflora—the evergreen Southern magnolia.  And on the subject of collector plants, Ken confesses to his latest acquisition—probably the most expensive single bulb he ever bought.Ken Druse needs no introduction, but I’ll offer one anyhow. He’s a prolific author a with hit books like “Making More Plants” and “The New Shade Garden,” and “Natural Companions” (affiliate links).

You probably knew it when you heard us try to narrow down our lists of desert-island shrubs a month or two ago on the podcast, that trees would be next. Special ones, like Ken’s ‘Morioka Weeping’ katsura, above.You all know Ken, great gardener, great friend of many years, and author and photographer of 20 great gardening books.Plus: Just for fun, I’m going to give away a copy of “A Way to Garden,” my 2019 book. Enter the giveaway by commenting in the box at the bottom o

What happens after the current tender colorful parade of beauty, with flowers everywhere and fresh green foliage expanding by the minute without our effort, is up to us gardeners—and that’s the harder part. That’s our topic today: what to do next to keep the garden going strong for the long haul, from pinching and shearing to pruning and other cutbacks.Ken Druse needs no introduction except to say he’s been my go-to garden friend for decades, is the author of an amazing 20 books, all of w

MAYBE YOU CAN feel it where you garden, too: a slight shift in the weather, which combined with shortening days, means summer is loosening its grip. It’s not fall yet. It’s not cleanup time, but what time is it in the garden right now? Ken Druse and I are each under way on projects that are just perfect for this moment, for the in-between time. From sowing biennials, to collecting seed of some annuals, to eradication of enthusiastic groundcovers and more that we are doing, and want to tell you about.

There are a lot of good things I could say about having known Ken for many years, and one of them is that we’ve had each other to talk to along the way while we’ve been writing each new book, someone to ruminate with and refine ideas with, time and again. So when Ken started telling me more than a year ago about what is now his latest and his 20th book, about fragrance, I was fascinated because frankly it’s not something I know a lot about. Now, thanks to Ken and “The Scentual Garden,” I do.Read along as you listen to the October 14, 2019 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below. You can subscribe to all future editions on iTunes or Spotify or Stitcher (and browse my archive of podcasts here). Plus: enter to win a copy of t

The previous time Ken had visited the show, just a couple of weeks prior, we got so sidetracked into talking about favorite tools that we rely on that we barely started sharing our garden resolutions, and then time ran out. So he’s back as promised to make his confessions, and I made mine–ranging from reclaiming grass paths that have grown too narrow, to tactics for avoiding overwhelm, and even a commitment to sharing plants (and the important of ruthlessly tossing some out, too).Read along as you listen to the December 30, 2019 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below. You can subscribe to all future editions on iTunes or Spotify or Stitcher (and browse my archive of podcasts here).Plus: To celebrate the new year and decade, I‘m offering two giveaways with this edition of the show and blog: a chance to enter to win Ken’s 2019 book, “The Scent