furry black beasts, from 2 inches to 100 pounds

Peter Estersohn

Read this Boysenberry vs. Blackberry guide to find differences and similarities between the two and get a clarity once and for all!

The ancient Chinese have cultivated Tree Peonies for over 1500 years. Prized specimens are and were grown for medicinal purposes as they contain glucocides and alkolides. The  imperial palace gardens had many specimens that became quite valuable.

I have been reading the Penguin Encyclopedia of Gardening which aims to provide ‘….an explanation of words used in a technical sense in a horticultural context in the UK and USA.’ Set out as an A to Z this resulting post, missing a thousand definitions, is unlikely to rank highly with search engines.

Plan a Visit to the Fort Hill Plantation on the Clemson University Campus, Home of John C. and Floride Bonneau Colhoun Calhoun and later Thomas Green and Anna Maria Calhoun Clemson.

If you too are facing the problem of your Basil Leaves Turning Black or Brown, then you are at the right post! Here are all the details on why it happens and how to keep this herb plant thriving.

I have grown a lot of viburnums over the years, and have pruned them at various times of year for one reason or another. Usually viburnums need relatively little pruning, assuming you planted the right cultivar in the right-sized space (for example, not ‘Mariesii’ among the doublefiles, shown, but ‘Watanabei’ if you only had a smallish area). Even the lightest form of pruning, the removal of spent flowers called deadheading, isn’t needed with most viburnums, since what you want is fruit after the flowers (unlike all that deadheading with lilacs, for instance, to prevent messiness).POOR PLANNING TO BLAMEMost of the pruning I’ve had to do on viburnums was because I didn’t leave enough room for the plant to reach its eventual size, and poor planning (meaning my impatience to have a filled-in garden) caught up with me in time. I have cut several viburnums to the ground or the

I HAVE LITTLE (NOTHING?) GOOD TO SAY about woodchucks, Marmota monax, even on their namesake Groundhog Day today. The only American animal with a holiday named for it simply makes me crazy by using my garden as a banquet table in any year he manages to get a foothold. My favorite nature writer, John Burroughs (1837-1921), didn’t have much use for the beasts, either—though he did name one of his Catskill Mountain houses Woodchuck Lodge.

I spoke about some notable natives with my friend Andy Brand of Broken Arrow Nursery, with whom I often hosting half-day workshops in my Hudson Valley, New York, garden, when we focus on upping the beneficial wildlife quotient in your own backyard with better plants and better practices. Andy has been one of the experts I’ve pestered for ideas as I’ve been doing that in my own garden in recent years to good effect.Andy is manager of Connecticut-based Broken Arrow, and he’s a serious amateur naturalist, and founder of the Connecticut state butterfly association. (That’s a photo by Andy of a red-banded hairstreak on a Clethra blossom, top of page.) Learn where many familia

In the Q&A that follows, Ellen’s answers contain green links to audio files from BirdNote’s archive that you won’t want to miss. A recap of earlier stories in our ongoing series is at the bottom of the page, along with information on how to get BirdNote daily–and if you want to give thanks to nonprofit BirdNote for all their wonderful avian “aha’s,” you can do so at this link.the turkey q&a with ellen blackstoneQ. Why isn’t the wild turkey our national bird? A. In 1784, that wise old Ben Franklin groused to his daughter, after the fact, about the choice of the bald eagle as our national symbol:“For my own part I wish the Bald Eagle had not been chosen the Representative of our Country. He is a Bird of bad moral Character. He does not get his Living honestly. …Too lazy to fish for himself, he watches the Labour of the Fishing Hawk; and when that diligent Bird has at length taken a Fish, and is bearing it to his Nest for the Support of his Mate and young Ones, the Bald Eagle

I first heard about “Bird Songs Bible: The Complete, Illustrated Reference for North American Birds,” edited by Les Beletsky, featuring sound from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and published by Chronicle Books, in this NPR segment last month. One caveat: The book-cum-boombox (birdbox?) ain’t cheap (cheep?) at $125.‘Millions Against Monsanto’ CampaignIWON’T ELABORATE OR START SHOUTING, but rather leave it at this: One of the things that scares me most is GMO crops, whether in the field or in our food. The Organic Consumers Union offers education, and also an advocacy program (aimed squarely at Monsanto, of course, whom they label “the biotech bully”) to make it easy for us all to add our names to the fight.

Since 1993, Scott has run Old House Gardens, the only American resource devoted exclusively to heirloom bulbs, many available nowhere else–older varieties that have been handed down for their enduring value and interest.After a degree from Columbia, Scott returned to Michigan to teach school and bought an 1870s fixer-upper house in Ann Arbor that led to an epiphany when he realized some of the plants outside it were hand-me-downs of gardeners past. He pursued a masters in historic preservation, worked as a landscape historian, and has taught landscape history at Eastern Michigan University.And most important for this discussion: Having that whole catalog of b