Prunus domestica 'Victoria'

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.

The RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2024 makes its anticipated return to the spring season this year, taking place between 21 – 25 May 2024. Discover our coverage of the gardens and other attractions this year.

“If a year was tucked inside of a clock, then autumn would be the magic hour.” ~Victoria Erickson~

A walled garden hidden away in London's busy Spitalfields neighbourhood

Victoriana Nursery Gardens is a family-run business. They like to help out local schools where they can – gardening is a fun and healthy activity for kids, helping them to learn about the environment and encouraging them to eat their veggies. They’re sponsoring a school garden this year, providing everything the school needs to get their veg plot up and running.

Finding the perfect piece to add to your home decor, whether it is a statement piece or the perfect complement to items you already have, can be difficult (if you're not looking in the right place).

ANNIE SCHLECHTER

If you’ve ever dreamt of a perfectly coordinated house and garden, you’re in the right place. You can actually plant the right color roses, flowers, and more foliage so that it matches your house just so. It’s all about planning, and this excerpt from The Color of Roses by Danielle Dall’Armi Hahn (Ten Speed Press, $35) will take out the guesswork. Follow these steps if you want to up your curb appeal and make your house the best looking one on the block.

Picnic in the shade of Cherry Trees

Growing Nandina Domestica in Pots? Here’s all you need to know! These beautiful plants are perfect for container gardening, offering a range of varieties that are both easy to care for and stunning to behold.

Did you know that the tradition of making and hanging a kissing ball dates back to the early Middle Ages? During that time, people used apples or potatoes as a base to create a ball-shaped decoration we now know as kissing balls. The decorations were hung in doorways to bestow goodwill and blessings to all who visited the home. During the 17th through the early 19th centuries, Puritans and other religious groups frowned upon the use of any holiday decoration. Fortunately, Prince Albert, the husband of Queen Victoria of England, revived the tradition of decorating with live greenery and Christmas trees for the holidays in 1840. Kissing balls were hung from doorways and ceilings to encourage romance, and many young women would stand underneath them and hope for a kiss.

By putting it all together, scientists can gain a better understanding of an entire ecosystem’s intimate interactions–providing a critical view into the effects of a changing climate. But they need our help, gardeners–and learning to be more objective, keener observers can open a whole world of smaller “aha’s” up to each of us, too.I got a lesson in phenology from Victoria Kelly, Environmental Monitoring Program Manager at the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies in Millbrook, New York, not far from my garden or from Robin Hood Radio, the NPR affiliate where my show is created each week. Environmental Monitoring is a longterm program at Cary, begun in the 1980s and designed specifically to monitor climate—and the air, precipitation and water chemistry.Now