Ornamental plants Ideas, Tips & Guides

Best of all: Even the frogboys, kings of my kingdom, give sedums a thumbs (well, whatever their digits are called) up. Have a look at some of the colorful faces who ask nothing and offer so much, succulent members of the genus Sedum, in a slideshow of favorite stonecrops.A couple of them already have profiles of their own here, such as the tall blue-green ‘Matrona,’ and the ground-hugging sunshine-colored ‘Angelina,’ both plants I would order if I didn’t already have them.‘Angelina’ profile ‘Matrona’ profile Click the first thumbnail to start the show, and toggle from slide to slide using the

Since 2011, Timothy has worked at Untermyer Park and Gardens in Yonkers, New York, which is becoming a horticultural destination for keen gardeners wanting inspiration–and a getaway for anyone just wanting to be surrounded by bold, contemporary plantings in a dramatic, historic setting. The Untermyer Gardens Conservancy is a non-profit organization collaborating with the City of Yonkers to facilitate the garden’s restoration (details on tours and how to visit otherwise are at the bottom of this page).In case you’re wondering: that garden has many vivid miles to go before it sleeps for winter. I even saw the phrase “floral fireworks” (such as the crape myrtles and hydrangeas in the right-hand photo below) used to describe it at the end of August, and there are plenty of foliage fireworks, too.Timothy and I worked together for years at “Martha Stewart Living” magazine, and he has been a gardener at the famed Wave Hill in New York City, and at the Garden Conservancy project called Rocky Hills

Andrew, who is now assistant director of the Chicago Botanic Garden, is past president of Magnolia Society International’s board of directors, and remains a member of the society’s board. In his tenure over 20 years as curator at Scott Arboretum of Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania, Andrew built the magnolia collection from about 50 to more than 200 cultivars. That’s a lot of magnolias.Now Andrew Bunting is author of a book on the queen of flowering trees, called “The Plant Lover’s Guide to Magnolias,” just out from Timber Press as part of an ongoing series on various distinctive genera of plants.We talked magnolias on my public-radio show and podcast. Read along while you listen in to the April 25, 2016 edition of the podcast using the player below (or at this link)–and even learn how to train a magnolia or any w

I couldn’t find Aralia spinosa for sale 15 years or so ago when I first wanted it, but a nearby nursery knew of a stash and got me some. They sent then-staffer David Burdick, now a popular daffodil and bromeliad expert with a business of his own, with the first few prickly beasts in ball and burlap.And those begat a colony, over time, a tropical-looking grove that’s handsome in leaf and in its high-summer flower period, and positively unparallelled in its autumn show of foliage and fruit. Its canopy becomes a stained-glass window of

IAM LOOKING FOR ANY BRIGHT SPOTS ABOUT NOW, as the mid-October-looking garden surfaces in this driest September.  A couple of easy, big perennials—Lespedeza thunbergii (above), the bush clover, and some favorite Aralias (including Aralia cordata and A.

‘Bob White’ didn’t make the Brooklyn Botanic Garden top 10 in their 2005 article rating crabs…but it was #11, the alternate behind ‘Hozam’ (or ‘Holiday Gold’) among the yellow-fruited forms. The article is worth a look if you’re thinking of adding a crabapple to your landscape, because choosing can be a challenge, and they have the great ones profiled.I grow my yellow-fruited crabs just beyond a stand of yellow-twig dogwood, Cornus sericea ‘Silver and Gold,’ so that my distant view of the whole gleaming area right now is quite nice: linear gold beneath a haze of golden baubles. The photo shows a small section of the combination.The birds will be back, I’m sure, for ‘Bob White,’ but offcolor fruits (read: other than red) seem to hold little interest until they are really hungry.  I’ve talked about this before with hollies, and the same hold true with crabs.  At least they have some consideration for my winter cheer, I suppose. By the way, I replaced the ‘Bob White’ thebark borers

Salix chaenomeloides is just one of various rough-and-tumble shrubs I planted the last year or two out alongside the road, between the parallel rows of my two-part front deer fence. I wanted another layer of botanical interest, and a little more buffer from the dusty dirt road I live on. Fast-growing toughies like the giant pussy willow, too coarse for most beds but a great companion in earliest spring in just such a spot, were perfect for the job.The shrub (Zones 5 or 6-8) is 10 feet high in just two years, and promises to be 12-15 and equally as wide in time. Its leaves are nothing spectacular, just willow-like. I’m told there will be yellow-orange anthers as the catkins mature, but even

IN CASE I FAILED TO CONVINCE YOU in earliest spring that you didn’t want a Forsythia, but a Lindera benzoin or spicebush instead, more evidence just presented itself. Now try to resist this native Eastern shrub, and tell me that your Forsythia measures up to its gold standard.

I doubt that Broken Arrow, founded by Dick and Sally Jaynes in 1984 in Hamden, Connecticut, needs much introduction—especially lately, as they were just featured in a “New York Times” piece by my former colleague Anne Raver. As Anne mentioned in that article, Adam (now 33 years old) used to buy plants at Broken Arrow as a teen-ager; now he’s their Propagation and Plant Development Manager.In the latter role, he’s the kind of particular guy who goes looking for a winterberry holly that shows off even without its fruit on (gold-splashed foliage, anyone?); who has such a passion for witch hazels that the nursery now offers 45 cultivars; who tracked down a pink-flowered Stewartia and….but let him tell you:The Q&A With Adam WheelerQ. So what does it take to catch the eye of the guy whose job is to go around looking for new things to add into Broken Arrow’s already very sophisticated product mix? You must see a l

THE RAIN HAS DRIFTED AWAY and so I thought we’d take another walk, yes? More areas of the garden are coming alive gradually, so let’s go see. (If you didn’t come along last time, you can always backtrack, by the way.

IT’S ALL HITS, ALL THE TIME here at the garden, or at least it is this time of year. Meet more of my beloved companions (click to get to know each one)…and hurry, the next gang will be showing up and showing off at any minute now.

In nature, Ilex verticillata or winterberry hollies inhabit the edge of the woods or even wetlands—not typically choosing to make their home where they’d suffer extra-dry conditions like the ones this year.Even with the occasional off year, I would not be without winterberries (or at least not intentionally). I hope the birds can make do with a quarter-crop, feasting instead on a bumper lot of crabapples and many seed-bearing things, from grasses to conifers. Fingers crossed.Learn more:Pretty, pretty: A gallery of winterberry hollies What birds like: 11 steps to making a bird garden Listen ins

GARDEN CLEANUP HAS ITS REWARDS. There you are poking around with a pruning shears or a rake, cutting some things back and uncovering others, and suddenly you find them: the first brave souls to bloom.  From snowdrops (above) to the bravest shrub of all, a quick rundown of the first heat out of the gate:Helleborus niger, the so-called Christmas rose, is always extra-early.

The plant in question, an East Asian native, is Codonopsis lanceolata (and don’t ask me how I even remember such trivia, when more days than not I can’t remember what tool I was going to get by the time I stand up to walk toward the barn). C. lanceolata, the bonnet bellflower is (no surprise) a Campanula relative.Though virtually nobody in these parts grows it, you can: Asiatica Nursery sold it, and Digging Dog has its blue-flowered cousin, C. clematidea

WITH A WEEK OF DAYS NEAR 80, the garden has moved ahead fast (perhaps too fast). No rain in sight, but blossoms everywhere, including these shot today.

This Japanese woodlander spreads to create thick mats of scalloped, blue-green, fuzzy foliage, from which erupt (and I think that’s exactly the word) orchid-pink flowers in early spring on 6- or 8-inch stems. It is never shy, and given part shade and a humusy soil it will romp…but in the nicest way.Arrowhead Alpines Nursery sometimes sells it. Once you’ve got it, there will be plenty for a lifetime (and friends). I’ve read a

IN OUR CHAT on my public-radio program, I learned why not to till when prepping a planting; how to help a desired species outpace an unwanted one by learning to manage and influence natural processes; and what the word “naturalistic” means today.what’s ‘naturalistic,’ anyway?Q. How did the native and natural become your specialty, Larry—did the education in landscape design come first, or the nature and science?A. My first experience in the landscape world was working in traditional horticulture—first a job, and then going to school for it. However my interest in it always came from the naturalistic end.As a kid, I grew up in the urban Philadelphia and I don’t think I even knew there was such as thing as a garden designer, until I got a job with a landscape firm, in the summer between high school and college.But the thing that always interested me was na

“Planthropology” turns out to be what it sounds like: “A kind of anthropology for plants,” says Ken. “Stories about plants we love, who they are, where they are, how they got there.”  As with all Ken’s books, it’s rich with his own photos (450 of them this time).I know a lot of those stories myself, or so I thought, but reading “Planthropology” I came across more that I didn’t know than familiar ones. Like the reason you won’t see the flower on a fig tree but will still get fruit (because the flowers are hidden inside, forming what we think of as the edible part). Or like the fact that bees are attracted to the color blue, and that birds see color much as we humans do. Who knew? (Well, apparently Ken did.)Perhaps my favorite chapter: the one cal

And then, this year, came ‘Bellfire’ (top and bottom photos) a supposedly more upright (to 24 inches) and genteel creature, a first cousin of ‘Bonfire’ and from the same New Zealand breeders. My plants are still so small I don’t have much to show or photograph, but as I say, all the signs are encouraging. They’re a little floppy yet due to their youth and the endless rain we’ve suffered. This is one I’d snap up at the midsummer sales and try to carry over, if you can find it, a potential investment plant like ‘Bonfire’ turned out to be.What begonia currently has your attention, and if you’ve known it for awhile, do you have any tips to share about making it a permanent member of the family? Do tell.Categoriesannuals &

This compact peony is sited in my garden beneath an old magnolia, with various woodlanders, and seems fairly happy, producing multiple blooms per stem over a couple of weeks. But this is hardly the equivalent of the steppes or an alpine meadow I’m offering. Read: In more sun it would be more prolific. The flowers, perhaps 2 to 3 inches across, are nodding, and though mine are magenta, the species ranges from that to paler pinks and even white.Now that I have read up on it and its origins in an old e-newsletter from the Canadian peony specialists LaPivoinerie D’Aoust, I think I am moving my plant this fall, to a slightly sunnier spot, to get more of the good stuff. Seneca Hills sells plan

YES, YES, I KNOW: I have already told you I love hellebores. While waiting for mine to reach full bloom, I took an online tour this very cold morning of other hellebore plantings that are enviably farther along.

There is an archive of viburnum tips and profiles of other fruit-bearing shrubs I love, great possibilities if you’re planning on doing some fall planting and want to bring in the birds, or have viburnum in need of TLC and need a hand. It’s all in the bullets below the slideshow for reference.Click on the first thumbnail to start the show, then toggle from slide to slide using the arrows beside each caption. Enjoy.Other Juicy Viburnum Treats from the Archives:THINK FALL (YES, FALL): My original homage to this genius of a genus. PRUNING VIBURNUM: They don’t like being picked at any more than you do. Prune these beautiful woody plants correctly and they will reward you and wildlife. TROUBLE IN PARADISE: Viburnum leaf beetle will ravage certain species and varieties in a flash, others not so. Learn how to combat this pest with non-toxic October-through-April search-and-destroy missions. More Fruit to Savor (and Share With Birds):WINTER

My clump of ‘Sagae,’ whose highly textural, blue-green foliage is suffused with a warm cream from the edges splashing inward, is probably 3 or 4 feet across now, heading for a maximum of about 6. This is a statement plant: big, bold, beautiful, about 30 inches tall. I treasure it, and was glad to be affirmed in my judgment by the CHO, Tony, who calls ‘Sagae’, the “finest and most dramatic variegated hosta ever introduced.”Another personal must-have would be ‘June’ (above), the month of my birth and also one beautiful hosta. I have to describe it as not just blue but nearly turquoise in spring, the creamy yellow centers heating up to chartreuse against a vivid blue. I’ve found ‘June’ to be a strong grower, clumping up to about 3 feet across, and have made numerous divisions from my original plants.  As summer heats up, the ‘June’ foliage darkens to deep blue with medium green here, but it’s good-looking

I gave L. sempervirens (Zones 4-9), whose woody stems twist around the corner post on my back porch the last decade, a serious pruning last year, after it seemed to have a lot of leggy growth that was especially appealing to the aphids. It has responded really favorably: heavy bloom and stronger growth after a year of recovery.Its far more subtle yellow-flowered cousin (above), L.s. ‘Flava’ or ‘Sulphurea,’ hasn’t really been troubled by insects here in all the years I’ve had it, and seems content to grow in part shade, not just full sun, an added blessing. If you will only have one sempervirens, maybe this should be it? (Hint, hint.)The L. heckrottii hybrid called ‘Goldflame’ (above, Zone 5-9) has been around for years and is also sold as ‘Pink Lemona

We talked about the advantages of growing from seed, about extra-cooperative little plants like certain sedges and Erigeron (fleabane) that can beautify even tough spots like at the roots of trees, about using pots to announce garden areas and the signature plants of each of the distinct gardens at Wave Hill, too—like larkspur, to name one.the plants of wave hill, with louis bauerQ. Glad to have you on the show, Louis.A. Thanks for asking me.Q. Thank you for saying yes because I need a little help with my plantsmanship over here. [Laughter.] So for people who haven’t visited Wave Hill, which is a must stop for any keen gardener, do you want to just give us the teeny version of why we need tocome visit—a little bit about Wave Hill?A. Well it really i

PEOPLE WHO KNOW ME know I say over and again that I am not a lover of white flowers. (Like all of us, I say a lot of stupid things.) But then I look around and, surprise, I have a whole lot of them.

Once they have dropped their leaves and gone dormant, after a good hard freeze or so, I get out the hand cart and engage a brave friend. We say our prayers, then wheel them one by one over my hilly garden, down to the unheated barn.I will certainly meet my end someday under one of these big pots, when I am manning the downhill side of this hauling operation.I make sure that they are well-watered during the fall, so that they go into storage well-hydrated—and therefore less prone to dessication while in there.  No water is offered in the coldest months, when the soil and the trees inside the building are mostly frozen, but I start checking around February, once the

never really minded, because what followed the sometimes-half-strength bloom were pleated, bluish-green leaves (details in in the slideshow, below) so beautiful I never tired of them.  And the plant’s structure, a slightly chaotic, outstretched tangle of delightfully crooked arms, pleased me all winter long. (That’s mine on the far left in the photo above, to show scale and shape, looking down the front path.)But then came the spring of 2010, the jubilee. As the bloggers in Southwest England at the Hegarty Webber Partnership garden design site will tell you, too, there was something going on that year with winterhazel. (I was happy for such company in that fine moment, and to “meet” them.) Their 20-something-year-old plant went positively mad, too. Synchronicity!Grow winterhazels in sun or part shade, in moist but well-drained soil, and if you’re pushing it (as I am) with the

BROWN PATCHES of lawn and garden widen daily, and the “grass” is now a minefield of yellow-jacket nests. Ouch! But the hummingbirds dance around me while I weed, and the tadpoles have suddenly hatched into dozens of tiny frogs (boing, boing, boing!) and an older frog poses on a begonia leaf…and I’m grateful to be here, anyhow, if a little tired and crispy.My Gratitude List, in PodcastLISTEN TO my Dog Days Gratitude List on the latest podcast I do each week with Robin Hood Radio, WHDD in Sharon, Connecticut, the smallest NPR station in the nation.

It’s just a start; some things aren’t even planted yet, and nothing has grown in, of course. But I wanted you to see what I’m trying (and tell me what caught your fancy for containers this year). Click on the first thumbnail to start the slideshow, then toggle from slide to slide using the arrows beside each caption. Enjoy.Other Timely Mid-June TopicsPots don’t need to contain soil; they can be mini water gardens. Here’s how. As we watch the spring garden crumple, remember: Nothing lasts (and that’s OK). Which oregano is the one that tastes good, please? So confusing! I first formally “met” doodler Andre Jordan last June. Here’s the doodle that drew me to him. Categoriesannuals & perennials container gardeningTagsMargaret Roach

If you’ve seen Amy’s previous books on melons and squash, which like the newest volume are collaborations with photographer Victor Schrager, you know they are somewhere between scholarly and scientific and sensuous (which means they cover a lot of ground).You can therefore go at reading “The Heirloom Tomato: From Garden to Table” from any angle: Dip in, perhaps, to grab a recipe (Amy’s Cream of Tomato Soup is calling to me, as are Tomato Bread Pudding and her oven-dried Tomato Chips).At another sitting, learn to grow tomatoes as expertly as Amy does (she tested an astonishing 1,000 varieties and profiles 200 in the book), or how to save the seed for next year’s crop.Come to “The Heirloom Tomato” one day with a supply of envelopes and stamps (or logged into your computer) an

ICONFESS THAT YESTERDAY, AS JACK AND I pressed our noses against the window at first light, I asked him, “I think we lost our garden, Jack–is it ever coming back?” Life on the tundra grows wearying, but as promised, I’m passing the rest of this vengeful winter in a dream state: dreaming of brighter days and plants ahead. Like species peonies: Molly the Witch (Paeonia mlokosewitschii, above) and her cousins, for instance.

If you said Heuchera, you’re right. Perhaps you’re going to reshuffle some shady beds this spring, and know that Heuchera, with their great foliage, can help make garden pictures work–but wonder which ones, and how best to use them. I invited George Coombs, trial garden manager at the must-visit Mt. Cuba Center in Delaware, with 50 acres of native-plant display gardens and 500 acres of natural land, back to the radio show to help make the best choices and grow them to perfection.George knows from Heuchera, having trialed 83 varieties side by side (the exhaustive results are in this pdf). “I say to people, ‘I’m doing Consumer Reports for plants,'” he explains. Though there are countless varieties on the market, many are duplicative in appearance or just not distinctive. “I can honestly say that when it

To create a year-round garden, I recommend starting your shrub shopping in the “V” aisle, for Viburnum. It was the stately doublefile viburnum (Viburnum plicatum tomentosum), that got me started in this outstanding genus of flowering and fruiting shrubs, so many of which are good in bloom, in fruit, and colored up in fiery fall foliage. The doublefile (bottom photo) is a plant whose habit of growth is so distinctive I could not help but notice. It stands with its branches held straight outward, like so many arms outstretched, and in spring they are completely covered with white flowers.The variety ‘Watanabe’ blooms off and on all season, May through summer’s end—how many other shrubs promise that? It is a compact version of the doublefile, reaching only 6 feet or so, an outstanding choice for smaller yards. If you can take the larger scale, the varieties ‘Mariesii’ and ‘Shasta’ (the most horizontal) are recommended. The doublefiles have another feature: handsome fall color, from a burnished wine color to smoky purple—another reason to include one in the landscape.Today I either possess or covet many Viburnum cousins, like the highly fragrant

YOU KNOW THE WAY A BEST FRIEND wants to know the details of your latest intrigue, based on whatever the friend likes most about objects of intrigue herself. (Forgive me, gentlemen; just swap all the pronouns in this post to suit.) “How are his manners?” she’ll ask, and “His sense of humor? His smile?” Here’s what I’d ask if I were your best friend and you had your eye on someone new, especially in the perennial department: How are his leaves? It’s leaves after all that dictate a plant’s character, hanging on as they do longer than most any flower.

“Last year [2012] at the overwintering sites, the area occupied was at only 60 percent of its previous low,” she says. “It had been declining, but that was astonishingly low.”The migration-monitoring program Journey North also reported lower stats in 2013’s cold spring. And though the numbers were only preliminary when we spoke that fall, University of Minnesota’s Monarch Larva Monitoring Program seems to indicate that “we’re at about 20 to 30 percent of our average,” Oberhauser says, acknowledging that these drastically lower numbers might be a “new normal.” But she’s not sounding defeated, by any means.A big positive: A lot of people are interested in monarchs. “Though it will be difficult to make up for all the habitat we’ve lost, we can make that ‘new normal’ as good as we can.”  (Ways to help are father down this page.)what going wrong for monarchs?MONARCH