Laura Ojeda Melchor

With their tufted heads and uncanny beaks, all the different types of bird of paradise flowers (Strelitzia spp.) are showstoppers in their own right.Even when they’re not flowering, the silky evergreen f

Is there anything tastier than a juicy, soft-yet-firm piece of cantaloupe unfurling its delightful flavor on your tongue?Of course not!And there’s no better reward for the w

If you’re growing bok choy, aside from dealing with potential pest and disease issues, the last thing you want is for your crop to go to seed.When bok choy bolts, the leaves an

When I first moved to southern California from Montana to attend university, I was amazed by the diverse array of stunning plants: the pink sprays of bougainvillea, the purple flush of jacaranda trees, the orange-tufted, sharp-beaked birds of paradise.It’s uncanny how much this flower resem

A certain family member of mine insists that only the tuberous root veggies with cream-colored flesh are real sweet potatoes. The orange things, she says, are yams.Friends, my dear family member is wrong. Just about

Johnny-jump-ups are one of my favorite flowers because they pop up everywhere, placing them among the easiest blooms to grow. They’re determined to flourish.Here’s an example: One year, I grew a container of t

Pansies, violets, and violas are some of my favorite flowers. These perky, cheerful blooms all belong to the same genus, Viola, but they are diverse in size and color.Known for being prol

Foxgloves are one of my top five favorite flowers. There’s nothing quite like the sight of tall spikes packed with long, tubular, brightly colored blooms with speckled throats.The common foxglove, Digitalis purpurea, is the

I admit it: I haven’t always loved beets (Beta vulgaris).But that all changed the day

I love those funny jokes about spinach. You know, the ones where people poke fun at the way you can put an entire bag of spinach in a pan to saute, but you’ll only have a teaspoon of the green once it’s done cooking?Okay, that’s a slight exaggeration –

Here’s a confession for you: even though I love them, I used to be too lazy to eat sunflower seeds. Unshelled ones, anyway.All that work cracking them

If you’ve never grown root vegetables in containers, now’s the time to try.Parsnips are in the Apiaceae family,

I’ve never forgotten the joy of seeing tiny purple, white, and yellow ‘Johnny-jump-ups’ popping up through the soil in the springtime.We had a clump of pansies in

Those of us in cold USDA Hardiness Zones 2 through 5 seem to have the gardening odds stacked against us.We must meticulously plan our gardens because ou

If you love both celery and root vegetables, you’ll adore this versatile veggie that’s like a two-in-one combo.The bulbous root known as celeriac, or Apium graveolens var. rapaceum,

Before you became a gardener, you may never have heard the term “bolting” before.At least, not in this particular context. Maybe you’re only now h

You planted your pumpkin seeds and felt that buzz of excitement when they germinated and poked through the earth.They grew into robust vines with huge le

Lacking the sharpness of onion or the aromatic spice of garlic, the shallot somehow takes the best of both of those beloved alliums and blends them into one beautiful, sweet yet savory flavor.This unassuming bulb is used in a variety of cuisines around the world.

As a kid, I dreamed of having my own berry patch. Any berry would do, but tart, juicy, sweet blackberries were a clear favorite.How wonderful it would be, I thought, if

While its primary common name makes it sound like this plant comes from the Caribbean island, Cuban oregano is a plant known by many other names as well, including Mexican mint, Spanish (or French) thyme, and Indian borage.Here’s the funny thing: Cuban oregano is not true ore

Boysenberries, Rubus ursinus x R. idaeus, are tasty hybrid berries that typically grow best in USDA Hardiness Zones 5-9.I’m in Zone 4, and it is admittedly audaci

The biggest pumpkins make for the best pie, right?Well… maybe not.Most cultivars are edible, and you can m

Homegrown celery, Apium graveolens, is delicious. It’s nothing like the stringy, tasteless stalks you buy in the grocery store. But did you know there are a number of different cultivars available?I wouldn’t blame someone for thinking that t

If you’ve fallen in love with bird of paradise plants but live in a cold climate, you can grow these tropical beauties indoors as houseplants.Given enough sunlight and the righ

There’s no greater feeling than carefully propagating your own eggplant (Solanum melongena), nurturing the seedlings, and watching the first star-shaped flowers bloom.And there’s no worse feeling than watching tho

When I was a kid, my mom turned our front yard, in Reno, Nevada, into a garden. I remember walking through rows of tall corn stalks that felt like an enchanted forest.I tried growing corn last year, but I started

Heaven is a bite of fresh cauliflower, straight from the garden.I have always loved this

The other day, I brought my friend out to the garden and parted the vines of my ‘Howden’ pumpkin plant, revealing an enormous green fruit.“Wow!” said my friend. “That’s beautiful. It looks like a wat

I first met arugula, Eruca sativa, when I made a spring panzanella salad several years ago. I’d never used the leafy green before, but I was hooked from the first peppery bite.And when I started shopping for seeds to grow my own,

Accidents happen. This is one of the universal truths of life, and it’s also true of pumpkins, my favorite fall fregetables.Take this scenario, for example:You’ve b

Every spring, I hold my breath and watch the flower beds at the front of the house.The first year that I lived in my little red Alaska home

I’m here to make a confession: when I first started gardening, I planted four broccoli seedlings in a container, I grossly underestimated how big they would get.They started from such tiny s

Peace lilies are some of the most rewarding houseplants to cultivate.Their glossy leaves add an attrac

There’s nothing like waking up one late-winter day to a field of gorgeous crocus blooms in your own backyard.But when, exactly, do yo

If you’ve ever walked down a sidewalk during a mushy, gray, late-February day and seen, to your great surprise, a pop of color already blooming on a woody shrub, you might have glimpsed a flowering quince.These woody, perennial shrubs aren’t the same thing as quince fru

You’ve grown your own delicious boysenberry bush. The first plump reddish-purple berries are beginning to ripen on the vine. And then you realize that you’re not really sure exactly when or how to harvest these beauties.At what point are they actually ready? How do you separate the