I’ve designed, installed, and continue to manage two meadow lawns to date. Through these gardens, as well as my own study in nature and research in references, I’ve learned a lot about what makes an effective meadow garden over the last few years.
The first meadow garden I designed was the ½-acre Prairie Garden at the Gardens on Spring Creek. This garden has recently drawn attention for its inclusion in Claire Takacs and Giacomo Guzzon’s wonderful new book “Visionary: Gardens and Landscapes for our Future.”
Then in 2021, I turned my lawn into a meadow, with complementary flanking beds. The meadow is certainly the main feature of my home yard and is constantly changing, both as things come into and out of interest—whether that be bloom, seed heads, or interesting foliage—and as I change the design to suit my tastes. A substantive, rose flagstone patio, about two-thirds of which my brother kindly helped me lay, acts as a sort of interface for plants and people between the house and the meadow. With the quarry twenty minutes away, the stone is easy to come by in my area for a fair price. It makes for an attractive, warm-toned living space comprised of quickly legible, geometric shapes that contrasts well with busy, flowing, green to tawny meadow vignettes.
Below, I’ll distill three of the crucial concepts for beginner meadow gardeners I have learned through the planning, installation, and reassessing of the gardens above. These tips include one for the hardscape design, one for the planting design and management, and one for the installation. Hopefully this will assist you in designing your very own meadow lawn or garden.
When you are laying out your garden’s perimeter, keep in mind that it is easier to install hardscape at
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The fall armyworm is a native species that can’t tolerate cold very well. They only overwinter in South Florida and the southernmost regions of Texas. Since they can not tolerate cold, we typically have about four to five generations per year. They begin to show up in late May to early June, but the worst damage typically occurs in August. They migrate north yearly, but their populations are lower for some years, and their damage is minimal. Damage seems worse following droughts.
As fall begins, many turfgrasses show signs of common diseases. “These fungi are always present, but disease occurs when the environmental conditions are ideal for its development,” says Clint Waltz, PhD, turfgrass specialist, Turfgrass and Education Center at the University of Georgia. “That means an extended period of humidity and temperatures in the 60s to 80s.”
Let's be honest: staying on top of cleaning and organizing every room in your home can get overwhelming—and before you know it, piles of junk on countertops and crammed-full kitchen cabinets can feel unmanageable.
The garden is definitely on the turn, but there are still treasures to be found. Helichrysum ‘Bright Rose’, for example, has flowered prolifically this year but, with all the other material, I had not cut it very often and the plants were covered in blooms that were not quite buds but didn’t look like spent flowers**. With little rain in August, it wasn’t as if they had ‘balled’ either but, whatever their status, I took advantage of their numbers and used them as a starting point for today’s Vase on Monday.
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Moving out on your own for the first time is a mixture of emotions: excitement about having your own space—whether shared with roommates or not—and naturally, a bit of apprehension.
With a little bit of planning ahead now, you can work toward ensuring a larger harvest in your fruit or vegetable garden next year all by following one simple trick: letting fruits and vegetables grow larger and longer and then saving their seeds.