How to Grow Western Red Cedar (Thuja plicata)

Flittering, twittering, and singing—birds bring so much life to a garden. Apart from their beauty and pleasant songs, they also add to the biodiversity of our landscapes by spreading seeds and eating insect pests. How can we encourage birds to not only visit our yards but to nest there? Here’s a hint: it goes beyond hanging up a bird feeder. You must provide sustenance and shelter for birds to truly thrive in your garden. Here are some tips to attract them and make them want to stay.

The Victoria plum, Prunus domestica ‘Victoria’, is Britain’s best-known plum variety. It produces heavy crops of delicious, egg-shaped fruits, ideal for use in jams and chutneys, as well as eating straight from the tree.

Learn how to grow a cute mini lavender tree that not only looks pretty but also smells lovely! Choose the right variety like Hidcote Blue or Munstead, find a sunny spot, and use well-draining soil with occasional watering. Give it a trim after blooming, and watch out for pests. Simple, right?

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Cherries make a wonderful tree for all sizes of garden. Many varieties are attractive trees, bearing spring blossom, colourful fruit, interesting bark and leafy foliage that turns orange, red and yellow in autumn.

Today I went out my back door and noticed that one of my rosebushes was, unexpectedly, sporting a fresh new flower bud.  It was within a day or so of opening up–small, greenish and obviously defiant of the season.  The bud was an oddity on a rosebush that is itself an oddity.  When I bought the small white-flowered shrub last summer it had one blossom that was half white and half red, and looked as if it had been half-dipped in red paint.  Though my February bud was not a “half and half” flower, I took its appearance as a harbinger of spring, plucked it, and delivered it to a friend who shares my belief in such things.

How to Grow and Care for Ironweed (Vernonia) Vernonia spp.

The Blueberry is a native American fruit harvested from wild plants since the country was settled. About 1910 the late Dr. F. V. Coville of the United States Department of Agriculture began the domestication of the High-bush Blueberry. A breeding program based on selected wild types has produced through the years a number of varieties vastly superior to their wild ancestors. Considerable research on cultural problems has developed a body of knowledge on which a highly profitable and extensive commercial industry is growing rapidly.

Hypertufa is a cast “rock-like” material which can be used for relatively inexpensive bonsai pots and slabs for plantings. It looks like rock, can be cast into almost any shape, is very lightweight and also strong enough to withstand the freeze/thaw cycle of most northern climates. The American Rock Garden Society uses the following basic recipe to create alpine troughs. They can be textured anywhere from very smooth to a rough rocky look for a “natural pot”.

The Blackberries of North America and Europe are a mighty clan of innumerable species and hybrids that have taxed the efforts of botanists to classify them. The many species in North America have furnished varieties suitable for cultivation in most of the United States except the cold, dry Great Plains region, and for the milder portions of Canada. One European species, the Cut-leaved Blackberry, Rubus laciniatus, has run wild on the Pacific Coast where it is cultivated.

If you want to know about the flowering cycle of tulips and how long they bloom, well, this post has everything in detail.

The pear grown in Britain is the European Pear which derives from Pyrus communis, native of the temperate parts of Europe and the western part of southern Asia as far as the Himalayas. In America some varieties are grown which are hybrids between the European Pear (as represented by ‘William’s Bon Chrdtien’, known in America as ‘Bartlett’) and Pyrus serotina, the Japanesesand pear.