Wellness Ideas, Tips & Guides

Want to grow perennials that have a long blooming period in your garden? Long-lasting perennials add color, height, and texture to the landscape. And equally important, many perennials provide important food sources for beneficial insects and pollinators, such as bees, butterflies, and birds. Perennials can take some time to get established in the garden and the first year, they're typically focused on growing roots. They grow faster in the second and third year and you can enjoy them each year.

Say you’re done making your favorite recipe, and run to your herb garden for some home-grown seasoning. But all you find are leggy shadows of a once-robust plant! Well, you can avoid this picture if you gently top your herb when it’s young with sets of true leaves and even after.

If you have garden you want to keep free of pesticides and insecticides, you might be looking for all-natural solutions. It’s true that there are a wide range of organic alternatives to turn to—pest-repellent plants, natural pesticides, or even bug nets for your plants. But what if you want your pest control alternative to be a little…cuter?

The jade plant is more commonly known for its fleshy, ovate leaves, but did you know that it can produce blooms, too? If you want a flowering jade plant, then these hacks will help you get more flowers! Don’t miss reading it till the end as we have kept the best one for last.

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When I think of mint, the first thing that enters my mind is its inimitable fragrance. With one whiff of a crushed mint leaf, menthol fills my nose with a coolness that invigorates me, opening my sinuses, awakening my senses, and clearing out the cobwebs in my mind. Just the thought of mint in my mouth makes my tongue tingle. Peppermint penetrates the taste buds with a lively pepperiness; spearmint permeates them with a subtle sweetness. Mint is exotic and yet a part of our everyday lives. Can you imagine growing up in America without tasting mint chocolate chip ice cream? What would tabbouleh be without mint? And what about our grandparents and the mint candies hidden in their pockets or set out on the coffee table? Menthol, which gives mint its well-known scent and flavor, is found in foods and medicines worldwide. It’s used commercially in toothpaste, chewing gum, and mouthwash. Menthol has soothed many stomachs, and it’s an antiflatulent to boot.

Among my favourite gardening quotations is one from the creator of the Larkin family in The Darling Buds of May, H.E. Bates. Mr Bates was a keen gardener and realised all too well the frustrations of our craft as well as the pleasures. ‘Gardening’, he said, ‘is like love. It doesn’t always yield to analysis.’ Times without number I have had cause to believe his wise words. I mean, sometimes – in the words of another sage, Sir Patrick Moore – ‘We just don’t know’. There; having got that off my chest there is little likelihood that I will ever be confused with the Oracle at Delphi. On the other hand, perhaps I can offer a crumb or two of comfort by sharing with you some of the mishaps that I have encountered during my years on the soil. They’ll make you smile if nothing else.

There is so much more to mushrooms beyond their cute umbrella tops and juicy stalks. Surviving in the harshest terrains, these ancient OGs never cease to amaze! Today, we take a look at another wondrous feat with glow-in-the-dark mushrooms!

Native to the Western Mediterranean, three-cornered leek is a bulbous perennial with white spring flowers. It’s also known as stinking onion, for reasons which become obvious when close by. In other countries, it’s known as onion grass or onion weed. Part of the allium family, it’s related to edible and ornamental onions as well as cultivated and wild garlic. However, since its introduction to the UK in the mid-18th century, three-corned leek has spread to become an undesirable invasive plant, forming dense colonies and crowding out native plants. It’s an offence to plant or dispose of it in the wild.

Each June, we recognize National Men’s Health Month to bring awareness to health and wellness needs specific to men. Research shows that men, on average, live 5 years less than women. This is not surprising, considering men also have a higher risk of developing chronic conditions like heart disease, cancer, mental health issues, and stroke. However, it’s not all bad news. With a few simple lifestyle modifications, men can reduce their risk for many of these conditions, leading to a longer, healthier life.

Not all living room layouts are created equal, and many people fall victim to six common mistakes when positioning their furniture in this space.

Boxwoods can be fantastically formal hedges or the basis of whimsical topiaries on their own, but, if you know what to plant in front of boxwoods, they’re also the perfect backdrop for a dazzling mix of companion plants. You can pair boxwoods with a combination of smaller shrubs, perennial plants, herbs, and even flowering bulbs. This supplies winter interest, attracts pollinators, keeps deer away, and more. No matter what effect you’re after, the plants you choose should play nicely with your boxwoods and fit in with your growing conditions as well as the size of your landscaping area. Keep reading for lots of beautiful ideas of what to plant in front of boxwoods. Why boxwoods are so popular Hailed as “man’s oldest garden ornament,” boxwoods have served as the “bones” or foundational plantin

House plants bring an extra dimension to your home. Many have evergreen foliage that adds colour and texture, and they create a natural atmosphere that helps promote feelings of calm. Tall house plants are ideal to add structural elements to a room and define the style of the space. With the huge amount of choice that’s now available, you can opt for the dramatic impact of a plant with bold foliage, such as the fiddle leaf fig, or go for a softer look with the wispy fronds of the asparagus fern or the cascading leaves of the ponytail palm.

Buff Strickland

These trees can become a great focal point indoors and thanks to their height, their leaves will be safe from cats, too. Not just that, even if they chew, your cats will be safe as well because all of these are non toxic for pets!

How to Identify and Control 15 Persimmon Pests

It’s official, the UK is a nation of gardeners! With recent Census figures showing that 87% of UK households have a garden, many Brits are now beginning to embrace their green thumbs.

I had never met a fava bean until I moved to Northern California in the early 1980s and started my market garden. I noticed that the local Italian folks seemed to love these strange, giant, puffy-looking beans, so I decided to try growing them. The real eye-opener came when I took my crop to the farmers’ market. It wasn’t just Italians who were enthusiastic about them; I was amazed at how excited customers of Middle Eastern descent got over the favas. They bought bucketfuls! So I figured favas must be a great vegetable.

What kind of caterpillar is feeding on this buckeye leaf?

Collaborative post

Collaborative post

If sunlight is playing hard to get, it’s time to usher in these lush shade-loving climbers into the spotlight! Morph those shady spots and dingy corners of your garden into green havens with these low-light outdoor vines that shine where the sun won’t!

Gooseberries are delicious cooked in pies or swirled into sweetened cream to make a gooseberry fool. They’re easy to grow, and just a single bush will reward you with masses of berries for up to 15 years.

The TikTok algorithm knows me pretty well by now—my FYP unlocks new fears daily, one of them being bristles from a grill brush getting lodged in my gums (I saw a video where it happened, okay?)

Although our first proper opening of the garden is not till a week tomorrow, we had a group visit on Thursday, a mixed blessing, as it meant the garden had to be more or less ‘ready’ over a week sooner than it might otherwise have had to be. We didn’t have any group visits last year, the first year that we hadn’t, and this was the first time we had a visit before the main openings as I had previously avoided this – June is probably the most floriferous month, and sometimes we could be in limbo for two or three weeks after the main openings until all group visits were over, before we could loosen the reins a little. Interestingly, this gardening group, from one of the local villages, had previously visited us the first year we opened, although all but a handful of them were new members so the garden was new to them.

As many of us know by now, there are lots of great ways to repurpose and reuse old items at home. Rather than tossing things in the trash, reusing can be an ideal option to be more sustainable—and it's a great way to save money.

Fuchsias originate from South America

Life, as I like to remind my sons, isn’t always fair. All things are not equal, no matter how much we’d like them to be and some are in fact far better than others, a truth brought home to all of us eventually. Hence the expression “garden-worthy”, that brilliantly concise description used to sum up a particular cultivar or variety’s outstanding qualities.

If you’re short on space, you often have to get creative with your layout. In the kitchen of a small apartment, an island might not fit or feel the most practical. However, many designers and decor influencers have opted for a different choice: modular kitchen islands. 

Cosmos flowers are for harmony and balance, so if you’re looking for these things, it would be a great choice for you. Let’s see what they represent and get into these.

Not all bedroom styles remain popular forever, and interior designers are pretty quick to pinpoint a few design schemes that they're ready to say goodbye to for good.

Wild mushroom collecting is a practice that helps people discover local food sources and the bounty generated by their own neighborhood forests. Of the many different species in North America, almost all of the mushrooms are technically edible, but many are too fibrous to consume. Only about 250 are considered significantly poisonous.

How to Propagate Bleeding Hearts from Stem Cuttings

It may take up to four years for these plants to start bearing fruits, but our selection of fruit trees are also excellent ornamentals with decorative foliage for your home! Read and bookmark this list of a dozen fruit trees that grow well indoors and in small spaces.

Dearest gentle readers, are you dreaming of a day frolicking through pastel flower beds, idling away in romantic gardens? Well, if you’ve caught the latest season of «Bridgerton», that wouldn’t be surprising.

Hi GPODers! Today we’re getting an update from a frequent GPOD contributor, Alice Fleurkens in Ontario.