Can ZZ Plant Cause Cancer? Myth or Reality?

Can I grow acai berry trees? Often compared to the blueberry for its similar nutritional benefits, acai products made from this trendy superfood have been finding their way onto grocery store shelves. But due to their short shelf life, fresh berries are difficult to purchase outside acai berry growing zones. Learn all about how to grow acai berries at home.

If you love the large variegated foliage of the dumb cane plant, then learn How to Grow Dieffenbachia from Cuttings and propagate its clones easily!

Yes, you read that right – snowman hands. When I started teaching food safety practices to children I wondered how to teach them about proper hand washing. We all know how important it is to thoroughly wash our hands before preparing food, after touching raw meat and poultry or any other potentially contaminated surface. We can easily explain to children (and adults!) that singing happy birthday twice, while scrubbing hands, equals the prescribed 10 to 15 seconds that we should do while washing. However, how do you explain how much soap to use to create a good lather?? The answer: snowman hands! Use enough soap that your hands look like a snowman’s hands after rubbing them together! I have found great success with this tip while teaching children (and now my own children) to wash their hands properly. And guess what – it takes a good 10 to 15 seconds of scrubbing soapy hands together to create those snowman hands! Bonus to the singing of happy birthday while washing hands! So next time you are washing your hands, use enough soap to create snowman hands. This will help prevent the spread of food-borne illness (and those nasty cold and flu bugs too!).

Whenever I encounter an introverted gardener, I engage them in conversation with this question: What wisteria do you recommend for my backyard?

Including more whole foods in your diet, such as fruits and vegetables, can keep your body healthy and functioning at its best. Fruits and vegetables contain high amounts of essential nutrients like fiber, vitamins, and minerals necessary for your body’s health and maintenance. People who eat more fruits and vegetables as part of an overall healthy diet are also likely to have reduced risks for some chronic diseases.

Pfizer Vaccine

While the Christmas tree takes the front-and-center stage during this holiday season, supported by a cast of poinsettias, cyclamens, kalanchoes, Christmas cactuses, and amaryllises, hollies often find themselves relegated to wreaths, garlands, and candle adornments. Years ago, I learned from Fred Galle’s tome, “Hollies: The Genus Ilex” (Timber Press, OR 1997), that hollies were quintessential Christmas symbols extensively used for centuries in holiday wreaths and Christmas decorations. Galle wrote that in London in 1851, 250,000 bunches of English hollies (Ilex aquifolium) were sold and adorned houses, churches, street corners, and marketplaces. In some parts of England, residents retained the holly sprigs until the following year because they believed it would protect their homes from lightning strikes.

(Note on Gallery: Clicking on a thumbnail gives you a large, higher-quality image.)Winterberry hollies are native to swampy areas from Canada south to Florida, from Wisconsin and Missouri east.  Despite their heritage in wetlands, I grow my plants in normal to dry soil, at the edges of my hilly outer fields. I just don’t have wet lowland to offer on my windy hillside.Though they’ll fruit much better in a moist year than a dry one (as with all fruiting plant

For a more detailed answer to each question, plus an extra question and answer or two, be sure to listen in. I’ve recapped the highlights below:Q. I have some plants in my garage that still have to be planted. Is it too late? I’ve never planted this late before, but I just got too busy with my job.–Michelle in Canada (hardiness Zone 5B)A. Yes—definitely get them in the ground, whether plunged (pots and all) or planted properly (removed from their pots first). I confess I often simply plunge

First, a recap of what Impatiens downy mildew (the fungus-like Plasmopara obducens) looks like:Did your impatiens seem to collapse in 2012? Early signs of infection may have been leaves that looked yellowish, as if the plant needed feeding, or foliage that curled under or seemed to wilt. Sometimes, a white material (the downy mildew) is visible on the undersides of leaves. Eventually, plants may defoliate, drop their flowers, and basically collapse. The fungus loves moist conditions and cool nights in particular. Particularly disturbing: symptoms happened earlier last year than before—as early as June.The disease, which attacks Impatiens walleriana (the species our

I got to know Franca this year when she opened an actual shop for Boxwood Linen in the next town, Hillsdale, New York, at the historic Hillsdale General Store, which was recently renovated. Franca grew up on a farm in Ontario, the daughter of parents born in Scanno, Abruzzo, so she is no stranger to the ways of the garden and kitchen.“We had a cellar, a cantina, at the old farm in Canada,” Franca recalls, “where we’d store not just canned goods but cheese and prosciutto and sausage—but no more!”Now Aida, Franca’s mother (above), visits her daughter’s Hudson Valley, New York-based home from Toronto each late-summer-into-fall, when the garden is offering up its best and there’s work to be done. Together, Franca and Aida continue the old traditions, but in a new location. They do hot-packed tomatoes two ways: chunky, and also as a puree. Aida used to use a motorized mach

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.