Swiss Chard

The Swiss Cheese plant might have a quirky name but remains one of the most spectacular plants. With ample green perforated leaves, it will make for a fantastic addition to your indoor garden. Let’s have a look at the Monstera Adansonii Care.

As native grasses such as little bluestem (Schizachyrium scoparium and cvs., Zones 3–9) and prairie dropseed (Sporobolus heterolepis and cvs., Zones 3–9) increasingly gain traction in gardens, exotics such as miscanthus (Miscanthus sinensis and cvs., Zones 4–9) are losing favor because of their invasive tendencies. But not all exotic grasses are troublesome and need to be avoided. Feather reed grass (Calamagrostis × acutiflora and cvs., Zones 5–9) is a natural hybrid of C. arundinacea and C. epigejos, which are both nonnatives and prolific self-sowers, but the hybrid rarely sets fertile seed—a major plus for an exotic grass, right? So why are other reed grasses—‘Karl Foerster’ aside—so underused? To answer that question is to understand the phenomenon of ‘Karl Foerster’ feather reed grass (C. × acutiflora ‘Karl Foerster’).

I first went to a Leek show in the North East one September about 40 years ago and the Pot Leeks on show were really something to behold. It is an art, a science and a bit of black magic that helps create a show stopper in this region renown for its prize leeks. Pot leek exhibition standards require a blanch of up to 6†which can give a circumference of 28″. Intermediates are up to 14″ blanched length and Long leeks are anything in excess of this.

Autumn sunshine sets off the traffic lights in the vegetable plot. A low angle for the rays of sunshine creates an extra opportunity to appreciate this vegetable. I like the leaf texture and think Chard can look so colourful that I will grow some amongst the flowers for next year.

“Passion is lifted from the earth itself by the muddy hands of the young; it travels along grass-stained sleeves to the heart. If we are going to save environmentalism and the environment, we must also save an endangered indicator species: the child in nature.” Richard Louv, Last Child in the Woods: Saving Our Children from Nature-Deficit Disorder

The horticultural world lost Rick Berry, a remarkable plantsman, in November. I had the honor of being Rick’s friend and sharing years of plant exchanges and stories. Looking back, my last visit in April 2021 to Rick’s nursery, Goodness Grows in Lexington, GA, was a poignant one.

WHAT DO YOU SEE WHEN YOU LOOK AT A FLOWER? Is the image altered by your particular point of view–whether that of an artist, scientist, or honeybee? I think it helps to be one part of each (which to me is what it means to be a gardener–to witness nature from all those perspectives at once, no?). The latest video by Canadian filmmaker Reid Gower overlays the words of the late Nobel physicist Richard Feynman with images of immeasurable beauty, and touches on those questions and more.

I SAY THANK YOU to the University of Chicago Press for investing in “Weeds of North America” (above) by Richard Dickinson and France Royer. The Canadian authors have created a massive work (800 pages paperbound) covering 500 of the continent’s pest plants, including aquatics. Key ID tips include not just flower and foliage photos, but also images of seeds and seedlings.This serious reference volume illuminates other reasons to consider the plants as pests, beyond the space they steal from natives. Such traits include toxicity to livestock (like milk thistle) or transmitting a disease to a valuable crop (like barberry does w

A recent interview with ethnobotanist and author Mike Balick of the New York Botanical Garden got me thinking about jewelweed—and then a shady front-yard bed under an old Eastern red cedar did, when the “weed” grew overnight from almost-unnoticeable volunteers to nearly knee-high (below) in the first spurt of steady warmth.“Growing up in the Northeast,” said Balick, author of “Rodale’s 21st Century Herbal,” “when I’d get stung by nettles, the jewelweed (Impatiens capensis) is always growing nearby. What I do, since it’s only available for two or three months: I grind it up in the blender and put it in an ice-cube tray, and have some ice-cubed jewelweed to rub on my skin for rashes or irritations at other times.”So there’s a reason to let some grow this year: to make an effective,

One of the best resources ever for those wishing to know their weeds is the book “Weeds of North America,” published in 2014 by University of Chicago Press, and co-authored by Richard Dickinson, with France Royer. Since its release, it is always at the ready here—with information about 500 species, plus photos of most every one at every life phase from seed to seedling to full plant and leaf and flower detail. There will be no mistaking weed from wildflower or garden plant again. Toronto-based Richard Dickinson has taught plant taxonomy for more than 25 years, and he joined me to talk about every gardener’s favorite—or is it unfavorite?—subject, weeds. I learned how they get so good at being weedy, and what their environmental impact is beyond taking space awa

Richardson, who got his doctoral degree in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at Dartmouth College and is now an ecological consultant and post-doc candidate, created “Bumble Bees of North America: An Identification Guide,” for Princeton University Press with Paul Williams, Robbin Thorpe, and Sheila Colla. As you’d see in a field guide to birds, range maps for each species are included, along with sections on natural history and conservation and even a glossary with up-close images of bumblebee body parts and more.Among the “aha’s” of our conversation: That bumblebees (bees in the genus Bombus) are like the annual plants in our gardens, performing their whole life cycle by summer’s end. That they can sting, and do make honey—but a lot less than, say, honeybees. And that you can learn to ID probably half the ones in your garden, even if you’re not a scientist.I’ve transcribed the high points in the transcript that follows, or listen to the whole in

Longtime disease ecologist Dr. Richard Ostfeld of Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies took me through the complex system of animal interactions, the effects of a warming climate, and other factors in the tick-borne disease equation, including advice on when and how to be alert.Admittedly, most of the pests readers ask me about are ones that feast on plants, but this one is not phytophagous but rather hematophagous, feasting on blood:“Ticks: the foulest and nastiest creatures that be.”So said Pliny the Elder, the Roman scholar who wrote a massive na